Tea at Trianon: The Real Jeanne du Barry

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Thursday, April 25, 2024

The Real Jeanne du Barry

From Tatler:

Born Jeanne Becú in 1743, the identity of du Barry’s father is lost to history. There are rumours that he was a monk, rather ironically known as Frére Ange – Brother Angel. Her mother Anne was a seamstress, who raised her daughter in the home of her own aristocratic lover, Monsieur Billiard-Dumonceaux. After the family was ousted from the Dumonceaux household, Jeanne worked on the streets of Paris, selling trinkets to passers-by to raise money for her family.
And so she would have remained, were it not for her unparalleled beauty. Known for her blonde ringlets and almond-shaped eyes, Jeanne’s face launched her into the courtesan intrigues of the French aristocracy. ‘Madame du Barry was the incarnation of beauty,’ historian Evelyne Lever told the documentary Secretes d’Histoire three years ago, ‘she was a veritable goddess.’ After being fired from her role caring for an elderly widow – whose two sons reportedly fell in love with the young Jeanne – she found herself preforming sex work in the gambling dens of Paris. It was here that she met Jean-Baptiste du Barry, a nobleman whose character is probably best summarised by his unfortunate nickname: Le Roué, or ‘The Old Lech’. (Read more.)