![]() Anne, as she told a confidante, had even feared the annulment of her marriage, since childlessness was one possible ground for repudiation according to the Catholic Church. The Queen had on the contrary endured twenty-two years of childless union. ![]() This was an age at which a royal princess might well expect to be a grandmother (Anne herself had been married at fourteen). ![]() When Louis, her first child, was born on 5 September 1638 the Spanish-born Queen of France was just short of her thirty-seventh birthday. The first woman in the life of Louis XIV - and probably the most important - was his mother, Anne of Austria. ![]() They saw in the arms of this princess whom they had watched suffer great persecutions with so much staunchness, their child-King, like a gift given by Heaven in answer to their prayers. ![]()
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