PRINCELY CULTURE AND CATHERINE DE MÉDICIS1

Margriet Hoogvliet

The name of Catherine de Médicis (1519-1589)2 evokes almost immediately the Massacre of St. Bartholomew (23-24 August 1572), which began with the assassination of the Protestant leader de Coligny and culminated in the murder of thousands of in and elsewhere in France. In sixteenth-cen• tury Protestant propaganda and in modern historiography, Catherine is con• sidered to be one of the cruel instigators who planned this massacre im• mediately after the marriage of her daughter Marguerite to the Protestant Henry de Navarre.3 The attention paid to the negative aspects of Catherine's political role tends to overshadow her art patronage,4 and even less attention

The research for this article has greatly benefited from the facilities granted by Prof. Volker Honemann of the Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität (Münster, Ger• many) and by the Centre d'Études Supérieures de la Renaissance (Tours, France). A research trip to the CERS in Tours was subsidised by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO). 2 In France, Catherine's Italian family name 'de' Medici' was rendered as 'de Médicis'. The number of publications on the life and politics of Catherine de Médicis is enormous, but consists largely of romanticised biographies. For scholarly studies, see Cloulas, Catherine de Médicis; Knecht, Catherine de' Medici; Franke and Welzel, 'Katharina von Medici'. Older, but still useful are: Mariéjol, Catherine de Médicis, and Héritier, Catherine de Médicis. The study by Bertière, Les Reines de France au temps des Valois, vol. 1, pp. 293-377 and vol. 2, pp. 7-409 is interesting, but lacks references. Also interesting but somewhat popular is: Laffont, Le règne de Catherine de Médicis. 3 Knecht, Catherine de ' Medici, and especially Bourgeon, Charles IX, argue that this Black Legend needs reconsidering. For the influence of Catherine's image as the 'wicked Italian queen' in modern historiographical research, see Sutherland, 'Catherine de Medici'. The sinister image of Catherine is also present in recent dramatisations of sixteenth-century France, as, for example, the film La Reine Margot (1994) by Patrice Chéreau (based on the novel by fils from 1834), and the theatre play La reine mère ou Catherine de Médicis by Marie-Thérèse Roy, performed at the Avignon festival in 1998. 4 The best documented study of Catherine's art patronage is still: Cloulas, Catherine de Médicis, pp. 319-369. See also: Mariéjol, Catherine de Médicis, pp. 205-245; Knecht, Catherine de'Medici, pp. 220-245; Knecht, 'Royal Patronage of the Arts'; Baudouin-Matuszek, ed, Paris et Catherine de Médicis, pp. 78-127; ffolliott, 'The Ideal Queenly Patron'. 104 MARGRIET HOOGVLIET

has been given to the creation of a princely culture by and for Catherine de Médicis.5 The life of Catherine de Médicis is the story of the ascent of la marchande florentine from the de' Medici family in Florence to the position of Queen of France. She was the only daughter of Lorenzo de' Medici and Madeleine de la Tour d'Auvergne, a duchess from the high nobility of France. In 1533, at the age of fourteen, the orphaned Catherine was given in marriage to Henry d'Or• léans (1519-1559), the second son of Francis I (1494-1547), king of France. Like all royal marriages ofthat time, this marriage served a political goal: the alliance between the de' Medici pope Clement VII and the French king. After the premature death of the Dauphin Francis in 1536, Henry unexpectedly found himself first in line for succession to the French Crown. In 1547, Cathe• rine's husband succeeded to the French throne as Henry II, and she was crowned queen of France. The life of the king ended on 10 July 1559, when he succumbed to the wounds incurred at a jousting party which formed part of the festivities celebrating two royal marriages.6 Catherine was left behind with young children and a country on the verge of a civil war between Catholics and Huguenots. I shall concentrate on the period following the death of Henry II in 1559, because before the latter event Catherine's role as queen of France was com• pletely overshadowed by Diane de Poitiers,7 maîtresse en titre of the king. Only after Henry's death and the subsequent exclusion of Diane de Poitiers from court and politics, could Catherine personally shape the cultural and po• litical life at court. From 1559 onwards she would be ever present in the politics of Renaissance France as a powerful queen mother, during the reigns of her sons Francis II (1559-1560), Charles IX (1560-1574), and Henry III (1574-1589). She was officially entrusted with the regency of France during the minority of Charles IX and again in the period prior to the return of Henry III from Poland. Λ Being a women and thus lacking the uncontestable status of a crowned king, Catherine had to shape her public image carefully. Her first problem was the legitisimation of female power in France, where Salic law could be used to prevent the passage of royal power to the hands of a woman. In Renaissance Europe, female regents could not use the same arguments to

5 It is only very recently that modern research has started to pay attention to this sub­ ject, see: ffolliott, 'Catherine de'Medici', as well as Franke and Welzel, 'Katharina von Medici'. 6 Knecht, Catherine de ' Medici, pp. 54-58. 7 As with Catherine de Médicis, most of the publications on Diane de Poitiers are highly romanticised. For scholarly publications, see: Bardon, Diane de Poitiers; Bertière, Les Reines de France au temps des Valois, I, pp. 283-292; Cloulas, Diane de Poitiers, Ruby, 'Diane de Poitiers'.