cahn | Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 44

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Not only are these posts still going, there is now (more) original research going on in them deciphering and translating letters in archives that apparently no one has bothered to look at before?? (Which has now conclusively exonerated Fritz's valet/chamberlain Fredersdorf from the charge that he was dismissed because of financial irregularities and died shortly thereafter "ashamed of his lost honor," as Wikipedia would have it. I'M JUST SAYING.)

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From:

mildred_of_midgard

I feel like there could also be cases where it would not redound to the honour of those ancestors, depending on what those ancestors were up to.

This is very true! When I was trying to get my hands on the Keith papers,

prinzsorgenfrei said their professor had advised never telling the family that you're researching anything negative about their ancestor. Fortunately, I wasn't, but I made extra sure to be positive toward Peter when making the request of the Knyphausens.

I wonder if Broglie would take the same stance toward that, though, as he does toward his constant trashing of Louis:

[Praise for the Comte de Broglie.] Unfortunately, I cannot say so much for the other personages who figure alongside of him, and especially for Louis XV., whose reputation (which had nothing to lose) will not gain, I fear, by the new light that is thrown upon it. I have not thought it right to suppress any of the miserable truths revealed by the documents, and I am under no apprehension lest a true picture should harm the great memories of the French monarchy. An institution such as that monarchy, which counts ten centuries of duration and of glory, is strong enough to bear the full light of history; and its discriminating admirers (I hope I am of the number) have no interest in disguising either the faults of the sorry monarch who precipitated its fall, or the evils of that arbitrary power which too often violated its principle and impaired its beneficence.

So maybe Broglie would find some way to spin doctor a less than glorious ancestry!

P.S. I was reading further along, and I find it absolutely hilarious that he devotes this entire section to "The Diplomatic Revolution was not Madame de Pompadour's fault, *unfortunately*."

Heaven forbid that I should plead the cause of Madame de Pompadour, or even that I should invoke extenuating circumstances on her behalf. If she was not on that one occasion so guilty as she was said to be, she was indisputably guilty on so many others, and her mere existence, the fact that her worthless and contemptible name has been mentioned in the annals of the French monarchy, is of itself so great a scandal, that no severity with respect to her can ever
appear excessive.

and

It is evident, therefore, that Frederick had made up his mind from the first: the Treaty of Westminster, with all its political consequences, was his own doing, and he alone is responsible for it before history. The truth tends also--and I am sorry for it, for the sake of morality--to the exculpation of Madame de Pompadour.

Tell us how you really feel, Duc de Broglie! (The guy is virtually incapable of getting through a paragraph without offering up his strongly worded opinion--a bit like your Lochiel bio's author.)

From:

luzula

OMG, the Pompadour sections! I am boggling at his ability to trash someone so thoroughly while also exculpating them...

From:

mildred_of_midgard

I know, he's HILARIOUS! (I'm like that with FW sometimes, to be fair.) I wasn't expecting this book to be a laugh a page. (No werewolves so far, but I'm only 120 pages in, and I'm prepared for anything.)

From:

selenak

Good grief. The Pompadour hate-on a century after her death is really something to behold. I wonder how much is 19th century morality vs good old through the centuries snobbery? (Because Reinette wasn't born a noble, which was the thing about her that first got the nobility's ire, though not universally so; the Duc de Croy, himself of impeccable bloodline, admired her and kept writing positively about her after her death, when there was nothing to gain by it anymore.)

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Good question. He definitely rags on Louis too for the adultery (so not a total double standard), but more for being a weak king (August III gets a few shots sent his way on this as well, though nothing as sharp as Louis--with Louis, it feels personal). So I wouldn't be surprised if there was some class snobbery at work too. Everyone has an assigned role to play: kings to make sure France tops, not bottoms, and middle and lower class people to know their place and stay out of politics!

From:

selenak

August III gets a few shots sent his way on this as well, though nothing as sharp as Louis--with Louis, it feels personal

Well, Louis is letting the (French) side down. Plus I think he never had much partisans. Even people who hate on Louis Quatorze for all the wars acknowledge that the Sun King made all other princes imitate him and managed to not just culturally but politically dominate Europe for most of his reign. And poor Louis XVI gets credit even among Republican minded later historians (if not his contemporaries) for having been without personal vices and dying nobly and bravely after surprising everyone with a spirited defense in his trial. Plus he very clearly inherited the mess his predecessors created and really would have had to be a genius to manage. But Louis XV neither had his great grandfather's tremendous energy, work willingness and charisma nor his grandson's personal virtues. Instead, he's the typical rich kid who fucks up with the inherited wealth without contributing anything of his own. (I mean, even culturally speaking - Madame de Pompadour gets the credit for the various styles she created and porcellain and silk manufacturers she supported, and of course Louis XV's time saw some of the superstars of French literature at their peak, but he had so absolutely nothing to do with the later that it's the Age of Voltaire in French, not the Age of Louis XV. So Broglie is just following well trodden footsteps when taking shots at him.

I'm also reminded of Orieux being frustrated that Voltaire had the love/hate relationship with Fritz and not Louis because in his French pov, it ought to have been Louis, except Louis never even hated Voltaire, he just was monumentally uninterested.

Never underestimate everyone catching sexual morals in the 19th century, though. When I read up on the 1848 revolutions, mistresses came up only to be booed and hissed at like there was no tomorrow. And remember the delusion about many chaste Prussians in Fritzian times that made Schmidt-Lötzen regretfully conclude in his Lehndorff preface that based on this diary, extramarital sex of all types didn't just start being practiced by the aristocracy when FW2 was King.

From:

mildred_of_midgard

Oh, I absolutely assumed it had to do with them both being French and the Duke having him some nationalist sensitivities. You should see Adam Zamoyski dragging August III in a similarly personal manner, it includes some of the most vicious attacks I've encountered on the part of a historian.

(You *will* see it, once I'm ready to do my write-up on August III, but I'm still trying to get my hands on a copy of his most recent biography.)