Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon, Duchess of Maine

Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon (Anne Louise Bénédicte; 8 November 1676 – 23 January 1753), was the daughter of Henri Jules de Bourbon, Prince of Condé and Anne Henriette of Bavaria. As a member of the reigning House of Bourbon, she was a princesse du sang. Forced to marry the Duke of Maine, legitimised son of Louis XIV and Madame de Montespan, she revelled in politics, the arts and held a popular salon at the Hôtel du Maine as well as the château de Sceaux. Louise Bénédicte was born on 8 November 1676 at the Hôtel de Condé in Paris. She was the eighth child born to the then Duke and Duchess of Enghien. The name Bénédicte was added in honour of the girls maternal aunt, Benedicta, Duchess of Brunswick-Lüneburg. She was brought up at the Hôtel de Condé with her many sisters and had to endure slave-like conditions under the madness of her father. Her mother, who was pious and gentle, was often beaten by her father as were their staff and her sister Marie Anne, Mademoiselle de Montmorency....