Françoise d'Aubigné, Marquise de Maintenon
Françoise d'Aubigné (27 November 1635 – 15 April 1719), known first as Madame Scarron and subsequently as Madame de Maintenon (French: [madam də mɛ̃t(ə)nɔ̃] ), was a French noblewoman and the second wife of Louis XIV of France from 1683 until his death in 1715. Although she was never considered queen of France, as the marriage was carried out in secret, Madame de Maintenon had considerable political influence as one of the King's closest advisers and the governess of the royal children.
Madame
Françoise d'Aubigné
27 November 1635
Niort, Kingdom of France
15 April 1719 (aged 83)
Saint-Cyr-l'École, Kingdom of France
Jeanne de Cardilhac
Born into an impoverished Huguenot noble family, Françoise married the poet Paul Scarron in 1652, which allowed her access to the Parisian high society. She was widowed in 1660, but later saw her fortunes improve through her friendship with Louis XIV's mistress, Madame de Montespan, who tasked her with the upbringing of the king's extramarital children. She was made royal governess when the children were legitimised, and in 1675 Louis XIV granted her the title Marquise de Maintenon. By the late 1670s, she had essentially supplanted Montespan as the king's maîtresse-en-titre.
After the death of Queen Maria Theresa in 1683, Madame de Maintenon married Louis in a private ceremony. She came to be regarded as the second most powerful person in France, and her piety had a strong influence on her husband, who became firmer in his Catholic faith and had no more open mistresses. In 1686, she founded the Maison royale de Saint-Louis, a school for girls from impoverished noble families, which had a significant influence on female education under the Ancien Régime. After Louis XIV's death in 1715, Madame de Maintenon retired to Saint-Cyr, where she died four years later at the age of 83.
Later life[edit]
After her husband's death in 1715, Françoise retired to the Maison royale de Saint-Louis at Saint-Cyr-l'École with a pension of 48,000 livres by the Duc d'Orléans and regent of France.[5] She continued to receive visitors at Saint-Cyr, including Tsar Peter the Great of Russia. He was seated at a chair by the foot of her bed and asked what her illness was, to which she replied, "Old age". She asked what brought him to her room, to which he replied, "I came to see everything worthy of note that France contains." He later remarked to his aides that she had rendered a great service to the King and nation.[21]
Françoise died on 15 April 1719, at the age of 83. Her will expressed her wishes to be buried in the choir at Saint-Cyr and bequeath her Château de Maintenon to her niece, Françoise Charlotte d'Aubigné, Duchess of Noailles[5] and her brother Charles' only daughter. In her honour, a small island, off the coast of Cape Breton, Nova Scotia, Canada, which at that time was known as "L'Île Royale", was attributed to her; this island was named Isle Madame (first noted as l'Isle de la Marquise).
