I dig Orsini=Ursins. It’s a bit like Medici = Medicis (you’ll have to hear the Italian = French in your mind) which the first time I actually heard it sounded so different it took me a second to realise who the person was referring to (followed almost immediately by a voice in my inner ear reminding me: i francesi sono cattivi…this saying of last generations will be familiar to our friend Portia, I’m sure. I’m equally sure it’s not a truth set in stone, but rather one of those expressions of rivalry between the two states.
It was a real web of relations, wasn’t it. With Maintenon and Orsini/Ursins wielding their soft power. Who was it who made the play on words re Maintenon/Maintenant?
Not sure who started Maintenon/Maintenant, but it seems to have been repeated all over the court in the early 1680s. She had the last laugh, of course.
I dig Orsini=Ursins. It’s a bit like Medici = Medicis (you’ll have to hear the Italian = French in your mind) which the first time I actually heard it sounded so different it took me a second to realise who the person was referring to (followed almost immediately by a voice in my inner ear reminding me: i francesi sono cattivi…this saying of last generations will be familiar to our friend Portia, I’m sure. I’m equally sure it’s not a truth set in stone, but rather one of those expressions of rivalry between the two states.
It was a real web of relations, wasn’t it. With Maintenon and Orsini/Ursins wielding their soft power. Who was it who made the play on words re Maintenon/Maintenant?
Not sure who started Maintenon/Maintenant, but it seems to have been repeated all over the court in the early 1680s. She had the last laugh, of course.