Diane d'Andouins

Portrait of Diane d'Andouins and her daughter, attributed to Sofonisba Anguissola

Diane d'Andouins or Diane d'Andoins (*  1554 at Hagetmau Castle in Gascogne , †  1620 at Hagetmau Castle), often also called La belle Corisande (German: The beautiful Corisande ), was Countess von Guiche and from 1583 to around 1590 Mistress of the French King Henry IV.

The educated woman from the old Gascogner nobility knew how to bind Heinrich IV through her wit and intellect for eight years. During this time, she was not only his influential lover, but also an advisor and political ally. Diane gave herself her nickname Corisande and borrowed it from the heroine in the chevaleresque novel Amadis de Gaula .

Even after Henry IV officially ended the relationship with Diane in favor of his new mistress Gabrielle d'Estrées , the two remained on friendly terms.

Life

Childhood and youth

Diane d'Andouins was born in 1554 as the eldest daughter of Paul d'Andouins, Count of Louvigny and Seneschal des Béarns , and his first wife Anne-Marguerite de Cauna in their parents' castle in Hagetmau, 26 kilometers south of Mont-de-Marsan . Through her parents she was related to both the Counts of Foix and the family of Poitiers and thus belonged to the high nobility of the Kingdom of Navarre .

She was an orphan at the age of eight and grew up under the care of Jeanne d'Albrets at the Navarre royal court in Pau . As the sole heir to one of the oldest noble families of the Béarns and Gascony, she had to expect a large dowry and was accordingly a sought-after marriage candidate. At the age of twelve years, was Huguenot behaved Diane declared of age, to August 16, 1567 a ceremony at Castle Pau with Philibert de Gramont to be engaged (1552-1580) from the Catholic house of the Count of Guiche. She converted to Catholicism for the wedding, which took place 15 months later, on November 21, 1568, at Bidache Castle . Shortly after the marriage, Philibert's father Antoine I. de Gramont renounced the title of count in favor of his son and made Diane Countess of Guiche.

Countess of Guiche

His marriage to Philibert had two children:

• Antoine II. De Gramont , (* around 1572–1644) 1st Duke of Gramont, ⚭ September 1, 1601 Louise de Roquelaure, March 2nd, 1618 Claude de Montmorency-Bouteville
• Catherine Charlotte (1573–1627), ⚭ 1591 François Nompar de Caumont, Count of Lauzun

Historians of the 17th and 18th centuries often took the view that Diane's son Antoine was an illegitimate child of Henry IV. They spread a claim from the novel Roman royal ou Aventures de la Cour , first published in 1620 , which Louise-Marguerite de Lorraine had published under a pseudonym, but which in no way claimed historical correctness. In this publication, later known as Les amours du grand Alcandre, about the love affairs of Henry IV, King Diane offers to legitimize their son Antoine. Today's historians, however, judge this as completely untrustworthy and as a literary freedom that the author took.

Philibert de Gramont died of a wound sustained on August 2, 1580 during the siege of La Fère , and widowed Diane at the age of 26. In his will of August 7th, her husband had appointed her to be the guardian of their two underage children, so that in the following years Diane managed the extensive estates of her family alone and thus ruled the county of Guiche.

Henry IV's mistress

Diane had a very close relationship with the royal court in Pau, where she had spent her childhood, throughout her life. They were very close friends with Catherine de Bourbon , the sister of Henry IV, and Diane often stayed at Pau Castle to visit her friend. There she met Henry IV for the first time in the spring of 1582, after he had become King of Navarre.

Diane was well educated and well read through her extensive training at the royal court. She was interested in poetry and was friends with Michel de Montaigne , who included 29 sonnets by Étienne de La Boétie in his essays in her honor . Contemporaries also attested to her having an alert mind and exceptional esprit. Because of these character traits, Heinrich von Navarra fell in love with the young widow. The love affair between the two is proven from January 1583. At that time Heinrich stayed longer at Hagetmau Castle for the first time. For the year 1583 numerous other stays of the Navarres king in Hagetmau are guaranteed. He later chose Pau Castle as a domicile for himself and his mistress, while his wife Margaret of Valois stayed in Nérac Castle .

Diane officially joined the list of mistresses of the kings of France , but their relationship differed significantly from the numerous other affairs that Heinrich had in the course of his life. For one thing, at more than eight years of age, it lasted far longer than most of Heinrich's other love affairs; for another, the position of Diane, who was almost the same age, extended far beyond that of a simple lover. She was both confidante and adviser, educated friend and supporter of the king. She had such a great influence on Heinrich that Théodore Agrippa d'Aubigné wrote in his pamphlet Confession catholique du sieur de Sancy that she could “turn and turn this prince as she will” (French: “[...] tourne et remuë ce Prince comme elle veut […] ").

The couple maintained lively correspondence during their liaison . Heinrich's letters to his mistress clearly show how great his trust was in Diane and that he heavily involved her and her advice in making decisions. Diane in turn - although Catholic herself - supported his fight against the Catholic League during the Huguenot Wars not only with good words and advice, but also with large sums of money and troops that it recruited from its possessions.

Numerous letters from the two of them are still preserved today. 37 of them were published in the Mercure de France in 1765 and 1766 . Together with other letters from Heinrich that became known by 1843, they were reprinted under the name Recueil des Lettres missives de Henri IV by Jules Berger de Xivrey . Through them, the relationship between the two is very well documented over the years; from the first surviving letter from 1585 to letters from the 1590s.

After the marriage of the French King Henry III. Having remained childless and François-Hercule de Valois-Angoulême, the last potential heir to the throne from the House of Valois, had died in 1584 , Henry of Navarra officially became heir to the French throne and had ideas of marriage around 1586. Like many of his other mistresses, he wanted to marry Diane. The written promise of marriage, which he is said to have written with his own blood, which is often mentioned in older historiography, is, however, once again an invention from the already mentioned novel Louise-Marguerites de Lorraine. The king asked his close confidante Théodore Agrippa d'Aubigné for his opinion on the marriage plans. He advised against it, and Heinrich then promised to put his plan on hold for the time being. Due to d'Aubigné's intervention, Diane became his bitter enemy for the rest of her life.

From 1587, the relationship between Heinrich and Diane gradually changed. Although the king still swore his great love for her in his letters and pledged his loyalty, this did not prevent him from seducing the 16-year-old Esther Imbert . Diane knew about the relationship, but did not try to oust her rival from Heinrich's favor. She probably did not see the young girl as a threat to her own position, although Esther even bore the king a son. When he died in 1588, Heinrich informed Diane of this in a letter, which some historians have so misunderstood that the son was a child of Diana and Heinrich. The love affair between the two and their correspondence continued, even after Henry of Navarre through the death of Henry III. on August 2, 1589 nominally became King of France and since that year successfully campaigned for the favor of Antoinette de Pons , Comtesse of La Roche-Guyon and Marquise of Guercheville.

The last few years

Diane d'Andouins only lost her influence on Henry IV in 1590, when he fell head over heels in love with the 20-year-old Gabrielle d'Estrées. Besides Diane, she was the only woman in Heinrich's life who knew how to bind him to her for a long time.

The abandoned lover yielded to her fate. When she supported the long-standing affection of her friend Catherine de Bourbon for her cousin Charles de Bourbon, comte de Soissons by encouraging the two lovers to marry without the consent of Henry IV, this was interpreted by many historians as late revenge because the king had very different plans for his sister. The marriage project failed and Catherine was finally married to Henry II of Lorraine in January 1599 . On this occasion, Diane received one of the last letters to her from Heinrich expressing his disappointment. Another letter dated September 21, 1597, however, shows that the relationship between the former lovers had improved again, as Henry IV thanked Diane for services rendered.

The Comtess de Guiche's beauty, previously praised by many contemporaries, faded with age. She became red-faced and corpulent, if not fat. Diane retired to her castle in Hagemaut and died there at the age of about 65.

literature

Main literature

• Jean-François Dreux du Radier: Mémoires historiques, critiques, et anecdotes des reines et régentes de France . Imprimerie des Frères Mame, Paris 1808, pp. 305-322 ( online ).
• Jean de Jaurgain: Corisande d'Andoins, Comtesse de Guiche et Dame de Gramont . In: Revue Internationale des Études Basques . No. 1, 1907, ISSN  0212-7016 , pp. 105-140 ( PDF; 156 kB ).
• Jean de Jaurgain: Corisande d'Andoins, Comtesse de Guiche et Dame de Gramont. Appendices . In: Revue Internationale des Études Basques . No. 1, 1907, ISSN  0212-7016 , pp. 302-319 ( PDF; 130 kB ).
• Raymond Ritter: Corisande d'Andoins Comtesse de Guiche. Une dame de chevalerie . Albin Michel, Paris 1959.
• Ernest Alfred Vizetelly: The Favorites of Henry of Navarre . Chatto & Windus, London 1910, pp. 88-115 ( online ).

further reading

• Jules Berger de Xivrey: Recueil des Lettres missives de Henri IV . 2 volumes. Imp. Royale, Paris 1843 ( Volume 1 online , Volume 2 online ).

Web links

Commons : Diane d'Andouins  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Short CV Diane d'Andouins (French)

References and comments

1. ↑ In many publications you can read that Diane was the only daughter, but Paul d'Andouins married Madeleine de Bretagne-Avaugour, with whom he had a daughter, after the death of his first wife. See J. de Jaurgain: Corisande d'Andoins, Comtesse de Guiche et Dame de Gramont , 1907, p. 108.
2. ↑ See R. Ritter: Corisande d'Andoins , 1959.
3. ↑ Agnes Becherer: The image of Henry IV (Henri Quatre) in the French Versepik (1593-1613) . Narr, Tübingen 1996, ISBN 3-8233-5166-4 , p. 66 ( online ).
4. ↑ J. de Jaurgain: Corisande d'Andoins, Comtesse de Guiche et Dame de Gramont , 1907 S. 122nd
5. ↑ Some publications mention Bordeaux or the year 1583 as the place or time of the first meeting.
6. ^ Jean Chrétien Ferdinand Hoefer : Nouvelle biography générale depuis les temps les plus reculés jusqu'à nos jours . Volume 22. Firmin Didot, Paris 1843, column 533 ( online ).
7. ↑ J.-F. Dreux du Radier: Mémoires historiques, critiques, et anecdotes des reines et régentes de France , 1808, p. 317.
8. ↑ J. de Jaurgain: Corisande d'Andoins, Comtesse de Guiche et Dame de Gramont , 1907 S. 131st
9. ↑ J. de Jaurgain: Corisande d'Andoins, Comtesse de Guiche et Dame de Gramont , 1907 S. 132nd
10. ↑ Diane was touted as a beauty in many contemporary writings. Whether this corresponded to reality cannot be verified with certainty today, because it is not entirely certain that Diane d'Andouins is actually the subject of all the paintings that she may show.