Posts Tagged ‘Louis XIV’

HugueNOT

Posted in General on October 18th, 2009 by Eugene Finerman – Be the first to comment

October 18, 1685:  The Evict of Nantes

On this day in 1685, Louis XIV revoked the Edict of Nantes which had guaranteed the freedom of worship to Protestants. Perhaps as revenge, the Mormon Tabernacle Choir has never sung “Louie, Louie.”

The Edict had been granted in 1598 by Henri IV of France, a man of steadfast principles. All his mistresses had to be married. (Of course, obligingly myopic husbands received titles and estates.) However, Henri was not so dogmatic about religion. He was born a Catholic; but when his mother became a Protestant, so did young Henri. By both rank (a member of the royal family) and actual ability, he became the leader of France’s Protestants. His marriage to Princess Margaret Valois (of the Catholic branch of the Royal Family) was supposed to establish ecumenical peace in a France rift by religious war.

Unfortunately, the Catholic side of the family celebrated the wedding by massacring the Protestant guests. (Perhaps when you are paying for the wedding, you have that prerogative.) On St. Bartholomew’s Day, as a wedding present Henri was offered the choice of death or Catholicism. Henri had found breathing to be habit-forming and wasn’t quite prepared to learn the details of the Afterlife. So he was Catholic again. Of course, as soon as he was able to flee Paris, Henri was a Protestant again and leading the surviving Huguenots in civil war.

The Protestant rebel was in the line to the French throne. The royal succession required descent through the male line, and Henri had consistent Y chromosomes dating back to Louis IX. Furthermore, none of his royal brothers-in-law was producing legitimate sons. (One had a daughter, another had the debilitating consequences of syphilis and the third liked to wear dresses.) By 1589, they were dead (possibly poison, probably 16th century medicine, and definitely assassination). Our Henri was the legitimate heir, but the Catholics of France were not prepared to accept a Protestant king.

So, once again Henri converted, rationalizing his latest contortion “Paris is worth a Mass.” No one questioned Henri’s sincerity; there was no sincerity to question. The Protestants could count on Henri’s religious tolerance but not necessarily his longevity. The Huguenots wanted a guarantee of religious freedom, and Henri obliged his former co-religionists with the Edict of Nantes.

Unfortunately, if a King can grant an edict, another can revoke it. Louis XIV certainly did not inherit religious tolerance from his grandfather. He ordered the destruction of Protestant churches and schools. The only guaranteed freedom left the Protestants was emigration. Louis did not even follow the English etiquette of bigotry: when persecuting a minority, at least offer them a colony in the New World.

Many of the Huguenots did flee France. Some found haven in the English colonies of the New World; Paul Revere was a descendant. Others made a shorter trip to the Protestant states of Germany. That would explain this irony: in subsequent invasions of France(especially the most recent) a number of German generals had French names.

Turban Decay

Posted in General, On This Day on September 12th, 2009 by Eugene Finerman – 2 Comments

September 12th, 1683:  The Ottoman Empire Begins Its Retreat to Oblivion

First, the official version: Vienna is besieged by the Ottomans but an army led by Poland’s King Jan Sobieski routes the Moslem horde and saves Western Civilization.

Once you have dispensed with the grateful tears and a few bars of Chopin (how else do you thank Poland), I will give you the actual history.

Yes, the Ottomans did besiege Vienna in 1683.  However, this was not the Ottoman Empire of 1483 or 1583, but the bloated parody of its martial glory. Uma Thurman had become Shelley Winters. This Ottoman army was no longer led by warrior kings; the Sultans–now cretins by birth or choice–rarely could find their way out of their harem. The army was now led by whichever courtier had bribed or connived the command.

The commanding pasha at Vienna was Kara Mustafa. He had an army of 140,000 men, but only a third of them were actual soldiers and their weapons were outdated. The other 90,000 men were basically support staff–and the pasha was enjoying the best coffee and cushions. Setting off from Constantinople in April, the Ottoman army lumbered upon Vienna in mid-July. Since an Ottoman horde was hard to ignore, Vienna had ample time to evacuated the civilian population. There was only a garrison of 18,000 left behind the walls of Vienna.

Even with their geriatric armaments, by sheer force the Ottomans could have taken the city. However, that would have been unprofitable for the Pasha. If Vienna were taken by storm, the Turkish soldiers would be entitled to whatever they could loot. On the other hand, if the city were besieged and starved into submission, then the Pasha would receive Vienna’s treasures. Guess which strategy Kara Mustafa preferred?

There are worse places to siege than Vienna in the summer. The Ottoman army enjoyed a pleasant two months of pillaging the Austrian countryside. However, their vacation ended rather abruptly–on this day in 1683–with the arrival of an allied army led by Jan Sobieski. The Pasha evidently had overlooked that possibility. Worse, although Sobieski’s force was half the size of the Pasha’s, the Christian army was composed of soldiers rather than servants. It turned out that the Turkish army was much faster when retreating than advancing. And, indeed, the Ottoman Empire now would be retreating for the next 250 years.

(Yes, in their haste, the Turks left behind sacks of coffee beans.  The Poles were entitled to the pick of the loot but were not interested in a sober beverage; so they gave the Turks’ caffeine to the Viennese who made it into an art.)

For his role in the debacle, Kara Mustafa did not receive the Medal of Freedom. He was strangled and then beheaded. So the Sultan was not a complete cretin.

And was Christendom saved? Well, it never was in danger. The Ottoman Empire had no plans for mosques in Moscow or Turkish baths in Bath. This was simply a turf war between Turkey and Austria, and the winner would get Hungary. Furthermore, if this had been a clash between Islam and Christendom, then Turkey had a very strange ally: the leading power of Western Civilization. You see, the Hapsburgs were fighting on two fronts: in the East against the Turks, and in the West against France. Yes, France and Turkey were allies of long-standing, with over a century of coordinated attacks against the Hapsburgs.

Indeed, while Austria was marshalling and mortgaging its resources against Turkey, there was little left to defend the west bank of the Rhine from Louis XIV. Perhaps the French victories offered some solace to the Turkish Sultan. He may have lost Vienna and then Hungary, but his French buddy now owned Alsace and Lorraine.

And Today’s Special Guest Victim Is….

Posted in On This Day on March 23rd, 2009 by Eugene Finerman – 1 Comment

If embezzlers and MBAs had a Hall of Fame, Nicolas Fouquet would be shamelessly prominent. As the Minister of Finance during the early reign of Louis XIV, Fouquet maintained a bookkeeping system modeled after the Gordian Knot. It could be said that he would collect all the revenues but was willing to share some with the government, or at least the officials he liked.

Fouquet had the finest home in France. It seems unlikely that he afforded it just by brownbagging his lunches. The thought certainly occurred to Louis XIV, who evidently resented being the social inferior of his minister. The King ordered Fouquet arrested for embezzlement. There was a public trial, and the verdict could hardly be in doubt, but the judges proved unusually sympathetic to the accused. (Had they been past recipients of Fouquet’s generosity?) They sentenced him to banishment; you might well suspect that Fouquet planned a comfortable exile. The King, however, overruled that lenient sentence and condemned Fouquet to life imprisonment. The disgraced minister spent the last fifteen years of his life in a less than luxurious cell. He died there in 1680.

His second career began in the 1930s. Someone in Hollywood had been reading Alexandre Dumas. The 19th century French novelist apparently had screenplays in mind. “The Three Musketeers” and “The Count of Monte Cristo” had been box office hits, and the studios wanted more. While Dumas himself was no longer available, he had been prolific and his works included a sequel to The Three Musketeers. Based on a legend about a prisoner in the Bastille, the story was known as “The Man in the Iron Mask.”

Dumas had imagined that the title character was Philippe the twin brother of Louis XIV, hidden from birth but now the center of a plot to substitute him on the throne. In the novel, the younger brother was the unknowing pawn of ambitious men. Their attempted coup fails, however, due to the heroism of D’Artagnan and the shrewdness of a government minister named Fouquet. The real king is saved (even if France isn’t) and Philippe is condemned to the Bastille where his royal features are covered by an iron mask.

It seemed like another swashbuckler perfect for Hollywood…except for one problem: the villains. In Dumas’ novel the conspirators were the Jesuits, led by the renegade musketeer Aramis. Hollywood was not prepared to vilify the Catholic Church (although the Church never has been shy about vilifying Hollywood). So, a new villain had to be created.

Poor Fouquet already had a criminal record. Since he was an embezzler, why not make him a traitor, too? So, from helping to foil the plot, Fouquet became the mastermind of it.

But then Hollywood came up with yet another improvement on the plot. Instead of making poor Philippe a malleable cipher, portray him as a noble alternative to his wicked older brother Louis–and have the plot succeed. Good Philippe would secretly replaced Louis, who then would become The Man in the Iron Mask. Of course, Fouquet would still have to be a villain, but he would prove his intrinsic evil by being loyal to the legitimate King.

The logic of the plot was very similar to Fouquet’s Gordian bookkeeping. Dumas would have been dismayed; he actually seemed to like the wily minister. In fact, Dumas even gives Fouquet one of the novel’s few jokes.

Fouquet has heard rumors of the twin prince. He asks a trusted henchman, “Do you recall some mystery surrounding the birth of Louis XIV?”

The aide replies, “Do you mean that Louis XIII was not the father?”

Fouquet corrects him, “I said a mystery.”

To Heir is Human

Posted in General on August 27th, 2008 by Eugene Finerman – Be the first to comment

George Bernard Shaw viewed morality as a middle class habit. The lower class was preoccupied with survival and couldn’t be sidetracked by puritanical affectations. The upper class could afford to enjoy itself without fear of consequences; it had etiquette rather than morals.

But one of the rules of etiquette dictated that a woman’s older children should be sired by her husband. Once she had dutifully extended the husband’s lineage, however, she could discreetly cross-pollinate. But in royal families, this latitude was not condoned. Cheating on the king was treason. Ask Catherine Howard for further details.

Nonetheless, some royal lines had their share of faux pas and faux heirs. We have already discussed Prince Albert’s doubtful paternity. Other royal families had their scandals, too. Of course, France would have its share of bedroom farces. For example, as the wife of Charle VI, Isabeau had given her husband a number of legitimate children; so she allowed herself a little indiscretion. Unfortunately, her older sons died, leaving her little indiscretion as the heir to the throne. Worse, she told everyone that the alleged dauphin was not the son of the king. However, the French in the 1420s were willing to crown any bastard in preference to acknowledging an English king (who happened to be the legitimate grandson of Charles VI and Isabeau). So France pretended that Charles VII was a Valois.

Two centuries later, France had two reigning queens: Anne of Austria and her husband Louis XIII. Louis was not even trying, and the Bourbon dynasty looked like it was about to expire. In most monarchies, a nephew or a cousin could succeed; but France had absurdly restrictive rules of succession. The king could trace his royal lineage only through the male side of the family. It did not matter if the previous king had sisters and they had sons; they were ineligible. That rigid law brought the Bourbons to the throne in 1589–when Henri III–the last Valois was stabbed to death by an irate monk. According to the laws of royal succession, his heir was his very distant cousin Henri of Bourbon–who shared one common great-great, etc. grandfather three hundred years earlier; but at least, it was a consistent male descent. If Louis XIII failed to have a son, the royal genealogists were not sure how far back they needed to go to find the next successor. Cardinal Richelieu feared for the future of France more than the soul of Anne of Austria. His eminence personally picked her confessor, a charming Italian named Mazarin. And soon the Queen had a heir and then another. The boys were rather short and stocky, while the Bourbons were tall and lanky; but Louis XIII did not mind the discrepancy. There would be a Louis XIV, and the details were irrelevant.

England might have had an illegitimate queen. George IV could not tolerate the presence of his wife, a surprisingly unclean German duchess named Caroline. When he was coronated, he had her locked out of Westminster Abbey. Rumors had it that he never spent more than one night with her; so people were surprised–if relieved–when Caroline had a daughter. George never publicly questioned the child’s origins and he recognized young Charlotte as his heir. If nothing else, his alleged daughter was his actual niece. According to rumor, George’s younger brother Frederick felt sorry for his insulted and unhappy sister-in-law, and he may have had an informal way of comforting her. In any case, Charlotte was the granddaughter of George III. If Princess Charlotte survived the rumors, she was not so fortunate against 19th century medicine. She lived long enough to be married and then died in childbirth.

The Bolsheviks did not kill the Romanovs. Catherine the Great had extinguished the line a century earlier. Killing her husband and producing a litter of bastards constituted a change of dynasty. Catherine did not even maintain a polite fiction as to her children’s paternity–especially the son born three years after her husband’s death. No better a mother than a wife, Catherine so disliked her heir that she relished telling him that he was no Romanov. However, his maternity was never in doubt, so he was allowed to succeed his malicious mother; and Tsar Paul maintained the name of Romanov.

And that should be enough scandals for today.

And Today’s Special Guest Victim Is…

Posted in General, On This Day on March 23rd, 2007 by Eugene Finerman – Be the first to comment

If embezzlers and MBAs had a Hall of Fame, Nicolas Fouquet would be shamelessly prominent. As the Minister of Finance during the early reign of Louis XIV, Fouquet maintained a bookkeeping system modeled after the Gordian Knot. It could be said that he would collect all the revenues but was willing to share some with the government, or at least the officials he liked.

Fouquet had the finest home in France. It seems unlikely that he afforded it just by brownbagging his lunches. The thought certainly occurred to Louis XIV, who evidently resented being the social inferior of his minister. The King ordered Fouquet arrested for embezzlement. There was a public trial, and the verdict could hardly be in doubt, but the judges proved unusally sympathetic to the accused. (Had they been past recipients of Fouquet’s generosity?) They sentenced him to banishment; you might well suspect that Fouquet planned a comfortable exile. The King, however, overruled that lenient sentence and condemned Fouquet to life imprisonment. The disgraced minister spent the last fifteen years of his life in a less than luxurious cell. He died this day in 1680.

His second career began in the 1930s. Someone in Hollywood had been reading Alexandre Dumas. The 19th century French novelist apparently had screenplays in mind. “The Three Musketeers” and “The Count of Monte Cristo” had been box office hits, and the studios wanted more. While Dumas himself was no longer available, he had been prolific and his works included a sequel to The Three Musketeers. Based on a legend about a prisoner in the Bastille, the story was known as “The Man in the Iron Mask.”

Dumas had imagined that the title character was Philippe the twin brother of Louis XIV, hidden from birth but now the center of a plot to substitute him on the throne. In the novel, the younger brother was the unknowing pawn of ambitious men. Their attempted coup fails, however, due to the heroism of D’Artagnan and the shrewdness of a government minister named Fouquet. The real king is saved (even if France isn’t) and Philippe is condemned to the Bastille where his royal features are covered by an iron mask.

It seemed like another swashbuckler perfect for Hollywood…except for one problem: the villains. In Dumas’ novel the conspirators were the Jesuits, led by the renegade musketeer Aramis. Hollywood was not prepared to vilify the Catholic Church (although the Church never has been shy about vilifying Hollywood). So, a new villain had to be created.

Poor Fouquet already had a criminal record. Since he was an embezzler, why not make him a traitor, too? So, from helping to foil the plot, Fouquet became the mastermind of it.

But then Hollywood came up with yet another improvement on the plot. Instead of making poor Philippe a malleable cipher, portray him as a noble alternative to his wicked older brother Louis–and have the plot succeed. Good Philippe would secretly replaced Louis, who then would become The Man in the Iron Mask. Of course, Fouquet would still have to be a villain, but he would prove his intrinsic evil by being loyal to the legitimate King.

The logic of the plot was very similar to Fouquet’s Gordian bookkeeping. Dumas would have been dismayed; he actually seemed to like the wily minister. In fact, Dumas even gives Fouquet one of the novel’s few jokes.

Fouquet has heard rumors of the twin prince. He asks a trusted henchman, “Do you recall some mystery surrounding the birth of Louis XIV?”

The aide replies, “Do you mean that Louis XIII was not the father?”

Fouquet corrects him, “I said a mystery.”