Louise de La Vallière

Overview

Louise de La Vallière (1644-1710), mistress of Louis XIV in the 1660s, made a duchess in 1667; she retired to the Carmelite convent in Paris in 1674. Source: Wikipedia, "Louise de La Vallière".

Relevance to Marie

Marie knows her mainly through Arsène Houssaye's Mlle de La Vallière et Mme de Montespan, which she reads in January 1874 and identifies with ("Elle aimait le roi parce qu'il avait l'air d'un roi", 015/1874-01-19; see Mademoiselle de La Vallière (Houssaye)). Later the name serves as a type of romantic beauty: Barnola tells her she looks like La Vallière with her hair done that day (035.0188), and in 1881 she sees in her ringlets "un faux air de La Vallière" (091/1881-03-25). In 1882 she cites her, with Mary Stuart, as a worn-out painting subject that only Bastien-Lepage could bring back to life (096/1882-08-18).

References in Diary

• 1874-01-19, 1874-01-21, 1874-02-01: reading Houssaye's book (015, 016)
• 1874-04-28: a greyhound to be named La Vallière (019)
• 1875-07-04: 035.0188
• 1876-06-29: footnote on Bragelonne (062)
• 1881-03-25: 091
• 1882-08-18: 096