1,2,3...Happy Birthday!!


Welcome to the Gossip Party!

Below please enjoy the wonderful bits of gossip submitted by YOU! I have enjoyed reading the entries all week, so I hope you have some pink champagne and queen cakes to indulge while you read. Also, I wanted to thank everyone again for visiting the site and contributing your knowledge and wit! I always look forward to hearing from you!

Eliza Ward says: Hey Lauren--did you hear about how the King's mistress, Athenais, was too lazy to look after their children, so she forced her friend to do it? Well it sure backfired on her! The King forgot all about Athenais and shacked up with her friend! In fact, he even married her! I guess those love potions Athenais tried to use on the King didn't work!

Júlia says: Jeanne de La Motte was very good when it came to scheme and win money (lots of it!), and imagine, the robbery that made her famous affected Marie-Antoinette herself! It is known as the Affair of The Necklace, because the purpose of that affair was to steal a massive diamond necklace made for Marie-Antoinette, that, obviously, as most things that the Queen wore, costed millions. This whole affair involves a cardinal, La Motte's lover, husband, the magician Cagliostro, and a looot of other shocking personalities and facts, one of them being that the affair made Marie-Antoinette hugely unpopular, although she was not to blame!

Alissa says: Much is known about the strange ingenuity of 18th century hair. These lovely coiffures oft attracted equal admiration from pests as they did humans (not that the two are mutually exclusive, of course). However, there is only one known case of intentional insect habitation; when the Princesse de Machin had her long locks arranged round a birdcage full of living butterflies.

Marie says:
Did you know that Ma
rie Antoinette had a kind of love affair with her stable boy before she moved to France? She did not have a hot and heavy romantic affair but more of she fantasized about him because of his physical appearance (especially because how bad the dauphin looked). Their affair was more of a deep forbidden unspoken love.

Paris Atelier says: A certain mistress of the King has been said to have been a prostitute and used wicked whiles to coerce him to bed her. All the while finding other prostitutes to pacify him while she held her position in the court and over the King.....hmmmm, sounds like scandal to me!

Sandra says:
To think that the "Belle Murphy" is now trying to replace Madame de
Pompadour as maîtresse-en-titre! Miss O'Murphy is a "graduate" of the Parc aux Cerfs, the brothel Madame de Pompadour set up herself for the king's pleasure. Casanova may have been impressed with the girl but she has definitely overstepped her bounds.

Elyse says: Pst, did you hear that that Voltaire has moved in with the marquise du Châtelet ... and that Émilie placed before him in a essay competition on the nature of fire?

Lucy says: Seems that back in the 18thc., chocolate was loved for more than its obvious reasons…it was also great for masking the taste of poison… In 1774, Pope Clement XI, who feared being murdered after having disagreed with certain Jesuits, mysteriously died after drinking a cup of chocolate brought to him by his favourite confectioner- who, by the way, also died later that very same day. Coincidence? All the hype was disproved by an autopsy…Regardless; the rumor stuck.

Dana says: Rumors can now be put to rest regarding the recent and continuously scandalous activities of Lady Sarah Lennox. For behavior most unbecoming a lady and great-granddaughter of a king, Lady Sarah has left her dowdy of a husband, Charles Burnbury for the safe haven of her lover, Lord William Gordon. Lord William Gordon is believed to be the father of her young daughter Louisa.

Mary says: Felicite de Genlis, mistress of the duc d'Orleans, had the ultimate revolutionary accessory: a polished shard of the fallen Bastille made into a brooch. Her stone was set in a wreath of emerald laurel leaves tied at the top in a jewelled tricolour rosette, and inlaid with the word 'Liberte' in diamonds.

Jessica
says: My all time favorite gossip about Marie Antoinette would probably be the affair of the diamond necklace. It was commissioned by Louis XV but he died without being able to pay for it causing the jewelers to be on the verge of bankruptcy. This is why they tried so many schemes to get Marie Antoinette to buy it and ultimately ruined her popularity with the people of France because she was spending all of France's money on diamonds.

Cathy says: The Duc de Lauzun is quite delicious my dear, but he is completely besotted with Lady Sarah Bunbury, you know the one the English king threw over to marry that plain little Princess Charlotte What’s Her Face. They say Lady Sarah’s husband is more interested in his horses than his wife and even brought that nice young Lord Carlisle with them here to Paris to keep her entertained, but I do believe Lauzun is going to beat Carlisle to her bed. Shall we wager on it?

Anabel says:
This was a very interesting gossip:
"When Madame du Barry was femme de chambre to the widow La Garde her two sons ended up falling in love with her. She was a temptress and trotted around knowing just what she was doing. The brothers fought tirelessly and violently over her until the poor widow, already heart broken over the loss of her husband, had to force Jeanne to leave her house!"

Katy says:
I heard that Comtesse de Provence gossiped about the Queen of France herself and smelled HORRIBLE to boot.


Tina says:
The Danes do it... with physicians! The Queen of Denmark, that poor Caroline Matilda, is having an affair with her husband's physician, Johann Friedrich Streuensee! She is totally besotted with him, flaunting their relationship openly for everyone to see, riding stride through the park and using men's clothes and now she is pregnant with the Doctor all the while that wild German Quack is administering drugs and ice cold baths to King Christian every morning and very busily taking over the country from the poor insane man! They're already calling it the Era of Streuensee and he is officially the King's maître des requêtes and quite in the middle of a mania of reform, issuing several cabinet orders a day and offending every local sensibility he can manage!

I enjoyed all this gossip so much!! I really think we should do this more often, just sit down and dish it all! So thank you again for entering!
OK, what you have all been waiting for I am sure, these are the winners of the Give Away!

The lucky winners selected out of the good old Hat (software!) are:
Anabel - Queen of Fashion
Lucy - Madame de Pompadour: Mistress of France
Allisa - Marie Antoinette, DVD
Eliza - Marie Antoinette, DVD
Congrats!!! Send your info along to me, I will contact you all if I do not hear from you!
Enjoy the weekend and have some Champagne for us!

10 comments:

  1. Congrats to the winners!<3

    ReplyDelete
  2. Enchantée! Wonderful party! Congratulations and may there be many more, ma chou!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I can't breathe...I can't believe it! Where's my snuff box?! No- really- THANKS so much!!! I've been dying to get my hands on this one. I'm soo lucky!!! I love this party!

    ReplyDelete
  4. That is awesome. I love reading all those juicy tidbits.

    ReplyDelete
  5. Wonderful reads! What fun! Thanks for all these from everyone!
    xoxo

    ReplyDelete
  6. I had so much fun!! This is fantastic; I agree with you, we should make this more often! I loved to read all the gossip, they were all excellent. Congratulations to Lauren, Heather and the winners, and thank you!

    ReplyDelete
  7. What a great party!! I loved it so much! And I still can't believe it. I'll be emailing you soon.

    Lots of kisses to everyone, mes amours!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Haha, that was amazing. I'm surprised that Lady Sarah made such an impression on French society! ;D

    ReplyDelete
  9. What amusing tidbits! I especially like the idea of a piece of the Bastille set with emeralds! Congratulations on your anniversary! And thank you so much, I'm so excited that I won!

    ReplyDelete