The illustrious cousin : the Marquise de Sévigné

The Lady of Burgundy

Although the famous marquise is best known for her impressive correspondence with her daughter, Madame de Grignan, she was much more than that. A well-educated woman of letters recognised by her peers, she was one of the most important figures of the 17^th century !

Born on 5 February 1626, little Marie was soon orphaned: her mother had died in childbirth and her father died a few years later at the siege of La Rochelle.
An heiress to a large fortune, she was brought up by her mother's family, who were the kind and loving Coulanges. Her uncle, Christophe de Coulanges, supervised her studies and taught her Italian, Latin and Spanish.

She had little contact with her paternal family, the Rabutins : the Coulanges were suspicious of their risky financial management and refused to arrange a marriage between young Marie and her dashing cousin, Roger, for this reason.

The woman who described herself as the "Lady of Burgundy" ended up spending very little time in the region !

A widow at last !

At the age of 25, the young woman became a widow. 

It was a liberation : from then on, she was no longer dependent on a man and could lead her life as she wished. In this highly patriarchal society, it was one of the few ways for a woman to free herself from male control.

Madame de Sévigné, who was very close to the "Précieuses Movement", moved into the Hôtel Carnavalet and assiduously attended the Paris Salons, making friends with the capital's most prominent figures. Her best friend was Madame de Lafayette (author of the famous "Princesse de Clèves") ; she was a close friend of the poet Voiture, and of course she was very close to her flamboyant cousin, Roger, with whom she kept up an impressive correspondence spanning more than forty years.

Unfortunately, she was to discover that she had to enjoy this Parisian life sparingly : her husband had squandered her fortune and she had to manage her frugal budget with an iron hand.

She had no choice but to stay in her castle in Les Rochers, in Brittany.

1671, the year of the tragedy

In 1671, Françoise de Sévigné, the marquise’s daughter, married François Adhémar de Morteil de Grignan : for the Marquise, it was a tragedy !

Her beloved daughter left the bosom of her mother to follow her husband to Provence and settle in the Château de Grignan. The two women began a frenzied correspondence : they wrote to each other almost daily, and in the space of twenty years sent each other more than six hundred letters.

The Marquise's strength ? Using her pen to convey all the feelings that animated her, but also all the vivacity, truth and variety of French society in her century !

Much more than just a mother pining for her child, she was above all the reporter of her time. She was a woman who had access to all circles of society ; she was a loyal friend, an incorrigible fashionista and, above all, she had an impressive number of correspondents.

In her letters, she describes the great scandals of the time (the Poisons affair) as well as the juiciest gossip (the announcement of the marriage of the "Grande Mademoiselle" to Lauzun), including the trial of Fouquet (a faithful friend, she transcribed almost every minute of it), not to forget, of course, the arrival of new fashions (her correspondence about chocolate is a delight to read).

Posterity was not mistaken : her correspondence, which was intended to remain private, was published from the 18^th century onwards, establishing the Marquise as a leading letter-writer of the "Grand Siècle".