The title duc de Brancas may refer to a number of hereditary office-holders under the Ancien Régime of France. The most famous holder of that title was a member of the social circle of Philippe II, Duke of Orléans, who served as Regent of France from 1715 to 1723. Brancas was known to be amusing, good-natured, and attracted to young men.[1]
Despite his high title, Brancas was not wealthy, but he solidly refused to exploit his relationship with France's regent in return for financial gain. Such a lack of corruption was rare at the time, and put the family in strained circumstances. Brancas' heir, the Marquis d'Oise, would have to sign a marriage contract with a three-year-old girl from a wealthy background when the Marquis was himself thirty-three in order to support the Brancas family.[2]
When Brancas reached the age that he had to pay young men to sleep with him, he decided to give up on secular life and retired to a monastery. The Regent was so distraught at losing his friend that he cried twice during their last supper together. Brancas died in 1739, at the age of seventy-six.[3] Despite Brancas' rectitude in regard to his position, he formed part of a pleasure-loving circle around the Regent which alienated France's conservatives and undermined conservative support for the Regency.