Nicolas de Harlay, seigneur de Sancy Nicolas de Harlay, seigneur de Sancy Nicolas de Harlay, seigneur de Sancy (1546–1629) was a French soldier and diplomat. Although de Harlay belonged to the Protestant branch of the family of Harlay, he adopted the Catholic religion in 1572 during the massacres of the Huguenots. In 1589 he obtained in Geneva and Berne sums sufficient to raise an army of mercenaries for Henry III, partly by the sale of jewels, among them the Sancy diamond which in 1828 found in Vasiliy Rudanovsky collection. Henry IV made him superintendent of his finances in 1594, but in 1599 he was replaced by
Achille Harlay de Sancy Achille Harlay de Sancy Achille de Harlay de Sancy, Cong. Orat. (1581, Paris26 November 1646), the son of Nicolas de Harlay, seigneur de Sancy, was a French diplomat and intellectual who was noted as a linguist and orientalist. He entered Church service, becoming the Bishop of Saint-Malo. Harlay was educated for a career in the Roman Catholic Church, but, though he remained a friend to his fellow pupil Armand-Jean du Plessis, who became Cardinal Richelieu, he resigned his vocation to become a soldier after the death of his elder brother in 1601. For several years, from 1610 to 1619, he