Marguerite DE VALOIS

Other Events and Attributes:

• Name: Margaret Princess Of France

Marguerite married Henry IV King Of FRANCE on 18 Aug 1572. Henry (son of Antoine Of NAVARRE and Jeanne III Of NAVARRE) was born on 13 Dec 1553; died on 14 May 1610. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Wikipedia: Henry was born in the Royal Ch‚teau at Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France, the son of Francis I and Claude de France and the grandson of Louis XII of France and Anne de Bretagne. With his brother, he spent three years in Spain as a hostage to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, as surety for his father, who had been captured at the Battle of Pavia. Henry married Catherine de Medici (13 April 1519?January 5, 1589) on 28 October 1533, when both were fourteen years old.

The following year he became involved with the thirty-five-year-old, recently widowed, Diane de Poitiers, who became his most trusted confidante and for the next twenty-five years wielded considerable influence behind the scenes, even signing royal documents. Extremely confident, mature and intelligent, she left Catherine powerless to intervene.

When his older brother Francis died in 1536 after a game of tennis, Henry became heir to the throne; he succeeded his father on March 31, 1547 and was crowned King of France on July 25, 1547 at Reims.

Henry's reign was marked by wars with Austria, and the persecution of the Protestant Huguenots. Henry II severely punished them, burning them alive or cutting out their tongues for speaking their Protestant beliefs. Even those suspected of being Huguenots could be imprisoned for life.

The Italian War of 1551?1559, sometimes known as the Habsburg-Valois War, began when Henry declared war against Charles V with the intent of recapturing Italy and ensuring French, rather than Habsburg, domination of European affairs. An early offensive into Lorraine was successful, with Henry capturing the three episcopal cities of Metz, Toul, and Verdun, but the attempted French invasion of Tuscany in 1553 was defeated at the Battle of Marciano.

After Charles's abdication in 1556 split the Habsburg empire between Phillip II of Spain and Ferdinand I, the focus of the war shifted to Flanders, where Phillip, in conjunction with Emmanuel Philibert of Savoy, defeated the French at St. Quentin. England's entry into the war later that year led to the French capture of Calais, and French armies plundered Spanish possessions in the Low Countries; but Henry was nonetheless forced to accept the Peace of Cateau-CambrÈsis, in which he renounced any further claims to Italy.

The Peace of Cateau-CambrÈsis was signed between Elizabeth I of England and Henry on April 2 and between Henry and Philip II of Spain on April 3, 1559, at Le Cateau-CambrÈsis, around twenty kilometers south-east of Cambrai. Under its terms, France restored Piedmont and Savoy to the Duke of Savoy, but retained Saluzzo, Calais and the bishoprics of Metz, Toul, and Verdun. Spain retained Franche-ComtÈ. Emmanuel Philibert, Duke of Savoy, married Margaret of France, Duchess of Berry, the sister of Henry II, and Philip II of Spain married Henry's daughter Elisabeth.

Henry raised the young Queen Mary I of Scotland at his court, hoping to use her as a tool of Valois imperialism. On April 24, 1558, Henry's fourteen-year-old son Francis was married to Mary in a union intended to give the future king of France not only the throne of Scotland but a claim to the throne of England. Henry had Mary sign secret documents, illegal in Scottish law, that would ensure Valois rule in Scotland even if she died without heir (Guy 2004:91). Mary's claim to the English throne quickly became current when Mary I of England died later in 1558, Henry and his Catholic advisors regarding Elizabeth Tudor as illegitimate.
Henry II was an avid hunter and participant in jousts and tournaments. On June 30, 1559, at the Place des Vosges in Paris, during a match to celebrate the Peace Treaty of Cateau-CambrÈsis with his longtime enemies, the Habsburgs of Austria and to celebrate the marriage of his daughter Elizabeth of Valois to King Philip II of Spain, King Henry was mortally wounded by a sliver from the shattered lance of Gabriel Montgomery, captain of the King's Scottish Guard. It penetrated the closed visor, pierced his left eye, penetrated the brain and came out via his ear. He suffered terribly, and, despite the efforts of royal surgeon Ambroise ParÈ, died on July 10, 1559 and was buried in a cadaver tomb in Saint Denis Basilica. Prior to his death, Queen Catherine limited access to his bedside and denied his mistress (Diane de Poitiers) access to him, even though he repeatedly asked for her. Following his death, Catherine sent de Poitiers into exile, where she was to live in comfort on her own properties until her death.

Nostradamus supposedly predicted Henry's death.

Henry was succeeded by his son, Francis II, who died the following year and was succeeded by his two brothers. Their mother acted as Regent. For the forty years following Henry II's death, France was filled with turbulence as Protestants and Catholics fought the bitter Wars of Religion

Henry married Caterina DE'MEDICI on 28 Oct 1533. Caterina (daughter of Duke of Urbino Lorenzo DE'MEDICI, II and Madeleine De La Tour D'AUVERGNE) was born on 13 Apr 1519 in Florence, Italy; died on 05 Jan 1589 in Royal Chateau de Bloia. [Group Sheet] [Family Chart]

Notes:

Catherine de' Medici (April 13, 1519 - January 5, 1589) was born in Florence, Italy, as Caterina Maria Romola di Lorenzo de' Medici, the daughter of Lorenzo II de' Medici, Duke of Urbino, and Madeleine de la Tour d'Auvergne, countess of Boulogne. She was queen consort of France from 1547 to 1559 as the wife of King Henry II of France.

In 1533, Catherine was married at the age of fourteen to Henry, the second son of King Francis I of France and Queen Claude, to further the interests of her uncle, Pope Clement VII. When Prince FranÁois, the dauphin, died after a game of tennis in 1536, Henry replaced him as heir to the throne and Catherine became the dauphine. Henry ascended the throne as Henry II in 1547, but throughout his reign he excluded Catherine from influence and instead showered favours on his mistress, Diane de Poitiers. On Henry?s death from a jousting injury in 1559, Catherine found herself thrust into the political arena as queen mother of the frail fifteen-year-old King Francis II, after whose own death in 1560, she was appointed regent for her ten-year-old son King Charles IX and granted sweeping powers. After Charles too died, in 1574, Catherine remained a significant force in the government of the third of her sons to become king, Henry III, though he dispensed with her advice in the last months of her life with disastrous consequences.

Catherine proved a tireless and resilient defender of the crown, but her three weak sons had the misfortune to reign during an age of almost constant civil and religious war in France, the origins of which were beyond the control of the monarchy and would have daunted even a mature king. At first, Catherine sought compromise through limited concessions to the Huguenots; she failed, however, to grasp the theological issues underpinning their movement, for which no concession short of freedom of worship would ever have been enough. Later, as anarchy set in, Catherine abandoned conciliation and resorted to hard-line policies towards religious rebels. As a result, she was personally blamed for the worst atrocities of the government, in particular for the notorious Massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day of 1572, in which thousands of Huguenots were butchered in Paris and throughout France. Catherine's subsequent vilification in contemporary pamphlets gave birth to "the black legend", which branded her for posterity as the epitome of the Machiavellian Renaissance prince, servicing an overweening lust for power with dark political crimes, serial poisonings, and even witchcraft. By the nineteenth century, this tradition had hardened to the point where the great historian Jules Michelet could refer to Catherine as that "maggot which came out of Italy's tomb".

Some recent historians have attempted to rehabilitate Catherine, excusing her from the worst excesses and reappraising her as a diligent ruler facing extraordinary and insoluble difficulties. R.J.Knecht, however, cautions against taking revisionism too far, since explicit documentary proof of Catherine?s lack of scruple remains, not least in her own letters. He also warns against overstating the degree of Catherine?s power: far from bestriding France, she fought a losing battle for control as the kingdom descended into anarchy around her. Her policies, therefore, may be seen not as a calculated tyranny but as an opportunistic series of rearguard actions designed to keep the Valois monarchy afloat at all costs. It is arguable that without Catherine's custodianship, the regime of her sons would never have survived as long as it did.

ccording to a contemporary chronicler, when Catherine de? Medici was born, in Florence on Wednesday 15 April 1519, her parents, were "as pleased as if it had been a boy". Their pleasure, however, was short-lived: the seventeen-year-old Madeleine de la Tour d?Auverne, countess of Bologne, died on 28 April, and her husband, Lorenzo II de? Medici, duke of Urbino, on 4 May, probably from syphilis, leaving their first-born an orphan. The young couple had been married the year before at Amboise as part of the alliance between King Francis I of France and Pope Leo X, Lorenzo?s uncle, against the Habsburg emperor Maximilian I. The lavish wedding celebrations had climaxed with a mock battle of such realism that several participants were killed. After her parents' death, the orphaned Catherine, a potentially valuable marriage pawn, was taken under the wing of Pope Leo, who refused a request from King Francis that she be raised at the French court.

Unlike her parents and her own children, Catherine enjoyed robust health most of her long life,[10] but in August she fell so ill that her life hung in the balance for three weeks. After her recovery, Pope Leo had her brought to Rome, where he noted how "fine and fat" she was. He already had ambitious plans for her; he declared her the duchess of Urbino, intending to marry her to Ippolito de' Medici, bastard son of his brother Giuliano di Lorenzo de' Medici, and set the pair up as rulers of Florence.

Catherine was first cared for by her grandmother, Alfonsina Orsini, after whose death in 1520, she passed to the household of her aunt, Clarissa Strozzi, who became her surrogate mother for the next few years, bringing her up with her own children. Catherine loved her Strozzi cousins faithfully for the rest of their lives, as if they were her brothers and sisters. The death of Pope Leo in 1521 briefly threatened the Medici ascendancy?his pro-Habsburg successor, Pope Hadrian VI, even stripped Catherine of her duchy?but the election of Cardinal Giulio de? Medici as Pope Clement VII in 1523 restored Medici fortunes. Taking over the role of Catherine's protector, Clement installed Catherine in the Palazzo Medici in Florence, insisting that the "little duchess", as the Florentine people affectionately called her, live in state, attended by a princely retinue.

Queen of France

During the reign of her husband (1547?1559), Catherine lived a quiet and passive life but observed what was going on. Catherine was extremely jealous of the relationship between her husband and de Poitiers, but had little authority to change it. Henry was loyal to de Poitiers, and trusted his mistress completely, and he was under her influence for the next 25 years. During this period, de Poitiers would be in control of any decisions made behind the scenes, with Henry's consent, including the signing of certain royal documents, and taking part in political decisions. Evidently she was quite competent in her role, and did not abuse her authority.

In 1552, when the king left the kingdom for the campaign of Metz, Catherine was nominated regent, but with very limited powers, as de Poitiers was still making most of the king's decisions with his blessing. When Henry II was badly wounded in a jousting event in 1559, however, Catherine took control. She limited access to her husband, and did not allow Diane de Poitiers to see him at all, even though he requested her presence repeatedly. When he died, Catherine had Diane exiled, and for the first time was able to wield power.