Louise Françoise de Bourbon, Mademoiselle du Maine

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Louise Françoise
Mademoiselle du Maine
Born (1707-12-04)4 December 1707
Palace of Versailles, France
Died Script error: The function "death_date_and_age" does not exist.
Château d'Anet, France
Burial Chapel of the Château d'Anet, France
Full name
Louise Françoise de Bourbon
House House of Bourbon
Father Louis Auguste de Bourbon
Mother Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon

Louise Françoise de Bourbon (4 December 1707 – 19 August 1743) was a grand daughter of Louis XIV of France and his mistress Françoise Athénaïs de Rochechouart de Mortemart, better known as Madame de Montespan. Louise-Françoise was known as Mademoiselle du Maine and had no children.

Biography

Louise Françoise de Bourbon was born at the Palace of Versailles to Louis Auguste de Bourbon, Légitimé de France, duc du Maine and his wife Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon, known as Mademoiselle de Charolais prior to her marriage. Her father was the eldest legitimised son of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan. Her mother was later a famous salon hostess at the family home Château de Sceaux. Her mother was also a grand daughter of le Grand Condé.

Known as Mademoiselle du Maine, she was the youngest of seven children two others of which had been female but had died in infancy.

Mademoiselle du Maine was placed in the Abbaye de Maubuisson, a very prestigious abbey in the Saint-Ouen-l'Aumône area of France, the north-western suburbs of Paris, France.[1] It is located 27.6 km (17.1 mi) from the center of Paris. As such she grew up here; when once visiting Madame de Maintenon in 1717, Maintenon said that she and her two brothers would have been very pleased with them.

Louise-Françoise was very close to her parents even though the latter were never really close. Louise-Françoise's mother would frequently embarrass her husband and this caused much friction. On 9 April 1714, she was baptised with the name of her aunt Louise Françoise de Bourbon, known as Madame la Duchesse. Madame la Duchesse had grown up with the Duke of Maine under the care of Madame de Maintenon. Present at her baptism were the Dauphin, Louis de France who was the guest of honour being helped by Mademoiselle du Maine's other paternal aunt, the Duchess of Orléans. It was the Cardinal de Rohan who baptised Mademoiselle du Maine.

In 1718 during the regency of Philippe d'Orléans both of her parents were imprisoned her father was sent to Doullens and her mother to Dijon. She was moved from the Abbey at Maubuisson to another convent at Chaillot in Paris around the area of the present Trocadéro. She stayed at Chaillot till 1720 when her parents were released from their separate imprisonments.

At the death of her father, she was given his apartments on the ground floor overlooking the Orangerie and lived next to her mother. Mademoiselle du Maine was rumoured to have been betrothed to one Monsieur de Guise but the said engagement never materialised. By 1740, another possible marriage was with the widowed Prince of Monaco who was often in residence at Versailles. This never occurred either. Another candidate was her first cousin, Louis de Bourbon, youngest son of her namesake and her uncle the Duke of Bourbon.

Louise Françoise is said to not have been attractive; the 1910 book on her mother the duchesse du Maine[2] stated that she was neither pretty or attractive, and save for her dowry, no one would have sought her hand. He also said that her court hoops were so large that on one occasion they became entangled with those of the Queen and the two women had to stand and pull against each other to disentangle themselves. Louis XV was most annoyed and Monsieur de La Tremoille was sent to the duchesse du Maine with the measurement for the hoops Mademoiselelle should wear, with the rider that in future she should stand at a more respectful distance from the Queen.

Louise Françoise would never marry; dying at the Château d'Anet at the age of 35 having been taken ill while out riding, noted by the duc de Luynes; he noted also No sooner was she place in her carriage than she fainted away. She never recovered consciousness, and died a few hours later. She left her profitable pensions to her first cousin Élisabeth Alexandrine de Bourbon, Mademoiselle de Sens; daughter of her namesake Madame la Duchesse.

She was buried at the Chapel of the Château d'Anet; her grave was left by revolutionaries of 1789–1799. She was outlived by her two elder brothers and her mother.

Ancestry

Family of Louise Françoise de Bourbon, Mademoiselle du Maine
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
16. Henry IV of France
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
8. Louis XIII of France
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
17. Marie de' Medici
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
4. Louis XIV of France
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
18. Philip III of Spain
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
9. Anne of Austria
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
19. Margaret of Austria
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
2. Louis Auguste de Bourbon
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
20. Gaspard de Rochechouart, Marquis of Mortemart
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
10. Gabriel de Rochechouart, duc de Mortemart
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
21. Louise de Maure, Countess of Maure
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
5. Françoise-Athénaïs, marquise de Montespan
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
22. Jean de Grandseigne, Marquis de Marsillac
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
11. Diane de Grandseigne
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
23. Catherine de La Béraudière, Dame de Villenon
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
1. Louise Françoise de Bourbon
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
24. Henry II de Bourbon, prince de Condé
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
12. Louis II de Bourbon, Prince de Condé
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
25. Charlotte-Marguerite de Montmorency
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
6. Henry III Jules de Bourbon, prince de Condé
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
26. Urbain de Maillé, Marquis de Brézé
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
13. Claire-Clémence de Maillé-Brézé
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
27. Nicole du Plessis de Richelieu
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
3. Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
28. Frederick V, Elector Palatine
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
14. Edward, Count Palatine of Simmern
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
29. Elizabeth Stuart
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
7. Countess Palatine Anne-Henriette of Simmern
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
30. Charles I, Duke of Mantua
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
15. Anna Gonzaga
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
31. Catherine of Lorraine
 
 
 
 
 
 

See also

References

  1. it is here that Gabrielle d'Estrées was buried
  2. Général de Piépape, La duchesse du Maine (1910).[page needed]