Free Athenais by Lisa Hilton

takes a savage tone.” 8 Athénaïs was brave enough and wild enough, she believed, to take on the court and win. That winter she shone so brightly that the court, more or less grudgingly, admitted that she deserved the title by which she was later to be known, “the real Queen of France.” However, her conquest was not yet complete. Was she simply an amusement for the King during the favorite’s pregnancy, her attractions enhanced by the adrenaline of the military campaign? Although her husband was still mercifully in the dark, her position was precarious. She had won the King’s love, but could she keep it?
    She was given an elegantly symbolic proof of her success in the Grand Divertissement the King gave at Versailles in July 1668. This time, the official reason was the peace treaty signed on 2 May at Aixla-Chapelle, which brought the first war in Flanders to a successful conclusion. Yet it was clear that this fête took its tone from the new mistress it aimed to please. The change in Louis’s character was reflected in his choice of theme for his party. Its title, “Les Fêtes de l’Amour et de Bacchus,” celebrated earthy, rather than ethereal pleasures. The imaginary delights of an enchanted isle give way to sensual gratification. Louis took a good deal of personal trouble over the preparations. He filled the gardens of his father’s old house with marvels, arranging Savonnerie tapestries, marble statues and orange trees in silver tubs among the trees. Following a collation of candied fruits set amid miniature palaces of pastry and marzipan served in the grove of the Etoile, the King led his guests by carriage to admire the Bassin des Cygnes, after which they repaired to the outdoor theater constructed by the Duc de Créqui, where they watched Molière’s Georges Dandin and one hundred dancers in Lully’s ballet Le Triomphe de Bacchus.
    Supper was served by the light of 300 candles alongside a model of Mount Parnassus, mythological home to Apollo and the Muses, equipped with real waterfalls. Sixty lucky people sat down with the King to fifty-six dishes, while another forty tried to look graceful about joining the Queen. Louise, who was still official mistress, sat next to Louis, but as the sound of the violins mingled with the rustle of the fountains, he could barely pull his eyes away from Athénaïs, shrieking with laughter among her friends — one of whom was Mme. Scarron. After supper, 3,000 guests danced outside the old château in an octagonal ballroom, specially created for the occasion by the royal architect, Le Vau, and adorned with great swaths of flowers. As once before, the fête concluded with magnificent fireworks, illuminated 1,000 at a time. When the rockets formed the King’s insignia in the sky, it was as though he had brought back the daylight for the delight of his secret love.
    This fête, the second of the three great divertissements given at Versailles, opens a new era in Louis’s reign. In the plans for the entertainment, Louis rehearsed the dominance over nature that was to characterize his project for Versailles, intended to show his mastery over his realm. It pleased him to ride roughshod over nature using his wealth, his will and his imagination to subdue it to his desires. In thus humanizing the landscape, he made himself master of it, showing his power to modify and even enhance what God had created. In fact, the three great fêtes of 1664, 1668 and 1674 might be interpreted as three “pagan Masses,” celebrating Louis’s omniscience as monarch. The world of the fête was one of constant mutation, of metamorphosis, the bright lights turning the Grand Bassin into a sea of fire beneath fountains of cascading fireworks. Statues became dancers; courtiers reappeared as shepherds, warriors, medieval troubadours; the very trees seem to uproot themselves to follow the King’s progress. In this shifting, shimmering world of illusions, the one constant was the King himself, the