While the Diamond Necklace incident seems more of a farce than a statement of fact, still much about 18th-century Versailles tended to be absurd. Seventeenth-century French society was deeply divided between the ultra-wealthy and the distressed peasants, with little social mobility among the lower classes. Perhaps no one knew this better than the young Jeanne de Valois-Saint-Rémy. Despite being of royal descent, Jeanne de Valois-Saint-Rémy was left on the streets because her alcoholic father could not even provide for her children’s necessities. I had to beg.
How could a nobleman fall into such suffering? Now, despite being a natural descendant of Henry II, her lineage goes back to “illegitimate” adultery. This meant that poor Jeanne could not enjoy all the splendor of royal life, although she received some education and married the French adventurer Nicolas de la Motte. It was noted that she looked quite pregnant at the wedding. Jeanne, who was her street kid yet in close proximity to the most powerful and wealthy families in the world, thought she would put herself and her family’s life above the difficult education she had to endure. I was determined to seize every opportunity to make myself comfortable.