Les Mignons was a term used by polemicists in the contentious atmosphere of the French Wars of Religion and taken up by the people of Paris, to designate the favourites of Henry III of France, from his return from Poland to reign in France in 1574, to his assassination in 1589, a disastrous end to which the perception of effeminate weakness contributed. The mignons were frivolous and fashionable young men, to whom public malignity attributed heterodox sexuality, rumors that some historians have found to be a factor in the disintegration of the late Valois monarchy.

Anne de Joyeuse, baron d'Arques then duc de Joyeuse was a French noble, governor, Admiral, military commander and royal favourite during the reign of Henri III in the French Wars of Religion. The eldest son of Guillaume de Joyeuse and Marie de Batarnay, Joyeuse was part of one of the most prominent noble families in Languedoc. His father served as the lieutenant-general of the province. Joyeuse began his career in the mid 1570s, serving in Languedoc in the fifth civil war before joining the main royal army during the sixth civil war and seeing combat at the Siege of Issoire in late 1577. Around this time he caught the attention of the king and entered into the circle of his favourites, he was made a Gentilhomme de la chambre then a Chambellan (chamberlain). By 1579 he would be one of the king's four chief favourites, alongside Épernon, Saint-Luc and D'O. That same year he became governor of the Mont-Saint-Michel. In 1580 civil war resumed and the king dispatched Épernon and Joyeuse to play important roles in the siege of La Fère. Joyeuse would be seriously wounded in the reduction of the city.