This lot is closed for bidding. Bidding ended on 9/11/2021
LA MOTTE, Jeanne de [Jeanne de Valois-Saint-Remy] (French, 1756-1791). Memoria di Giovanna di St Remy di Valois. 1786. 12mo. Rebound in blue paper. Penciled notes on front page. A trickster, con artist, and self-proclaimed countess, Jeanne de La Motte’s central role in the Diamond Necklace Affair and the subsequent fall of the French monarchy made her one of the most infamous women of the eighteenth century. Though neither King Louis XVI nor Marie Antoinette bore any direct responsibility for the scandal, both insisted on trying the countess and her accomplices in French court as a means of defending their honor. The notion of Marie Antoinette attempting to defraud the Crown’s jewelers in order to acquire an expensive diamond necklace and then her refusal to pay for it fed into the widespread perception that the monarchy was uncaring of the struggles of the common people, and the scandal led at least in part to the French Revolution and the execution of Marie Antoinette and Louis XVI.