The
Ranums'
Panat Times
Volume 1, redone Dec. 2014
Guise Musicians "Margot" and "Magdelon" and Isabelle
Margot and Magdelon
"Magdelon" (a haut dessus) and "Margot" (a dessus), for whom Charpentier wrote the two Lenten pieces (H. 157 and H. 95) in cahier 6 (which dates from Holy Week 1673), surely were Guise chambermaids — who tended to be given just that sort of nickname. Judging from the date of these two pieces and their position in Charpentier's autograph notebooks, they were intended for women in the service of either Marie de Lorraine or Isabelle d'Orléans (who at the time were sharing the Hôtel de Guise but would soon part company). At approximately the same date, Charpentier composed another piece (H. 19) for three women — haut dessus, dessus and bas dessus. They clearly were not nuns, for he identified the two higher parts as destined for "Melles B et T." Can these three women be identified with certainty? It is difficult, but not impossible.
In 1987, I proposed that "Magdelon" was "Magdaleine" Boisseau, Mlle de Guise's senior chambermaid (who had been christened Élisabeth); that "Margot" was Marguerite-Agnès de la Bonnodière de la Humière, the princess's maid of honor; that "Mlle B" was Mageleine Boisseau; and that "Mlle T" was "Isabelle" (Élisabeth) Thorin, a newly arrived chambermaid. I reasoned that it doubtlessly was the arrival of a new dessus that prompted Charpentier to identify the singers in these three pieces. (By contrast, he felt no need to identify the bas dessus who sang with Mlles T. and B., for there clearly was only one maid capable of singing that part.)
After the service for which this Ave Regina coelorum was intended, the maid with the low voice disappeared from the "French" (that is, the Guise) notebooks. This is an important clue in any search for "Magdelon" and "Margot." For, in June 1673 — in other words, shortly after this performance — Mme de Guise moved out of the Hôtel de Guise, taking her personal domestics with her. The unnamed bas dessus would therefore seem to have been one of her chambermaids, rather than one of Mlle de Guise's; but although the états of Mme de Guise's household for 1674 show five femmes de chambre, none bears a first name that permits certain identification as "Margot" or "Magdelon" nor as "Mlle B" or "Mlle T." Mme de Guise did, however, have a lingère, Catherine Brunet, who could be the mysterious "Mlle B" [Arsenal, ms. 6631, dossier II, wages for 1674]. Still, this is unlikely, for a lingère occupied a relatively low position in the household , and most of the women musicians named in Mlle de Guise's will of 1688 held the rank of chambermaid, or higher. It is also possible that "Margot" was Marguerite de Mornay, who left Mlle de Guise's employ at some point (perhaps as early as 1673?), after having "longtemps" been a fille d'honneur at the Hôtel de Guise [MC, XCIX, 292, pension, July 28, 1682, when she was a chanoinesse at Remiremont in Lorraine].
In short, "Margot" and "Magdelon" appear to have been Mlle de Guise's personal servants. So was "Mlle T." And so, it would seem, was "Mlle B." It is not clear whether "Mlle B" was Magdelaine Boisseau, that is, simultaneously "Mlle B" and "Magdelon," or whether "Mlle B" and "Magdelon" were different people. If so, a second domestic christened Marguerite has eluded me. Was "Margot" Marguerite-Agnès de la Bonnodière, the sister of Mlle de Guise's maid of honor, Françoise de la Bonnodière? Marguerite clearly was considerably younger than her sister, for her legacy was considerably smaller than Françoise's: 8,000 livres compared to 12,000 livres. In other words, in the late 1660s and early 1670s, she was still young enough to be a fille de la musique. No états of Mlle de Guise's household survive for the 1660s, however, so it is difficult to move from hypothesis to assertion concerning the identity of "Margot." Nor have I been able to trace her in the maze of the Minutier Central. For the same reasons, little is known about Élisabeth Boisseau, other than that she entered the Guise household prior to 1656. That is to say, Mlle de Guise's mother, who died in 1656, had given Boisseau some furniture [A.N., R*4 1056, inventory, items 195-96]. The legacy that Élisabeth Boisseau received in 1688, as first chambermaid, supports this reasoning: she was awarded a relatively small amount of cash (3,000 livres) but a sizeable pension (900 livres). In short, she did not need a dowry, she required a regular income for her old age. Indeed, if one assumes that Boisseau was in her twenties when she received the gift in 1656, she was well into her forties in 1673 and can be seen as ready to leave the ensemble once Mlle de Guise had trained a haut dessus to replace her. This replacement arrived on the scene several years later, in the form of a young adolescent, Geneviève de Brion, q.v. In the interim the higher part was sung by a chambermaid called Elisabeth or "Isabelle" Thorin, q.v.
"Isabelle" Thorin
"Isabelle" is indubitably the same person as "Thorin," for in April 1689 the executors of Mlle de Guise's will refer to "Elisabeth Thorin, fille majeure, demeurant à l'hôtel de Guise, femme de chambre ... sous le nom d'Isabelle par [le] codicille" de Mlle de Guise [Chantilly, A 15, April 19, 1689]. Judging from Elisabeth Thorin's position in the list of Mlle de Guise's domestics, she entered Mlle de Guise's service circa 1670. By 1688, she was too old to marry and was therefore willed both a sum of money (5,000 livres) and a pension (300 livres). Isabelle did indeed remain single, living on in the orangerie wing of the Hôtel de Guise with Henriette Nodot, also a senior chambermaid, who was more or less Boisseau's contemporary (and who was either the real or the pretend sister of the nun at Montmartre whom everyone believed to be Mlle de Guise's daughter). Over the years, the Mlles Nodot and Thorin prudently invested whatever money the Guise executors sent their way.
Isabelle's family origins remain unclear. Thorins do however crop up in Guise and Charpentier circles. For example, in the 1620s, a Catherine Thorin was the wife of Jean Thibert, concillor and élu at Meaux, where the composer's cousins resided. The name Thorin also has strong associations with Normandy, especially the environs of Alençon, Mme de Guise's duchy. For example, Thorin women were involved in marketing the lace produced there.
There is an even more intriguing thread that involves a Thorin, but following it to the end requires immersion in the records of the Minutier Centrale of Paris. In 1580 Ferrie Thorin, the widow of Pierre Le Grand, a master mason, gave the children of a painter named Pierre Jacquet (and Marie de Broye, his wife) the usufruct of her property — which included a house on the rue "Frepault" [AN., Y 120, f. 135; Y 121, f. 366v]. In 1629 that house was occupied by a certain Jacques Jacquet, mason and stone cutter [Y 170, f. 87v] who appears to have been Marceau Jacquet's grandson [fich. Lab. 35648, baptism of Jacques, son of Nicolas, in 1602; and 35594]. The links between the Thorins and the Jacquets are explained by the fact that both Ferrie Thorin's sister Jehanne and Pierre Jacquet, the painter, had married children of a painter named Pierre de Broue/de Broye [fich. Lab. 35665; 16310; 37912; 48898; 62898]. In other words, long before the ancestors of "Nanon"/Anne Jacquet, the Guise musician q.v., ever became instrument makers and began to call upon painters to decorate the soundboards of their instruments, and long before a Jacquet girl married a painter and eventually became Philippe de Champaigne's mother-in-law, this dynasty of masons had intermingled with a network of painters. None of these details permits an answer to the tantalizing question: Did Isabelle Thorin and Anne Jacquet consider themselves "cousins"?
For more on Mlles Thorin and Nodot: see MC, X 277, May 3 and Dec. 19, 1689; 278, Jan. 9, 1690; and also May 7, 1700; and LXXV, 338, constitution, June 19, 1687. Of special interest is the "transport réciproque" signed by Nodot and Thorin, Aug. 21, 1692, XC, 284: Thorin cedes Nodot the rights to the unpaid half of her Guise legacy, in return for a rente of 125 livres that Nodot had acquired in 1687. For Catherine Thorin, of Meaux, see MC., XX, 171, Apr. 19, 1628, fol. 227; and B.N., P.O. 2835, "Thorin," #62,960, pieces 3 and 4. Re the Thorins of Alençon: Marie Thorin, from Mamers, married Pierre Brossard, born into a merchant family of Le Mans "near Alençon," who had set up shop in Paris in 1698, MC., inventory, July 31, 1702. The Brossards, who sold the point de France and point de Malines lace that was made in Alençon, had a branch in that city (title 5). Marie's sister (?) Suzanne, was a "marchande" at Alençon, consentement, Aug. 26, 1702. Other Torins lived in nearby Mamers.