Mary Queen of Scots (16 page)

Authors: Kathryn Lasky

BOOK: Mary Queen of Scots

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It was during the sixteenth century that the Catholic Church and the Pope had weakened as symbols of spiritual unity in Europe. Plagued by corruption and greed, the Church had lost much of its prestige. Because of this loss of influence, it became easier for new ideas to be introduced, ideas that emphasized the central value of humans and their potential to create lasting things on Earth. At the same time Protestant reformers who had objected to the worldliness and corruption of the Church gained strength. It was during this century that Martin Luther and John Calvin began a religious revolution that became known as the Reformation. On 31 October, 1517, Luther posted his ninety-five theses on the door of a church in Wittenberg, Germany. The theses criticized the Catholic Church’s practice of selling indulgences and stressed the spiritual inward character of the Christian faith. The posting of the theses to the church door is thought of as the beginning of the religious Reformation. Martin Luther’s reform ideas began to spread throughout Europe. By 1550, Lutheranism was a major force in northern Europe. In Scotland, men such as John Knox were rejecting the Catholic Church and Catholic monarchs, in attempts to make the country a Protestant one. The Protestantism that Knox established in Scotland – the Presbyterian faith – made possible the eventual union of Scotland with England. In England, Queen Elizabeth practised a religious tolerance that found favour with the reformers.

So the world into which Mary Stuart was born was one in which old orders were giving way to new ones. Art and humanism were becoming important. Religion and its connections with politics was being questioned. Monarchies were still strong, but the first hints that a separation of church and state might be advisable, that religious tolerance might be a good policy, were emerging. The culture was becoming more secular, and the people did not trust the old religion of the medieval era. Still, not all were ready for the Protestantism of the reform.

Henry VIII, angry with the Pope who would not give him a divorce from his wife, Catherine of Aragon, did not embrace Luther or the reform movement but began his own church, the Church of England. His daughter, Mary Tudor, a devout Catholic, incensed by her father’s abandonment of the Church and her mother, during her reign became militant in her attempts to follow her faith. She ordered thousands of heretics (her word for anyone who was not a practising Catholic) burned. Her sister, Elizabeth, however, when she became queen declared that she did not want to “open windows in men’s souls”, meaning that she did not care to peer into people’s private religious beliefs.

When Luther’s works first appeared in Paris, King Francis I, father of Henry II, banned them. But by 1534 the people of France were becoming increasingly dissatisfied with the Catholic Church. Many were followers of John Calvin, a French exile in Geneva. The French Protestants who followed Calvin became known as Huguenots. Henry II was no more lenient than his father, Francis I, but Protestantism continued to spread. Indeed it was Catherine de Medici, after her husband’s death, who decided that it was simply not practical to have a policy of religious repression. The uncles of Mary Stuart, however, the de Guises, were violently opposed to Catherine’s policies of conciliation. As le Balafré, Francis, duc de Guise, passed through Vassy with his partisans in March 1562, trouble erupted that resulted in the massacre of a Huguenot congregation. Thus the first civil war, a religious war, broke out in France.

Mary’s father, James V, was Catholic and the son of Margaret Tudor, the sister of Henry VIII. Both James V and his wife, Mary de Guise, were Catholics and had not embraced the Church of England. However, both Mary de Guise as Queen Regent and Mary Stuart, during the brief time she actually reigned, did practise religious tolerance and tried to come to some sort of settlement or agreement with John Knox and his followers. One might imagine that despite her profound devotion to Catholicism and despite her lack of political skills, and her own impulsiveness, Mary, Queen of Scots, like Elizabeth, had no interest in looking “into the windows of men’s souls”. Mary Stuart was pious but not intolerant. She had beliefs but she was not dogmatic. She was not cunning nor was she slavishly in the thrall of her advisers. But she was never given the time or the opportunity to truly explore her capacities and talents as a monarch. Her instincts were good but she was often a creature of impulse. This was her worst fault.

The Stuart–de Guise Family Tree

Mary Stuart was a product of the joining of two of the most powerful ruling families of France and Scotland, the de Guises and the Stuarts. She was only a week old when she was named Queen of Scotland after the death of her father, King James V. At age 16, she was married to the Dauphin of France, 15-year-old Francis II. She also held the title of Queen of France when Francis assumed the throne after the death of his father, King Henry II. A widow at age 18, Mary later married her first cousin Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Together they had a son, James VI, who at 13 months old was named King of Scotland when Mary was forced to abdicate the throne. As King James I, James VI would later begin the reign of the British House of Stuarts.

The chart over the page illustrates the blending of the Stuart–de Guise families. The crown symbol indicates those who ruled. Double lines represent marriages; single lines indicate parentage. Dates of births and deaths (when available) are noted.

M
ARY
S
TUART
: Queen of Scotland and once Queen of France, she sought to dethrone Elizabeth I and become Queen of England. Instead, she was imprisoned for treason and beheaded on 8 February, 1587.

Mary Stuart’s parents

J
AMES
S
TUART
V: King of Scotland and the father of Mary, Queen of Scots, he was the son of King James Stuart IV and Margaret Tudor (the eldest sister of King Henry VIII of England and grandmother to Mary, Queen of Scots). James V died six days after Mary’s birth in 1542, disappointed to the end that Mary had not been born the male heir he desired.

M
ARY
DE
G
UISE
DE
L
ORRAINE
: Mother of Mary, Queen of Scots, she was the fifth of ten surviving children of Claud, Duke de Guise and his wife, Antoinette de Bourbon; she died on 11 June, 1560.

Mary Stuart’s husbands

F
RANCIS
DE
V
ALOIS
II: Son of King Henry II and Queen Catherine de Medici of France, Francis and Mary were married on 24 April, 1558. Two years later, on 5 December, 1560, he died after suffering from an ear infection.

H
ENRY
S
TUART
, L
ORD
D
ARNLEY
: First cousin and second husband of Mary, Queen of Scots, he was also the grandson of Margaret Tudor; Margaret’s daughter, Lady Margaret Douglas, was his mother. Darnley and Mary were married on 29 July, 1565, and had one child together, James VI. Darnley died mysteriously in an explosion on 10 February, 1567.

J
AMES
H
EPBURN
, E
ARL
OF
B
OTHWELL
: A noble from Scotland, he was Mary’s third husband and suspected murderer of her second husband, Lord Darnley. He was imprisoned in Denmark where he died insane in 1578.

Mary Stuart’s heir

J
AMES
S
TUART
: Son of Mary, Queen of Scots and Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, James VI was named King of Scotland from infancy and would also be the first of the Stuart royal family to rule England.

While this book is based on a real character and actual historical events, some situations and people are fictional, created by the author.

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First published in the US by Scholastic Inc, 2002
(
as The Royal Diaries: Mary, Queen of Scots – Queen Without a Country
)
This electronic edition published in the UK by Scholastic Ltd, 2014

Text copyright © Kathryn Lasky, 2002
Cover illustration © Richard Jones, 2010

eISBN 978 1407 12973 0

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Produced in India by Quadrum

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