Conti, HOUSE OF

Conti, HOUSE OF, a younger branch of the Bourbon House of Condé (q.v.). Its founder and first prince was Armand de Bourbon Conti, brother of the great Condé. He was born at Paris in 1629, and took his title from the little town of Conti, near Amiens. Though feeble and deformed, and set aside for the church, he took with ardour to the career of arms, but after 1657 retired from the world, and died at Pézenas in 1666.—LOUIS ARMAND, eldest son of the preceding, was born in 1661. After a short but promising career in arms, he died childless in 1685.—FRANÇOIS LOUIS, Prince de la Roche-sur-Yon et de Conti, brother of the preceding, and the most remarkable of the family, was born at Paris in 1664. Educated under the eyes of the great Condé, he early conceived a passion for war, and already in his first campaign in Hungary covered himself with glory. Falling into disgrace with the court, he was banished to Chantilly, but pardoned by the intercession of the great Condé before his death. Subsequently Conti served under the Due de Luxembourg, who was warmly attached to him, and took a brilliant part in the victories of Steinkirk and Neerwinden. In 1697 he narrowly escaped being made king of Poland. On his return to France he was still coldly received by Louis, who, however, was at last forced by disaster to employ him. He received the command of the army of Flanders in 1709, but died on the 22d February of the same year. Saint-Simon, in his Mémoires, thus speaks of him: 'He was the delight of armies, the divinity of the people, the hero of officers, the darling of parliament, and the admiration of the most learned savants.'—The last member of the House of Conti was LOUIS FRANÇOIS JOSEPH, who was born 1734, and died at Barcelona, 1807.