Marie Mancini (1639–1715)

Marie Mancini was born Anna Maria Mancini in Rome to an aristocratic Italian family. She was the third of five sisters. Her mother Geronima Mazzarini was a sister of Cardinal Mazarin, the powerful chief minister of Anne of Austria, regent for her son King Louis XIV of France. Following the death of Marie's father, she and her sisters were taken to Paris in hopes of making advantageous marriages for them. Along with two of their female Martinozzi cousins, they became known at the French court as the seven "Mazarinettes." Marie's mother had been persuaded by a horoscope that Marie would cause trouble and asked her brother to "shut Marie up in a convent and keep her there." Marie was educated at a convent and bloomed into a beautiful and charming young woman. At about age 16, she caught the eye of the 18-year-old King Louis, and they fell in love. Louis promised to marry her and make her queen, but politics, etiquette, and Anne of Austria made that impossible. Mazarin exiled Marie from the French court, and arranged her marriage to Lorenzo Colonna, an Italian prince. According to Marie, her parting words to Louis were, "Sire, vous êtes roi, vous pleurez, et je pars ("Sire, you are the king, you weep, and yet I am leaving."). She had three children with her husband, but later left him and traveled around Europe with her sister Hortense Mancini and on her own. She was one of the first women in France to publish her memoirs, and became a celebrity.