Mistrusting Medics Might Save Monarchies-A PoD concerning French Royalty ca.17122

After oh-so-many years silently and humbly lurking,finally a PoD bit me and wont leave me alone:to wit, what if the tragedy of 1712 had not struck the French House of Bourbon? Let us recap:after his father.the Grand Dauphin,had died the year before,the young Duc de Bourgogne,aged 29,became the new Dauphin.Himself having two healthy and strapping boys(the Duc de Bretagne, aged four,and the Duc
de Anjou,aged two) and a spirited and wellbeloved wife still in her child-bearing years(Marie-Adelaide de Savoie,the apple of old Louis Quatorzes eye) the sucession seemed secure.People in the court stated flocking to the camp of the new dauphin,of whom Great Things were expected soon,for sureley the old sovereign wasnt long for this world anxmore.The new Dauphin was considered earnest,well-educated and very devout.He was devoted to his wife and his familly and had an accquired distaste for war. His personal habits were considered frugal and even somewhat boring.Politically he seemed to be less autocratic and more open to counsel than his grandfather.All in all,change seemed to be around the bend....
What came around said bend was Death int the form of either smallpox or measeles.Early in the year Marie-Adeleliade caught whatsoever epedemic went round Versailles and ,also probably due to the usual medical blunders of the age such as bleeding fever-weakened patients ,promptly died leaving her husband broken-hearted and infected.Despite (or perhaps because) intense medical support he died one week later,followed to the grave by his elder son.The later Louis 15 survived only to become such because his nursemaid barricaded herself with him in secluded rooms taking care for him in his illness without aid of learned doctors....
Now,the PoD is obviously somebody managing to save either all (my preference) or the male Bourbon victims so there will be no regency needed when the sun king passes away around two to five years later:instead we will see a thirtysomething grown man with formed opinions probably not wanting to continue the goverment style of the old king.Said ATL Louis 15 is -taking typical Bourbon lifespans in account-going to rule for twenty to thirty years and god only knows whom of his descendants is going to suceed him.This is going to change cultural ,social and political history all over europe for suure,letting loose trampling swarms of quantum butterfies in the roccoco china shop of international politcs...
Now I have run my fool self ragged trying to come up with answers what exactly to expect from such changes and save for a vague hope of avoiding the French Revolution by better governance,a higher involvement of France in North America and elsewhere and the strange notion of a cardinal-archbihop Arouet being a important court figure I have got NOTHING. So I place the ball now in your court ,esteemed forummateslease come up with some ideas.opinions,criticisms or(dare I hope ?) timelines ,for mercys sake-all of it very appreciated by The eyes of nostradamus

Princess Marie Adélaïde, died 12 February 1712, at the age of 26 and Louis, Dauphin of France, Duke of Burgundy, died 6 days later at the age of 29

So the POD will have to be before mid of January (the date most likely she caught it, as measles takes 14 days to show signs and then nearly 20 days to kill you) I thought of doing a early French version of "Edward Jenner" but this would be to bizarre even for ASB, so we need to keep the young heir's family away from the sick.

Maybe have the family travel to Turin, the capital of the Duchy of Savoy to visit her father, avoiding the sick and have the family return to France in the Summer or Autumn of 1712, when King Louis XIV dies (Three years earlier.)

Making Louis, Dauphin of France, Duke of Burgundy, TTL version of Louis XV

Jonathan said:

I thought of doing a early French version of "Edward Jenner" but this would be to bizarre even for ASB, so we need to keep the young heir's family away from the sick.

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Actually such a POD is not ASB at all, almost the opposite in fact.
Any of those guys might have been a "Jenner" candidate:

-Numerous French Jesuits were active in China during the 17th and 18th centuries-

French Jesuits pressured the French king to send them to China with the aims of counterbalancing the influence of Ottoman Empire in Europe. The Jesuits sent by Louis XIV were: Jean de Fontaney (1643–1710), Joachim Bouvet (1656-1730), Jean-François Gerbillon (1654–1707), Louis Le Comte (1655–1728) and Claude de Visdelou (1656–1737).
(wikipedia)

"Inoculation against smallpox in China did not become widely known and practiced until the period 1567-72, according to the author Yu T'ien-Chih. Vivid descriptions of the practice are recorded by Yu Chang in his book Miscellaneous Ideas in Medicine, of 1643."
(The Genius of China: 3000 Years of Science, Discoveries and Inventions")

Thanks,gentlemen.So,can someone confirm-measeles or smallpox?Since an early inoculator(I would suppose a jesuit doctor,not impossible apropos Bourgognes religious leanings) would probable not extend the smallpox treatment to another disease..... The idea of simply removing them from the scene of the disaster also has merit,but why would they travel so far with small children in tow? On an unrelated note,nobody interested in what gappens once history is derailed?I always find the actzal development after thetimeline branching the most interesting thing.....

Thanks,gentlemen.So,can someone confirm-measeles or smallpox?Since an early inoculator(I would suppose a jesuit doctor,not impossible apropos Bourgognes religious leanings) would probable not extend the smallpox treatment to another disease..... The idea of simply removing them from the scene of the disaster also has merit,but why would they travel so far with small children in tow? On an unrelated note,nobody interested in what happens once history is derailed?I always find the actual development after the timeline branching the most interesting thing.....

eyes of nostradamus said:

Thanks,gentlemen.So,can someone confirm-measeles or smallpox?Since an early inoculator(I would suppose a jesuit doctor,not impossible apropos Bourgognes religious leanings) would probable not extend the smallpox treatment to another disease..... The idea of simply removing them from the scene of the disaster also has merit,but why would they travel so far with small children in tow? On an unrelated note,nobody interested in what gappens once history is derailed?I always find the actzal development after thetimeline branching the most interesting thing.....

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Firstly, while the duc de Bourgogne might've been a fan of the Jesuits, Marie-Adélaïde was not. Her last confession was to a priest of known Jansenist sympathies. Also, considering the fact that 1711 had seen a smallpox epidemic rage through Europe (carrying off the Holy Roman Emperor, a couple of kids of the duc de Lorraine and Mgr. le Dauphin) its not unlikely that the Bourgognes caught the tail end of it. The supreme irony, of course, being that Louis XV was saved from smallpox in 1712 only for it to kill him in 1774.

Gentlemen,I think we know now that ITTL the Bourgognes got hit by the last flickers of the 1711 smallpox epidemic-but for this PoD to work,we need a semi-plausible way to curtail it. The bit about jansenist sympathies actually fits my impression of the somewhat moralistic sentiments of the Bourgognes,no argunent here,but how DO we save them? Also (this problem aside) is there anyone interested in the effects of the PoD? ,

Well, smallpox COULD be fatal, it wasn't necessarily always. And since Queen Caroline had her kids variolated AFAIK, which was an early form of inoculation as I understand it, a butterfly bringing that to the French court (considering her correspondance with the dowager duchesse d'Orléans) is perhaps not that weird. So, perhaps rather than avoiding it, the Bourgognes simply have better luck surviving it. Ms. Valena might have ideas if that was at all possible. And as a result variolation gets to the French court before to London and Vienna.

Here's a link to an older thread with a...ahem spirited debate, maybe there's some answers there?: https://www.alternatehistory.com/discussion/showthread.php?t=294790

Ms. Valena is here.
And that old debate got derailed in...strange directions, but anyways, variolation concept is not that new and it coming from Britain is even getting it BACKWARDS.
Variolation is practiced in Ottoman Empire.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Variolation#Lady_Mary_Wortley_Montagu
The very same Ottoman Empire that is an ancient ally of France. Going all the way to China or getting the idea second-hand from Brits is completely unnecessary.

Many thanks,dear lady-so for the sake of the argument and to proceed from the Pod.lets postulate an embassy from the Grand Turk led by some aritculate and persuasive hakim coming to Versailles just in the wake of the Grand Dauphins death ;the ambassador convinces the king and the heir to take precautions against another outbreak by inoculating the royal familly;everything works out and the disaster is averted.The Sun King dies somewhen in the next five years ,as anything else would be rather ASB, and Bourgogne becomes Louis 15.What happens next?Who,if any,becomes first minister-Fenelon?Someone else?What,if any, reforms are tackled?What alliances are pursued,what prorities set internally?Will colonial policy change?What about the conflicted relations of the French church and the Roman curia?The enlightment is starting,how will TTL Louis 15 react?Ideas,comments ,everything pretty much in demand here.....

Both measles and smallpox were well known, and the doctors of the time, as dangerous as they were, would have been able to tell them apart. Smallpox has about a 30% plus mortality rate, children do better with it than adults. Since the royal family lived in a more or less urban environment, not some isolated village it is likely that the adults had had some exposure to measles as children, even if they did not get sick. Measles is more likely to have a fatal outcome (due to measles/viral pneumonia) in adults although it can kill or cause permanent damage in children that's less common. All this makes me wonder exactly what it was that did in the entire family, even the nasty medical practices of the day such as bleeding, purging and medications using mercury were unlikely to be fatal quickly and so completely.

FWIW variolation was known although not commonly practiced as far away as colonial America by the early 18th century, so it being known and capable of being practiced in France at this time is highly probable although the extent of such practice would have been limited.

Variolation involves the use of smallpox matter from an infected to a non infected hopefully resulting in a mild case of smallpox which should confer lifetime immunity. Vaccination uses cowpox (Latin vacca=cow), this illness is almost always local giving the well known scar, though not truly lifetime in result - modern practice was re-vaccination every 10 years or so.

Can somebody please once and for all establish which illness was to blame so we can devise a realistic PoD and proceed to the actual Tl ? As far as I gather from the last posts,measles are the real problem to prevent and would best be avoided altogether ,whereas smallpox has a better survival rate and could easily be inoculated away.Therefore we need to establish the nature of our beast in order to continue to TL-work.

Just go with smallpox, even if it was measles. Due to the conflicting sources, you can "pick" the disease, so to speak.

I don't know how politically-active Fenelon was, and if he would really be 1st choice. Bourgogne had the support of people like the duc de Saint-Simon etc, and ideas for an earlier polysynodie.

In a tl where the Grand Dauphin becomes Louis XV they have the following breakdown:
Dauphin Louis (Bourgogne) has a party whose aim is administrative reform, strengthening of the provinces and intermediary councils between the people and the king, also exclusively nobles to sit at said councils rather than the new money of Louis XIV's reign.
Berri: stood for continuation of Louis XIVs policies, and gathered around him all who stood to lose from the dauphin's reforms.
Orléans: sarcastic man, agnostic, military successes, stood for reform
Maine: LXIV's fave son, so many oldtimers went to his party instead of Berri's, seeing Berri as an unweighed quantity.

Good and well,lets use the Turkish embassy prevents small pox variant then, call our ambassador Orhan Huyuk Hakim Pasha and let the heathen gain the unending gratitude of the most christian king.aThen 1715 Louis 14 dies right on schedule,Bourgogne becomes King Louis 15 and presumable starts decentralizing,re-aristocratifying and generalyy changing tack,Who will be his allies,who will-if any- oppose this?What will be the results of it,who will now become the great men of the court?Which changes in foreign policy and cultural development will the new king effect?Will there be an attempt of toning down the expensive extravagancies of the previous reign?Also ,will the rising borgeoise take its losses in good grace?Questions to be considered.... Concernig Fenelon:most sources seem to think he was- firmly expecting to be a key advisor of his former pupil - devastated when he died ,thereby shattering his high hopes. May have been wishful thinking on his part,thuogh.Maine and the other legitimes are in the doghouse,me thinks,and while I can see Saint-Simon -old snob he is-rejoice at the new role of the aristocracy of the sword,his hero-worship of the former king could hamstring a political role badly in the face of abandonment of his policies.....

Not sure why there are not more responses to this. Just La Petite Dauphin let alone his wife and oldest son changes the face of European history. I've read quite a bit on Marie-Adelaide (not only have there been biographies of her but even in bios of Louis XIV -like Antonia Fraser's - she comes to dominate the last years of the Sun King's life) and although there hasn't been much written on Burgundy he is an interesting character as well.
Here's what we get if Louis, Marie-Adelaide and Louis of Brittany live (and I've heard several sources say that at least in the case of M-A and Brittany it was the Doctors who killed them by bloodletting which is why Madam de Ventadour saved Anjou/Louis XV by not letting the doctors touch him):

-La Petite Dauphin, was highly popular among the masses at the time of his death (so he will have good will on his side). To reformers like St. Simon and Fenelon at court, he was the great hope of France. Even the notoriously critical Liselotte, Dowager Duchesse of Orleans had good things to say about him. It was thought he would bring many changes to France, not the least of which is the policy of decentralization to the provinces (the opposite of his grandfather’s policies). De-evolution (which goes against everything France had been building for and still is today) might butterfly away the Parisian-centered French Revolution which did away with all French provinces. But with several generations of the Provinces keeping their identity and having decisions made locally they might not take too kindly any Committees of Public Safety or representatives on mission with absolute powers. In fact I’d wager if Burgundy lives then the French Revolution as we know it (and the Napoleonic Wars that followed) will be entirely butterflied away - not the least of which because Louis XV’s excesses and Louis XVI’s existence probably never occur.

-Louis XIV’s semi-legitimated sons by Montespan would be out of the loop. The Duke of Orleans (OTL Regent) as well. I can definitely see the pious Burgundy looking at the atheistical and ambitious Phillipe of Orleans as a threat. A whole new set of people would be governing France.

-In Marie-Adelaide, France would have its first popular and actually powerful Queen since Anne of Austria. In OTL, the Queens of France did not have an easy time of it - Maria Theresa of Spain and Marie Leszczyńska were largely ciphers, Madam de Maintenon was morgantic and behind the scenes and Marie-Antoinette was hated. Marie-Adelaide was raised in the court of Savoy with political intelligence, took classes with her husband, and had the backbone her husband lacked. He didn’t call her his “Draco” (Draconian) for nothing. She was also immensely popular and if she never gets or survives smallpox she is young enough to have even more children.

-Very high possibility that Louis XVI will be Brittany and not Anjou (our timeline Louis XV). Also likely zero chance that either will marry the older Marie Leszczyńska since the need for an heir won’t be that desperate. Which mean both will probably marry elsewhere. How about one of the daughters of Peter the Great (who visited France after Louis XIV’s death) as part of an alliance? Such an alliance in the mid-1700s would change things a lot - especially if one of the sons married OTL Empress Elizabeth who is not there in Russia to launch the coup that dethrones the infant Ivan VI.

-Also likely that Brittany and Anjou will have more siblings (since Marie-Adelaide is still young) and that both will turn out as pious as their parents (instead of the playboy hedonist Louis XV became in OTL). Burgundy is said to be monkish ever since Fenelon became his teacher and Marie-Adelaide is said to have noticeably calmed down from her hijinks as Duchess of Burgundy when she became Dauphine.

-Possibly greater support for the Jacobite cause in 1715 or 1745? Princess Louisa Stuart and James Francis Edward were definitely part of Marie-Adelaide’s inner circle and she possibly could convince Louis XIV (who it is said loved her more than any other woman outside his mother) to send an actual army.

-The alliance/union with Spain would be tight for at least a lifetime. It has been said that the person Phillipe of Anjou (Philip V) loved most in the world was his brother, Burgundy and it was his brother’s death (and then his first wife’s - Marie-Adelaide’s sister) which sent him into the depression that lasted the rest of his life. He is also unlikely to abdicate in 1724 (which some saw as a way to claim the French throne if the young Louis XV died) and his son Luis I will probably not marry Louise Elisabeth d’Orleans (the Regent’s daughter). There is also the possibility that Maria Luisa of Savoy lives (she died in 1714 of TB) and even she does not I can definitely see Marie-Adelaide having the major influence of Philip’s new bride, which may not be Elizabeth Farnese (which would butterfly away not only Charles III but almost most of OTL Spanish/Parma/Two-Sicilies Bourbons. I can also see Louis/Burgundy eventually fighting for the Spanish/Austrian Netherlands on France’s border or possibly engineering a trade with Naples for them (which would put the House of Lorraine, already heirs of Tuscany and Milan ruling the majority of Italy).

-Which would leave open the question of who DOES the Heiress of Parma marry?

-Charles, Duke of Berri, possibly lives. Easily to butterfly Berry-Bon Couer’s death from a hunting accident if his brother’s family lives. He might have been doing something else that day since he was no longer Regent in Waiting. And if his promiscious wife Marie Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans still dies in 1719, that leaves the still-young Berry to wed some European heiress to further a French alliance.

-There's always the possibility that Louis XIV actually lives longer in a TL with Burgundy and his family survive. Most biographies agree that he was crushed by the death of M-A and Louis and was never the same afterward.

Bumping the thread to see if there any takers.

jb3 said:

-Which would leave open the question of who DOES the Heiress of Parma marry?

-Charles, Duke of Berri, possibly lives. Easily to butterfly Berry-Bon Couer’s death from a hunting accident if his brother’s family lives. He might have been doing something else that day since he was no longer Regent in Waiting. And if his promiscious wife Marie Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans still dies in 1719, that leaves the still-young Berry to wed some European heiress to further a French alliance.

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How about we combo this?

Valena said:

How about we combo this?

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I thought about it, but I just doubt the Heiress of Parma will remain unmarried until she was 27 (in 1719 when Berri's wife dies). So I think she will be married to someone else before then who will be a new player in Italy - perhaps James Francis Edward Stuart (who was half-Italian, and did not marry Clementina Sobieski till 1719)?

I think keeping all of all the Grand Dauphin's sons alive (as well as Marie-Adelaide and perhaps her sister the Queen of Spain as well) instead of just Philip V alone will have repercussions. Not only no Regency but as a group they were all close (Marie-Adelaide was notoriously still loyal to her Savoy family despite arriving in France at 12) and the grandsons of Louis XIV were very bonded. They would basically form a court amongst themselves pushing out Louis XIV's illegitimate children and the Duke of Orleans (OTL Regent).

Well, according to the biographies on Adélaïde I read, the king's illegitimate children were close to le Grand Dauphin, and in Antonia Fraser's words, "when he [the dauphin] died, the wasps in the cabal at Meudon lost their power to sting". And to quote another biographer on Louis XV's daughters - "they were the unfortunate generation whose turn had never come".

Also, Adélaïde... hated is perhaps too strong a word, but severely disliked la Montespan's daughters, particularly as a result of several scathing verses Mme la Duchesse had written about her, her husband, etc. And I don't know if Adélaïde's matchmaking skills would be a good thing in preventing Isabel Farnese from arriving in Spain, or a bad thing, considering how she picked the duchesse de Berri (based on a personal pique). Although, she might propose Louisa Maria Theresa for Philip V as bride, which would certainly be interesting. Equally, la Consolatrice might end up as the second duchesse de Berri.

JonasResende said:

Well, according to the biographies on Adélaïde I read, the king's illegitimate children were close to le Grand Dauphin, and in Antonia Fraser's words, "when he [the dauphin] died, the wasps in the cabal at Meudon lost their power to sting". And to quote another biographer on Louis XV's daughters - "they were the unfortunate generation whose turn had never come".

Also, Adélaïde... hated is perhaps too strong a word, but severely disliked la Montespan's daughters, particularly as a result of several scathing verses Mme la Duchesse had written about her, her husband, etc. And I don't know if Adélaïde's matchmaking skills would be a good thing in preventing Isabel Farnese from arriving in Spain, or a bad thing, considering how she picked the duchesse de Berri (based on a personal pique). Although, she might propose Louisa Maria Theresa for Philip V as bride, which would certainly be interesting. Equally, la Consolatrice might end up as the second duchesse de Berri.

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Right. If Burgundy and Marie-Adelaide live to take the thrown the entire ruling class (including Orleans IMO and definitely Montespan's offspring) would be sent back to their plotting and country estates. Both Marie-Adelaide and Burgundy were very much forthright political players (in comparison to what would have happened had the Grand Dauphin lived).

Louisa Stuart died in 1712. It would be fairly easy to butterfly away her death (many thought her brother who lived was the more sickly one), although in 1719 should be 27, the same age of Elisabeth Farnese - although it would be reasonable that she would remain unmarried to that age then the Parma heir. By all accounts Marie-Adelaide actually settled down after becoming Dauphine and became more dedicated to her husbands and his prerogatives (she engineered the disgrace of the Duc de Vendome because of his insinuations about Burgundy's role on the battlefield). She was also close to his brothers (Philip of course was married to her sister) since she grew up with them. I think she might have chosen wisely for Berri (and let's not mistake it - it would have been her choice) if Berri lives and his Orleanist wife still dies early. I think everyone at court recognized that marriage was a disaster.