I Am Louis XIV

  Chapter 84 Mrs Christina is worried

As I said before, personal emotions must always give way to national affairs. Although Philip, Duke of Anjou was still unhappy, and Marie Mancini was very worried, the king could only give the former a promise to go hunting in Versailles together, and then Give the latter a permission to enter and leave the king's study at any time, and then continue to work tirelessly for France - the most important thing is probably the one that Bishop Mazarin mentioned, the intention to let Madame Christina Alexandra Was elected as the plan of the Queen of Naples.

First of all, the history of Naples should be mentioned here. Naples is a combination of an area located in southern Italy and Sicily. It was jointly occupied by the Byzantines, Lombards and Turks. Later, the Normans drove them all out and took their Divided into a country, Naples, but it was never recognized by the Pope and the Holy Roman Emperor, and decades later, the area was taken over by the Holy Roman Emperor of the Hohenstaufen family, but in 1266 In 2009, Charles of Anjou, the younger brother of King Louis IX of France, acquired the country at the request of the Pope—of course, Clement IV was a French pope at that time, and everyone knew where the request came from— At that time, the last member of the Hohenstaufen family, Xiaokang Latin resolutely raised his troops to confront Charles, but he was defeated and captured. Then, with the Pope's acquiescence and people's uproar, Charles did not hesitate to cut off Xiaokang Latin's head and let the family This extinction also eliminates the last bit of trouble they may bring.

After this, Charles moved the capital from Sicily to Naples, showing his great ambitions, but like every ruler, he was not friendly to the people of Naples, and he was tyrannical and reckless, triggering the famous Sicilian Vespers The riots, Sicily split from Naples and became the possession of the Spanish Aragonese royal family - at the beginning of the fourteenth century, Naples briefly prospered for a period of time, but from the late fourteenth century to the beginning of the fifteenth century, the Anjou royal civil war Endless, as a result, Alfonso V of Spain became a fisherman in the snipe and clam competition. He used the title of Two Sicilies in 1443, pointing to Naples and Sicily at the same time - in 1495, it was replaced by the French King Charles VIII. It was recaptured by the world, but in less than ten years, Spain regained the dominion of these two places. After that, Spain also knocked on its bones without any pity, triggering the Massaniello Incident—not long ago, that is, July 47.

At that time, if France was not in chaos, Bishop Mazarin really wanted to intervene, and now it is the same. The Neapolitans are full of anger and resentment against the Spaniards. With a little provocation, the Sicilian Vespers and Massani love It is not difficult to repeat the Luo incident, and then they can introduce the former Queen of Sweden. Among the nobility, Christina's reputation is not bad, because she has always been keen to canonize nobility, so as to stabilize her rule, but businessmen and officials People didn't like her, maybe the commoners, maybe because she was too extravagant as a queen - she was a profligate, but every monarch at the time was like that.

It is very simple for her to become the master of Naples, with the support of France, the approval of the Church of Rome, the promise to the Neapolitans that they will never collect taxes arbitrarily, and maybe get married and have children. She has a room of her own in the Louvre, but she stays by the Queen Mother's side more to win the Queen Mother's favor. She also intends to flatter the King. She did not give the King an expensive gift, but Gave him a man - Rene Descartes.

As a philosopher, physicist, mathematician, and theologian, René Descartes was deeply favored by the former Queen Christina of Sweden, but the Roman Church hated him very much, because although he always insisted that he was a devout Catholic, But he always preached secret deism and atheism beliefs. The French mathematician and one of the king's teachers, Blaise Pascal, accused the old man, saying that there is no God in his philosophy, and he does not need God. But God, he shouldn't have said something like that, because his mentioning it made Louis interested, and he asked Bishop Mazarin to get him Descartes' books, among them "Geometry" and "Reflections" and "Meteorology" was placed on the king's bookshelf. Madame Christina saw it and said to the king that she was very willing to let Mr. Descartes come to France, because he was a rare scholar who was witty, knowledgeable and interesting. —The king listened, and asked her to write to Mr. Descartes, and let two credible people serve as messengers to meet the old man.

Descartes was born in 1596. After winning the appreciation of the Queen of Sweden, he decided to move to Sweden. Even if Her Majesty reminded him that Sweden was cold and not suitable for an old man, he still gave birth a few years ago. He was seriously ill, and on the advice of the doctor, he returned to the Netherlands, but because of the hostility of the church to him, he was not so happy - with the invitation of the French king, he naturally obeyed and came to Paris, D'Artagni The Count of Ang found him a place to live outside the Louvre, and the king gave him a sum of money to put him in—he had no wife and children, so he became very rich at once, not to mention the favor of the king, and he immediately became With guests at various parties, servants to serve, fine food and warm clothes, Mr. Descartes recovered quickly. Although not as good as young people, he could also ride horses and play tennis, but most of the time , he would rather lie in that comfortable big bed and let his thoughts gallop everywhere.

The king liked this gift very much, and the king talked to her several times, but it was because of this that Louis felt that as a king, Madame Christina was more than enough, and she was too emotional. Rich, her thoughts are too complex, she is easily driven by her own personal feelings, and her character is too paranoid, these are just some small flaws for a noble lady, but for a ruler, these weaknesses will be overcome by her enemies Zoom in infinitely.

   He spoke to the Bishop of Mazarin, and the Bishop said of course: "It is precisely because she is such a person that we need her to be the Queen of Naples."

   This sentence made Louis laugh. Yes, their original intention was not to find a real, authoritative and capable monarch for Naples, but to build a solid barrier between France and Spain.

  ———

But the last thing they wanted happened, just as Cristina was about to leave for Pesaro, where she was waiting for the final outcome of the negotiations between Naples and the French, a team of Spanish envoys suddenly appeared in Paris, and their The arrival made Bishop Mazarin immediately suspend the plan, and there is a possibility of premature death.

  Christina is of course angry about this, who leaked this secret? She came to Paris, nominally, to ask the King of France to mediate with her cousin, now the King of Sweden, about her annuity. Few people, almost a handful, knew about it.

   "I will find that man," she said to the king, and went to Avignon in the name of a pilgrimage.

   (end of this chapter)