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Anne Couvent: Seven Royal Lineages with Arms

It is interesting to note that three royal gateway ancestors found for French Canadians go through women, namely, Catherine de Baillon, Jeanne Le Marchand, and Anne Couvent.  These three women all settled in New France.  Anne Couvent’s royal gateway is of particular interest because she leads back to more recent royals than either Catherine de Baillon or Jeanne Le Marchand.

Without the groundbreaking research published by Roland-Yves Gagné and Laurent Kokanosky in 2007, which established that the Anne Couvent descended from royalty through her mother Antoinette de Longueval, these royal connections would have remained hidden from her descendants.  Their research was featured on a webpage at this site under the surname de Longueval, see  http://habitant.org/longueval.  To truly appreciate the research challenges the authors overcame to establish this royal gateway it is necessary to read Gagné and Kokanosky’s article.  The full citation for their work is:

Gagné, Roland-Yves, and Laurent Kokanosky, "Les origines de Philippe Amiot (Hameau), de son épouse Anne Couvent et de leur neveu Toussaint Ledran," Mémoires de la Société généalogique canadienne-française 58, no. 1, issue 251 (Spring 2007): 17-58.

Anne Couvent came to New France from Picardy with her husband Philippe Amiot / Hameau and two sons, Jean and Mathieu, in 1636. A third child, Charles, was born in New France. After Philippe Amiot died, Anne Couvent remarried in 1639 to Jacques Maheu. They had two children: Marie Madeleine Maheu who died in infancy and Jean Maheu. After Jacques Maheu died Anne married a third time to Étienne Blanchon in 1666 but had no more children. In addition, her nephew, Toussaint Ledran, the son of Louis Ledran and her sister Charlotte Couvent, also settled in New France.  Many Canadians and Americans descend from one of the Couvent sisters and thus from royalty. 

Anne Couvent descends from many of the royal and noble houses of Europe.  Here I merely report on seven of Anne Couvent’s royal lineages displaying the arms used by her ancestors in each generation:

These royal lineages would of course also apply to Toussaint Ledran through his mother Charlotte Couvent.

The intrepid researcher will be able to uncover several other royal lineages for the Couvent sisters and of course many other armigerous and noble ancestors. 

There are some points regarding these royal lineages and the displayed arms that must be considered.  For instance, it is necessary to note that the Amiots and the Couvents were apparently not armigers. While it is true that the Honorable Georges-Elie Amyot (1856-1930), industrialist and member of the Legislative Assembly of Québec, used the following arms: “D'azur, à la bande d'argent chargée de cinq mouchetures d'hermine.”  These are the arms of the unrelated Amyot de Moyencourt family said to be of Normandy (but Moyancourt is in Picardy).  He apparently assumed these arms as his own around 1912.  There is no indication that these arms were used by his Amiot ancestors either in France or Canada.  

Arms used by
Georges-Elie Amyot

The Amiot dit Villeneuve family were seigneurs in Québec and often married into other notable families.  There were almost nobles.  In 1667, the Intendant of New France, Jean Talon, recommended that Mathieu Amiot dit Villeneuve, seigneur of the Pointe-aux-Bouleaux near Ste-Croix, be ennobled.  The king agreed and issued letters of nobility for Amiot in 1668.  However, Talon was unsure if the letters had to be registered with the Sovereign Council of New France or the Parlement of Paris in order to be officially recorded.  Before an answer to this question could arrive from Versailles, the king cancelled all such ennoblements that had not yet been registered.  Despite lacking official ennoblement, the children of Charles Amiot de Vincelotte, Anne’s son, and his wife the noble lady Geneviève de Chavigny, were for all practical purposes accepted as being noble by others in New France.

The Longueval arms displayed in generations 2 and 3 of these armorial lineages are the original or ancient arms of the family.  The exact arms used by Charles de Longueval has not yet been determined, nor do we know how this noble was related to the other members of the house of Longueval.  It is interesting to observe that of the eight Longueval arms recorded in the 1696 “Armorial général de France,” five of them are similar to the ancient Longueval arms. 

The arms for the Joyeuse family are those used by Claude Joyeuse de Champigneulle, esquire, seigneur of Sivry, lieutenant in the cavalry regiment of the Colonel General as found in the “Armorial général de France.”  Claude was a descendant of Jean de Joyeuse, seigneur of Champigneulle.  No source has been found mentioning the exact arms used by Jean and François Joyeuse de Champigneulle in generations 4 and 5, but it is very likely that their heir used their arms. 

It should be understood that there are several other royal gateways established for French Canadians and Acadians that can be found at Denis Beauregard’s “Quebec and Acadian Royal Descends (QRD30)--Main References.” Available at http://www.francogene.com/gfna/gfna/998/qrd30.htm. 

I have listed the sources I relied on to compile these armorial lineages: Anne Couvent’s Ascending Armorial Lineages: References.

Lastly, please contact me if you notice any corrections or additions for these armorial lineages. I want to thank Roland-Yves Gagné and Laurent Kokanosky for their research that makes these armorial lineages possible. I also appreciate the comments I received from David Robert on earlier drafts. Any mistakes or ommissions remain mine.