Jeanne, Queen of Charles I. of France, maintained a female fool of the
name of Artaude du Puy, but of whom we know nothing more than that she
cost her mistress, or rather the royal treasury, a considerable sum,
for dress. There is an unpublished autograph letter of Charles, dated
January 3, 1373, an extract from which, printed by the author of ‘_Les
Monnaies des Évêques_,’ etc., shows that the King orders his treasurers
to pay Jean Mandoli, furrier and citizen of Paris, the sum of 179 gold
francs, for certain gauds and braveries of woman’s dress, furnished “to
Artaude du Puy, Fole to our dear companion, the Queen.”
In 1429, we hear of a _moult gracieuse folle_ (she is so called by
St. Remy), whose name was Madame d’Or, and whose wit kept all the
nobles laughing at the festival in honour of the institution of the
Golden Fleece, at Bruges, in 1429. A _folle_ was also attached to the
household of Margaret, the granddaughter of Charles the Bold. Her
position in the household is clearly ascertained by the fact that, when
moving abroad, she followed her mistress in a chariot, accompanied by
the “_old_ ladies in waiting.”
In the succeeding century, in the year 1561, we find a woman, named La
Jardinière, registered as “Fole de la Royne,” attached to the rather
gloomy household of the Queen Dowager, Catherine de Medicis. Catherine
seems to have patronized this sort of official, for in 1568, and for at
least four subsequent years, there was a certain _Jacquette_, who held
in the Queen’s establishment the office of “Plaisante de la Royne.”
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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