After changing hands through three decades, Chantilly in 1386 became the property of Pierre d’Orgemont, Chancellor to Charles V of France, who laid the foundations of an imposing feudal fortress, flanked by seven stately towers.
Several centuries later a change again occurred in the ownership of Chantilly. By default of male issue it passed into the possession of Jean II, Baron de Montmorency, who married Marguerite, sole heiress of the Orgemonts; and with this illustrious family Chantilly emerged from comparative obscurity into historical fame. Henceforth it became a favourite centre for the leading men of France, and within its hospitable walls kings and princes found sumptuous entertainment.
Matrimonial alliance in the beginning of the seventeenth century brought the property into the family of the Condés, a younger branch of the Bourbons; and later still, by the marriage of the last Prince de Condé with Princesse Bathilde d’Orléans, and the tragic death of their only son, the Duc d’Enghien, Chantilly passed into the possession of its last private owner, Prince Henri d’Orléans, Duc d’Aumale.
The family of the Montmorencys was well known and famous in France during the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, but became extinct under Richelieu, who, for reasons of state, sent the last scion of that race, Henri de Montmorency, to the scaffold.
Plate II.
