BALUE, JEAN (c• 142I-1491), French cardinal and min ister of Louis XI., was born of very humble parentage at Angle in Poitou. He became almoner to Louis XI., in 1465, bishop of Evreux, and in 1468 cardinal. But in that year Balue was corn promised in the king's humiliation by Charles the Bold at Peronne and excluded from the council. He then intrigued with Charles against his master; their secret correspondence was intercepted, and on April 23 1469, Balue was thrown into prison, where he remained eleven years, but not, as has been alleged, in an iron cage. In 148o, through the intervention of Pope Sixtus IV., he was set at liberty, and from that time lived at the court of Rome. He received the bishopric of Albano and afterwards that of Palestrina. In 1484 he was even sent to France as legate a latere. He died at Ancona in 1491.
See Henri Forgeot, "Jean Balue, cardinal d'Angers" (1895) , in the Bibliotheque de l'ecole des hautes etudes.