Louis III, Prince of Condé

Louis III de Bourbon
Duke of Bourbon
Portrait by François de Troy
Prince of Condé
Tenure	1 April 1709 - 4 March 1710
Predecessor	Henri Jules, Prince of Condé
Successor	Louis Henri I, Prince of Condé
Born	(1668-11-10)10 November 1668 Hôtel de Condé, Paris, France
Died	4 March 1710(1710-03-04) (aged 41) Palace of Versailles, Île-de-France, France
Spouse	Louise Françoise de Bourbon ​ ​ (m. 1685)​
Issue Detail	Marie Anne, Mademoiselle de Bourbon Louis Henri I, Prince of Condé Louise Élisabeth, Princess of Conti Louise Anne, Mademoiselle de Charolais Marie Anne, Duchess of Joyeuse Charles, Count of Charolais Henriette Louise, Mademioselle de Vermandois Élisabeth Alexandrine, Mademoiselle de Sens Louis, Count of Clermont
House	Bourbon-Condé
Father	Henri Jules, Prince of Condé
Mother	Anne Henriette of Bavaria

Louis III de Bourbon, Prince of Condé (10 November 1668 – 4 March 1710) was a prince du sang as a member of the reigning House of Bourbon at the French court of Louis XIV.^[1] Styled as Duke of Bourbon from birth, he succeeded his father in 1709 as Prince of Condé (French pronunciation: [kɔ̃de]); however, he was still known by the ducal title. He was prince for less than a year.

Louis de Bourbon was born at the Hôtel de Condé in Paris on 10 November 1668 to Henri Jules de Bourbon, Prince of Condé and Anne Henriette of Bavaria,^[2] and was the grandson of le Grand Condé.^[3]

One of nine children, he was his parents' eldest surviving son. His sister, Marie Thérèse de Bourbon, was married to François Louis, Prince of Conti.^[4][5] Another sister, Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon, would marry Louis Auguste, Duke of Maine, a legitimised son of Louis XIV, in 1692. His youngest sister, Marie Anne de Bourbon, much later married the famed general Louis Joseph de Bourbon.^[6]

In June 1684, Louis XIV paid a visit to the Condés in order to demand the hand of the Duke of Bourbon for one of his daughters by Madame de Montespan; Louise Françoise, Mademoiselle de Nantes, who had just reached her eleventh birthday. However, due to this, the arrangement was kept secret until the following April,^[7] and in July 1685, they were married.^[2][8] It came as a surprise to the royal court seeing the marriage between a prince du sang and an illegitimate daughter of the king. The head of the House of Condé, le Grand Condé, however, acquiesced to the socially inferior match in the hope of gaining favour with the bride's father, Louis XIV.

The seventeen-year-old duc de Bourbon was known at court as Monsieur le Duc. After the marriage, his wife assumed the style of Madame la Duchesse. Louis was frequently unfaithful to his young wife, who, despite being initially heartbroken, eventually followed him in this path. One author noted that:^[9]

She learns that her husband is taking advantage of the Fontainebleau ladies with a few companions and gallop into the carriage to Paris to indulge in debauchery. The king, moved by her sorrow, sends her his physician and reproaches the equerry for not keeping a closer eye on the Duke of Bourbon. Fourteen is not an age for a princess to be so sad.

Like his father, who became Prince of Condé in 1687, Louis led a typical, unremarkable life. In appearance, he was unimpressive in comparison with his wife, famed for her beauty.^[10] He was short in stature, and a macrocephalic with a bilious complexion.^[8] He was also noted for his lack of intelligence, as well as being notoriously malevolent and offensive^[1] Saint-Simon, who disliked Louis, described him as:^[11]

... a man considerably shorter than the shortest men, who, without being fat, was stout all over, with a surprisingly large head and a frightening face; it was said that he was a dwarf of Madame la Princesse. He was lividly yellow, almost always looking furious, but at the same time so proud, so audacious that it was hard to get used to him. [...] He had wit, was well-read, retained some of an excellent education, and even displayed politeness and grace when he chose to; but he very rarely chose to. He had neither the avarice, nor the injustice, nor the baseness of his ancestors; but he possessed all their valor and showed application and intelligence in war. He also had the malice and all the cunning to increase his rank through subtle usurpations, and even more audacity and impetuosity than they did in attacking.

As a soldier, Louis showed some expertise and participated in the battles of Steenkerque (August 1692)^[11] and Neerwinden (1693).^[1] In June 1692, he also fought in the siege of Nancy.^[11]

Louis was prince de Condé for just over a year, dying only eleven months after his father. Like his father, and his paternal great-grandmother Nicole du Plessis,^[a] Louis was deemed insane several years before his death, "making horrible faces", as one historian noted. Bourbon died in 1710 at the age of 41.

By his marriage to Louise Françoise, Mademoiselle de Nantes, he had nine children, all of whom survived him:^[13][14][15]

1. Marie Anne Éléonore de Bourbon, Mademoiselle de Bourbon (22 December 1690 - 30 August 1760); became a nun.^[16]
2. Louis Henri I, Prince of Condé (18 August 1692 - 27 January 1740); married Marie Anne de Bourbon and had no issue. He later married Landgravine Caroline of Hesse-Rotenburg and had issue.
3. Louise Élisabeth de Bourbon (22 November 1693 – 27 May 1775); married Louis Armand, Prince of Conti and had issue.
4. Louise Anne de Bourbon, Mademoiselle de Charolais (23 June 1695 - 8 April 1758); died unmarried.
5. Marie Anne de Bourbon (16 October 1697 - 11 August 1741); secretly married Louis de Melun, Duke of Joyeuse.
6. Charles, Count of Charolais (19 June 1700 - 23 July 1760); secretly married Jeanne de Valois Saint Remy (descendant of Henri II of France) and had illegitimate issue.
7. Henriette Louise de Bourbon, Mademoiselle de Vermandois (15 January 1703 - 19 September 1772); died unmarried.
8. Élisabeth Alexandrine de Bourbon, Mademoiselle de Sens (15 September 1705 - 15 April 1765); died unmarried.
9. Louis, Count of Clermont (15 June 1709 - 16 June 1771); died unmarried.

• Sternberg, Giora (June 2014). Status Interaction During the Reign of Louis XIV. OUP Oxford. ISBN 978-0-19-964034-8.
• Achaintre, Nicolas Louis (1825). Histoire Généalogique Et Chronologique de la Maison Royale de Bourbon [Genealogical and Chronological History of the Royal House of Bourbon] (in French). Vol. 2. Mansut. ISBN 9782013512589. {{cite book}}: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)
• Noel, William (1912). The love-affairs of the Condés (1530-1740). London : Methuen. ISBN 9781149146569. {{cite book}}: ISBN / Date incompatibility (help)CS1 maint: publisher location (link)
• Townend, William (1858). The Descendants of the Stuarts. An Unchronicled Page in England's History. 2. Ed., with Add.
• Murray Lane, Henry (1911). The Royal Daughters of England and their Representatives. London Constable and Company, Ltd.
• Bernot, Jacques (2004). Mademoiselle de Nantes, fille préférée de Louis XIV (in French). Nouvelles Editions Latines. ISBN 978-2-7233-2042-9.
• Prime, Temple (1903). Notes Relative to Certain Matters Connected with French History: On the Feudal Nobility, the Appanage and the Peerage; on the Surnames of Collateral Branches of the House of France.--Bourbon, as a Surname in the Royal House, Extinct in 1830; Account of Some Lines Founded by Princes of the Royal House; Account of Four Lines of Princes Descended Illegitimately from the Royal House; Account of the Branches of the House of Lorraine which Settled in France. De Vinne Press.
• von Ammon, Christoph Heinrich (1768). Genealogie ascendante jusqu'au quatrieme degre inclusivement de tous les Rois et Princes de maisons souveraines de l'Europe actuellement vivans [Genealogy up to the fourth degree inclusive of all the Kings and Princes of sovereign houses of Europe currently living] (in French). Frederic Guillaume Birnstiel.

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