The mistresses of the French kings are some of the most iconic and recognizable. Madame de Pompadour, Agnès Sorel, Madame de Montespan, Madame de Maintenon, Diane de Poitiers. These are just a few of the hundreds of women who came to dominate the French court. In many cases they all shared a similar background; daughters of minor nobility who knew the ways of a royal court and played their parts accordingly. However, in the waning years of the French monarchy, one woman scandalized the French court by coming not from the nobility but from the working class. Jeanne Bécu, later known as Madame du Barry was a self-made woman who achieved wealth and infamy by supposedly rising from a brothel to King Louis XV’s bed. Depicted both during her lifetime and after as a vulgar, social climbing courtesan, Madame du Barry has rarely gotten a fair depiction. However, when truly analyzed, what she was able to achieve by the age of 25 is nothing less than astonishing.
Featured Guest: Dr. Christine Adams, a historian, and author that focuses mainly on French family and gender history. Christine is the co-author of the book The Creation of the French Royal Mistress: From Agnès Sorel to Madame DuBarry.
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