Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 39

[cahn]

Last post, along with the usual 18th-century suspects, included the Ottonians; changing ideas of conception and women's sexual pleasure; Isabella of Parma (the one who fell in love, and vice versa, with her husband's sister); Henry IV and Bertha (and Henry's second wife divorcing him for "unspeakable sexual acts"). (Okay, Isabella of Parma was 18th century.)

Comments

Re: Broglies

[mildred_of_midgard]

Same! De Broglie is the wave-particle guy to me! (And I imagine, to luzula.)

It does appear from Wikipedia that he is the great-great-great-grandson (whew) of 7 Years' War!Broglie.

Neat! I don't think I knew that, or if I did, I looked it up and promptly forgot.

...yeah that sounds not so fun for everyone but Louis XV :P

Sadly, I don't even think it was fun for him. ;) From what I've read, he had a reputation for being lazy and letting other people rule for him, but the problem wasn't that he didn't care or want to carry out his responsibilities, but that he was insecure in a way that made him painfully shy as well as indecisive. So rather than be big into representational government a la Louis XIV, or even being front and center while doing hands-on ruling, a la Fritz or Joseph II, he spent a lot of time closeted with this or that minister, the head of his spy network, etc., doing work behind the scenes and getting no credit for it. He wanted to do the right thing for his country, but he didn't really have the personality for the public aspects of the job.

From what I've read, anyway.