Anne Geneviève de Bourbon was a french princess who, after a life crowded with excitement, romance, and intrigue, turned her back on the ways of the world and lived the life of a penitent for 20 years before her death. She was one of the leaders of the Wars of the Fronde (1648-1653) in France.
Background
Anne Geneviève de Bourbon was born on August 28, 1619, in Château of Vincennes, Vincennes, France. Her parents were Henry de Bourbon, Prince of Condé and Charlotte Marguerite de Montmorency. A princess of the blood, she was the sister of the Grand Conde and the prince of Conti. She was born in the keep at Vincennes, where her mother had joined her father, who had been imprisoned there since 1616 by the order of Marie de Medici. She spent her childhood in an environment rife with conspiracies.
Education
Anne Geneviève de Bourbon was educated with greater strictness in the convent of the Carmelites in the Rue Saint-Jacques in Paris.
Career
Anne Geneviève de Bourbon used her influence to urge her husband, the governor of Normandy, to raise the province to fight against the royal forces. When her husband and her two brothers were arrested in 1650, she quickly outfitted herself as a man and went to Normandy at the head of a small band of mounted troops. She organized the defense of Dieppe against the royal army and tried to raise the province, but did not gain wide support. Again disguised as a man, she fled to take refuge in Holland, barely escaping closely following royal troops. Once there, she encouraged Turenne to negotiate with Spain.
Returning to Paris after the liberation of her husband and the princes, she quickly resumed her activities against the government. Conde, governor of Guyenne, was to organize resistance there while Conti and Madame de Longueville held Berry. However, confronted by royal troops, they were forced to evacuate Bourges and withdraw to Guyenne. Conde turned again toward Paris, leaving his sister and Conti at Bordeaux to continue the fight. However, the conspirators were ultimately forced to sue for terms, and the royalists entered Bordeaux in August 1653.
The Fronde over, Madame de Longueville essentially retired from political life, immersing herself instead in the Jansenist movement. After the death of her son in 1672 she spent the rest of her days in devotion to religious life, much the same as her old rival the Duchess of Chevreuse.
Achievements
Religion
Yet despite the social atmosphere in which Anne grew up, her early influences were also spiritual ones. These were turbulent political times, and after her uncle had perished on the scaffold, her newly widowed aunt became a Carmelite nun. Anne's mother, no doubt under the influence of her sister, became a dévote, a laywoman who lived as spiritual a life as possible while remaining in the everyday world. Anne often accompanied her mother on visits to the convent where they had their own rooms. At the age of 13, the girl announced her desire to become a nun; while her mother might have been persuaded to allow it, her father was resolutely opposed, and Anne was told that she must prepare to make her entrance into society instead.
According to one account, the 14-year-old Anne was wearing the hair shirt of a religious penitent when she made her public debut in February 1635, but spiritual thoughts were not to preoccupy her for much longer. Anne soon became accustomed to the pleasures of society and seems to have forgotten her earlier plans to forsake it for the life of a nun.
Politics
Intelligent and ambitious, Madame de Longueville threw herself into the Fronde. She was the heart of the resistance during the siege of Paris by royal troops (1649) and set up her headquarters at the Hotel de Ville, where she held a day to honor "the child of the Fronde," Charles-Paris d'Orleans. She succeeded in making her brother head of the troops raised by Parlement, and she helped negotiate the Peace of Rueil between the Crown and the Frondeurs.
Views
Quotations:
"I found myself like a person who suddenly awakens from a long sleep in which she has dreamed she was great, happy, honored, and esteemed, and discovers that she is loaded with chains, pierced with wounds, overcome with languor, and shut up in an obscure prison."
Personality
The notorious and powerful Marie de Rohan-Montbazon who, rumor had it, had been, and perhaps was still, the mistress of the Duc de Longueville, had developed an implacable dislike for her lover's new wife. It was Madame de Rohan-Montbazon who circulated a rumor concerning a letter Anne had supposedly written to a lover; her supporters insisted that Anne's honor be cleared but it was impossible, given the etiquette of the day, to confront the source of the allegation directly. Rather, Madame de Rohan-Montbazon's champion, the Duc de Guise, was challenged to a duel on Anne's behalf by the youthful Comte de Coligny. Rumors spread that the young Duchesse had witnessed the death of her brave champion from behind the windows of a house in the Place Royale and a popular song alleged that he had died in the attempt to become her lover.
Physical Characteristics:
Anne's radiant beauty made her the center of attention: her brilliant blue eyes, pearl-like complexion, and silver-blonde hair combined with her pleasing personality to inspire admiration and affection in all who met her.
Interests
Writers
Antoine Arnauld
Connections
At age 22, on June 2, 1642, Anne Geneviève de Bourbon was married off to a widower with a 17-year-old daughter, a man 24 years older than herself. Henri II d'Orléans, Duke of Longueville, although not a man of intellectual distinction or wit, was the French noble closest in rank to the princes of the blood.
Her children were Charlotte Louise, Mademoiselle de Dunois (1645–1664), Jean Louis Charles d'Orléans, Duke of Longueville (1646–1694), Marie Gabrielle (1646–1650), Charles Paris d'Orléans, Duke of Longuveille (1649–1672).