Alternates are a collection of noblemen including a naturalized German, and that other wily lay cardinal, Jules Mazarin.Īs the godlike Divine Right arm of church and state, the Sun King was not just any old French monarch.
Conspiracy theorists, most of them left-wing “republicans,” ferret out “real” biological parents and have turned up many, especially on the woman-shy father’s side.Īmong the candidates for biological father is the sly, red-robed Cardinal Richelieu, though he was an antique by 1637 when conception occurred. Royalists and other apologists explain the miracle with meteorology, calendars, and dynastic pressures, which presumably spurred performance. Both putative parents were thirty-seven years old, he a geezer with “the libido of a goldfish” as one pundit has put it and she an old maid by the standards of the day.
The creature’s vital juices are an essential part of the regal hare recipe, and blood is equally essential in the tale of Mazzarino and Louis XIV.įor centuries a controversy has boiled and bubbled about Louis XIII’s presumed inability to sire an heir, and the “miraculous” birth of the little Sun King after decades of barren wedlock to Anne of Austria. Reprinted with permission from A Taste Of Paris: A History Of The Parisian Love Affair With Food Thicker Than WaterĪs any cook will tell you, blood is not just thicker than water it takes longer to come to a boil or reduce in a recipe for slow-simmered pressed duck or, better, lièvre à la royale. In the excerpt below, Downie rehashes the history of King Louis XIII’s fatherhood troubles through a bloody lens while looking at the how lièvre à la royale is served today by the likes of Alain Ducasse and Paul Bocuse. Food writer David Downie makes the connection of blood’s role in the dish and French history in his latest book, A Taste Of Paris. Blood is an essential ingredient to the vintage French dish, lièvre à la royale, or slow-cooked hare that’s dressed with a sauce made of the red stuff.
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