Oil on canvas, 61cm by 51cm.
Louise de la Vallière (1644-1710) was one of the many mistresses of Louis XIV of France, by whom she had five children, only two surviving infancy.
She was deeply religious and some time after being replaced in the King’s affections, she took the veil as an act of contrition, and entered a Carmelite convent in Paris at the age of thirty.
The 1763 Burghley Inventory records: ‘The Marble Hall……Madame la Valiere a copy by Pattoon.’
