One of the most fascinating and sad figures of the French Revolution, Théroigne de Méricourt was born Anne-Josèphe Terwagne in 1762 near Liège. Her mother died when she was five, so Anne-Josèphe was sent to live with an aunt, who didn’t really want her. First, she sent the little girl to a convent, but later,
All Things Georgian remembers Edward Dando, an infamous oyster eater. To quote: He was also known by the appellation of the ‘celebrated oyster eater.’ For Dando, although not a thief (by his own reckoning) did not see why he should not have plenty of everything, even though he had no money to pay for it,
On 2 April 1810, Marie Louise Of Austria walked down the aisle at the “Salon Carré” turned chapel, in the Palais De Tuileries, to marry Napoleon, the man she had been thaught to hate since she was little. To add to her uneasiness, she wore a dress entirely chosen and made for her in France
The League of Nations, the precursor to the United Nations, was an intergovernmental organisation created as a result of the Paris Peace Conference that ended the First World War. Its principle mission, at which it failed, was to maintain world peace. But it also had another important, but little known, function: it established and oversaw
The Temple had been, as its name imported, the fortress and palace of the Knights Templars, and, having been erected by them in the palmy days of their wealth and magnificence, contained spacious apartments, and extensive gardens protected from intrusion by a lofty wall, which surrounded the whole. It was not, unfit for, nor unaccustomed
Prince Louis Stanislas Xavier, Count of Provence, always coveted the crown. Yet, no one thought he would really become king. Born on 17 November 1755 in Versailles, he was the third surviving on of the Dauphin Louis and his wife Maria Josepha of Saxony and far too removed from the crown for him to seriously
Anne Boleyn loved dogs. She doted on Purkoy, the little lapdog given her by Sir Francis Bryan, who had received it from Honour, Lady Lisle. When he brought him to court, the Queen fell in love with him straight away. In a letter to Lady Lisle, Sir Francis explains: “…it may please your Lordship to
Hello everyone, today I have two book reviews for you. Enjoy! Stalin: New Biography of a Dictator by Oleg V. KhlevniukCan a biography of Stalin, one of the cruellest dictators the world has ever known, be both concise and exhaustive? I didn’t think so, but Klevniuk proved me wrong. In 408 pages (not that many
One of the perks of being a queen is receiving lots of presents. In June 1842, Queen Victoria received quite a few from the Imam of Muscat, as the Earl of Aberdeen reveals in this short letter to Her Majesty: Foreign Office, 28th June 1842 Lord Aberdeen, with his humble duty, begs to enclose for
Chanel. Dior. Givenchy. Gaultier. Today French fashion designers are renowned and loved the world over. But the first to be celebrated, and to bring haute couture to the forefront of popular culture was a poor but ambitious young woman, Rose Bertin. Born on 2 July 1747 at Abbeville, Picardy, Rose moved to Paris to try
