Mother Knows Best

In 1661, Louis XIV firmly grasped the reins of power from his mother, Anne of Austria, and thanked her for her wise guidance of the state during his minority. Around the same time, Henri II, fifth duke of Guise, was awaiting the outcome of a lawsuit he had launched against the actions of his own mother, Henriette-Catherine de Joyeuse, claiming that she had taken actions during Queen Anne's regency that were prejudicial to his estate, in secret, without his knowledge or consent. ¹ Louis XIV was grateful to his mother for the calm state in which he received his kingdom, especially in terms of crown–grandee relations. Guise had only abusive words for his mother, claiming restitution of properties or annuities worth millions. But in fact, Guise's accusations were unjust, as inspection of the facts reveals that there might have been no Guise patrimony at all in 1661 were it not for the actions of his mother and her prominent place in the circles of power of Anne's regency government. This prominence was derived from the twin factors of princely rank and princely trans-regionalism which allowed Guise's mother, and other women of his clan, to perform actions of great use to their families that were denied to most other courtiers. In particular, Guise women relied on an inter-dynastic network of sovereign families, the ‘society of princes’, which played a prominent part in the regencies of both Anne of Austria and her predecessor, Marie de Medici. Marie was herself a product of this society, at the intersection of a tri-family ‘super-clan’, the Houses of Lorraine, Medici and Gonzaga, referred to in a recent study by Jean-François Dubost as ‘une dorsale catholique européenne’. ²