Anne Marie Louise D'Orleans Montpensier, duchess of, known as Mademoiselle, a French princess, born in Paris, May 29, 1627, died there, March 5, 1693. She was the daughter of Gaston, duke of Orleans, brother of Louis XIII.; and being one of the richest heiresses in the world, her whole youth was passed in negotiations of marriage, which were defeated, as she declared, by the intrigues of Cardinal Mazarin. During the wars of the Fronde (1649-'52) she sided with the Frondeurs, and compensated by her boldness and capacity for the weakness and indecision of her father. In 1652 she volunteered to command the expedition sent to Orleans, forced her way into the city by one gate while the royalists were vainly seeking admission at another, and secured the adhesion of the authorities to the cause which she favored. Returning to Paris in time to assist Conde at the battle of the Porte St. Antoine, July 2, she caused the guns of the Bastile to be fired upon the royal troops, though she still did not despair of becoming the wife of the young Louis XIV. Banished after the reestablishment of Louis's authority in Paris, she employed her exile in the composition of her Memoires, which were resumed in 1677, and continued till 1688. She finally returned to Paris in 1660, and lived in comparative retirement till 1669, when she fell in love with Lauzun, a poor Gascon noble six years younger than herself.

The king gave his consent to the marriage, but was induced to revoke it and to commit Lauzun to the Bastile, where he was confined for ten years. It is said that a secret marriage had already taken place. Mademoiselle finally obtained his release by giving up two of her largest estates to the duke of Maine, the king's natural son by Mme. de Montespan, but Lauzun proved ungrateful and brutal. She forbade him her presence, and passed the rest of her life in devotional exercises. In the library of Paris are two manuscripts of her Alemoires, of which one is probably an autograph. The work was published at Amsterdam in 1746, in 8 vols. The edition by Cheruel (Paris, 1858) contains a collection of letters and various writings from her pen, including the Relation de Vile imaginaire, and the Ilistoire de la princesse de Paplilagonie.