The Serpent and the Moon: Two Rivals for the Love of a Renaissance King (51 page)

I
T had taken time for Philip II of Spain and his father, Charles V, to realize that the sole victors of all the fighting between the two great Catholic princes were the Protestants. Henri II began to come to this
realization as well. Inside his kingdom, religious dissent had grown alarmingly. The martyrdom of the tailor had serious repercussions; pamphlets and broadsheets appeared publicly denouncing the duchesse de Valentinois and condemning the king’s adultery. The
Parlement
had continued to persecute heretics throughout the wars, but in a rather haphazard manner. Once Henri realized with horror the extent of the growth of the Protestant movement, he undertook the most drastic measure: the king of France invited the pope to send him the dreaded Inquisition in order to stamp out heresy. In 1557, at the time of Saint-Quentin, Henri II had issued the Edict of Compiègne, a virtual declaration of war upon heretics. The
Parlement
opposed it fiercely and the French defeat at Saint-Quentin distracted the king from putting it into effect.

Initially, the reformers appeared to be mostly from the working classes, but in recent times it had become clear that more and more conversions had occurred among the upper classes. Calvinist preachers dared to infiltrate France to make converts, and this greatly worried the king and the staunchly Catholic Guise family. Calvinist meetings became less secret and more frequent until a mass demonstration convinced the king that once he returned from war and peace had been declared, he would have to put a stop to these threats to his authority.

By the autumn of 1558, both sides, the imperialists and the French, wanted peace. Their treasuries were once again empty and the mounting threat of the new religion alarmed the Catholic monarchs more than their desire for territorial gains.

Charles V had retired to the Monastery of San Geronimo de Yuste in Estremadura in central Spain, where he lived in great luxury among some fifty of his courtiers. His gout did not improve with his gluttonous diet of rich and rare food. Oysters and fish were brought by mule, packed in nettles and ice; pâté, game, and pies were sent by his sister from the imperial Netherlands. Charles V had organized for himself the perfect place to retire, surrounded by his favorite
objects d’art
, his tapestries, pictures, and books, and his astonishing collection of clocks. Having left the worries of his empire behind, Charles V had never been so content. The emperor died peacefully in September 1558. He had renounced all his titles and honors, and many people speculated that
his forswearing of so vast an empire was in part due to a genetic inheritance from his mother, Joanna the Mad. A month before he died, he ordered his own formal funeral to take place with all pomp and honor in the Monastery of Yuste. His catafalque was draped in black surrounded by candles, and his household attended in deepest mourning, also carrying candles. The emperor himself joined in as one of the mourners and prayed to God for his soul, “to which the Lord had granted so much Grace during life and prayed that now He show pity.…”

Following the death of his father, Philip II hurried back to Spain. A truce between France, England, Spain, and Savoy was signed on October 17, 1558. Negotiations over what form that peace should take were moved from Cambrai to nearby Câteau-Cambrésis, but the two sides maintained their intransigence. With the death of Mary Tudor on November 17, the issue of Calais no longer presented any difficulty to her husband, Philip II, who, as king of England, had been duty-bound to defend the city. When he heard the news of the death of his wife, Philip II immediately proposed that he seal the treaty by marrying the fourteen-year-old daughter of Henri II, Elisabeth de Valois. Mary Tudor’s death also prompted the French to assert the rights of Mary, Queen of Scots, to the throne of England.

Henri II trusted Montmorency more than anyone else to negotiate the peace, so he secured his release with a down payment on his exorbitant ransom. To the Constable’s shame, he learned that two of his nephews had converted to Protestantism, news which delighted his enemies, the staunchly Catholic Guises. For five months, Montmorency and the Guises argued over what France’s position should be. The pope was anxious about the rapid spread of heresy, and he decided to intervene by appealing not to the French queen but to Diane de Poitiers. He wrote her that it was her Christian duty to join him in prayer to convince the king that peace was the right way, God’s way, to bring an end to the religious conflicts tearing the Christian world apart. As a partner to the king’s adultery, Diane must have been impressed to receive an appeal from God’s representative on earth—impressed perhaps, but not overwhelmed. She had no difficulty in translating the pope’s Latin missive and was certainly flattered by his
approach. To Diane, the Protestant threat was as abhorrent as it was to Henri, and both recognized that it constituted the real enemy.

It was Diane who helped Henri II see that the time had come to bring an end to the French kings’ phantom of Italy and accept that Calais was a worthy substitute. For more than half a century, the rivalry between the house of Habsburg and that of Valois had not gained either any worthwhile prizes, and it had cost them many lives and much revenue. Consumed with their own obsessions, the two greatest Catholic monarchs of the time had inadvertently allowed the new heresy to spread. Diane was determined to direct The Most Christian King’s energy toward conquering this foe. Henri could see that most of Germany and Switzerland, Scotland and Bohemia, had succumbed to heresy. It was even surfacing in Spain and the Italian peninsula. The cardinal de Lorraine maintained that two thirds of the inhabitants of France were “infected” during Henri’s reign.

When the king left his meeting with the duchesse de Valentinois, he joined his council. Once Henri II made a decision—and it was clear he had been thinking about this one for some time—it was impossible to move him. Henri II had decided on peace at almost any price. There was still much to negotiate, but the price under discussion was indeed high. Henri declared himself willing to give up his territories in Luxembourg and Italy. He would keep only Calais and the three bishoprics of Metz, Verdun, and Toul. Henri ended by saying he had called the meeting to
announce
his decision, not to discuss it. Final negotiations with Philip were to begin.

That the king renounced all France’s claims on Italy was a great blow to the Guises and to the queen. Catherine could not believe her husband would give up her heritage, so dearly won. Unable to blame Henri, in her fury, she blamed the Constable and inevitably also Diane. Henri firmly disagreed, telling her that the real culprits were those who had broken the truce with England, Spain, and Savoy—namely, the Guises.

There is a much-quoted story that when Diane came into the queen’s apartment that evening to attend to her duties, she found Catherine sitting by the fire with a book. Possibly unaware of Catherine’s
fury over the loss of Italy, or perhaps choosing to ignore the queen’s dismay, she asked what she was reading. It was one of the rare times when Catherine’s hatred was not held in check. Announcing that her book was a history of France, the queen told a stunned Diane that in the annals of the kingdom she had found that “in every era there was a time when a whore dictated the affairs of state.” For twenty years she had kept her peace with her husband’s mistress, lying quiet and still in the grass. This time the serpent struck out. The insult traveled to all the palaces in France, all the courts of Europe. The truth was out, the mutual hatred of the rivals finally exposed.

Diane’s revenge was subtle. Montmorency mentioned in passing how strange it was that only Henri’s first child, the legitimized Diane de France, showed any resemblance to the king. This comment was also passed from one court to the next, and it was still a common rumor that Diane de France was the daughter of Diane de Poitiers. Henri fled from the fray and retired to the haven of Anet with his beloved “Lady.”

Only the Guises did not profit from the truce with Spain. Their bellicose exhortation to war had caused the renewal of the hostilities that had cost France the dreadful defeat at Saint-Quentin. In order to pay the exorbitant ransoms for both Montmorency and Diane’s son-in-law Claude d’Aumale, the king had to give both families money from the royal treasury. Once home, Henri gave Aumale a cavalry command serving under the Constable.

The religious issue was such a source of conflict among the two camps that Henri, Diane, and Montmorency formed a trio against the Lorrainers. All three sought peace. Since Montmorency’s return, the cardinal, Diane’s erstwhile protégé, was very aware of the Constable’s growing ascendancy over the king, despite his sixty-five years. Diane, too, was consolidating her power base, and welcomed the marriage of her granddaughter, Antoinette de La Marck, to Montmorency’s son, Damville. This would neutralize her own Guise connection through her daughter Louise’s marriage to the duc d’Aumale. The Guise family was furious at the establishment of this new force against them and watched helplessly as the trio made decisions. The Guises’ ace, yet to
be played, was the seventeen-year-old dauphine, their niece Mary, who would surely tip the scales in their favor once again. The serpent still waited, but time was on her side and drawing near.

Final negotiations for the peace began on February 10, 1559 at Câteau-Cambrésis. There were two treaties—one between France and England, and one between France, Spain, and Savoy. In essence, France gave up all of her territories won over the past sixty-five years during the past four reigns. The king’s great supporters—Montluc, Tavannes, Brissac, Saint-André—all echoed the Guises in their dismay at the humiliating terms to which Henri agreed. But the king wanted peace, whatever it might cost. The treaties were signed on April 3 and 4. Although the people rejoiced, the peace was not at all popular with the French military captains, who felt that so much blood had been shed to no purpose. Brantôme wrote that it was as if with one stroke of the pen, all the battles fought and French blood spilled throughout the century was for naught.

_____________________

1
. Once Diane de Poitiers saw the appalling conditions in the hospitals in Paris, she completely altered the existing methods of hygiene and medical care in the capital.

2
. Quoted by Brantôme.

3
. His grandfather was Duke Antoine II, head of the senior branch of the house of Lorraine, whose younger brother Claude founded the ducal house of Guise.

4
. Rene Guerdan,
Marie Stuart: reine de France et d’Ecosse
.

5
. Since the Guise family was from the junior branch and he was totally Francophile, he was a good match for Claude.

6
. By taking a small rowing boat, the author discovered this little staircase under the first arch of the bridge.

CHAPTER TWENTY

A Cruel Fate

T
he marriage of the queen of Scotland was the first of a series of moves designed to preserve the new balance of power by alliances forged within Europe’s royal families. The dauphin’s marriage had been followed by the wedding of Henri’s daughter Claude de Valois to Charles II of Lorraine. The double nuptials of Henri’s long-unmarried sister Marguerite, and of his fourteen-year-old daughter Elisabeth, were to take place a few months later, in June 1559. The French army was particularly distressed that Princess Marguerite was to marry their enemy Emmanuel Philibert, duc de Savoie, who had fought them with such brutality. Nor did they feel any more comfortable that their princess, Elisabeth, was to marry Philip II of Spain,
¹
son of their old adversary, the Emperor Charles V, and widower of Bloody Mary of England. But these were highly political unions brokered in the interests of peace in Europe, and the soldiery had no voice in politics.

Henri II displayed his joy and good humor in the weeks that followed the treaty. It was as if a great burden had been lifted from him, and the country reflected his mood. Despite the misery of the people, who had been stricken by endless wars, poverty, famine, and inflation, euphoria gripped the nation. The routes the procession would take were cleaned and the buildings were hung with banners, tapestries, and carpets. Workmen, carpenters, painters, and decorators labored to turn Paris into a suitable venue for the many international dignitaries who would come for the celebrations. Peace would mean prosperity, and the royal weddings were occasions to celebrate.

At the same time as the weddings were being arranged in the interest of peace, several highly respected councilors were arrested for denouncing the burning of people for invoking the name of Christ, whereas “adulterers, blasphemers and murderers” went unpunished. This accusation touched a raw nerve with Henri, and the councilors were sent to the Bastille. Not far from that prison, the residents of the rue Saint-Antoine once again saw the road’s cobbles lifted and the ground prepared for a tournament—a traditional part of the celebrations in honor of a peace treaty and of royal marriages.

The three representatives of Philip of Spain all arrived in Paris on June 15 with so little pomp and splendor that the good and curious citizens felt cheated. Philip’s dour entourage and lack of courtly display appeared in stark contrast to that of the other bridegroom, the duc de Savoie. He rode into a festive Paris at the head of two hundred knights in crimson velvet, their coats lined in cloth of gold, their pages dressed in black velvet. Philip IPs three modest courtiers would jointly “marry” Elisabeth de Valois—by proxy, in his name. This wedding took place in Nôtre-Dame on June 22, in the presence of the entire court, including even Montmorency’s Protestant nephews. The consummation following the nuptial Mass was purely symbolic: the Duke of Alba slipped his bare leg under the covers of the marriage bed and touched the naked bride. Thereafter, the French princess was legally queen of Spain. There was much ribald speculation among the population as to whether the Duke of Alba regretted his pleasure was so short-lived. The celebrations included banquets, dances, and masquerades
held in the three Parisian palaces, Les Tournelles where Henri lived, the Louvre, and the Palais de la Cîté.

The betrothal of Henri’s sister Marguerite and the duc de Savoie took place on June 28, and the marriage was to be celebrated on July 2. During the nine days between the two weddings, there would be five days of brilliant tournaments with jousting, the king’s favorite sport, at which he excelled and intended to take part. The tourney ground in the rue Saint-Antoine had never looked so splendid with the royal arms of France, Spain, and Savoy draped over the timbers of the stands. Triumphal arches stood at either end with symbols of war and peace, and high galleries were erected on each side for the spectators.

On the first day of the tournament, the queen surprised her husband by seeking an early audience. It promised to be another glorious June day and Henri was excited by the prospect of some good sport in which he could shine before Diane and a large audience that would include many distinguished foreign visitors. The queen told her husband that she had had a dream in which she saw Henri’s face covered in blood. Catherine had always been highly superstitious and became alarmed when her own astrologer, Ruggieri, warned her that the king would be killed in a duel. In her anxiety, she had sent for the great Nostradamus, who confirmed the prediction and foretold Henri’s death. Some years earlier, Catherine had been warned by one of her Italian astrologers, Simeoni, never to allow Henri to compete at arms in an enclosed arena, as it would end in death, pierced through the eyes. He had foretold that the king’s reign would begin with a duel and a death in an enclosed arena, and would end the same way in his forty-first year. Henri IPs reign had begun with Jarnac’s fatal duel and he had just turned forty.

Catherine was sincerely afraid, and would not be reassured by Henri that there was no danger, as he was not taking part in a duel. The purpose of jousting was, after all, to unseat the opponent, not to harm him. The king had often taken part in jousts and tournaments during his reign; why should today’s event be any different? Henri did not believe in predictions—they were usually wrong—and he so enjoyed the thrill of jousting, especially against such excellent adversaries, and in
the presence of Diane. In his mind, he was still
Le Beau Ténébreux
, and Diane the lovely Lady of his dreams.

Each morning of the tournament Catherine repeated her pleas and voiced her fears, but Henri merely laughed. He told Catherine and Diane that he intended to joust in an enclosed arena to teach the young knights raw courage, and Catherine trembled. Nostradamus’ prediction went as follows:

On the third day of the tournament, Vieilleville presented Henri with his armor as usual. The king entered the lists outside the Palace of Les Tournelles, wearing, as always, the black and white colors and the crescent moon emblem of his mistress. Since the birth and death of her twin girls in June 1556, Catherine had not completely recovered her health and the intense heat of June made her unwell. Such heat normally made the fat queen perspire and glow, but today she looked unusually pale. Nor was she pleased to have her wishes thwarted. Catherine was still smarting from the loss of her Italian heritage, and had become obsessed with her dark premonitions following the death of her twins. Distracted in her anxiety, she did not acknowledge her neighbors. On her left was the serene figure of the duchesse de Valentinois, in her habitual black and white. Next to her, Mary Stuart and her husband, the dauphin, who had both known and loved Diane all their lives, were their usual friendly selves.

Catherine and Diane watched the king ride into the lists, mounted on a splendid Turkish charger ominously named Le Malheur—The Disaster.
²
The horse was a gift from the duc de Savoie, soon to be his brother-in-law, with whom Henri “broke the first lance.”
³
His next challenger was the duc de Guise, the great
Balafré
, but Henri failed to
unseat him and that round ended in a draw. As Emmanuel Philibert de Savoie regained the stand, Henri publicly complimented him on the excellence of his gift horse, Le Malheur.

It was stifling hot on that June 30, 1559, and the queen, her face by now as flushed as her purple dress, begged the contestants, laboring in their heavy armor, to cease. But the king was buoyant with his success, and would not hear of it. Instead, he demanded to break his third and final lance with the twenty-nine-year-old comte de Lorge, Gabriel Montgomery, the noble captain of his Scottish Guard, who had unseated him on a previous day of the tournament.

Catherine’s anxiety increased: she sent the duc de Nemours with yet another message begging Henri not to gallop any more “for love of her.” Henri’s ambiguous reply, that it was precisely “for the love of her” that he wished to break one more lance, has puzzled posterity ever since. A final warning came from the king’s Master of the Horse, who advised him that his visor was not properly fastened. At times, Henri could be as stubborn as his grandmother, Anne de Bretagne. Ignoring the pleas of his wife and his household, Henri II spurred Le Malheur and charged Montgomery. The run was successful but ended in a draw as neither contestant was unseated. Vexed by scoring a second draw, on impulse, and against the laws of chivalry, the king challenged his brave captain, eleven years his junior, to break yet another lance with him.

A strange frisson of alarm made Montgomery attempt to decline, until his laughing, jubilant king ordered him to obey.

An uneasy stillness fell over the crowd, as if word of the queen’s dream had spread. Two seasoned warriors, Vieilleville and Montluc, had also had premonitions of the king’s death and watched anxiously. To a shout of “
Monjoie!
” (the French knights’ traditional battle cry), both riders spurred their horses, the black and white plumes on the king’s helmet flying like those on top of his horse’s head. As always when he charged, Diane caught her breath. The impact of the lances simultaneously striking armor was tremendous, and both riders almost came down with their mounts, but they recovered and continued to the end of the lists. Once again, the run ended in a draw.

Annoyed with his performance, Henri grabbed another lance,
shouting to Gabriel Montgomery to come at him again. The captain just had time to turn his horse and none to change his lance as they began the run. As they lowered their weapons, Montgomery must have seen that the metal end securing the tip of his wooden lance was missing, but it was too late. Even if Montgomery did not notice, most of the spectators would have seen the unshod lance, so likely to split with the force of impact. The crowd held its universal breath and even the trumpeters, mesmerized, failed to sound the usual call. To the onlookers, the charge seemed to pass in slow motion as the horses plowed through the sand, which flew with each stride. As the lances struck metal, the horses jarred violently on impact, rearing and screaming.

Both lances broke, Montgomery’s splintering. The king was seen to reel from the force of the blow and slump forward, but through sheer willpower and the reflexes of an experienced rider, Henri managed to keep his seat. His horse continued on down the length of the lists with Henri holding on to its neck. Before he could fall from the saddle, the grooms caught Le Malheur and gently lowered their
wounded master. Before the run, Henri had opened his visor, the door of his “golden cage,” as Nostradamus had called it, to mop his brow, and had failed to refasten it securely. As the gilded helmet was removed, the king fainted. All in the stands could see his face was covered in blood, and a cry of dismay rose from the crowd. The visor of the damaged helmet had been open a fraction; a large splinter from Montgomery’s broken lance had entered the king’s right eye, penetrating his skull and leaving the temple by the ear. Another thick splinter had pierced his throat.

While pandemonium broke out in the crowd, Henri was carefully carried to his pavilion, where he regained consciousness. His first thought was for the wretched Montgomery, who, kneeling, begged his king to cut off his hand and his head, and to pardon him. Despite excruciating pain, Henri assured the desperate man there was nothing to pardon: he had obeyed his sovereign and performed honorably and well.

In the stands, all was chaos; the queen was hysterical, the dauphin had fainted. Amid the mass of screaming spectators fighting to reach the ground, Diane struggled desperately to climb over the railings and force her way through, but the crush was too great. As she tried in vain to get word of the king’s injury, Diane de Poitiers must have felt helpless for the first time since he had become her protector. Shock, panic, and resignation mingled with her fear—fear that her beloved might die, fear of living without him, fear of the queen’s vengeance. Diane felt her power fading with the king’s life. Without Henri, she had no authority. Her pleas to see him were left unanswered; no one would give her news—those were the queen’s orders. Catherine was in charge at last. Distraught, Diane went back to her house nearby to wait for word from Henri.

The English ambassador, Sir Nicholas Throckmorton, watched as the king was taken back to the palace on a litter. “Nothing covered his face, he moved neither hand nor foot, but lay as one amazed.” On reaching Les Tournelles, Henri regained consciousness again and tried to climb the stairs to his apartment. The king’s own doctor, Jean Chapelain, washed the wound with vinegar and rosewater, and removed what he could of the splinters but did not dare touch the large piece of the lance embedded in the wound. Catherine, the duc de
Savoie, and the cardinal de Lorraine took the first shift by his bed until three in the morning, then François de Guise, Alphonse d’Este, and Anne de Montmorency took over until dawn. In his pain, Henri called out repeatedly for Diane, but no messenger was sent.