Pompadour, JEANNE ANTOINETTE POISSON, MARQUISE DE, the most famous among the mistresses of Louis XV., was born in Paris, 29th December 1721. She was baptised as the child of François Poisson and his wife Madeleine de la Motte, but it was suspected that her father was Le Normant de Tournehem, a wealthy fermier-général, who provided for her education. She grew up a woman of remarkable grace and beauty, devoted to music and painting, and charming every one by her vivacity and wit. But her mind was early depraved by her mother, who constantly dinned into her ears that she was 'un morceau de roi,' and habituated her to see in the rôle of king's favourite the ideal of feminine ambition. In 1741 she was married to her protector's nephew, Le Normant d'Étioles, and soon became a queen of fashion in the financial world of Paris. But neither this nor a devoted husband's love could satisfy her heart, and, as it was impossible to hope for an introduction at court, for two years she sought to attract the eye of the king by waylaying him when he went out hunting. At length in February 1745 she attained her object at a ball given by the city on the occasion of the dauphin's nuptials, and ere long she was installed at Versailles, and ennobled by the title of Marquise de Pompadour. Her husband, to whom she had already borne a daughter, was removed from Paris, but later had his loss reconced with lucrative offices; her brother was afterwards made Marquis de Marigny. Ere long she assumed the entire control of public affairs, the king being merely an indolent fainéant who assisted at the spectacle of his reign without even taking an interest in it. For twenty years the mistress swayed the whole policy of the state, and lavished its treasures on the gratification of her artistic tastes, and in carrying out her own ambitious schemes. She reversed the traditional policy of France because Frederick the Great lampooned her, and the proud Maria Theresa addressed her in a letter under the royal style as Ma cousine. She filled all public offices with her nominees, corresponded with the generals in the field, and made her own creatures ministers of France, the Abbé de Bernis and the Duc de Choiseul. Her policy was disastrous, her wars unfortunate; still the ministry of Choiseul was the only fairly creditable portion of the reign, which owed to her twenty years of relative dignity. She was a lavish patroness of the arts, and heaped her bounty upon poets and painters, yet did not escape showers of lampoons—the famous Poissardes, for a suspected share in which many a wit went to the Bastille. She loved china, fine buildings, books, and sumptuous bindings, and it is said printed with her own hands a fine edition of the Rodogune of Corneille. Indeed, she was an artist in everything—'elle était des nôtres,' as Voltaire said truly when he heard of her death. The king remained faithful to her from habit rather than affection, and from the rôle of mistress she passed into that of amie nécessaire, and retained her difficult position to the end, by relieving him of all business, by diverting him with private theatricals in her famous 'théâtre des petits cabinets,' where she acted charmingly, and at last even by countenancing his infamous debaucheries and providing him with mistresses too insignificant to be rivals. She herself said with the pathos of truth, 'ma vie est un combat,' and at last her nerves gave way under the strain, and after a languor of twenty days she died, 15th April 1764. She met the inevitable with that queenly dignity that marked everything she did. Her breath fled on the wings of a playful sally—'Stay, Monsieur Curé,' she said to the priest who was leaving her room, 'wait a little; we shall go out together.'
Madame de Pompadour was the last mistress of the king worthy of the name; the descent from her reign of grace and decorum to the boisterous vulgarities of Dubarry was profound. She was 'froide comme une macrense,' says Madame du Hausset, her femme-de-chambre, in her silly but interesting memoirs, and there can be no doubt that throughout life ambition was the one passion of her heart. She secured her reign till her last hour—no sooner had she closed her eyes than she was forgotten.
The Mémoires (Liège, 1766) attributed to her are of no value. See the studies by Capefigue (1858) and Campardon (1867); E. and J. de Goncourt, Les Maîtresses de
Louis XV. (vol. ii. 1860); Beaujoint's Secret Memoirs of La Marquise de Pompadour (1885); but especially her Correspondance, with her father and brother, edited by Malassis (1878), and with the Comte de Clermont, edited by Bonhomme (1880).