The Comtesse De Polignac and the Marquis De Nesle
Women continued to duel with each other over men even in enlightened eighteenth-century France. This time the aristocratic ladies in question, Madame de Nesle and Madame de Polignac had never been close friends. However, they ended up as deadly enemies when they became rivals for the heart of Armand de Vignerot du Plessis, third Duke de Richelieu and the great-great-nephew of the infamous Cardinal Richelieu.
The Comtesse de Polignac was renown for her love affairs. However, she had met her match in Richelieu. The Duke was a notorious womanizer, and a grand manipulator of women and de Polignac fell for him hard. However, once he had toyed with her for a while, de Richelieu left her for the “very beautiful and very romantic” Marquise de Nesle. Richelieu not only abandoned de Polignac; he tormented her. He refused to speak to or acknowledge her, driving the woman into a senseless frenzy of jealousy.
Eventually, de Nestle became weary of de Polignac’s histrionics. So, in 1721, she wrote to the Comtesse and challenged her to a duel. The Comtesse accepted. This time, pistols were the weapons of choice and the ladies agreed to meet in the Bois de Boulogne with their seconds at the appointed time. The ladies were to walk towards each other until they were within just a scarf’s distance from each other and then fire at will. Madame De Nesle fired the first shot- but it fell short of its target. However, when Madame de Polignac fired her shot, she succeeded in wounding her rival in the shoulder.
Because of the quantities of blood, de Polignac believed that her rival was dead- or soon would be. However, before returning to her carriage, she treated the potential corpse to a haughty diatribe. “I will teach you the consequences of robbing a woman like me of her lover,” said de Polignac, as she stood victorious over the prone body of the Marquise. Then, as de Nesle’s seconds attended to her, she muttered to herself: “If I had the perfidious creature in my power, I would tear out her heart as I have blown out her brains.”
However, much to the Comtesse’s disappointment, the Marquise lived. However, de Polignac still had her revenge, albeit indirectly. For shortly afterward, the Duke moved on to a new lover, abandoning the Marquise in favor of the daughter of the Regent of France, Charlotte Aglae d’Orleans. Presumably, this lady was so well placed that no one wanted to duel her. Or maybe Richelieu’s past lovers had realized that he simply was not worth the bloodshed.
Female dueling continued until as late as the turn of the twentieth century.