Catherine de' Medici
Catherine de' Medici | |||||
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House | Medici | ||||
Father | Lorenzo de' Medici, Duke of Urbino | ||||
Mother | Madeleine de La Tour d'Auvergne | ||||
Religion | Catholicism | ||||
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Catherine de' Medici (Italian: Caterina de' Medici, pronounced
Catherine was born in Florence to Lorenzo de' Medici, Duke of Urbino, and Madeleine de La Tour d'Auvergne. In 1533, at the age of 14, Catherine married Henry, the second son of King Francis I and Queen Claude of France, who would become Dauphin of France upon the death of his elder brother Francis in 1536. Catherine's marriage was arranged by her uncle Pope Clement VII. During his reign, Henry excluded Catherine from state affairs and instead showered favours on his chief mistress, Diane de Poitiers, who wielded much influence over him. Henry's death in 1559 thrust Catherine into the political arena as mother of the frail 15-year-old Francis II. When Francis II died in 1560, she became regent on behalf of her 10-year-old son Charles IX and was thus granted sweeping powers. After Charles died in 1574, Catherine played a key role in the reign of her third son, Henry III. He dispensed with her advice only in the last months of her life but outlived her by just seven months.
Catherine's three sons reigned in an age of almost constant
Some historians have excused Catherine from blame for the worst decisions of the crown, but evidence for her ruthlessness can be found in her letters.[4] In practice, her authority was limited by the effects of the civil wars. Therefore, her policies may be seen as desperate measures to keep the House of Valois on the throne at all costs and her patronage of the arts as an attempt to glorify a monarchy whose prestige was in steep decline.[5] Without Catherine, it is unlikely that her sons would have remained in power.[6] Catherine has been called "the most important woman in Europe" in the 16th century.[7]
Birth and upbringing
Catherine de' Medici was born Caterina Maria Romula de' Medici
Within a month of Catherine's birth, both her parents were dead: Madeleine died on 28 April of
Catherine was first cared for by her paternal grandmother, Alfonsina Orsini. After Alfonsina's death in 1520, Catherine joined her cousins and was raised by her aunt, Clarice de' Medici. The death of Pope Leo in 1521 briefly interrupted Medici power until Cardinal Giulio de' Medici was elected Pope Clement VII in 1523. Clement housed Catherine in the Palazzo Medici Riccardi in Florence, where she lived in state. The Florentine people called her duchessina ("the little duchess"), in deference to her unrecognised claim to the Duchy of Urbino.[12]
In 1527, the Medici were overthrown in Florence by a faction opposed to the regime of Clement's representative, Cardinal Silvio Passerini, and Catherine was taken hostage and placed in a series of convents.[13] The final one, the Santissima Annuziata delle Murate was her home for three years. Mark Strage described these years as "the happiest of her entire life".[14] Clement had no choice but to crown Charles of Austria as Holy Roman Emperor in return for his help in retaking the city.[15] In October 1529, Charles's troops laid siege to Florence. As the siege dragged on, voices called for Catherine to be killed and exposed naked and chained to the city walls. Some even suggested that she be handed over to the troops to be raped.[16] The city finally surrendered on 12 August 1530. Clement summoned Catherine from her beloved convent to join him in Rome where he greeted her with open arms and tears in his eyes. Then he set about the business of finding her a husband.[17]
Marriage
On her visit to Rome, the Venetian envoy described Catherine as "small of stature, and thin, and without delicate features, but having the protruding eyes peculiar to the Medici family".[18] Suitors, however, lined up for her hand, including James V of Scotland who sent the Duke of Albany to Clement to conclude a marriage in April and November 1530.[19] When Francis I of France proposed his second son, Henry, Duke of Orléans, in early 1533, Clement jumped at the offer. Henry was a prize catch for Catherine, who, despite her wealth, was of common origin.
The wedding, a grand affair marked by extravagant display and gift-giving,[20] took place in the Église Saint-Ferréol les Augustins in Marseille on 28 October 1533.[21] Prince Henry danced and jousted for Catherine. The fourteen-year-old couple left their wedding ball at midnight to perform their nuptial duties. Henry arrived in the bedroom with King Francis, who is said to have stayed until the marriage was consummated. He noted that "each had shown valour in the joust".[20] Clement visited the newlyweds in bed the next morning and added his blessings to the night's proceedings.
Catherine saw little of her husband in their first year of marriage, but the ladies of the court, impressed with her intelligence and keenness to please, treated her well. However, the death of her uncle Clement on 25 September 1534 undermined Catherine's standing in the French court. The next pope, Alessandro Farnese, was elected on 13 October and took the title Paul III. As a Farnese he felt no obligation to keep Clement's promises, broke the alliance with Francis and refused to continue paying her huge dowry.[22] King Francis lamented, "The girl has come to me stark naked."[23]
Prince Henry showed no interest in Catherine as a wife; instead, he openly took mistresses. For the first ten years of the marriage, the royal couple failed to produce any children together. In 1537, he had a brief affair with Philippa Duci, who gave birth to a daughter, whom he publicly acknowledged.[24] This proved that Henry was fertile and added to the pressure on Catherine to produce a child.
Dauphine
As dauphine, Catherine was expected to provide a future heir to the throne.[25] According to the court chronicler Brantôme, "many people advised the king and the Dauphin to repudiate her, since it was necessary to continue the line of France".[26] Divorce was discussed. In desperation, Catherine tried every known trick for getting pregnant, such as placing cow dung and ground stags' antlers on her "source of life", and drinking mule's urine. On 19 January 1544, she at last gave birth to a son, named after King Francis.
After becoming pregnant once, Catherine had no trouble doing so again. She may have owed her change of fortune to the physician
However, Catherine's ability to bear children failed to improve her marriage. About 1538, at the age of 19, Henry had taken as his mistress the 38-year-old
Queen of France
Henry allowed Catherine almost no political influence as queen.[29] Although she sometimes acted as regent during his absences from France, her formal powers were strictly nominal.[30] Henry even gave the Château of Chenonceau, which Catherine had wanted for herself, to his mistress Diane de Poitiers instead, who took her place at the center of power, dispensing patronage and accepting favors. The imperial ambassador reported that in the presence of guests, Henry would sit on Diane's lap and play the guitar, chat about politics, or fondle her breasts.[31] Diane never regarded Catherine as a threat. She even encouraged the king to spend more time with Catherine and sire more children.[citation needed]
In 1556, Catherine nearly died giving birth to twin daughters, Jeanne and
Henry's reign enabled the rise of the Guise brothers,
On 3–4 April 1559, Henry signed the
King Henry took part in the jousting, sporting Diane's black-and-white colours. He defeated the dukes of Guise and Nemours, but the young
Queen mother
Reign of Francis II
Francis II became king at the age of fifteen. In what has been called a coup d'état, the Cardinal of Lorraine and the Duke of Guise—whose niece, Mary, Queen of Scots, had married Francis II the year before—seized power the day after Henry II's death and quickly moved themselves into the Louvre Palace with the young couple.[39] The English ambassador reported a few days later that "the house of Guise ruleth and doth all about the French king".[40] For the moment, Catherine worked with the Guises out of necessity. She was not strictly entitled to a role in Francis's government, because he was deemed old enough to rule for himself.[41] Nevertheless, all his official acts began with the words: "This being the good pleasure of the Queen, my lady-mother, and I also approving of every opinion that she holdeth, am content and command that ...". Catherine did not hesitate to exploit her new authority. One of her first acts was to force Diane de Poitiers to hand over the crown jewels and return the Château de Chenonceau to the crown. She later did her best to efface or outdo Diane's building work there.
The Guise brothers set about persecuting the Protestants with zeal. Catherine adopted a moderate stance and spoke against the Guise persecutions, though she had no particular sympathy for the Huguenots, whose beliefs she never shared. The Protestants looked for leadership first to
In June 1560,
When Catherine realized Francis was going to die, she made a pact with Antoine de Bourbon by which he would renounce his right to the regency of the future king, Charles IX, in return for the release of his brother Condé.[48] As a result, when Francis died on 5 December 1560, the Privy Council appointed Catherine as governor of France (gouvernante de France), with sweeping powers. She wrote to her daughter Elisabeth: "My principal aim is to have the honour of God before my eyes in all things and to preserve my authority, not for myself, but for the conservation of this kingdom and for the good of all your brothers".[49]
Reign of Charles IX
Charles IX was ten years old at the time of his royal consecration, during which he cried. At first Catherine kept him very close to her, and even slept in his chamber. She presided over his council, decided policy, and controlled state business and patronage. However, she was never in a position to control the country as a whole, which was on the brink of civil war. In many parts of France the rule of nobles held sway rather than that of the crown. The challenges Catherine faced were complex and in some ways difficult for her to comprehend as a foreigner.[50]
She summoned church leaders from both sides to attempt to solve their doctrinal differences. Despite her optimism, the resulting Colloquy of Poissy ended in failure on 13 October 1561, dissolving itself without her permission.[51] Catherine failed because she saw the religious divide only in political terms. In the words of historian R. J. Knecht, "she underestimated the strength of religious conviction, imagining that all would be well if only she could get the party leaders to agree".[52] In January 1562, Catherine issued the tolerant Edict of Saint-Germain in a further attempt to build bridges with the Protestants.[53] On 1 March 1562, however, in an incident known as the Massacre of Vassy, the Duke of Guise and his men attacked worshipping Huguenots in a barn at Vassy, killing 74 and wounding 104.[54] Guise, who called the massacre "a regrettable accident", was cheered as a hero in the streets of Paris while the Huguenots called for revenge. The massacre lit the fuse that sparked the French Wars of Religion. For the next thirty years, France found itself in a state of either civil war or armed truce.[55]
Within a month
Huguenots
On 17 August 1563, Charles IX was declared of age at the
In 1566, through the ambassador to the
On 27 September 1567, in a swoop known as the
The Huguenots retreated to the fortified stronghold of La Rochelle on the west coast, where Jeanne d'Albret and her fifteen-year-old son, Henry of Bourbon, joined them.[68] "We have come to the determination to die, all of us", Jeanne wrote to Catherine, "rather than abandon our God, and our religion."[69] Catherine called Jeanne, whose decision to rebel posed a dynastic threat to the Valois, "the most shameless woman in the world". Nevertheless, the Peace of Saint-Germain-en-Laye, signed on 8 August 1570 because the royal army ran out of cash, conceded wider toleration to the Huguenots than ever before.[70]
Catherine looked to further Valois interests by grand dynastic marriages. In 1570, Charles IX married
Catherine pressed Jeanne d'Albret to attend court. Writing that she wanted to see Jeanne's children, she promised not to harm them. Jeanne replied: "Pardon me if, reading that, I want to laugh, because you want to relieve me of a fear that I've never had. I've never thought that, as they say, you eat little children."[73] When Jeanne did come to court, Catherine pressured her hard,[74] playing on Jeanne's hopes for her beloved son. Jeanne finally agreed to the marriage between her son and Margaret, so long as Henry could remain a Huguenot. When Jeanne arrived in Paris to buy clothes for the wedding, she was taken ill and died on 9 June 1572, aged forty-three. Huguenot writers later accused Catherine of murdering her with poisoned gloves.[75] The wedding took place on 18 August 1572 at Notre-Dame, Paris.
St. Bartholomew's Day massacre
Three days later, Admiral Coligny was walking back to his rooms from the Louvre when a shot rang out from a house and wounded him in the hand and arm.[76] A smoking arquebus was discovered in a window, but the culprit had made his escape from the rear of the building on a waiting horse.[77] Coligny was carried to his lodgings at the Hôtel de Béthisy, where the surgeon Ambroise Paré removed a bullet from his elbow and amputated a damaged finger with a pair of scissors. Catherine, who was said to have received the news without emotion, made a tearful visit to Coligny and promised to punish his attacker. Many historians have blamed Catherine for the attack on Coligny. Others point to the Guise family or a Spanish-papal plot to end Coligny's influence on the king.[78] Whatever the truth, the bloodbath that followed was soon beyond the control of Catherine or any other leader.[79]
The St. Bartholomew's Day massacre, which began two days later, has stained Catherine's reputation ever since.[36] There is reason to believe she was party to the decision when on 23 August Charles IX is said to have ordered, "Then kill them all! Kill them all!"[80] Historians have suggested that Catherine and her advisers expected a Huguenot uprising to avenge the attack on Coligny. They chose therefore to strike first and wipe out the Huguenot leaders while they were still in Paris after the wedding.[81]
The slaughter in Paris lasted for almost a week. It spread to many parts of France, where it persisted into the autumn. In the words of historian Jules Michelet, "St Bartholomew was not a day, but a season".[82] On 29 September, when Navarre knelt before the altar as a Roman Catholic, having converted to avoid being killed, Catherine turned to the ambassadors and laughed. From this time dates the legend of the wicked Italian queen. Huguenot writers branded Catherine a scheming Italian, who had acted on Machiavelli's principles to kill all enemies in one blow.[83]
Reign of Henry III
Two years later, Catherine faced a new crisis with the death of Charles IX at the age of twenty-three. His dying words were "oh, my mother ..." The day before he died, he named Catherine regent, since his brother and heir, Henry the Duke of Anjou, was in the Polish–Lithuanian Commonwealth, where he had been elected king the year before. However, three months after his coronation at Wawel Cathedral, Henry abandoned that throne and returned to France in order to become King of France. Catherine wrote to Henry of Charles IX's death: "I am grief-stricken to have witnessed such a scene and the love which he showed me at the end ... My only consolation is to see you here soon, as your kingdom requires, and in good health, for if I were to lose you, I would have myself buried alive with you."[84]
Henry was Catherine's favourite son. Unlike his brothers, he came to the throne as a grown man. He was also healthier, though he suffered from weak lungs and constant fatigue. His interest in the tasks of government, however, proved fitful. He depended on Catherine and her team of secretaries until the last few weeks of her life. He often hid from state affairs, immersing himself in acts of piety, such as pilgrimages and flagellation.[85]
Henry married
In 1576, in a move that endangered Henry's throne, Francis allied with the Protestant princes against the crown.[88] On 6 May 1576, Catherine gave in to almost all Huguenot demands in the Edict of Beaulieu. The treaty became known as the Peace of Monsieur because it was thought that Francis had forced it on the crown.[89] Francis died of consumption in June 1584, after a disastrous intervention in the Low Countries during which his army had been massacred.[90] Catherine wrote, the next day: "I am so wretched to live long enough to see so many people die before me, although I realize that God's will must be obeyed, that He owns everything, and that He lends us only for as long as He likes the children whom He gives us."[91] The death of her youngest son was a calamity for Catherine's dynastic dreams. Under Salic law, by which only males could ascend the throne, the Huguenot Henry of Navarre now became heir presumptive to the French crown.[36]
Catherine had at least taken the precaution of marrying Margaret, her youngest daughter, to Navarre. Margaret, however, became almost as much of a thorn in Catherine's side as Francis, and in 1582, she returned to the French court without her husband. Catherine was heard yelling at her for taking lovers. Catherine sent Pomponne de Bellièvre to Navarre to arrange Margaret's return. In 1585, Margaret fled Navarre again. She retreated to her property at Agen and begged her mother for money. Catherine sent her only enough "to put food on her table". Moving on to the fortress of Carlat, Margaret took a lover called d'Aubiac. Catherine asked Henry to act before Margaret brought shame on them again. In October 1586, therefore, he had Margaret locked up in the Château d'Usson. D'Aubiac was executed, though not, despite Catherine's wish, in front of Margaret.[92] Catherine cut Margaret out of her will and never saw her again.
Catherine was unable to control Henry in the way she had Francis and Charles.[93] Her role in his government became that of chief executive and roving diplomat. She travelled widely across the kingdom, enforcing his authority and trying to head off war. In 1578, she took on the task of pacifying the south. At the age of fifty-nine, she embarked on an eighteen-month journey around the south of France to meet Huguenot leaders face to face. Her efforts won Catherine new respect from the French people.[94] On her return to Paris in 1579, she was greeted outside the city by the Parlement and crowds. The Venetian ambassador, Gerolamo Lipomanno, wrote: "She is an indefatigable princess, born to tame and govern a people as unruly as the French: they now recognize her merits, her concern for unity and are sorry not to have appreciated her sooner."[95] She was under no illusions, however. On 25 November 1579, she wrote to the king, "You are on the eve of a general revolt. Anyone who tells you differently is a liar."[96]
Catholic League
Many leading Roman Catholics were appalled by Catherine's attempts to appease the Huguenots. After the Edict of Beaulieu, they had started forming local leagues to protect their religion.[97] The death of the heir to the throne in 1584 prompted the Duke of Guise to assume the leadership of the Catholic League. He planned to block Henry of Navarre's succession and place Henry's Catholic uncle Cardinal Charles de Bourbon on the throne instead. In this cause, he recruited the great Catholic princes, nobles and prelates, signed the treaty of Joinville with Spain, and prepared to make war on the "heretics".[98] By 1585, Henry III had no choice but to go to war against the League.[99] As Catherine put it, "peace is carried on a stick" (bâton porte paix).[100] "Take care", she wrote to the king, "especially about your person. There is so much treachery about that I die of fear."[101]
Henry was unable to fight the Catholics and the Protestants at once, both of whom had stronger armies than his own. In the
By 1587, the Catholic backlash against the Protestants had become a campaign across Europe.
Last months and death
Henry hired Swiss troops to help him defend himself in Paris. The Parisians, however, claimed the right to defend the city themselves. On 12 May 1588, they set up barricades in the streets and refused to take orders from anyone except the Duke of Guise.[106] When Catherine tried to go to Mass, she found her way barred, though she was allowed through the barricades. The chronicler L'Estoile reported that she cried all through her lunch that day. She wrote to Bellièvre, "Never have I seen myself in such trouble or with so little light by which to escape."[107] As usual, Catherine advised the king, who had fled the city in the nick of time, to compromise and live to fight another day. On 15 June 1588, Henry duly signed the Act of Union, which gave in to all the League's latest demands.
On 8 September 1588 at Blois, where the court had assembled for a meeting of the Estates, Henry dismissed all his ministers without warning. Catherine, in bed with a lung infection, had been kept in the dark.[108] The king's actions effectively ended her days of power.
At the meeting of the Estates, Henry thanked Catherine for all she had done. He called her not only the mother of the king but the mother of the state.
On 5 January 1589, Catherine died at the age of sixty-nine, probably from
Henry IV was later reported to have said of Catherine:
I ask you, what could a woman do, left by the death of her husband with five little children on her arms, and two families of France who were thinking of grasping the crown—our own [the Bourbons] and the Guises? Was she not compelled to play strange parts to deceive first one and then the other, in order to guard, as she did, her sons, who successively reigned through the wise conduct of that shrewd woman? I am surprised that she never did worse.[116]
Patron of the arts
Catherine believed in the
An
Beyond portraiture, little is known about the painting at Catherine de' Medici's court.[122] In the last two decades of her life, only two painters stand out as recognisable personalities: Jean Cousin the Younger (c. 1522 – c. 1594), few of whose works survive, and Antoine Caron (c. 1521–1599), who became Catherine's official painter after working at Fontainebleau under Primaticcio. Caron's vivid Mannerism, with its love of ceremonial and its preoccupation with massacres, reflects the neurotic atmosphere of the French court during the Wars of Religion.[123]
Many of Caron's paintings, such as those of the Triumphs of the Seasons, are of allegorical subjects that echo the festivities for which Catherine's court was famous. His designs for the Valois Tapestries celebrate the fêtes, picnics, and mock battles of the "magnificent" entertainments hosted by Catherine. They depict events held at Fontainebleau in 1564; at Bayonne in 1565 for the summit meeting with the Spanish court; and at the Tuileries in 1573 for the visit of the Polish ambassadors who presented the Polish crown to Catherine's son Henry of Anjou.[122]
The musical shows in particular allowed Catherine to express her creative gifts. They were usually dedicated to the ideal of peace in the realm and based on
Catherine de' Medici's great love among the arts was architecture. "As the daughter of the Medici," suggests French art historian Jean-Pierre Babelon, "she was driven by a passion to build and a desire to leave great achievements behind her when she died."
Catherine had emblems of her love and grief carved into the stonework of her buildings.
Although Catherine spent ruinous sums on the arts,[134] most of her patronage left no permanent legacy.[135] The end of the Valois dynasty so soon after her death brought a change in priorities.
Culinary legend
The legend that de' Medici introduced a long list of foods, techniques and utensils from Italy to France is discredited by food historians.[136] Barbara Ketcham Wheaton and Stephen Mennell provided the definitive arguments against these claims.[137][138] They point out that Catherine's father-in-law, King Francis I, and the flower of the French aristocracy had dined at some of Italy's most élite tables during the king's Italian campaigns (and that an earlier generation had done so during King Charles VIII's invasion of 1494); that a vast Italian entourage had visited France for the wedding of Catherine de' Medici's father to her French-born mother; and that she had little influence at court until her husband's death because he was so besotted by his mistress, Diane de Poitiers. In fact, a large population of Italians—bankers, silk-weavers, philosophers, musicians, and artists, including Leonardo da Vinci—had emigrated to France to promote the burgeoning Renaissance. Nevertheless, popular culture frequently attributes Italian culinary influence and forks in France to Catherine.[139]
The earliest known reference to Catherine as the popularizer of Italian culinary innovation is the entry for "cuisine" in
Links to the occult
Catherine de' Medici has been labelled by
Catherine herself had been educated by
Issue
Catherine de' Medici married Henry, Duke of Orléans, the future Henry II of France, in Marseille on 28 October 1533. She gave birth to ten children, of whom four sons and three daughters survived to marriageable age. Three of her sons became kings of France, while two of her daughters married kings and one married a duke. Catherine outlived all her children except Henry III, who died seven months after her, and Margaret, who inherited her robust health. Victoire and Jeanne were twin daughters born in 1556; Jeanne was stillborn due to surgeons breaking her legs to save her mother's life;[b] Victoire survived, dying less than two months later. According to the diplomat Simon Renard, the birth nearly killed Catherine,[151] and the royal couple were advised by the King's physician to have no further children.
- Francis II, King of France (19 January 1544 – 5 December 1560). Married Mary, Queen of Scots, in 1558.
- Elisabeth (2 April 1545 – 3 October 1568). Married Philip II, King of Spain, in 1559.
- Claude (12 November 1547 – 21 February 1575). Married Charles III, Duke of Lorraine, in 1559.
- Louis, Duke of Orléans (3 February 1549 – 24 October 1550). Died in infancy.
- Elizabeth of Austriain 1570.
- Henry III, King of France (19 September 1551 – 2 August 1589). Married Louise of Lorraine in 1575.
- Margaret (14 May 1553 – 27 March 1615). Married Henry, King of Navarre, the future Henry IV of France, in 1572.
- Hercules, Duke of Anjou (18 March 1555 – 19 June 1584), renamed Francis when he was confirmed.
- Victoire (24 June 1556 – 17 August 1556). Died in infancy.
- Jeanne (24 June 1556). Stillborn[152]
Ancestry
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Notes
References
- ^ Pliny the Elder, Letters 9.23.
- ^ Thomson, 98; Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 3; Neale, The Age of Catherine de Medici.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 272.
- ^ Knecht, 272. For a summary of the fluctuations in Catherine's historical reputation, see the preface to R. J. Knecht's Catherine de' Medici, 1998: xi–xiv.
- ^ a b Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 20.
- ^ Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 26.
- ^ Strage, Mark (1976). Women of Power: The Life and Times of Catherine de' Medici. London and New York: Harcourt, Brace & Jovanovich. Prologue, p. xi.
- ^ Frieda, Leonie, Catherine de Medici: Renaissance Queen of France, p. 14 ("the baby received the names Caterina, a Medici family name, Maria, since it was the day of the Holy Virgin, and Romula, after the founder of Fiesole").
- ^ Knecht 1998, p. 8 (dates of death); Héritier 1963, p. 15 (cause of Madeleine's death).
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 8.
- ^ Frieda 2003, p. 22 (New York edition).
- ^ Young, The Medici: Volume II, 15.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, p. 11.
- ^ Strage, pp. 13, 15
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 10–11.
- ^ Strage, p.15
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 12.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, p. 14.
- ^ Hay, Denys, ed., The Letters of James V, HMSO (1954), p. 173, 180–182, 189,
- ^ a b Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 16.
- ^ "Eglise Saint-Ferréol les Augustins | Marseille 13". www.marseille13.fr.
- ^ Frieda 2003, p. 47 (NY edition). Knecht 1998, p. 28, gives likely incorrect dates of 25 September 1533 for the death of Pope Clement VII and 12 October for the election of Pope Paul III.
- ^ Frieda 2003, p. 48 (NY edition): "J'ai reçu la fille toute nue." Knecht 1998, p. 28, gives the English translation ""The girl has been given to me stark naked." He cites Cloulas (Catherine de Médicis, 1979, p. 57), who gives the French as "J'ai eu la fille toute nue", without citing a source.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 29–30. Henry legitimised the child under the name Diane de France; he also produced at least two sons by other women (Knecht, p. 38).
- ^ a b c Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 29.
- ^ Knecht, 29.
- ^ de Costa, Carloine (Spring 2010). "The long barren years of Catherine de Medicis: A gynaecologist's view of history". O&G Magazine. 12 (3). Retrieved 24 November 2021.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, p. 30. Another source (Héritier 1963, p. 36) dates the beginning of their sexual relationship to late 1536 or early 1537.
- ^ Morris, 247
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 42–43.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 38.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 34.
- ^ Guy, 46.
- ^ Guy, 41.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 55.
- ^ a b c Pettegree, 154.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 56–58.
- ^ Guy, 102–103.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 59.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 60.
- ^ Morris, 248.
- ^ Holt, 38–39.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 64; Holt, 44. The incident was known later as the "tumult" or conspiracy of Amboise.
- ^ Knecht, Renaissance France, 282.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 65–66.
- ^ Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 32.
- ^ Knecht, 72; Guy, 119.
- ^ Pettegree, 154; Hoogvliet, 105. The regency was traditionally the preserve of the princes of the blood.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 73.
- ^ Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 28.
- ^ Manetsch, 22.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 80.
- ^ Knecht, Renaissance France, 311; Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 11–12. The edict, also known as the Edict of Toleration and the Edict of January, was significant for effectively recognising the existence of Protestant churches and permitting their worship outside city walls.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 87.
- ^ Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 140.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 89.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 90.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 91; Carroll, 126; Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 17.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 91–92.
- ^ Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 15.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 104, 107–108.
- ISBN 978-1845111229– via Google Books.
- ^ Wood, 17.
- ^ Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 147.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 118.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 120.
- ^ Quoted by Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 149.
- ^ Bryson, 204.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 132.
- ^ Wood, 28.
- ^ Holt, 77.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 135.
- ^ Bryson, 282.
- ^ Jeanne d'Albret wrote to her son, Henry: "I am not free to talk with either the King or Madame, only the Queen Mother, who goads me [me traite á la fourche] ... You have doubtless realized that their main object, my son, is to separate you from God, and from me." Quoted by Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 148–149.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 151. An autopsy revealed tuberculosis and an abscess.
- ^ Sutherland, Massacre of St Bartholomew, 313.
- ^ Holt, 83. The investigators traced the house and horse to the Guises and claimed to have found evidence that the would-be killer was Charles de Louviers de Maurevert.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 154–157. Coligny was lobbying the king to intervene against the empire in the Netherlands.
• The Duke of Anjou was later reported as saying that he and Catherine had planned the assassination with Anne d'Este, who longed to avenge her husband, Francis, Duke of Guise.
• For an overview of historians' various interpretations, see Holt, 83–84. - ^ Pettegree, 159–160.
- ^ Holt, 84.
• The memoirs of Marshal Tavannes, edited by his son and published around 1620 (Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 122, 158), state that Catherine had summoned a war council in the Tuileries Gardens (so as not to be overheard) to plan the next move: "Because the attempt on the Admiral would cause a war, she, and the rest of us, agreed that it would be advisable to bring battle in Paris". It is almost certain, however, that when Charles gave the order "Kill them all!", he meant those drawn up on a list by Catherine, and not, as has often been claimed, all Huguenots. - ^ Holt, 84.
- ^ Quoted by Morris, 252.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 163–164; Heller, 117; Manetsch, 60–61. The misogyny and anti-Italianism in Huguenot "histories" proved seductive not only to Protestants but to Catholics seeking a scapegoat for France's woes.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 172.
- ^ Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 232, 240, 247.
- ^ Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 22.
- ^ Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 205.
- ^ Holt, 104.
- ^ Holt, 105–106; Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 186.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 212–213.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 217.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 254–255.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 189.
- ^ Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 209.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 200.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 201.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 185.
- ^ Pettegree, 164.
- ^ Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 255.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 249.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 251.
- ^ Knecht, Renaissance France, 440.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 253.
- ^ Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 287.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 257.
- ^ "The Day of the Barricades", as the revolt became known, "reduced the authority and prestige of the monarchy to its lowest ebb for a century and a half." Morris, 260.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 263.
- ^ Henry wrote a note to Villeroy, which began: "Villeroy, I remain very well contented with your service; do not fail however to go away to your house where you will stay until I send for you; do not seek the reason for this my letter, but obey me." Sutherland, Secretaries of State, 300–303.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 264–265.
- ^ Yet on 22 December 1588, Guise spent the night with his current mistress Charlotte de Sauve, the most accomplished and notorious member of Catherine de' Medici's group of female spies known as the "Flying Squadron", making it unlikely Catherine was kept 'in the dark'. Emmanuel le Roy Ladurie France 1460–1610.
- ^ Pettegree, 165.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 266. The words were reported to the government of Florence by Catherine's doctor, Filippo Cavriana, who acted as their informant.
- ^ a b Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 267.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 268–269.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 269.
- ^ Brantôme, p. 88.
- ^ Hoogvliet, 109.
- ^ Knecht, 220.
- ^ Knecht, 240–241.
- ^ Dimier, 205–206.
- ^ Dimier, 308–319; Jollet, 17–18.
- ^ a b Blunt, 98.
- ^ Blunt calls Caron's style "perhaps the purest known type of Mannerism in its elegant form, appropriate to an exquisite but neurotic society." Blunt, 98, 100.
- ^ Yates, 68.
- ^ Yates, 51; Strong, 102, 121–122.
- ^ Lee, 44.
- ^ Babelon, 263.
- ^ Sutherland, Ancien Régime, 6.
- ^ Knecht, 228.
- ^ Knecht, 223.
- ^ Hoogvliet, 108.
- ^ Zerner, 379.
- ^ Hoogvliet, 111. Ronsard may be referring to Artemisia, who drank the ashes of her dead husband, which became part of her own body.
- ^ Thomson, 168.
- ^ Knecht, Catherine de' Medici, 244.
- ISBN 978-0199677337.
- ^ ISBN 978-1439143735.
- ISBN 978-0252064906.
- ISBN 978-2753574069
- ^ Diderot, Denis; le Rond d'Alembert, Jean (1754). Encyclopédie, ou dictionnaire raisonné des sciences, des arts et des métiers. Paris: Briasson, David, Le Breton and Durand. p. vol. IV, p. 538.
- ^ Gardner, Gerald B. The Meaning of Witchcraft. p. 91.
- ^ a b See Rowlands, Alison (2013). Witchcraft and Gender in Early Modern Europe. Oxford. p. 9.
- PMID 19364432.
- ^ William E. Burns, Astrology through History: Interpreting the Stars from Ancient Mesopotamia, xxii.
- ^ Kocku Von Stuckrad, Locations of Knowledge in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: Esoteric Discourse and Western Identities, 142–145.
- ^ Gardner, Gerald. The Meaning of Witchcraft. p. 91.
- ^ Grillot de Givry, Émile-Jules. Witchcraft, Magic & Alchemy. p. 121.
- ^ Farley, Peter R. Where Were You Before The Tree of Life? Volume 6. p. 218.
- ^ Jean Bodin, De la demonomanie des sorciers, 71 verso.
- ^ Gortner, C. W. "History's Black Widow: The Legend of Catherine de Medici". Wonders and Marvels. Archived from the original on 5 March 2016. Retrieved 20 February 2016.
- ISBN 978-0756515812. Retrieved 12 June 2022.
- ^ Heritier, 48, has the twins' deaths the other way round.
- ^ a b c d Whale, 65
- ^ a b Tomas, 20
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- ISBN 0851152473.
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External links
- Catherine de Medici history
- Portraits of Catherine de' Medici (in French)
- Memoirs of Marguerite de Valois Full text at Gutenberg. Retrieved 27 March 2007.
- Encyclopædia Britannica. Vol. 5 (11th ed.). 1911. pp. 528–529. .
- New International Encyclopedia. 1905. .