Summary
In the age of the Sun King, having one’s wife in the monarch’s bed was, for noblemen, a boundless source of privilege. When Louis XIV set his sights on Madame de Montespan, all of Versailles congratulated her husband, but they had reckoned without Louis-Henri de Pardaillan. Passionately in love with his wife, he took it very badly indeed, mounting a relentless, ruinous war against the most powerful man on earth to win her back.
