Catherine de Medici (b. 1518 - d. 1589) The great French ruler, Henry’s wife, who played one of the leading roles on the “European stage” for 28 years. A selfish power-lover, a cruel killer, an ambitious hypocrite, a cunning intriguer... Such

The idea for such a post matured a long time ago - when I saw in one LiveJournal message a fairly well-known costume historian in his circles, among others, this portrait:

Under the portrait with the attribution “Catherine de Medici and her brother Francesco,” a rather lively discussion broke out about how much the features of the future ruler of France were already visible in this girl, how similar she was to herself in adulthood, etc. Moreover, what struck me most was that the author of the post himself also participated in these discussions. While I was thinking about whether I wanted to intervene, someone came and said that, guys, wake up and open your eyes - this is not the same Catherine de Medici, and she didn’t and couldn’t have had any brothers. All this together, once again, brought me to a sad thought about the intuitive distrust of specialists who study anything “from antiquity to the present day.” For, even if you close your eyes to the brother who came from nowhere, then the level of painting of this portrait, and the costume on the girl, everything simply screams that this is the beginning of the 17th century, and not the beginning of the 16th, especially for a specialist in the history of costume. Everyone is human, and everyone can make mistakes, but this is one of those gross mistakes that a specialist, who also gives public lectures in Moscow, cannot afford.

Of course, this is not the first and not the last mistake of this kind, even if we take only this costume historian, so I would like to repeat for the umpteenth time - there is no need to study anything “from antiquity to the present day,” and most importantly, in isolation from “big history” and numerous auxiliary disciplines - the approach must still be comprehensive, interdisciplinary, and genealogy, my dears, is our everything. It is not for nothing that in all countries, in all schools, at the beginning of the 20th century, it was a compulsory discipline, even in a very truncated form, like the history of the ruling dynasty.

But let's return to our Catherine de Medici. So who is depicted in this wonderful portrait?

I think that I will not reveal a great secret if I say that Queen Mother Catherine of the Medici family was not happy with her children. The eldest son, Francis II, named after his famous grandfather, King Francis I, was entirely under the influence of the Guise brothers, whom Catherine did not like, considered upstarts, but with whom she was forced to reckon. Due to the fact that Francis was married to the Guises' niece, Queen Mary Stuart of Scotland, whom he adored since childhood, their power was stronger than that of their mother, despite the fact that Catherine was formally the regent. But, I repeat several times, all of Catherine’s children both loved and, at the same time, feared her, and always expressed deep respect and reverence for her. Francis, as is known, died shortly before his 17th birthday, leaving no heirs.

Catherine's second child was a girl who was named Elizabeth. In my purely subjective opinion, it was Elizabeth, and not Margot, who was the most beautiful princess of the house of Valois. Just like Margarita, Elizabeth inherited black hair and brown eyes from her mother, and was distinguished by tact, sophistication, grace and impeccable artistic taste.

At the age of 14 she was married to King Philip II of Spain and remained in history under the Spanish name Isabella de Valois. Catherine sincerely admired her daughter, and due to the fact that their relationship was close and warm, Catherine had very high political hopes for Isabella, believing that she, with her beauty, gentleness and high intelligence, would be able to influence the tough policies that Spain led towards the French Huguenots, forcing Catherine to act rashly and belligerently. But Isabella, having seen enough in her childhood of, to put it mildly, an extremely peculiar marriage of her parents - the power of the favorite and the tears of her mother, was immensely grateful to Philip for the respect and understanding that he showed her from the very first days of her marriage. An absolutely political union turned into a union of love, and, to Catherine’s great chagrin, Isabella gently but unconditionally made it clear to her that she would always and in everything share her husband’s views. The meeting of Isabella and Catherine 8 years later was a shock for the Queen Mother, and she bitterly complained to those close to her that “her daughter had become completely Spanish.” Six months after this meeting, Isabella died while trying to give Philip an heir to the throne.

After the death of Francis II, his younger brother Charles IX, who was 10 years old at that time, ascended the throne of France. Catherine, who was already anticipating unlimited power, as far as was possible under those conditions, was disappointed both in her hopes and in her second son. Of course, the weak, and in many matters weak-willed king, despite all the respect, did not trust his mother, did not dare to openly resist her decisions, but loved to do everything his own way behind her back. Despite the real power in her hands, Catherine's political position was very difficult. France was torn apart from within by religious wars; in its foreign policy, Philip II of Spain reproached it for being too lenient towards heretics (Huguenots), of whom there were almost more Catholics in France at that time, and this, on the other hand, threatened the throne.

The behavior of the suspicious Charles, who either brought Catholics or Huguenots led by Coligny closer to him, did not make Catherine’s task of stabilizing the situation in the country easier. In an effort to gain outside support, Catherine, as a true monarch of the Renaissance, preferred the policy of dynastic marriages. Having married her eldest daughter, Elizabeth of Valois, to the King of Spain, she chose the daughter of Emperor Maximilian II, Elizabeth of Austria, for Charles. The choice was successful - one of the most beautiful princesses of the time, soft and gentle Elizabeth adored her husband, but Charles almost openly preferred the company of Marie Touchet, with whom he had a son. Thus, this marriage union did not live up to the Queen Mother’s hopes. Karl died of lung disease a week before his 24th birthday.

The next king to ascend the throne of France was Catherine's favorite son. It is very difficult to write about Henry III - he was such a controversial personality - not a single historian can give him at least an unambiguous portrait, and the task of this post does not include assessing his personality. Therefore, we will limit ourselves to the emotions of Queen Mother Catherine.

She was always admired by Henry's mind, comparable to hers, which was a good century ahead of his time, she highly appreciated his elegant manners, although some then believed that such manners were excusable only for sophisticated ladies, but there was a flip side to all this: managing Henry , how she managed his older brothers, Catherine could not. And she voluntarily submitted to this. She set herself a goal: to serve the interests of her son and, in particular, to achieve peace in the south of the country. She travels a lot, negotiates, trying to do everything so that nothing threatens her Henry’s throne. And her biggest disappointment was the discovery of the fact that Henry, despite all his outward respect, took all of Catherine’s efforts for granted, practically did not take her opinion and experience into account, and most often acted as it was convenient for him, and not as was necessary which will ultimately lead to his death. The first in a series of similar actions was his marriage, by his own choice, to the Guizov’s niece, Louise de Vaudemont. He took revenge on his mother for not allowing him to marry his greatest love, Maria of Cleves. And the last was the order to kill the Duke of Guise, which turned into the murder of the king. Fortunately, Catherine did not live to see this moment.

The behavior of the younger children never brought anything but irritation and grief to Catherine. François, Duke of Alençon, spent his entire life scheming against his brothers. In an effort to channel his energy and cunning in the right direction, Catherine, following her logic of dynastic marriages, wooed him to England as a consort for Queen Elizabeth. Nothing came of this venture, despite the fact that, to the great surprise of modern historians, Elizabeth highly appreciated the sophisticated Prince Valois, even despite the nickname “little frog” that she gave him. In any case, when Francois died, mourning was declared at the English court, and the ambassadors noted with surprise the tears in Elizabeth's eyes.

Catherine’s attitude towards Margot, the youngest of her daughters, is generally well known to everyone from the unforgettable series “Queen Margot”, however, the reality was much worse - Catherine and Henry had to lock Margot in isolation in the castle, “until she somehow “I didn’t disgrace you,” said the Queen Mother, and ultimately, Catherine stopped calling her daughter by name and crossed her out of her will.

Looking at this whole, to put it mildly, bleak picture, some of the Queen Mother’s actions become much clearer. And yet, in this dark kingdom there was a ray of living light - Catherine had an outlet among her children in the form of her middle daughter - Clotilde or Claude, as she was commonly called.

Claude de Valois was not a beauty - she had a hump and she limped, but in her softness and tact she resembled her older sister Elizabeth, and, out of political necessity, Catherine sacrificed her - at the age of 11, Claude of France was married to Duke Charles of Lorraine III. To the great surprise of the French court, the marriage turned out to be successful and based on mutual respect and trust. Claude gave birth to 9 children and died of complications at age 27. Catherine's grief was simply enormous. And she focused all her unspent feelings of love on her eldest granddaughter - daughter Claude Christina of Lorraine.

Christina was quite beautiful and had a purely French charm. A girl lived and was raised at her grandmother’s court in Paris. The last thing Catherine managed to do in her life was to find a good match for her beloved granddaughter. Just at this time in Florence, under very mysterious and dramatic circumstances, the Grand Duke of Tuscany and a very distant relative of Catherine, Francesco de' Medici and his second wife Bianca Capello, died of poison. Francesco's younger brother Ferdinand de' Medici ascends to the throne of Florence. The marriage was beneficial to both parties, and in April 1589 Christina de Lorraine arrived in Florence. Ferdinand was one of the best Grand Dukes of the Medici family. He was loved, the duchy prospered, Christina was happily married, and she named her second girl, born in 1593, in honor of her beloved grandmother, to whom she was very grateful - Catherine de Medici. It is this girl - another Catherine from the Medici family - who is depicted in the famous portrait with which we began our story.)

Catherine's parents - Lorenzo II, di Piero, de' Medici, Duke of Urbino (September 12, 1492 - May 4, 1519) and Madeleine de la Tour, Countess of Auvergne (c. 1500 - April 28, 1519) were married as a sign of the alliance between King Francis I of France and by Pope Leo X, Lorenzo's uncle, against Emperor Maximilian I of Habsburg. The young couple was very happy about the birth of their daughter; according to the chronicler, they “were as pleased as if it were a son.” But, unfortunately, their joy was not destined to last long: Catherine’s parents died in the first month of her life - her mother on the 15th day after giving birth (at the age of nineteen), and her father survived his wife by only six days, leaving the newborn as an inheritance Duchy of Urbino and County of Auvergne. After this, the newborn was cared for by her grandmother Alfonsina Orsini until her death in 1520. Catherine was raised by her aunt, Clarissa Strozzi, along with her children, whom Catherine loved as siblings all her life. One of them, Pietro Strozzi, rose to the rank of marshal's baton in the French service. The death of Pope Leo X in 1521 led to a break in Medici power on the Holy See until Cardinal Giulio de' Medici became Clement VII in 1523. In 1527, the Medici in Florence were overthrown, and Catherine became a hostage - she was imprisoned in a monastery. Clement was forced to recognize and crown Charles of Habsburg as Holy Roman Emperor in exchange for his help in recapturing Florence and freeing the young duchess. Pope Clement VII In October 1529, the troops of Charles V besieged Florence. During the siege, there were calls and threats to kill Catherine. There were other ideas regarding the fate of Catherine: they proposed placing the girl on the wall between two battlements under artillery fire, or giving her to the soldiers to be mocked. Although the city resisted the siege, on August 12, 1530, famine and plague forced Florence to surrender. Clement met Catherine in Rome with tears in his eyes. It was then that he began to search for a groom for her, considering many options, but when in 1531 the French king Francis I proposed the candidacy of his second son Henry, Clement immediately jumped at the chance: the young Duke of Orleans was the most profitable match for his niece Catherine . Fourteen-year-old Catherine, leaving Florence on September 1, 1533, said goodbye to Italy forever. Catherine could not be called beautiful. At the time of her arrival in Rome, one Venetian ambassador described her as "red-haired, short and thin, but with expressive eyes" - a typical appearance of the Medici family. But Catherine was able to impress the sophisticated French court, spoiled by luxury, by turning to the help of one of the most famous Florentine craftsmen, who made high-heeled shoes for the young bride. Her appearance at the French court caused a sensation. The wedding, which took place in Marseilles on October 28, 1533, was a major event marked by extravagance and the distribution of gifts. Europe has not seen such a gathering of the highest clergy for a long time. Pope Clement VII himself attended the ceremony, accompanied by many cardinals. “The wedding of Henry Valois and Catherine lasted thirty-four days,” Honore de Balzac said about the events of distant times. “...The Pope demanded that both of these teenagers become actually husband and wife on the very day of the celebration - he was so afraid of the various tricks and tricks that were in use at that time.” He wanted to make sure that the union was now indissoluble and Francis I could not refer to “non-consummation of marriage” in order to return Catherine to him. However, the king himself announced his decision to be present at the wedding night of the young newlyweds - this fact is confirmed by several testimonies. After the wedding, 34 days of continuous feasts and balls followed. At the wedding feast, Italian chefs first introduced the French court to a new dessert made from fruit and ice - this was the first ice cream.
On September 25, 1534, Clement VII died unexpectedly. Paul III, who replaced him, dissolved the alliance with France and refused to pay Catherine's dowry. Catherine's political value suddenly disappeared, thereby worsening her position in an unfamiliar country. King Francis complained that “the girl came to me completely naked.” Catherine, born in merchant Florence, where her parents were not concerned with giving their offspring a comprehensive education, had a very difficult time at the sophisticated French court. She felt like an ignorant person who did not know how to elegantly construct phrases and made many mistakes in her letters. We must not forget that French was not her native language, she spoke with an accent, and although she spoke quite clearly, the ladies of the court contemptuously pretended that they did not understand her well. Catherine was isolated from society and suffered from loneliness and hostility from the French, who arrogantly called her “Italian” and “merchant’s wife.” In 1536, the eighteen-year-old Dauphin Francis unexpectedly died and Catherine's husband became heir to the French throne. Now Catherine had to worry about the future of the throne. The death of his brother-in-law marked the beginning of speculation about the involvement of the Florentine woman in his poisoning for the quick accession of “Catherine the Poisoner” to the French throne: the heir, who drank a glass of ice water in Lyon after a game of ball, suddenly died. According to the official version, the Dauphin died of a cold; nevertheless, the courtier, the Italian Count of Montecuccoli, who gave him a cup of cold water, inflamed by gambling, was executed. The birth of an illegitimate child to her husband in 1537 confirmed rumors about Catherine’s infertility. Many advised the king to annul the marriage. Under pressure from her husband, who wanted to consolidate her position with the birth of an heir, Catherine was treated for a long time and in vain by various magicians and healers with one single goal - to get pregnant. Every possible means was used to ensure successful conception, including drinking mule urine and wearing cow dung and deer antlers on the lower abdomen. Finally, on January 20, 1544, Catherine gave birth to a son. The boy was named Francis in honor of his grandfather, the reigning king (he even shed tears of happiness when he learned about this). After her first pregnancy, Catherine seemed to no longer have problems conceiving. With the birth of several more heirs, Catherine strengthened her position at the French court. The long-term future of the Valois dynasty seemed assured. The sudden miraculous cure for infertility is associated with the famous doctor, alchemist, astrologer and fortuneteller Michel Nostradamus, one of the few members of Catherine’s close circle of confidants. Heinrich often played with children and was even present at their births. In 1556, during her next birth, surgeons saved Catherine from death by breaking off the legs of one of the twins, Jeanne, who lay dead in her mother’s womb for six hours. However, the second girl, Victoria, was destined to live only six weeks. In connection with this birth, which was very difficult and almost caused the death of Catherine, doctors advised the royal couple not to think about having new children anymore; after this advice, Henry stopped visiting his wife's bedroom, spending all his free time with his favorite Diane de Poitiers Diane de Poitiers Back in 1538, the thirty-nine-year-old beautiful widow Diana captivated the nineteen-year-old heir to the throne, Henry of Orleans, which over time allowed her to become an extremely influential person, as well as (in the opinion of many) the true ruler of the state. In 1547, Henry spent a third of every day with Diana. Having become king, he gave his beloved the castle of Chenonceau. When King Francis I died and Henry II ascended the throne, it was not Catherine de Medici, his wife, who became the real queen, but Diana. Even at the coronation, she took an honorable public place, while Catherine was on a distant podium. This showed everyone that Diana had completely taken the place of Catherine, who, in turn, was forced to endure her husband’s beloved. She, like a real Medici, even managed to overcome herself, humble her pride, and win over her husband’s influential favorite. Diana was very pleased that Henry was married to a woman who preferred not to interfere and turned a blind eye to everything. Having become a faithful knight of Diana, Henry wore the colors of the mistress of his heart: white and black, until his very last breath and decorated his rings and clothes with the double monogram “DH” (Diana - Henry). On March 31, 1547, Francis I died and Henry II ascended the throne. Catherine became Queen of France. The coronation took place in the Basilica of Saint-Denis in June 1549. During the reign of her husband, Catherine had only minimal influence on the administration of the kingdom. Even in Henry's absence, her power was very limited. In early April 1559, Henry II signed the peace treaty of Cateau-Cambresis, ending the long wars between France, Italy and England. The agreement was strengthened by the engagement of Catherine and Henry's fourteen-year-old daughter, Princess Elizabeth, to thirty-two-year-old Philip II of Spain. Defying the predictions of the astrologer Luca Gorico and Nostradamus, who advised him to abstain from tournaments, Henry decided to participate in the competition. On June 30 or July 1, 1559, he fought in a duel with the lieutenant of his Scots guard, Earl Gabriel de Montgomery. Montgomery's split spear passed through the slot of the king's helmet. Through Henry's eye, the tree entered the brain, mortally wounding the monarch. The king was taken to the castle de Tournel, where the remaining fragments of the ill-fated spear were removed from his face. The best doctors in the kingdom fought for Henry's life. Catherine was at her husband's bedside all the time, and Diana did not appear, probably for fear of being sent away by the queen. From time to time, Henry even felt well enough to dictate letters and listen to music, but soon he became blind and lost his speech. Diana was removed during the agony of Henry II. She was forced to return the Crown Jewels in accordance with the inventory. The Duchess was frightened: she asked Catherine's forgiveness and handed her her property and her life. The Queen Mother was generous. She limited herself to forbidding Diana and one of her daughters, the Duchess de Bouillon, from coming to court; but not the other - to the Duchess d'Aumale - the daughter-in-law of the Duke of Guise. Perhaps, in order to preserve the inheritance of the Duke d'Aumale, the Guises did not confiscate her fortune from Diana, as she herself once did in relation to the Duchess d'Etampes. Catherine was content with which forced the former favorite to sell Chenonceau to her, giving her her possession of Chaumont in return. Everyone was surprised by the queen’s generosity: her jealousy and contempt for Diana during her husband’s lifetime were well known. Catherine waited, she feared the influence of Diana’s powerful family alliances. Therefore, she limited herself to the resignation of the duchess and her supporters: thus, the keeper of the seals, Cardinal Jean Bertrand, was forced to give up his place to Chancellor Olivier. Later, the queen would be able to express her contempt: going to the siege of Rouen in September 1562, she would pass by Anet and “not see Madame de Valentinois and not will enter her house." Henry II died on July 10, 1559. From that day on, Catherine chose as her emblem a broken spear with the inscription “Lacrymae hinc, hinc dolor” (“from this all my tears and my pain”) and until the end of her days she wore black clothes as a sign of mourning. She was the first to wear black mourning. Before this, in medieval France, mourning was white. Despite everything, Catherine adored her husband. “I loved him so much...” she wrote to her daughter Elizabeth after Henry’s death. Catherine de Medici mourned for her husband for thirty years and went down in French history under the name “The Black Queen.” Her eldest son, fifteen-year-old Francis II, became the King of France. Catherine took up state affairs, made political decisions, and exercised control over the Royal Council. However, Catherine never ruled the entire country, which was in chaos and on the brink of civil war. Many parts of France were virtually dominated by local nobles. The complex tasks that Catherine faced were confusing and to some extent difficult for her to understand. She called on religious leaders on both sides to engage in dialogue to resolve their doctrinal differences. Despite her optimism, the "Conference of Poissy" ended in failure on October 13, 1561, dissolving itself without the queen's permission. Catherine's point of view on religious issues was naive because she saw the religious schism from a political perspective. “She underestimated the power of religious conviction, imagining that all would be well if only she could persuade both parties to agree.” “The king’s health is very uncertain,” the Tuscan ambassador reported to his court, “and Nostradamus, in his predictions for this month, says that the king’s death will occur before the new year.” And so it happened: on December 5, 1560, Francis II died. The death was blamed on the cupbearer, who allegedly mixed poison into the intoxicating drink. However, historians are still arguing about the reliability of this fact. But it is definitely established that even when Francis was the Dauphin (in 1555), an attempt was made to poison him. The scenario is traditional: a luxurious feast, a cupbearer... And if not for the healing talent of Nostradamus, Francis would have died as the Dauphin. Francis II died in Orleans shortly before his 17th birthday from a brain abscess caused by an ear infection. He had no children, and his 10-year-old brother Charles IX ascended the throne. Catherine declared herself regent: the new king, Charles IX, was only ten years old. This sullen and cruel teenager had a morbid addiction to blood - he killed animals for his own pleasure, cut the throats of his dogs, and strangled birds. He was never able to govern the state on his own and showed minimal interest in state affairs. Karl was also prone to hysterics, which over time turned into outbursts of rage. He suffered from shortness of breath - a sign of tuberculosis, which ultimately brought him to the grave. Arrogant, contemptuous and sickly, Karl grew into an intolerable tyrant. His relationship with his mother left much to be desired, although he could not yet do without her advice. Repeated attempts to poison this monarch, some authors note, ended in nothing. Charles reigned for fourteen years (all this time Nostradamus was listed as the court physician) and died in 1574. Through dynastic marriages, Catherine sought to expand and strengthen the interests of the House of Valois. In 1570, Charles was married to the daughter of Emperor Maximilian II, Elizabeth. Catherine tried to marry one of her younger sons to Elizabeth of England. She did not forget about her youngest daughter Margarita, whom she saw as the bride of the again widowed Philip II of Spain. However, soon Catherine had plans to unite the Bourbons and Valois through the marriage of Margaret and Henry of Navarre. Margaret, however, encouraged the attention of Henry of Guise, son of the late Duke François of Guise. When Catherine and Karl found out about this, Margarita received a good thrashing. The escaped Henry of Guise hastily married Catherine of Cleves, which restored the favor of the French court towards him. Perhaps it was this incident that caused the split between Catherine and Giza. Between 1571 and 1573, Catherine persistently tried to win over the mother of Henry of Navarre, Queen Jeanne. When, in another letter, Catherine expressed a desire to see her children, while promising not to harm them, Jeanne d'Albret replied: “Forgive me if, reading this, I want to laugh, because you want to free me from a fear that I never had. I never thought that, as they say, you eat small children.” Ultimately, Joan agreed to a marriage between her son Henry and Margaret, with the condition that Henry would continue to adhere to the Huguenot faith. Shortly after arriving in Paris to prepare for the wedding, forty-four-year-old Jeanne fell ill and died. The Huguenots were quick to accuse Catherine of killing Jeanne with poisoned gloves. The wedding of Henry of Navarre and Margaret of Valois took place on August 18, 1572 at Notre Dame Cathedral.
Three days later, one of the Huguenot leaders, Admiral Gaspard Coligny, on his way from the Louvre, was wounded in the arm by a shot from the window of a nearby building. The smoking arch was left in the window, but the shooter managed to escape. Coligny was carried to his apartment, where surgeon Ambroise Paré removed the bullet from his elbow and amputated one of his fingers. Catherine was said to have reacted to this incident without emotion. She visited Coligny and tearfully promised to find and punish her attacker. Many historians blamed Catherine for the attack on Coligny. Others point to the de Guise family or to a Spanish-papal conspiracy that tried to end Coligny's influence over the king. The name of Catherine de Medici is associated with one of the bloodiest events in the history of France - St. Bartholomew's Night. The massacre, which began two days later, tarnished Catherine's reputation indelibly. There is no doubt that she was behind the decision on August 23, when Charles IX ordered: “Then kill them all, kill them all!” The train of thought was clear, Catherine and her Italian advisers (Albert de Gondi, Lodovico Gonzaga, Marquis de Villars) expected a Huguenot uprising after the assassination attempt on Coligny, so they decided to strike first and destroy the Huguenot leaders who came to Paris for the wedding of Margaret of Valois and Henry of Navarre . The St. Bartholomew massacre began in the first hours of August 24, 1572. The king's guards burst into Coligny's bedroom, killed him and threw his body out of the window. At the same time, the sound of the church bell was a conventional sign for the beginning of the murders of the Huguenot leaders, most of whom died in their own beds. The king's newly minted son-in-law, Henry of Navarre, was faced with a choice between death, life imprisonment and conversion to Catholicism. He decided to become a Catholic, after which he was asked to stay in the room for his own safety. All the Huguenots inside and outside the Louvre were killed, and those who managed to escape into the street were shot by the royal riflemen who were waiting for them. The Parisian massacre continued for almost a week, spreading across many provinces of France, where indiscriminate killings continued. According to historian Jules Michelet, "Bartholomew's Night was not a night, but a whole season." This massacre delighted Catholic Europe, and Catherine enjoyed the praise. On September 29, when Henry of Bourbon knelt before the altar like a good Catholic, she turned to the ambassadors and laughed. From this time on, the “black legend” of Catherine, the evil Italian queen, began. An interesting point: Karl once publicly accused his mother of being to blame for organizing St. Bartholomew’s Night, and, moreover, declared that he would now rule himself without her help. The scandal ended with a dinner with reconciliation, but it was after this dinner that Karl finally fell ill and fell ill. With the death of twenty-three-year-old Charles IX, Catherine faced a new crisis. The dying words of Catherine's dying son were: “Oh, my mother...” The day before his death, he appointed his mother as regent, since his brother, the heir to the French throne, the Duke of Anjou, was in Poland, becoming its king. In her letter to Henry, Catherine wrote: “I am heartbroken... My only consolation is to see you here soon, as your kingdom requires and in good health, because if I lose you too, I will bury myself alive with you.” Henry was Catherine's beloved son. Unlike his brothers, he took the throne at an adult age. He was also the healthiest of all, although he also had weak lungs and suffered from constant fatigue. Catherine could not control Henry the way she did with Francis and Charles. Her role during Henry's reign was that of a state executive and traveling diplomat. In addition, there were persistent rumors that Heinrich did not let a single handsome young man through, and this plunged his mother into despair. During the reign of Henry III, civil wars in France often descended into anarchy, maintained by the struggle for power between the high nobility of France on the one hand and the clergy on the other. A new destabilizing component in the kingdom was the youngest son of Catherine de Medici - Francois, Duke of Alençon. He plotted to seize the throne while Henry was in Poland and later continued to disturb the peace in the kingdom, using every opportunity. The brothers hated each other. Since Henry had no children, Francois was the legal heir to the throne. One day, Catherine had to lecture him for six hours about his, Francois, behavior. But the ambitions of the Duke of Alençon (later of Anjou) brought him closer to misfortune. His ill-equipped campaign in the Netherlands in January 1583 ended with the destruction of his army in Antwerp. Antwerp marked the end of François's military career. Catherine de Medici wrote in a letter to him: “... it would have been better for you to die in your youth. Then you would not have caused the death of so many brave noble people.” Another blow befell him when Elizabeth I officially broke off her engagement to him after the Antwerp massacre. On June 10, 1584, François died of exhaustion after failures in the Netherlands. The day after her son’s death, Catherine wrote: “I am so unhappy, living long enough, seeing so many people die before me, although I understand that God’s desire must be obeyed, that He owns everything and what He lends us only so far.” as long as He loves the children He gives us.” The death of Catherine's youngest son was a real disaster for her dynastic plans. Henry III had no children, and it seemed unlikely that he would ever have any. According to the Salic Law, the former Huguenot Henry of Bourbon, King of Navarre, became the heir to the French crown. The behavior of Catherine's youngest daughter, Marguerite de Valois, annoyed her mother just as much as Francois's behavior. One day in 1575, Catherine yelled at Margarita because of rumors that she had a lover. Another time, the king even sent people to kill Marguerite de Bussy’s lover (a friend of François Alençon), but he managed to escape. In 1576, Henry accused Margaret of having an inappropriate relationship with a lady of the court. Later, in her memoirs, Margarita claimed that if it were not for Catherine’s help, Henry would have killed her. In 1582, Margarita returned to the French court without her husband and soon she began to behave very scandalously, changing lovers, Catherine had to resort to the help of the ambassador to appease Henry of Bourbon and return Margarita to Navarre. She reminded her daughter that her own behavior as a wife was impeccable, despite all the provocations. But Margarita was unable to follow her mother's advice. In 1585, after Margaret was rumored to have tried to poison and shoot her husband, she fled Navarre again. This time she headed to her own Agen, from where she soon asked her mother for money, which she received in an amount sufficient for food. However, soon she and her next lover, persecuted by the inhabitants of Agen, had to move to the Karlat fortress. Catherine asked Henry to take immediate action before Margaret disgraced them again. In October 1586, Margarita was locked in the castle d'Usson. Margarita's lover was executed before her eyes. Catherine excluded her daughter from her will and never saw her again. In 1588 the culmination of the religious wars began. There was a whiff of rebellion in Paris. Leaflets about “His Majesty the Hermaphrodite” appeared, and an image of the Queen Mother, that “old witch” who gave birth to a perverted son, was burned. The day came when cries were heard in front of the Louvre: “Down with Valois! Death to Valois! Thus, for the first time in a thousand years, the throne of France began to shake. With the knowledge of Henry III, Cardinal de Guise was killed, he was brutally stabbed to death, his body was thrown next to the body of his brother, both corpses were cut into pieces and burned in the fireplace of the castle, so that later they would not be worshiped as martyrs. As soon as Guise was sent to the next world, the king went down to his mother, who occupied the apartment under his own and who, most likely, should have heard the noise at the time of the murder. At the patient's bedside sat the doctor Filipe Cavriana, a spy for the Grand Duke of Tuscany, to whom he told about this scene. Henry asked him how the queen was feeling. The doctor told him that she was resting after taking medication. Then the king approached the old woman and greeted her very confidently: “Good afternoon, Madam, excuse me. Monsieur de Guise is dead; There's no point in talking about him anymore. I ordered him to be killed, ahead of his intentions towards me.” He recalled what insults he had to endure, and all that he knew about the incessant intrigues of his enemy. To save his power, his life and his state, he had to take these extreme measures. God himself helped him in this; With that, he took his leave, telling his mother that he was going to mass to thank heaven for the happy outcome of this punishment. “I want to be a king, and not a prisoner and a slave, as I was, from May 13 until this hour, when I again become a king and master.” With these words he left. The queen was too weak to answer him. “She almost died,” said the doctor, “from terrible grief,” and adds: “I am afraid that the departure of Madame Princess of Lorraine [to Tuscany] and this funeral of the Duke of Guise may worsen her condition.” On the morning of January 5, on the eve of Epiphany, she wanted to write a will and confess. She was living out her last minutes. Her loved ones were worried. Let us give the floor to the eyewitness of this event, Etienne Pasquier: “There is something remarkable in her death. She always had great faith in fortune tellers, and since she had once been told that in order to live long she had to beware of some Saint Germain, she especially did not want to go to Saint Germain-en-Laye, for fear of meeting her death, and even, in order not to live in the Louvre, which belongs to the parish of Saint-Germain de l'Auxerrois, she ordered the construction of her palace in the parish of Saint-Eustache, where she lived. Finally, God wished that, when she died, she would not live in Saint-Germain, but the king’s first confessor, de Saint-Germain, became her comforter.” An autopsy revealed a terrible general condition of the lungs with a purulent abscess on the left side. According to modern researchers, the possible cause of death of Catherine de Medici was pleurisy. “Those who were close to her believed that her life was shortened by annoyance due to the actions of her son,” believed one of the chroniclers. Since Paris was held by enemies of the crown at that time, they decided to bury Catherine in Blois. She was later reburied in the Parisian Abbey of Saint-Denis. In 1793, during the French Revolution, a revolutionary crowd threw her remains, as well as the remains of all French kings and queens, into a common grave. Eight months after Catherine's death, everything she had strived for and dreamed of during her life was reduced to zero when the religious fanatic monk Jacques Clement stabbed to death her beloved son and last Valois, Henry III. The servant reported that Catherine, just before her death, quietly said: “I was crushed by the rubble of the house.” Sources.