Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine

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For homonyms, see Charles of Lorraine (disambiguation).
Cardinal-priest of Sant'Apollinare 1555-1574
Orders
Consecration8 February 1545
by Claude de Longwy de Givry
Created cardinal4 November 1547
by Pope Paul III
RankCardinal-priest
Personal details
Born17 February 1524
Joinville, France
Died25 December 1574 (aged 50)
Avignon, France
Previous post(s)
  • Bishop of Metz
    1550–1551
  • Coadjutor Bishop of Metz 1547–1550
  • Cardinal-priest
    of Santa Cecilia 1547–1555
Coat of armsCharles de Lorraine's coat of arms

Charles de Lorraine (17 February 1524 – 26 December 1574),

Lorraine, after the death of his uncle, Jean, Cardinal of Lorraine (1550). He was the protector of François Rabelais and Pierre de Ronsard and founded Reims University
. He is sometimes known as the Cardinal de Lorraine.

Biography

Born in 1524,

Archbishop of Reims in 1538, (the day after the coronation of king Henry II of France, at which he had officiated).[3]

Cardinal

In a political move to draw France closer to the papacy, Pope Paul III consecrated Charles as cardinal in July 1547.

Bishop of Metz
, his uncle Cardinal Jean de Lorraine, on 16 November 1547. Charles' uncle died on 10 May 1550 and he resigned and was succeeded as Administrator by Cardinal Robert de Lenoncourt.

The efforts of Charles to enforce his family's pretensions to the

Cardinal de Granvelle
(at Péronne) initiated friendly relations between the Guises and the royal house of Spain.

In March 1558 de Pierceville wrote to Charles about building works and furnishing of the royal palaces, including the

married on 24 April 1558.[5]

In 1562, he attended the

Guy de Faur de Pibrac
, royal counsellor, who represented Charles IX at the council from 26 May 1562, towards the end of the year were joined by the Cardinal Lorraine. He was instructed to arrive at an understanding with the Germans, who proposed to reform the church in head and members and to authorize at once Communion under Both Kinds, prayers in the vernacular and the marriage of the clergy.

In the reform articles which he presented (2 January 1563), he was silent on the last point, but petitioned for the other two.

Pius IV was indignant, and the cardinal denounced Rome as the source of all abuses. In the questions of precedence which arose between him and the Spanish ambassador, Count de Luna, Pius IV decided for the latter. However, in September 1563, on a visit to Rome, the cardinal, intent perhaps on securing the pope's assistance for the political ambitions of the Guises, professed opinions less decidedly Gallican. Moreover, when he learned that the French ambassadors, who had left the council, were dissatisfied because the papal legates had obtained from the council approval of a project for the "reformation of the princes", which the latter deemed contrary to the liberties of the Catholic Church in France (the "Gallican church"), he endeavoured, though without success, to bring about the return of the ambassadors, prevailed on the legates to withdraw the objectionable articles and strove to secure the immediate publication in France of the decrees of the council; this, however, was refused by Catherine de' Medici.[7]

When in 1564,

Margaret of Valois, the king's sister. His share in the negotiations for the marriage between Charles IX and Elizabeth of Austria, and for that of Margaret of Valois with the prince of Navarre, granted him temporary favour. Shortly after the death of Charles IX, the cardinal appeared before his successor, Henry III
, but died soon afterwards, at Avignon.

Legacy

As the Archbishop of Reims, Charles crowned successively Henry II,

Confession of Augsburg
.

From 1560, at least twenty-two libelous pamphlets were in circulation and fell into Charles' hands; they damaged his reputation with posterity as well as among his contemporaries. One of them, "La Guerre Cardinale" (1565), accuses him of seeking to restore to the Holy Roman Empire the three former

Théodore de Bèze (1566) denounced the pluralism of the cardinal in the matter of benefices. He established Reims University and served as François Rabelais and Pierre de Ronsard's guardian.[8]

Portrait of Charles of Guise by El Greco.

References

  1. ^ Wellman 2013, p. 236.
  2. ^ Carroll 2009, p. 311.
  3. ^ Carroll 2009, p. 56.
  4. ^ Knecht 2014, p. 42.
  5. ^ HMC Laing Manuscripts at the University of Edinburgh, vol. 1 (London, 1914), pp. 14-5
  6. ^ Carroll 2009, p. 157-158.
  7. ^  One or more of the preceding sentences incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Goyau, Georges (1910). "House of Guise". In Herbermann, Charles (ed.). Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 7. New York: Robert Appleton Company.
  8. ^ Konnert 2016, p. 52.

Sources

  • Carroll, Stuart (2009). Martyrs and Murderers: The Guise Family and the Making of Europe. Oxford University Press.
  • Konnert, Mark W. (2016). Local Politics in the French Wars of Religion: The Towns of Champagne, the Duc de Guise, and the Catholic League, 1560-95. Routledge.
  • Knecht, R. J. (2014). Catherine de'Medici. Taylor & Francis.
  • Wellman, Kathleen (2013). Queens and Mistresses of Renaissance France. Yale University Press.

External links

Wikimedia Commons has media related to Charles de Lorraine (1524-1574).


Catholic Church titles
Preceded by
Jean IV of Lorraine
Archbishop of Reims

1538–1574 		Succeeded by
Louis II, Cardinal of Guise
Preceded by
Jean IV of Lorraine
Bishop of Metz

1550–1551 		Succeeded by
Robert de Lenoncourt
Preceded by
Jean IV of Lorraine
 Abbot of Cluny
1550–1574 		Succeeded by
Claude de Guise
French nobility
Preceded by
Duc de Chevreuse

1555–1574 		Succeeded by
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