Hello and Welcome to Western Sieuve episode two hundred and eighty four. A New
King. Catherine was only fifteen when Pope Clement's unexpected death entirely destroyed her political
existence. Knowing she was regarded as a poor excuse for a princess by the
ever cast conscience French. Lacking any foreign dynastic support and without any powerful French
connections of her own, she must have felt incredibly vulnerable. If she had
been beautiful, perhaps she could have evoked the love of the common people,
but her heavy cheeks and bulging eyes were stubborn features that could not be coaxed
away by makeup. Her Italian fashions and other hints of her origins only served
to remind people of past French military failures in Italy and a lost opportunity of
allying France with a superior bride. Besides, when the French were not busy
imitating the Italians in art and culture or occupying their country, they tended to
despise them as money grabbing opportunists who would slip a knife between a man's shoulder
blades as soon as his back was turned. It is unlikely that the Venetian
ambassador exaggerated excessively when he wrote that the marriage quote displeases the entire nation end
quote. Catherine, above all, was a practical person. She knew that
she could neither change her birth nor her face, but she could use the
experiences of her past and her formidable willpower and intelligence to overcome her present misfortunes.
Recognizing that she was unpopular, she decided to cultivate the most important people
at court. The first and most obvious would be the King. Fortunately,
Catherine seems to have from the start evoked protective feelings from her father in law.
Ever, quick to see what made people happy, she had no trouble
at all identifying Francis's weakness. The king put pleasure before almost anything else.
He was frequently found in the company of a beautiful group of courtly ladies referred
to as La petitbund. Membership to this group required several traits. A quick
wit, a willingness to take body jokes, courage on horseback, and above
all, good looks. Catherine found herself admitted, though she was decidedly lacking
in the final element. Her job became keeping Francis happy. She was terrific
at it and proved quite adept at performing the latest dances. Catherine is even
credited with having brought the side saddle to France. Her conversational skills, more
learned than most girls of her age, amused Francis immensely. Catherine also appealed
to the king's sister, Marguerite, now the Queen of Navarre, for friendship
and guidance. Marguerite was one of the cleverest women at court. She also
supported religious reform, certainly much more than her brother did. Marguerite had a
ton of influence at court and over her brother, so Catherine was fortunate to
be taken under her wing. Despite all these inroads, the one person Catherine
did not seem to be able to grow closer to was her own husband.
Henry treated his wife with civility, but his indifference to her was plain for
all to see. Henry resented his father's choice of bride. He did not
find Catherine attractive and bristled at her lack of royal blood. Plus, with
Clement dead, there was no dowry. From Henry's perspective, Catherine no longer
brought anything to the table at all. Oh, how wrong he was.
The biggest problem was that Catherine now found herself in a growing rivalry with Henry's
favorite, Diane de Poitiers. If you remember from last time, Diane was
the woman who had endeared herself to Henry when he was a child by showing
him kindness on the day of the prisoner exchange. Now, Diane was nineteen
years older than Henry at this point, though she was still considered a beauty,
Diane had been widowed since fifteen thirty one. While they were not openly
having an affair during the period before Francis's death, there is little doubt amongst
scholars that by fifteen thirty two thirty three, Henry had become completely infatuated with
Diane. The biggest issue here is that Diane's relationship with Henry would create massive
problems for Catherine moving forward. In fifteen thirty six, Francis declared war on
the emperor again, and he took his sons with him on campaign. Well
on campaign, on August the second, despite the immensely hot and oppressive weather,
the Dauphin, the heir to the throne, played a vigorous game of
tennis with one of his gentlemen. After the game, he felt hot and
breathless, sending his secretary, an Italian count named Sebastian de Montai, for
a glass of freezing water to cool himself. He collapsed immediately after drinking it.
Not long afterwards, the prince developed a high fever and experienced difficulty breathing.
He died in the early morning hours of the tenth of August at Tournon.
The king, not near his son when he passed, was heard later
to cry out, quote, my God, I know I must accept with
patience whatever it be thy will to send me. But from whom, if
not from thee ought I hoped for strength and resignation end quote. With the
sudden and unexpected death of the Dauphin, Henry and Catherine were pressed into the
limelight. They were now the future king and Queen of France. Both were
seventeen years old. Unfortunately, Catherine found herself in her new position and almost
immediately under threat. Imperial ambassadors accused her of poisoning the former Dauphin so that
her husband might be king. This sounds ridiculous to us because it is,
but Italians were assumed to be all experts in the art of poison. Hence,
to many in France, Catherine was a natural suspect. Luckily for her,
Francis gave the wild allegations no credence at all. Still, it was
a sign of things to come. But the real problem was in baseless poisoning
accusations. The real problem was that Catherine and Henry had been married for three
years, and yet there had been no sign of her becoming pregnant, making
matters worse. In fifteen thirty seven, Henry got the wife of one of
his grooms pregnant, or at least Henry assumed the child was his. This
would mean that the problem was Catherine. Evidently, Henry was more than capable
of fathering a child. If Catherine could not produce an air, there was
every reason to believe she might go the path of another Catherine, Catherine of
Aragon, and find herself in the proverbial royal dust bin. Catherine's endurance faced
another test as Diane de Poitier became more assiduous in her attentions to Henry.
In fifteen thirty eight, a truce was declared between France and the Empire,
encouraged by Pope Paul the Third, who wanted Francis and Charles to unite in
a campaign against the ever threatening Ottoman Turks. When Henry returned from the war,
Diane, now thirty eight years old, found him more confident and no
longer the timid boy she had been coaching for years. She showered Henry the
Dauphin with compliments on his military prowess. Knowing that the moment had arrived for
her to take possession of him completely. Casting aside any platonic ideals with which
she had fended him off forever, she decided to become involved with him romantically
and become effectively the mistress to the future king. Aided by Anne de Montmorenci,
who offered the couple the use of his castle for their trysts, Diane
allowed Henry to become her lover. It's not known exactly when this happened,
but certainly, by some point in fifteen thirty eight, the two were having
a f Catherine knew she would not last long now unless she produced a child,
and unbeknownst to her, a campaign to replace her was already under way.
But then, in an odd twist of fate, Diane de Poitier decided
to throw her weight to influence behind Catherine. She was worried about her own
position. There was no reason to believe that a new young bride might be
quite as willing to indulge Henry's affair with Diane as Catherine had been. In
Catherine Diane had resignation, so she decided she would not risk a throw of
the dice. Diane would back Catherine. Of course, the final decision rested
with the King, and knowing that he was, however unwillingly having to consider
a new wife for his son, Catherine gambled everything on a show of feminine
submission to the man who liked to call himself quote the first gentleman of France
end quote, which is a ridiculous title given his behavior, but anyway,
throwing herself at his feet. Sobbing, Catherine told Francs that she accepted that
she must stand aside for a bride who would bear Henry children, begging only
to be allowed to remain in France and serve the fortunate lady who might replace
her in whatever lowly capacity the King might permit. Her sorrow and humility were
so touching that the King found himself her champion against his own better judgment,
unable to stand the sight of any woman in tears, Frances profoundly moved declared,
quote, my child, it is God's will that you should be my
daughter and the wife of the Dauphin. So be it end. Quote.
It was a reprieve, but everyone knew a temporary one, and so the
king had spoken. Catherine would remain the Dauphine. Even Henry began treating his
wife with some affection, realizing he had no option. He after all,
needed an air as well. Her enemies silenced for a moment, Catherine turned
first to traditional medicine, with almost no success. Prayers and offerings to God
were constantly on her lips. Diane, for her part, gave her advice
potions, sent the daff ann off to do his duty conscientiously and regularly by
sleeping with his wife. He followed Diane's orders, but with little enthusiasm.
Catherine poured over old medical texts, anything that she could find, even references
to ancient magic and pagan remedies. Some of these were borderline dangerous and ridiculous,
but Catherine followed them anyway. She drank large contents of mules or urine,
and the current wisdom being that it would provide a primitive form of inoculation
against a real She was given clear instructions, though not to go near the
mule okay. The astrologers were also consulted, and Catherine faithfully followed their every
instruction, but no child appeared. Finally, exasperated, Catherine became convinced that
she was sexually incompetent in committing some sort of an error. Whatever Diane was
doing with her husband, she had to try to do the same. It
is said that the young woman ordered holes to be bored through the floor so
that she could look down into the bedchamber where her husband and Diane spent their
passionate nights together. Catherine's ladies and waiting begged her not to go through this
agonizing process, but she would hear no argument and instead went to watch Henry
make love to his mistress. What she had seen suggested to her that she
and her husband did something different when they lay together, and so at last,
a doctor named Jean Vanrell was called. He examined the couple and found
that their reproductive organs both carried slight physical abnormalities. The sensible doctor counseled a
method that might overcome the problem, though we don't know what that was.
The couple were told what to do, and Henry performed his duty. Their
joy was obvious to all when, in the early summer of fifteen forty three,
Catherine became pregnant. On January the nineteenth, fifteen forty four, she
went into labor, and everyone was relieved when she delivered a healthy baby and
a boy at bat The happy couple named the child Francis, for the aging
King. The symbolism was obvious. Whatever cured doctor Farnell had prescribed for the
Dauphin and his wife, it worked spectacularly. Over the following twelve years,
Catherine would give birth to another nine children. Catherine's good health was, not,
however, inherited by her children, with the notable exception of their daughter
Margot, who enjoyed good health. Her siblings were by and large sickly.
Of the seven children who would survive infancy, six suffered from weak lungs and,
most likely tuberculosis. Francois, Charles Maximilian, and Edouard Alexandre were also
prone to septic sore's infections, and as they grew older, fits of dementia
that implied genetically inherited syphilis from their grandfather, Lorenzo the second de Medici.
In many ways, the dreadful health of the royal children, especially the boys,
was one of the major factors that forced Catherine to maintain her central role
in governing France even once her sons were mature. At the birth of her
first son and immediately went from being barely tolerated to widely celebrated. Oddly,
if anything, Diane's influence over Henry grew as Catherine gave birth to child after
child. Katherine, in the end was forced to concede that there were three
people in this marriage. Now, what happens next is kind of interesting,
and it has a lot to do with court intrigues, so I'll get into
it a little bit. But essentially, there's two court favorites. There's Diane,
who's Henry's court favorite, and then there's Madame de et Temps, who
is favorite to the King Francis. Catherine tried to navigate between the two as
best she could, even though their quiet rivalry had sort of blown up into
open hostility. At first, the two sort of had a mild dislike for
each other. Over time, this grew into open hatred, mostly driven by
the fact that Madame de Eestempes really started to fear at one point that eventually
Francis was going to die, and that was becoming increasingly clear as the years
went on, meaning that she was almost certainly going to be replaced by Diane,
and so it was sort of a jealousy thing. By fifteen forty,
as Francis began to weaken from excesses that stemmed from his youth, talents from
the Tempes about quote unquote, the old Lady, as she called Henry's Mistress,
grew louder and louder. She claimed to have been born on her rival's
wedding day, though she was actually only nine years younger than Diane. Rumors
about Henry's favorite were enlarged, and any differences between them was eagerly seized upon.
Dad Tempes took a keen interest in the new religion, while Diane detested
the reform movement. Essentially the two which just sort of picked opposites sides of
every issue that they could maybe regardless of to their personal beliefs. The positions
between the two parties at court polarized progressively. Overtime. Madame de et Tempes
championed the King's son, Charles, who was his favorite but youngest. She
planned to make him powerful enough to protect her when the king died. After
the Emperor and Francis had met in Nice in fifteen thirty eight and settled a
ten year truce, the king, egged on by his younger favorite, entered
into talks with his erstwild enemy about a marriage between Charles and the Emperor's daughter
Mary. Francis would lad to believe that Milan would be her dowry, which
infuriated Henry, his son, who considered that duchy rightfully. His Montmorenci,
who had promoted peace between the two rulers, found himself disgraced and banished from
court when the Emperor proceeded to go back on his earlier promise is by installing
his son later Philip the Second of Spain, who we're going to get too
soon in the podcast, as Duke of Milan in fifteen forty. The relationship
between Henry and Charles, the two remaining royal brothers, which could never really
have been described as cozy or close, now became a dangerous feud, each
party sort of led on by these two rival women, Diane de Poitier and
the Duchess of Essampeis, and enjoyed considerable backing by the princess's respective followers.
Henry always felt jealous of his father's clear love for his younger brother, and
he may have even resented the fact that Charles had not been forced to endure
the appalling years of captivity and spain. Now he was witnessed to quit blatant
efforts by Charles to carve out wrong base for himself as a feudal lord so
powerful that he would in fact represent a major threat to Henry when Henry became
king. Now, after the Emperor had made a fool of Francis with his
promise and marriage and milan for Prince Charles, the king had no choice but
to go to war with his old enemy. The brothers now competed with each
other for military glory. In fifteen forty two, Charles took Luxembourg with little
effort, but when he heard that Henry was preparing to attack Pepignon, he
hastened to join him and share in the military success. Perepignon proved impossible to
take, and during Charles's absence, the imperialists recaptured Luxembourg as the rivalry between
the two princes now exacerbated France's declining position. France continued to suffer, steadily
running out of allies. Henry begged his father to allow Morancy to return with
his undoubted military skills, which might help France recover the initiative, but the
king denied his own request. Nevertheless, despite his father and re fought with
notable valor and distinction, but was powerless to do anything to prevent further imperial
successes. The Emperor's troops proceeded to invade Champagne and directly threatened Paris, but,
as just so often happened in his reign, just as Charles the Fifth
was about to destroy his old enemy, we know, his troops deserted him
because, as we know, they hadn't been paid. Perpetual problem for Charles
the Fifth. Both parties, exhausted, now negotiated a settlement, and the
peace Treaty of Crepe was signed on the eighteenth of September and fifteen forty four.
This treaty could probably be described as the maybe second dumbest act of Francis's
reign, second only to being captured in battle, because it incorporated a marriage
between Charles of France and either a daughter of the Emperor or one of his
brother's daughters. If it were the emperor's own daughter, then he would bestow
the Netherlands upon her as her dowry. If it was her niece, then
she would receive Milan as her wedding gift. In return, Francis agreed to
give his son several of France's most important duchies, ang Le May, Bourbon
and Orleans. Now why was this a bad deal? Because he's basically dividing
France in half between his two sons. Henry was apoplectic when he heard the
details. For though the secession had been assured thanks to the birth of his
son, now Charles, his younger brother, would be just as powerful as
he was, and more worse still, he would have the backing of the
Emperor. The House of Balois would be effectively split in half. Doubtless,
this is exactly what Charles the Fifth intended, and Francis just didn't see it.
The country was only now just starting to emerge as a national entity,
leaving behind the old factional feudalism that had just been deviled France for so long.
Henry understood, as did many other outraged members of the nobility, that
the Treaty of Crape contained all the ingredients to revive this dangerous situation. Having
been obliged to sign this treaty out of quote, fear and reverence from my
father end quote, and reproceeded to write a secret denunciation of the pact,
which gave away inalienable crown properties. Three members of his closest entourage, Francois
of Geese Andtoine de Bourmont, and Bourbon's brother, the Count de Anlais,
witnessed the document. Now, the Duchess of Estampees was triumphed. At this
point she had manipulated the increasingly decrepit Francis, possibly using treachery. She had
skillfully undermined the Dauphin and his party, and this gave her every reason to
hope that she might be secure after Francis's death. After all, although there
is no direct evidence against her, it is thought that the Duchess was passing
secrets to the Emperor and therefore almost certainly guilty of treason. She left for
Brussels with Queen Eleanor and Charles to celebrate the signing of the treaty. The
cool relationship between Francis and his oldest son, Henry worsened. Henry rarely now
saw his father and absent at himself from court as much as he could.
In revenge, Francis ostentiously lavished gifts and love and pride all on Charles,
his youngest son. Finally, in the fall of fifteen forty four, King
Francis vanished Diane de Potier from court after constant pestering from his own favorite.
Now, as an aside, you know, some of these court politics issues
may seem a little bit mundane to be covering in the podcast, but they
actually a lot of times, and they will in this case have major foreign
policy and domestic ramifications. We're covering them now in the podcast and didn't episodes
before because frankly, we just didn't have the information. It's extremely likely that
there was a lot of court intrigue in the court of let's say, Charlemagne,
we just don't have the sources to substantiate it. What happens starting in
the early modern period is our number of sources increases dramatically. That's really what
drives the change in the narrative. It's not so much that I've decided this
part of history is more interesting. It's just that the number of sources up
exponentially, all right. So getting back to the story. After Diane was
banished from court, Henry moped around a bit, but Catherine was no doubt
secretly a little gleeful. But Henry didn't have much time to mope around because
there was still ongoing wars and conflicts going on. As you will recall,
back in the reign of Henry the eighth, the English captured the city of
Bologne, and so Charles, the youngest son, and Henry decided to go
campaigning in the Bone area, trying to evict the English who had captured the
town back in fifteen forty four. At this time, you could actually finally
start to see relations between Henry and his younger brother Charles getting a little bit
better. Francis, anxious to keep busy in order to avoid dwelling on his
dwindling health, had actually gone with his sons on campaign. That was a
little unusual for this period. Henry and his brother had hardly addressed one word
to each other since the Peace of Crepe had been signed, But gradually a
general sort of fraternal spirit started to emerge. During the military operations, maybe
a sense of camaraderie. And then in the month of August fifteen forty four,
plague, this is the recurring waves of bubonic plague to come back every
eight to ten years, broke out in the vicinity of Bologne. On September
the sixth, Charles and some of his young nobles came upon a house where
all the inhabitants had recently died of the disease. Charles, in what could
only be described as a colossal blunder or maybe an excess of youthful confidence,
decided to go in and have a look. He was urged not to,
but laughing, the young prince commented, quote, never yet has a son
of France died of the plague? End quote. And with that he and
his friends went inside and they started to tear the place apart, allegedly pillow
fighting at one point, and he was right, never yet to this point
had a son of France died of the plague. By evening he began to
feel sick. Three days later Charles was dead. Never yet the piece of
crepe was now totally obsolete. Henry was now going to be the undisputed ruler
of a United France. Henry, going forward, refused to attend council meetings.
He now said he didn't wish to be tainted by his father's failed legacy
when he passed. Finally, after long last, and if we're being honest,
a lot of wasted money and a lot of wasted lives. In June
of fifteen forty six, France and England signed a peace treaty, giving back
Bologne for the price of two million ECUs. With a natural sense of relief,
Catherine and Henry went on their first official progress together that fall. Catherine
had given birth to two children in the span of just fourteen months, and
fell ill while the couple was traveling. Henry stayed by her side as she
recuperated, an indication of just how much their relationship had changed. Fortunately for
France, she did recover. Then, in February of fifteen forty seven,
word reached France that Henry, the eighth King of England, had died.
Francis was devastated by the news. He knew he likely did not have much
longer to go himself. He could no longer ride a horse and could barely
walk. By late February, he was bedridden. The most likely cause of
his final sickness was probably gone rhea, which if left untreated, would lead
to bladder and urinary tract infections. Catherine visited her dying benefactor shortly thereafter,
on March the twentieth, and she could tell the end was near. Then,
on March the thirty first, fifteen forty seven, the king, who
had started his reign so auspiciously, only to see it end so badly,
breathed his last. Certainly, both Henry and Catherine had learned a lot from
Francis and his reign, and as the new King and Queen of France,
they were determined not to repeat his mistakes as always. Before our next episode,
if you're interested in additional content, check out the links to the show
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