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Melusine and her daughters
Oct. 13th, 2021 06:43 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
mildred_of_midgardHatton's George I bio has something I've been looking for for a while now: more detail on Katte's Aunt Melusine, mistress to G1. Not a lot is known about her, apparently. But I got more than is in Wikipedia.
First, I discovered in the detailed "how I rendered their names" section (the one that says "Braunschweig" is too foreign :P) that not only did Ehrengard Melusine von der Schulenberg go by her second name, so did her daughter Petronella Melusine. (I admit, I was very confused by Goldstone calling the older Melusine "Ermengarde", and not just because of the Ehrengard/Ermengarde!)
So the woman who had a fling with Katte whom we've been calling Petronella actually went by Melusine too, just to make it that much harder for writers of fiction. :P
The three daughters were not only never recognized by G1, Hatton is very unsure whether they even ever knew who their parents were. They were, remember, passed off as the daughters of Melusine's sisters and she was passed off as their aunt. Which is why Hervey is able to think that one of them is the mistress rather than the illegitimate kin of G1, G2, and Fritz of Wales.
Hatton says there's some evidence the daughters knew they were the children of G1 and Melusine, but some counterevidence (but that could just be them observing the proprieties).
That was news to me! I thought since Wikipedia lists them as the children of G1 and Melusine that it was common knowledge to contemporaries, but apparently this was a deduction by "recent" (book published in 1978) century scholars based on documentary evidence, like Melusine's will.
As to why the will doesn't say they're her nieces (but also doesn't say they're her daughters, again, this is a deduction), Hatton speculates:
We know that the duchess of Kendal (the title by which Melusine was known in England after 1719) was a regular churchgoer, at least in her later years, and the phraseology of the religious preamble to the will is less stereotyped than those usually encountered. It would seem, therefore, that the solemnity of the occasion made it impossible for her to perpetuate the lie which had been forced upon her by circumstances.
As to why G1 never acknowledged them, she gives these speculative reasons:
1. When he was a young man, he fathered an illegitimate child. His parents, Ernst August and Sophia, came down on him hard and said he could have mistresses, but no scandals. They had an electorate to win! So after this, no more acknowledged illegitimate children.
2. The first two were born before the divorce, which meant there would have been a scandal.
3. After the divorce (this is G1 placing SD's mother SD of Celle under house arrest,cahn, and the disappearance of her lover), the divorce itself was a big scandal that endangered the quest to get recognition for the electoral status of Hanover, so no acknowledging any children that would have raked up the divorce scandal again.
Character portraits of Melusine and her daughters, for those who might want to write fic:
( More )
( More details from Hatton )
First, I discovered in the detailed "how I rendered their names" section (the one that says "Braunschweig" is too foreign :P) that not only did Ehrengard Melusine von der Schulenberg go by her second name, so did her daughter Petronella Melusine. (I admit, I was very confused by Goldstone calling the older Melusine "Ermengarde", and not just because of the Ehrengard/Ermengarde!)
So the woman who had a fling with Katte whom we've been calling Petronella actually went by Melusine too, just to make it that much harder for writers of fiction. :P
The three daughters were not only never recognized by G1, Hatton is very unsure whether they even ever knew who their parents were. They were, remember, passed off as the daughters of Melusine's sisters and she was passed off as their aunt. Which is why Hervey is able to think that one of them is the mistress rather than the illegitimate kin of G1, G2, and Fritz of Wales.
Hatton says there's some evidence the daughters knew they were the children of G1 and Melusine, but some counterevidence (but that could just be them observing the proprieties).
That was news to me! I thought since Wikipedia lists them as the children of G1 and Melusine that it was common knowledge to contemporaries, but apparently this was a deduction by "recent" (book published in 1978) century scholars based on documentary evidence, like Melusine's will.
As to why the will doesn't say they're her nieces (but also doesn't say they're her daughters, again, this is a deduction), Hatton speculates:
We know that the duchess of Kendal (the title by which Melusine was known in England after 1719) was a regular churchgoer, at least in her later years, and the phraseology of the religious preamble to the will is less stereotyped than those usually encountered. It would seem, therefore, that the solemnity of the occasion made it impossible for her to perpetuate the lie which had been forced upon her by circumstances.
As to why G1 never acknowledged them, she gives these speculative reasons:
1. When he was a young man, he fathered an illegitimate child. His parents, Ernst August and Sophia, came down on him hard and said he could have mistresses, but no scandals. They had an electorate to win! So after this, no more acknowledged illegitimate children.
2. The first two were born before the divorce, which meant there would have been a scandal.
3. After the divorce (this is G1 placing SD's mother SD of Celle under house arrest,
cahn, and the disappearance of her lover), the divorce itself was a big scandal that endangered the quest to get recognition for the electoral status of Hanover, so no acknowledging any children that would have raked up the divorce scandal again.Character portraits of Melusine and her daughters, for those who might want to write fic:
( More )
( More details from Hatton )
