Louis XIII

Louis XIII is one of the strangest kings in the history of France. Joseph Barry has written an article about the famous father of King Louis XIV which is published in the summer of 68 in Horizon magazine.

Rather than write out the entire article as I did with Rochefoucauld in the previous posts, I will paraphrase it and reduce it to a few pages in this blog. It is rather extensive and long.

Joseph Barry introduces the story of Louis XIII through the use of the hunting lodge which Louis XIII had built to accomodate himself and his hunters in the region of the Versailles. Louis loved to hunt, especially birds. Barry alleges that the hunting lodge is built from Louis's fear of women. This man had a very difficult rearing as a child, but he was born to Marie d'Medici, wife of Henry IV, at the Chateau du Fontainbleau in full view of his cousins, the Princes of the Blood, who were to bear witness to the birth of the child. Because questions of legitimacy could instigate civil wars, the witnessing of the birth of a child was a long term custom of French royals, not instituted by the Bourbons, but continued to be practiced by them. After the birth of the child, the identification of him as a boy, the king threw wide the doors to the bedroom of the queen and invited everyone to come to inspect the baby boy.

Because the child had difficulty in taking in milk, a membrane under his tongue had to be cut so that he could nurse properly. He was given to a Mme. Montglat, a tall, thin, dominating woman to be his governess, and his doctor was Jean Heroard, who kept a meticulous journal noting every medication that the king took until the physician's death.

His future wife was decided upon before he was one years old as he was promised to marry the Spanish infanta. Early in life he expressed his fear of girls and of love. He did not want anything to do with either.

The little king grew up in an environment with all his half brothers and sisters around him. At one time there were nine children by five different mothers living at Saint Germaine. They were known throughout the land as le troupeau (the flock). The king (Henry IV) would come in the room with the Queen and would later return with Henrietta, his mistress. Louis XIII did not like either woman. It is said that when Henry took the young dauphin for a walk in the gardens of Fontainbleau, he introduced him to the Comptesse de Moret, " My dear lady, I have given this beautiful lady a child. He will be your brother." The dauphin blushed and stammered, "He is no brother of mine." After that he turned his attention to bagging birds, hunted them with a ferocity that made him perhaps one of the greatest killers of that royal sport.

Sadly, he was whipped by his governness and his father, and his mother when a child, even after signing documents. He was even asked when a child if he would be as ribald as his father, and he said coldly, "NO."

He loved to hunt, and after one session with his father at the favorite woods of Versailles, he was invited to dinner with his father. Shortly thereafter, Henry IV was attacked by a deranged man who stabbed him. Henry IV was taken back to the Louvre, carried to his bedroom on the second floor, and laid out on the bed. When he died, someone said the king is dead, and someone else responded," Not in France, the king is never dead," looked at the young prince, and said," Voila! There is the living king." He was only eight years old.

to be continued.