The World Changes

The chapter follows the progressive politicization of Colson and his neighbors during the so-called pre-Revolutionary period (1787–89), taking note of the extent to which he and they were taken totally by surprise by the events of that period. It examines, notably, Colson’s reaction to the Assembly of Notables of 1787; to the long struggle between Louis XVI and the Parlement of Paris; to the convocation of the Estates General for May 1789; and to the electoral assemblies and the statements of grievances (cahiers de doléances) drawn up in those assemblies. It also emphasizes Colson’s descriptions of the “hurricane” of July 1788 that destroyed a large proportion of the crops in northern France, and of the terrible winter of 1788–89 and its effects on the population of Paris.

Philip the Fair of France and His Family’s Disgrace: The Adultery Scandal of 1314 Revealed, Recounted, Reimagined, and Redated

In the spring of 1314, the three daughters-in-law of King Philip the Fair of France were seized as adulteresses, and two young knights, their alleged lovers, were brutally put to death at Pontoise, their property confiscated.1 The knights in question were brothers, Philippe and Gautier d’Aulnay, whose actions brought singular dishonor to their line and to their father Gautier, a faithful vassal and supporter of Count Charles of Valois, Philip the Fair’s brother and close confidant.2 Two of the king’s disgraced daughters-in-law were sent to the Norman fortress of Château-Gaillard. The oldest, Marguerite of ducal Burgundy (ca. 1289‐1315), the daughter of the late Duke Robert of Burgundy (1248‐1306) and of Saint Louis’s daughter Agnes of France († 1327), was married to Louis (1289‐1316, r. 1314‐1316), king of Navarre and heir to the throne of France. Taken with her was Blanche of Artois and comital Burgundy (1296/1297‐1325/1326), wife of the king’s third son Charles of La Marche (1294‐1328, r. 1322‐1328), and daughter of the late Count Othon of Burgundy († 1303) and of Mahaut († 1329), countess of Artois and Burgundy. Jeanne (1287/1288‐1330), Blanche’s elder sister and wife of Philip of Poitiers (1290/1291‐1322, r. 1316‐1322), enjoyed prestige and standing the other two lacked because of the great landed inheritance, the county of Burgundy, which she had brought to her marriage. Perhaps because of this, perhaps because her guilt seemed less clear than that of the others, she was treated differently and imprisoned near Paris, at Dourdan. After Philip the Fair died on 29 November 1314, Jeanne was released, around Christmastime, declared innocent after proceedings in the Parlement of Paris. News of the shocking and unprecedented scandal spread throughout the realm of France and beyond its borders. Marguerite and Blanche were generally considered guilty, even though there was wonderment at how the affair could have taken place.3

Book III. The Parlement of Paris.

Chapter I. Dishonoured Bills. While the unspeakable confusion is every where weltering within, and through so many cracks in the surface sulphur-smoke is issuing, the question arises: Through what crevice will the main Explosion carry itself? Through which of the old craters or chimneys;...