KING LOUIS XIII Signed Receipt for the Steward and Builder of the Fountains from the Royal Palace: the Florentine Tommaso Francini (Thomas Francine)
Countersigned by Henri-Auguste de Lomenie, the Secretary of State for the Navy to King Louis XIII 
Size: 15.8" x 10.2" (40 cm x 26 cm)
"Louis by the grace of God, King of France and Navarre. To our soul and feel
Advisor to our Council of State and treasurer of our savings Mr Paul Ardie Hello. We would like to ask that from the ordinary 
and extraordinary funds of our charge for the present year you pay, bail and deliver cash [...] giving receipt to our dear 
and well-loved Thomas Francine, Intendant and conductor 
of our Fountains the sum of twelve hundred pounds which we would have donated to him 
by our letters patent of the eighth day of November 1625 [...] under our seal 
for the considerations continued there of which he would not have been paid because of the receipt of 
the sieur Feydeau, in that from this sum nothing is deducted or reduced
of Sieur Feydeau, in that from this sum nothing is deducted or reduced
for the right of five deniers intended for our order & militia of the Holy Spirit from which we 
have dispensed it [...] For such is our pleasure. Given in Paris on the 6th day of February 
in the year of grace one thousand six hundred and twenty-seven and of our reign the seventeenth.
Louis
and below Loménie"
Tommaso Francini (1571–1651) and his younger brother Alessandro Francini (or Thomas Francine and Alexandre Francine in France) were Florentine hydraulics engineers and garden designers. They worked for Francesco I de’ medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany, above all at the Villa Medicea di Pratolino, whose water features Francesco de Vieri described thus in 1586: "the statues there turnabout, play music, jet streams of water, are so many and such stupendous artworks in hidden places, that one who saw them all together would be in ecstasies over them."
In the reign of Louis XIII, Francini remained in the employ of the Marie de’ Medici, the Queen Mother. He worked with Salomon de Brosse, engineering the aqueduct that brought water from the little river of Rungis to the gardens and his Medici Fountain and grotto in the Luxembourg Garden of her Palais de Luxembourg in Paris. In 1627, he thus obtained the survival of his office of intendant of the waters and fountains of the king in favor of Henri, his eldest son, who had been assisting him for some time in his work. Two more years Later, he also transmitted to her the survival of the caretaker's office of the from the view of the waters of Rungis in Pariss, then endowed with 1200 pounds tournaments.
Alessandro Francini engraved views of the fountains and brought out a Livre d'architecture in 1631 that featured many fantastically rusticated doorways and gates. 
The Francini brothers founded a dynasty of French fountain engineers; a younger Francini worked on fountains in the early stages of Versailles, especially the Grotto of Thetis (completed 1668, described by Andre Felibien, 1676 and demolished for the enlargement of the château 1686). Members of the Francini clan were still at work in the eighteenth century.
From the Book “Paul Ardier, treasurer of savings, lord of Beauregard, Vineuil and Goulet en Blésois, 1543-1638, by R. Porcher. Paris, A. Picard, 77 pages.”
Paul Ardier, second son of Jean Ardier, lord of Prévallon, and of Jacquette Doré, sent in 1571 to the court, where his uncle Guillaume Doré patronized him, became an officer of the house of the Duke of Anjou 
and accompanied this favorite son to Poland of Catherine de Medici. Ardier already enjoyed royal favour, for he had been given the mission of bringing back the jewels; he followed the court on the banks of the
Loire, established useful relations there and, on August 6, 1572, married Suzanne Phélipeaux, daughter of Louis Phélipeaux, lord of La Vrillière. One of his brothers-in-law, Paul Phélipeaux, lord of Pontchartrain, 
who at the age of forty-one became secretary of state, contributed much to his political fortune. Appointed commissioner in 1599 to visit the granaries of Normandy, he soon entered the Council of State and filled 
the post of intendant and tax collector general, and, in 1627, that of treasurer of savings. It is in his beautiful castle of Beauregard, which he had bought in 1617 from Philippe d'Angennes, that Paul Ardier died on 
September 25, 1638. 
Henri-Auguste de Loménie (1594 – 3 November 1666), Count of Brienne, Seigneur de La Ville-aux-Clercs was a French politician. He was secretary of state for the navy from 1615 to February 1643, and then secretary of state for foreign affairs from 1643 to 1663 under Mazarin during the minority of Louis XIV. From the Lomenie family (originating in Flavignac in Limousin), he was the son of Antoine de Lomenie, secretary of state to Henry IV and a Huguenot converts.
The Count de Brienne was naturally destined to public office. He traveled to Germany, Poland and Italy, by order of his father, the last as well prepare for his career. He was back in Paris towards the end of 1609, that he was noticed by Henry IV, who allowed him to attend the board sometimes. Marie de Medici, regent of France, commissioned him in 1614 to negotiate with some members of the États généraux, "whose minds were unwell", and his clever response obtained from them the nomination of a president acceptable to the court. This success earned him in 1617, master of ceremonies and provost of king's orders. Until the death of his father, his principal occupation "was to accompany the King and gain the honor of his good graces, to which he succeeds."
The British Embassy, where he was responsible for negotiating the marriage of Henrietta Maria of France with the Charles I of England. However, when he seemed to have met with success in its attempt at accommodation, he was disowned by Louis XIII and Richelieu. 
The kindness of the queen mother of Louis XIII to him was also the affection of the princess to Madame de Brienne, his wife, the whole court knew to be the closest confidante of Anne of Austria. This influence kept him in power until the death of Mazarin, but before that time, his influence began to wane. 
The impairment of the Count of Brienne was not soon enough for the young and voluntary authority of Louis XIV; high diplomatic capacities should preferably also attract the attention of the king, a great kingdom was coming, and he had to carry and moderate both the ideas of the gigantic new prince, physical strength and moral well above that of the Count de Brienne.
He died in 1666. Le Tellier, who became chancellor, said in council, when he heard the news: “He had never seen a man more intelligent in business, less shaken at the least danger, less stunned by surprises, and more fertile in expedients to disentangle them happily.”
And the King Louis XIV said: “I lost today the oldest, most loyal and most informed of my ministers.” 

Louis XIII (27 September 1601 – 14 May 1643) was a monarch of the House of Bourbon who was King of France from 1610 to 1643 and King of Navarre (as Louis II) from 1610 to 1620, when the crown of Navarre was merged with the French crown.
Shortly before his ninth birthday, Louis became king of France and Navarre after his father Henry IV was assassinated. His mother, Marie de' Medici, acted as regent during his minority. Mismanagement of the kingdom and ceaseless political intrigues by Marie and her Italian favorites led the young king to take power in 1617 by exiling his mother and executing her followers, including Concino Concini, the most influential Italian at the French court.
Louis XIII, taciturn and suspicious, relied heavily on his chief ministers, first Charles d'Albert, Duc de Luynes and then Cardinal Richelieu, to govern the Kingdom of France. King and cardinal are remembered for establishing the Académie Francoise, and ending the revolt of the French nobility. They systematically destroyed castles of defiant lords and denounced the use of private violence (dueling, carrying weapons, and maintaining private armies). By the end of 1620s, Richelieu established "the royal monopoly of force" as the ruling doctrine.[1] The reign of Louis "the Just" was also marked by the struggles against the Huguenots and Habsburg Spain.