Spanish-born French noblewoman and socialite (1773?1835)
Theresa Tallien
|
---|
Portrait of Madame Tallien, by Jean-Bernard Duvivier, 1806
|
Born
| Juana Maria Ignacia Teresa de Cabarrus y Galabert
31 July 1773
(
1773-07-31
)
|
---|
Died
| 15 January 1835
(
1835-01-16
)
(aged 61)
|
---|
Known for
| Liaisons
with high-profile men - and the role as symbol of the end of terror in France (Notre Dame du Thermidor)
|
---|
Spouse(s)
| 1
Marquis de Fontenay
(annulled)
2
Jean-Lambert Tallien
(annulled)
3
Francois-Joseph-Philippe de Riquet
,
Prince de Chimay
|
---|
Children
| 11, by various husbands and lovers
|
---|
Theresa Cabarrus, Madame Tallien
(31 July 1773 – 15 January 1835) was a Spanish-born French noblewoman and socialite who became
Princess of Chimay
during her lifetime.
Life
[
edit
]
Early life
[
edit
]
She was born
Juana Maria Ignacia Teresa de Cabarrus y Galabert
in
Carabanchel Alto
,
Madrid
,
Spain
to
Francois Cabarrus
, an ethnic
Basque
French-born Spanish
financier
, and Maria Antonia Galabert, the daughter of a French
industrialist
based in Spain. Theresa's father founded and governed the bank of San Carlos, which became the
Royal Bank of Spain
, and was King
Joseph I of Spain
's Minister of Finance. In 1789, he was ennobled by King
Charles IV of Spain
with the title of
count
.
From 1778 to 1783, Theresa was raised by
nuns
in France. She was a student of the painter
Jean-Baptiste Isabey
. She returned home to the family castle briefly in 1785, and then her father sent her back to France at twelve years old to complete her education and get married.
The first of her many love affairs was with
Alexandre de Laborde
; however, the young couple was forced to separate as de Laborde's powerful father,
Jean-Joseph de Laborde
, disapproved of her.
Cabarrus then
arranged
for his "very beautiful" daughter to marry a rich, powerful Frenchman in order to strengthen his position in France. On 21 February 1788
Theresa was married to Jean Jacques Devin Fontenay (1762?1817), the last Marquis de Fontenay,
a wealthy aristocrat described as small, red and ugly. The bride was fourteen years old. Even though in the 1780s Theresa had begun to take an interest in
Liberalism
and the principles of the Revolution, she was presented at the court of
King
Louis XVI
. The newlyweds visited the royal court of Spain as well. On 2 May 1789 Theresa had a son, Devin Theodore de Fontenay (1789?1815), whose father was perhaps Felix le Peletier de Saint-Fargeau, brother of
Louis-Michel le Peletier de Saint-Fargeau
.
When her husband fled at the outbreak of the Revolution in 1789, she resumed her
maiden name
and obtained a
divorce
in 1791.
She took refuge in
Bordeaux
, where she was supported by her uncle and his family. While in Bordeaux she met
Jean Lambert Tallien
, Commissioner of the
National Convention
at the theatre.
Some time later she began an affair with him. In December 1793 she appeared as the Goddess of Reason at a large parade organised in Bordeaux by Tallien and his fellow-Commissioner
Ysabeau
to celebrate the
feast of Reason
.
Thermidor and Directory
[
edit
]
In February 1794, Tallien was denounced by
Maximilien Robespierre
for moderation and the easing of repression. Robespierre also reproached him for his liaison with 'one Cabarrus, an ex-noble, who gets him to pardon many enemies of the Republic'
She accompanied Tallien when he went to
Paris
to justify his conduct, only to be imprisoned on Robespierre's orders first in
La Force prison
, then in
Carmes prison
where she met
Josephine de Beauharnais
. Tallien was one of the chief organisers of the
Thermidorian Reaction
which overthrew Robespierre. On the same day, 27 July 1794 (
9 Thermidor
) Tallien had Theresa and Josephine de Beauharnais freed from prison and became one of the leading figures in French political life. Theresa was a moderating influence on her husband: after the outbreak of the Thermidorian Reaction, she earned the moniker 'Our Lady of Thermidor' (
French
:
Notre-Dame de Thermidor
)
as the person who was most likely to intervene in favor of the detained.
Pregnant with their daughter, she married Tallien on 26 December 1794.
Their marriage was relatively short-lived however as Theresa began divorce proceedings against Tallien in February 1797. Tallien accompanied Napoleon to Egypt but was captured by the British on his voyage back to France and held prisoner. On his release in 1802, the divorce was finalised.
Theresa became one of the leaders of Parisian social life.
Her
salon
was famous and she was one of the originators of the
Greek Revival
Directoire style
women's
fashions
of the
French Directory
period.
[12]
She was a very colorful figure; one story is that she was said to bathe in the juice of
strawberries
for their healing properties.
[13]
She once arrived at the
Tuileries Palace
, then the chief residence of
Napoleon Bonaparte
, supported by a black page, with eight
sapphire
rings and six toe rings, a
gold
bracelet on each ankle and nine bracelets on each arm. To top the look off Theresa had a head band covered in
rubies
. On another occasion she appeared at the
Paris Opera
wearing a white
silk
dress without sleeves and not wearing any underwear.
Talleyrand
commented: "
Il n'est pas possible de s'exposer plus somptueusement!
" ("One could not be more sumptuously unclothed!").
Marriage to Riquet
[
edit
]
After her divorce from Tallien Theresa had a brief flirtation with Napoleon.
[1]
She then moved first to the powerful
Paul Barras
,
[14]
whose former mistress was Napoleon's first wife Josephine; then to the millionaire speculator
Gabriel-Julien Ouvrard
(with whom she had five children);
[14]
and finally, attempting to regain respectability and to get away from Paris, she married
Francois-Joseph-Philippe de Riquet
,
Comte de Caraman
, on 22 August 1805
[15]
- he had become the sixteenth
Prince of Chimay
after the death of his childless uncle in 1804. She spent the rest of her life first in Paris, then on the
Chimay
estates
[1]
(now in
Belgium
). After the
Battle of Waterloo
in 1815, these became part of the
United Kingdom of the Netherlands
.
She had become one of the most famous women of her age, and she resented this role. Once when she appeared at the Louvre accompanied by her children, so many spectators flocked to see her up close, that she had to escape down a staircase to save herself. The marriage to Caraman meant that she returned to the class in which she had been born - and educated.
The couple invited musicians such as
Daniel Auber
,
Rodolphe Kreutzer
,
Luigi Cherubini
,
Charles de Beriot
and
Maria Malibran
to Paris and later to Chimay, where Theresa held a little court. Cherubini composed his
Messe en fa majeur dite Messe de Chimay
at their castle there in 1809, derived from a Kyrie and Gloria he wrote in 1808 for the village church of Chimay.
[16]
Theresa died in Chimay, where she was interred with Francois-Joseph de Riquet under the
sacristy
of the local church where a memorial stands to her memory.
[1]
She bore eleven children during her various liaisons, including
Joseph de Riquet
, first son of Francois-Joseph-Philippe, who became the seventeenth
Prince of Chimay
in 1843.
Children
[
edit
]
Theresa bore eleven children by various husbands and lovers.
Issue by a man via an affair named Ferdinand Louis Felix Lepeletier.
- Antoine Francois Julien Theodore Denis Ignace de Fontenay (Lepeletier) (1789?1815); had illegitimate issue.
Issue by Jean Lambert Tallien:
- Rose Thermidor Laure Josephine Tallien (1795?1862), married Count Felix de Narbonne-Pelet in 1815;
Issue by Paul Barras:
- Francis Barras, born in 1797, who died at 1833; had illegitimate issue.
Ouvrard was the father of five of her children, born during her marriage to Tallien and after her divorce:
- Clemence Isaure Theresa Ouvrard (1800?1884), married Colonel Hyacinthe Devaux, no issue; as a widow she became a nun;
- Jules Adolphe Edouard Ouvrard de Cabarrus, Doctor Cabarrus (1801-1870), married Adelaide de Lesseps (1803-1879);
- Clarisse Theresa Ouvrard (1802-1877), married Achille Ferdinand Brunetiere in 1826; had illegitimate issue.
- Auguste Stephanie Coralie Theresa Ouvrard (1803-?), married Amedee Ferdinand Moissan de Vaux, son of the Baron of Vaux, in 1822.
- Elisabeth Gabrielle Ouvrard (1804-1857)
She and Riquet had three children together:
Cultural references
[
edit
]
As Teresa Cabarrus, she is a prominent character in
Baroness Orczy
's novel
The Triumph of the Scarlet Pimpernel
.
She was played by
Carolyn Jones
in the 1954 film
Desiree
, starring
Marlon Brando
, and by
Florence Pernel
in the 2002
Napoleon
(miniseries)
.
Bibliography
[
edit
]
- Castelnau, Jacques (1937).
Madame Tallien
(Hachette) (in French).
- Chimay, Princesse de (1936).
Madame Tallien
(Plon) (in French).
- Chronicle of the French Revolution
. Longman. April 1989.
ISBN
978-0582051942
.
- Diaz-Plaja, Alberto (1943).
Teresa Cabarrus
(Olimpo) (in Spanish).
- Gilles, Christian (1999).
Madame Tallien: la reine du Directoire : biographie
(in French). Atlantica.
ISBN
9782843941214
.
- Gueniffey, Patrice (2015).
Bonaparte
. Harvard University Press.
ISBN
9780674368354
.
- Jumieges, Jean Claude (1967).
Madame Tallien ou Une femme dans la tourmente revolutionnaire
(in French). Ed. Rencontre.
- Paxton, John (1988).
Companion to the French Revolution
. Facts on File.
ISBN
9780816019373
.
- Adams, C. (2016).
Mistresses and Merveilleuses: The Historiographical Record on Female Political Players of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries.
Medieval Feminist Forum 51
(2), 95-103.
[17]
- Freund, A. (2014).
Portraiture and Politics in Revolutionary France.
Penn State University Press.
[18]
- Freund, A. (2014).
The
Citoyenne
Tallien: Women, Politics and Portraiture during the French Revolution.
The Art Bulletin (93)
3, 325-344.
[19]
- Hesse, Carla. (2018).
The Other Enlightenment: How French Women Became Modern
. Princeton University Press.
[20]
- Rauser, A. (2020).
The Age of Undress: Art, Fashion, and the Classical Ideal in the 1790's.
Yale University Press.
[13]
- Abrantes, Laure Junot (Duchesse d'). 1832.
Memoires of the Duchesse d'Abrantes (Madame Junot)
. J&J Harper.
[21]
References
[
edit
]
- ^
a
b
c
d
"Theresa Tallien"
.
monumentshistoriques.free.fr
. Retrieved
27 April
2019
.
- ^
Rauser, A. (2020).
The Age of Undress: Art, Fashion, and the Classical Ideal in the 1790's
. New Haven: Yale University Press. pp. 165?173.
ISBN
9780300241204
.
- ^
a
b
Rauser, Amelia (2020).
The Age of Undress: Art, Fashion, and the Classical Ideal in the 1790s
. Yale University Press.
ISBN
978-0-300-24120-4
.
- ^
a
b
"Theresa Tallien, "Incroyable", "Merveilleuse" et Premiere Dame!"
.
Point de Vue
(in French). 16 October 2017
. Retrieved
27 April
2019
.
- ^
a
b
Huguenaud, Karine (March 2005).
"Madame Tallien"
.
napoleon.org
. Retrieved
27 April
2019
.
- ^
Cherubini: Mass in F (Chimay)
, Classical Music Review, accessed February 2018.
- ^
Adams, Christine (2016-04-15).
"Mistresses and Merveilleuses: The Historiographical Record on Female Political Players of the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries"
.
Medieval Feminist Forum
.
51
(2): 95?103.
doi
:
10.17077/1536-8742.2041
.
ISSN
1536-8742
.
- ^
Freund, Amy (2014).
Portraiture and Politics in Revolutionary France
. Penn State University Press.
ISBN
978-0-271-06569-4
.
- ^
Freund, Amy (September 2011).
"The Citoyenne Tallien: Women, Politics, and Portraiture during the French Revolution"
.
The Art Bulletin
.
93
(3): 325?344.
doi
:
10.1080/00043079.2011.10786011
.
ISSN
0004-3079
.
S2CID
153406511
.
- ^
Hesse, Carla (2018).
The Other Enlightenment: How French Women Became Modern
. Princeton University Press.
ISBN
978-0-691-18842-3
.
- ^
d'), Laure Junot Abrantes (duchesse (1832).
Memoirs of the Duchess D' Abrantes (Madame Junot)
. J. & J. Harper.
|
---|
|
Significant civil and political events by year
|
---|
1788
| |
---|
1789
| |
---|
1790
| |
---|
1791
| |
---|
1792
| |
---|
1793
| |
---|
1794
| |
---|
1795?6
| |
---|
1797
| |
---|
1798
| |
---|
1799
| |
---|
|
|
|
|
|
|
|
---|
Overview
| |
---|
Brothels
| |
---|
Law
| |
---|
People
| Activists
| |
---|
Brothel owners & madams
| |
---|
Courtesans
| |
---|
Pimps
| |
---|
Prostitutes
| |
---|
|
---|
Organisations
| |
---|
Red-light districts
| |
---|
Other
| |
---|
|
---|
International
| |
---|
National
| |
---|
Academics
| |
---|
People
| |
---|
Other
| |
---|