16

In the spring of 1614, the princes of France entered into open conflict with the queen regent Marie de’ Medici and left the court. Recently emancipated, César de Vendôme, the legitimized natural son of Henry IV, took refuge in Brittany, a province where he had been governor since 1598. To justify and legitimize his conduct, he printed four letters addressed to the king (his brother) and the queen regent. These short texts reflect on a new way of exercising power for provincial governors. The latter deployed in their printed texts a precise political language and a discourse of obedience which are not simply testimonies to “rhetorical duplicity”. However, the discursive strategy of the Duke of Vendôme proves to be most fragile with the royal family as well as with the Breton gentlemen, who were deeply divided on the loyalty they owed him in the run-up to the meeting of the Estates General in Paris.