Louise-Marie de Gonzague (1611-1667), reine de Pologne
Work published with the financial support of the CRCV.
Chantal Grell, Louise-Marie de Gonzague (1611-1667), reine de Pologne. Passion et politique à la cour des Vasa. Volume I : Le temps de l’attente. Volume II : Le temps de l’action, éditions Honoré Champion, collection “Bibliothèque d’études de l’Europe centrale” no. 26, “histoire” series, March 2024, 15,5 x 23,5 cm, 1076 p., 2 volumes, €150 (ISBN: 978-2-7453-6075-5).
Louise-Marie de Gonzague, queen of Poland (1645-1667), was a key piece on Europe’s political chessboard. For Richelieu and Mazarin, her hard-negotiated marriage was intended to counter Austrian influence in Poland-Lithuania, Europe’s largest and most vulnerable state, which had remained neutral during the Thirty Years War. However, the queen did not prove to be as docile an instrument as expected. Exiled to a foreign country, this pious, anxious, yet courageous woman, hungry for power, was faced with the tragedy of an invaded, ruined Poland, undermined by the greed of its barons and a weakened royal power. Wishing to do the right thing, she tried in vain to make this elected monarchy hereditary. Despite being hated and the subject of a damnatio memoriæ, she nevertheless forged a lasting relationship between France and Poland.
Here Chantal Grell, specialist in “Grand Siècle”, or Great Century, history and professor at université de Paris-Saclay, brings together three areas of her research: historiography, the history of royal courts, and the history of Poland. She is editorial director of Correspondance d’Hevelius (1611- 1687), astronome de Dantzig.
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