CATHERINE DE MÉDICIS (1519-1589)

CATHERINE DE MÉDICIS (1519-1589), queen of France. Wife of King Henry II, mother of Kings Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III, Catherine de Médicis, the power behind the throne in France for three decades, has generated passionate opinions among contemporaries and historians alike. She was born in 1519 into one of the greatest Italian princely families: her father, Lorenzo de' Medici, was duke of Urbino, and her uncle was Pope Clement VII. Her mother, Madeleine de La Tour, was daughter of Jean, comte d'Auvergne, and Jeanne de Bourbon-Vendôme, both related to the French royal family.

Her marriage in 1533 to Henry, the younger son of Francis I, was a product of French dynastic ambitions in Italy. But the death of the second Medici pope, Clement VII, a year later, negated the political advantage of the match, and Catherine's isolation at court was increased by her husband's devotion to his mistress, Diane de Poitiers. When Henry acceded to the throne on his father's death in 1547, it was Diane who ruled as queen in all but name. Catherine's political role was limited to the production of children: four sons and a daughter survived into adulthood. Her husband's accidental death in 1559 did not at first usher her into the front rank of politics, but the weak Guise-dominated regime of her eldest son, Francis II, increasingly involved her in policy making in order to widen its base of support. Her real political career began at the age of forty-one with the death of Francis II on 5 December 1560 and her elevation as regent on the accession of the ten-year-old Charles IX.

Catherine faced the problem of combating Protestantism while monarchical authority was weak. She appointed Anthony of Bourbon, king of Navarre, as lieutenant-general of the kingdom and promoted a group of moderates to the royal council who were led by the chancellor, Michel de L'Hôpital. Under her aegis, they embarked on a policy of compromise, toning down the repression of heresy and promoting the cause of doctrinal reconciliation between the faiths, most notably at the Colloquy of Poissy (August 1561). When it was clear that doctrinal compromise was impossible, she hoped to foster stability and peace by establishing limited legal toleration of Protestantism, enshrined in the edict of January 1562. Her policies were anathema to many Catholics and as early as Easter 1561 a group of magnates, led by the duke of Guise and the constable of Montmorency, formed the Triumvirate to resist change. The king of Navarre's defection to the Triumvirate following the Edict of Toleration and the outbreak of civil war were a serious blow to Catherine's policy and left her at the mercy of the factions. The assassination of the duke of Guise by a Huguenot in March 1563 allowed her to broker peace anew and recommence the policy of compromise. During the four years of peace that followed, Catherine dominated government and worked hard to rebuild royal authority. To this end she embarked on a tour of France (1564–1566) with her son Charles. Yet during this period Catherine's commitment to toleration was put into question by her growing reliance on a group of Ultra-Catholic Italian advisors. Protestant suspicions of her motives at a meeting in 1566 with the Spanish envoy, the duke of Alba, were partly responsible for the recommencement of civil war in 1567.

Catherine was once again instrumental in negotiating peace in 1570, and to ensure its durability she arranged the marriage of her daughter, Marguerite, to the leader of the Protestants, Henri de Navarre. Her policy began to unravel when French Protestant intervention in the Low Countries threatened to reignite civil war. Her role in the St. Bartholomew's Day Massacre is contentious, but it seems likely that while she sanctioned the murder of the Protestant leader, Gaspard de Coligny, her responsibility for the popular massacre that followed is less certain. She now lost all credit with the Protestants and though her hold on power at court was as great as ever, the fortunes of the monarchy sank to ever lower depths. Until her death in 1589, Catherine continued to enjoy influence during the reign of her favorite son, Henry III, who came to the throne in 1574, most notably brokering a peace with the Protestants in 1578–1579 and attempting to reconcile her son with the rebel duke of Guise in 1585 and 1588. Catherine realized that civil war undermined royal authority, and she worked to reconcile factions, but her methods and motives were not always trusted, leaving her with the mostly unfair reputation of a Machiavellian plotter and conspirator.

BIBLIOGRAPHY

Diefendorf, Barbara. Beneath the Cross: Catholics and Huguenots in Sixteenth-Century Paris. New York and Oxford 1991. Chapter 6 is the most reliable account in English of the Massacre of Saint Bartholomew.

Knecht, Robert. Catherine de' Medici. London, 1998.

Nugent, Donald. Ecumenism in the Age of Reformation: The Colloquy of Poissy. Cambridge, Mass., 1974.

Soman, Alfred, ed. The Massacre of Saint Bartholomew: Reappraisals and Documents. The Hague, 1974.

Sutherland, N. M. Catherine de Medici and the Ancien Régime. London 1966.

——. The French Secretaries of State in the Age of Catherine de Medici. London, 1962.

——. "The Legend of the Wicked Queen." In Princes, Politics and Religion, 1547–1589. London, 1984.

——. The Massacre of Saint Bartholomew and the European Conflict, 1559–1572. London. 1973.