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- BIOGRAPHY
Pons was born about 1460, the son of Gaston VI de Gontaut-Biron, baron de Biron, and Catherine de Salignac. In 1489 he married Madeleine de Rochechouart-Mortemart, daughter of Jean II, seigneur de Mortemart, and Marguerite d'Amboise. The marriage did not result in progeny. On 15 May 1499 he married Marguerite de Fabournet de Montferrand, daughter of Jean, seigneur de Montferrand, and Bernardine de Lavedan. Their daughter Catherine would have progeny, marrying François de Durfort, seigneur de Rauzan.
Pons was a counsellor and gentleman of the bedchamber of King Charles VIII, and held the positions of Maître d'Hôtel du Roi and Ecuyer-Tranchant. He fought in Brittany and in Italy, including the Battle of Fornovo on 6 July 1495.
Like many of his ancestors, Pons enhanced the château de Biron in the Périgord, which had come into the Gontaut family in 1189. In 1497 he added a delicate Pavillon de la Recette and a two-story funerary chapel. About 1515 he and his brother Amand, bishop of Sarlat, commissioned a beautiful Pieta for the chapel in which the two brothers are shown on either side of the Virgin, Pons kneeling at Christ's feet. The Pieta is now in the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, donated by the magnate J. P. Morgan in 1916.
Pons died after 14 June 1524.
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