Artois was born October 9, 1757 at the Palace of Versailles. He was a member of the House of Bourbon and the grandson of King Louis XV. With his father and three older brothers ahead of him in line for the throne, no one expected Artois would ever be king. He received no formal education and led an idle and undisciplined life at court. When his grandfather died in 1774 (his father and eldest brother having already passed away), Artois’s brother became King Louis XVI.
The Don Juan of Versailles
The Count of Artois was said to be handsome, charming, generous and impulsive. He was a horseman, a gambler and a playboy – the “Don Juan” of Versailles. (1) Artois was a close friend of Louis XVI’s wife, Marie Antoinette. The two of them indulged in expensive frivolities, like the construction of the Château de Bagatelle. Their activities highlighted the gulf between the royal family and ordinary French people, and added to the unrest that sparked the French Revolution.
