December 5, 1560: Death of King François II of France and Scotland

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Catherine de Médici, Francis II of France, Henry II of France, Jousting, Marie de Guise, Mary I of Scotland, Mary Queen of Scots, Regency

François II (January 19, 1544 – December 5, 1560) was King of France from 1559 to 1560. He was also King consort of Scotland as a result of his marriage to Mary I, Queen of Scots, from 1558 until his death in 1560.

He ascended the throne of France at age 15 after the accidental death of his father, Henry II, in 1559. His short reign was dominated by the first stirrings of the French Wars of Religion.

Although the royal age of majority was 14, his mother, Catherine de’ Medici, entrusted the reins of government to his wife Mary’s uncles from the House of Guise, staunch supporters of the Catholic cause. They were unable to help Catholics in Scotland against the progressing Scottish Reformation, however, and the Auld Alliance was dissolved.

François was succeeded by two of his brothers in turn, both of whom were also unable to reduce tensions between Protestants and Catholics.

Childhood and education (1544–1559)

François was born 11 years after his parents’ wedding Henri II and Catherinede Médici. The long delay in producing an heir may have been due to his father’s repudiation of his mother in favour of his mistress Diane de Poitiers, but this repudiation was mitigated by Diane’s insistence that Henri spend his nights with Catherine.

François was at first raised at the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye. He was baptised on February 10, 1544 at the Chapelle des Trinitaires in Fontainebleau. His godparents were François I (who knighted him during the ceremony), Pope Paul III, and his great-aunt Marguerite de Navarre. He became governor of Languedoc in 1546 and Dauphin of France in 1547, when his grandfather François I died.

King Henri II, his father, arranged a remarkable betrothal for his son to Mary I, Queen of Scots, in the Châtillon agreement of January 27, 1548, when François was only four years old. Mary had been crowned Queen of Scotland in Stirling Castle on September 9, 1543 at the age of nine months following the death of her father James V. Mary was a granddaughter of Claude, Duke of Guise, a very influential figure at the court of France.

Once the marriage agreement was formally ratified, the six-year-old Mary was sent to France to be raised at court until the marriage. She was tall for her age and eloquent, and Francis was unusually short and stuttered. Henri II said, “from the very first day they met, my son and she got on as well together as if they had known each other for a long time”.

On April 24, 1558, François and Mary married in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. It was a union that could have given the future Kings of France the throne of Scotland and also a claim to the throne of England through Mary’s great-grandfather, King Henry VII of England. As a result of the marriage, François became King Consort in Scotland until his death. The marriage produced no children, and may never even have been consummated, possibly due to François illnesses or undescended testicles.

Becoming king

A little over a year after his marriage, on July 10, 1559, François became king at age 15 upon the death of Henri II, who died from injuries that he suffered in a jousting accident. On September 21, 1559, François II was crowned king in Reims by his uncle Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine. The crown was so heavy that nobles had to hold it in place for him. The court then moved to the Loire Valley, where the Château de Blois and the surrounding forests were the new king’s home. Francis II took the sun for his emblem and for his mottoes Spectanda fides (This is how faith should be respected) and Lumen rectis (Light for the righteous)

Death

The king’s health deteriorated in November 1560. On November 16, he fainted. After only 17 months on the throne, François II died on December 5, 1560 in Orléans, Loiret, from an ear condition. Multiple diseases have been suggested, such as mastoiditis, meningitis, or otitis exacerbated into an abscess.

Ambroise Paré, the royal surgeon, considered performing a trepanation. Some suspected Protestants of having poisoned the king, a view held by Catholics as the tensions between them and Protestants were on the rise, but this has not been proven.

François II died childless, so his younger brother Charles, then ten years old, succeeded him as King Charles IX of France. On December 21, the council named Catherine de Médici Regent of France. The Guises left the court, while MaryI, Queen of Scots, François II’s widow, returned to Scotland. Louis, Prince of Condé, who was jailed and awaiting execution, was freed after some negotiations with Catherine de Médici.

On December 23, 1560, François II’s body was interred in the Basilica of St Denis by the Prince of La Roche-sur-Yon.

History of Male British Consorts Part IV

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Cardinal Beaton, Earl of Arran, Francis II of France, Henry II of France, Henry VIII of England, King Consort of Scotland, Mary I of Scotland, Regency

In this entry I will examine the marriage of Mary I, Queen of Scots and her first marriage to King François II a France and how he became king consort of Scotland.

Mary I, Queen of Scots (December 8, 1542 – February 1587), also known as Mary Stuart or Mary I of Scotland, reigned over Scotland from December 14, 1542 until her forced abdication on July 24, 1567.

Mary, the only surviving legitimate child of King James V of Scotland and Marie of Guise, was six days old when her father died and she acceded to the throne.

Scotland was ruled by regents until she became an adult. From the outset, there were two claims to the regency: one from the Catholic Cardinal David Beaton, and the other from the Protestant James Hamilton, Earl of Arran, who was next in line to the throne.

Beaton’s claim was based on a version of the king’s will that his opponents dismissed as a forgery. Arran, with the support of his friends and relations, became the regent until 1554 when Mary’s mother managed to remove and succeed him.

King Henry VIII of England took the opportunity of the regency to propose marriage between Mary and his own son and heir, Edward, hoping for a union of Scotland and England.

On July 1, 1543, when Mary was six months old, the Treaty of Greenwich was signed, which promised that, at the age of ten, Mary would marry Edward and move to England, where Henry could oversee her upbringing. The treaty provided that the two countries would remain legally separate and, if the couple should fail to have children, the temporary union would dissolve.

Cardinal Beaton rose to power again and began to push a pro-Catholic pro-French agenda, angering Henry, who wanted to break the Scottish alliance with France.

King Henri II of France proposed to unite France and Scotland by marrying the young queen to his three-year-old son, the Dauphin François.

On the promise of French military help and a French dukedom for himself, Arran agreed to the marriage.

François II (January 19, 1544 – December 5, 1560) was the eldest son of King Henri II of France and Catherine de Medici.

In May 1546, Beaton was murdered by Protestant lairds, and on September 10, 1547, nine months after the death of Henry VIII, the Scots suffered a heavy defeat at the Battle of Pinkie.

Mary’s guardians, fearful for her safety, sent her to Inchmahome Priory for no more than three weeks, and turned to the French for help.

After the death of Queen Mary I of England, King Henri II of France proclaimed his eldest son and daughter-in-law king and queen of England. In France the royal arms of England were quartered with those of Francis and Mary.

Mary’s claim to the English throne was a perennial sticking point between herself and Queen Elizabeth I of England.

On April 4, 1558, Henri had Mary sign secret documents, illegal in Scottish law, that would ensure Valois rule in Scotland even if Mary died without leaving an heir. Twenty days later, she married the Dauphin at Notre Dame de Paris, and he became King Consort of Scotland.

When Henri II died on July 10, 1559, from injuries sustained in a joust, fifteen-year-old François sixteen-year-old Mary became king and queen of France.

Two of the Queen’s uncles, the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorraine, were now dominant in French politics, enjoying an ascendancy called by some historians la tyrannie Guisienne.

King François II died on December 5, 1560 of a middle ear infection that led to an abscess in his brain. Mary was grief-stricken. Her mother-in-law, Catherine de’ Medici, became regent for the late king’s ten-year-old brother Charles IX, who inherited the French throne.

The marriage produced no children, and may never even have been consummated, possibly due to François’s illnesses or undescended testicles.Mary returned to Scotland nine months later, arriving in Leith on August 19, 1561.

Having lived in France since the age of five, Mary had little direct experience of the dangerous and complex political situation in Scotland.

As a devout Catholic, she was regarded with suspicion by many of her subjects, as well as by Queen Elizabeth I England

July 8, 1545: Birth of Carlos, Prince of Asturias. Part I.

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Carlos of the Asturias, Catherine of Aragon, Catherine of Austria, Henry II of France, Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, Holy Roman Empire, John III of Portugal, King Carlos I of Spain, Kingdom of Spain, Philip II of Spain

Carlos, Prince of Asturias, also known as Don Carlos (July 8 1545 – July 24, 1568), was the eldest son and heir-apparent of King Felipe II of Spain. His mother was Infanta María-Manuela of Portugal, daughter of João III of Portugal and Catherine of Austria, Infanta of Castile and Archduchess of Austria, Catherine was the posthumous daughter of King Felipe I by Queen Joanna of Castile. Catherine was born in Torquemada and named in honor of her maternal aunt, Catherine of Aragon.

Carlos was born at Valladolid on July 8, 1545, the son of the double first cousins Felipe II of Spain and Infanta María-Manuela of Portugal. His paternal grandfather, Emperor Charles V, was the reigning king of Spain. Carlos’s mother María died four days after the birth of her son from a haemorrhage she had suffered following the birth.

The young Infante Carlos was delicate and deformed. He grew up proud and willful and, as a young adult, began to show signs of mental instability. Many of his physical and psychological afflictions may have stemmed from the inbreeding common to his family, the House of Habsburg, and the royal houses of Portugal (House of Aviz) and Spain.

Carlos had only four great-grandparents instead of the maximum of eight, and his parents had the same coefficient of co-ancestry (1/4) as if they were half siblings. He had only six great-great-grandparents, instead of the maximum 16; his maternal grandmother and his paternal grandfather were siblings, his maternal grandfather and his paternal grandmother were also siblings, and his two great-grandmothers were sisters.

In 1556, Emperor Charles V abdicated and retired to the Monastery of Yuste in southern Spain, leaving the Spanish holdings of his empire to his son, who became King Felipe II, who was Carlos’s father. The former emperor died in 1558, and the following year, Prince Carlos was betrothed to Elizabeth of Valois, eldest daughter of King Henri II of France. However, for political reasons, and for his father’s mistrust on Carlos’s temper, Elizabeth of Valois instead married his father, King Felipe II, in 1560.

The health of Carlos was always weak. At age 14 he fell ill with malaria, which provoked severe deformations in his legs and spinal column. In 1561 the doctors of the court recommended him to move permanently to Alcalá de Henares for his health, as the climate was milder. Carlos constantly complained about his father’s resistance to giving him positions of authority.

Finally, the King gave him a position in the Council of Castile and another in the Council of Aragon. This only made Carlos more furious, since both organisations were important but ultimately consultative. He showed no interest in the councils or in familiarising himself with political matters through them.

Three other brides were then suggested for the Prince: Mary I, Queen of Scots; Margaret of Valois, youngest daughter of Henri II of France; and Archduchess Anna of Austria, who was later to become Felipe II’s fourth wife, and was a daughter of Felipe’s cousin, Emperor Maximilian II and Felipe’s sister Maria. It was agreed in 1564 that Carlos should marry Anna. His father promised him rule over the Low Countries in 1559, before his accident, but Carlos’s growing mental instability after it, along with his demonstrations of sadism, made his father hesitate and ultimately change his mind, which enraged Carlos further.

In 1562, he suffered a serious head injury falling downstairs while chasing a serving girl. The prince was close to death, in terrible pain and suffering delusions. After trying all sorts of remedies, including doctors of all types, healers, and even the relics of Diego de Alcalá, his life was saved by a trepanation of the skull, performed by the eminent anatomist Andreas Vesalius.

After his recovery, Carlos became even wilder, more unstable in his temper and unpredictable in his behaviour. His father was forced to move him away from any position of power. He took a dislike to the Duke of Alba, who became the commander of Felipe’s forces in the Netherlands, a position that had been promised to Carlos.

April 24, 1558 – Mary I, Queen of Scots, marries Prince François, the Dauphin of France, at Notre Dame de Paris.

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Catherine de Médici, Charles IX of France, Fotheringhay Castle, François II of France, Henry II of France, James V King of Scots, James VI of Scotland, James VI-I of Scotland and England, Mary Queen of Scots, Notre Dame Cathedral of Paris, royal wedding

The Bride

Mary I, Queen of Scotland (December 8, 1542 – February 8, 1587), reigned over Scotland from 14 December 1542 to 24 July 1567.

Mary I, Queen of Scotland

Mary was born on December 8, 1542 at Linlithgow Palace, Scotland, to King James V of Scotland and his French second wife, Mary of Guise. She was said to have been born prematurely and was the only legitimate child of James to survive him. She was the great-niece of King Henry VIII of England, as her paternal grandmother, Princess Margaret of England, was Henry VIII’s sister. Besides being the queen of Scotland, Mary was a granddaughter of Claude, Duke of Guise, a very influential figure at the court of France.

On December 14, 1542, six days after her birth, she became Queen of Scotland when her father died, following the Battle of Solway Moss after drinking contaminated water while on campaign.

The Groom

François II (January 19, 1544 – December 5, 1560) was King of France from 1559 to 1560. He was also King consort of Scotland as a result of his marriage to Mary I, Queen of Scots, from 1558 until his death in 1560.

François II, King of France, King Consort of Scotland.

Born eleven years after his parents’ wedding, the long delay in producing an heir may have been due to his father’s repudiation of his mother in favour of his mistress Diane de Poitiers, however this repudiation was negated by Diane’s insistence that Henry spend his nights with Catherine. François was at first raised at the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye. He was baptized on February 10, 1544 at the Chapelle des Trinitaires in Fontainebleau. François became governor of Languedoc in 1546, and Dauphin of France in 1547, when his grandfather King François I died.

The Arrangement

King Henri II of France, his father, arranged a remarkable betrothal for his son to Mary, Queen of Scots, in the Châtillon agreement of January 27 1548, when François was only four years old. King Henri II desired to unite France and Scotland through the marriage.

King Henri II of France on the promise of French military help and a French dukedom for himself, the Earl of Arran agreed to the marriage. In February 1548, Mary was moved, for her safety, to Dumbarton Castle. The English, opposed to the union, seized the strategic town of Haddington. In June, the much awaited French help arrived at Leith to besiege and ultimately take Haddington. On July 7, 1548, a Scottish Parliament held at a nunnery near the town agreed to the French marriage treaty.

Once the marriage agreement was formally ratified, The French fleet sent by Henri II, commanded by Nicolas de Villegagnon, sailed with Mary from Dumbarton on August 7, 1548 and arrived a week or more later at Roscoff or Saint-Pol-de-Léon in Brittany.

Mary was accompanied by her own court including two illegitimate half-brothers, and the “four Marys” (four girls her own age, all named Mary), who were the daughters of some of the noblest families in Scotland: Beaton, Seton, Fleming, and Livingston. Janet, Lady Fleming, who was Mary Fleming’s mother and James V’s half-sister, was appointed governess.When Lady Fleming left France in 1551, she was succeeded by a French governess, Françoise de Paroy.

Although Mary was tall for her age and eloquent, François, her betrothed, was unusually short and stuttered. Henri II commented that “from the very first day they met, my son and she got on as well together as if they had known each other for a long time”.

The Wedding

On April 24, 1558, the fourteen-year-old Dauphin married Mary the 15 year old Queen of Scots in Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. It was a union that could have given the future kings of France the throne of Scotland and also a claim to the throne of England through Mary’s great grandfather, King Henry VII of England. As a result of the marriage, François became King Consort in Scotland until his death. The marriage produced no children, possibly due to Francis’ illnesses or his undescended testicles.

King François II and Queen Mary of France and Scotland

A little over a year after his marriage, on July 10, 1559, François became King of France at the age of fifteen upon the death of his father Henri II, who had been killed in a jousting accident. On September 21, 1559, François II was crowned king in Reims by his uncle Charles, Cardinal of Lorraine.

King François II died on December 5, 1560, of a middle ear infection that led to an abscess in his brain. Mary was grief-stricken. His mother, Catherine de’ Medici, became regent for the late king’s ten-year-old brother the new King Charles IX, who inherited the French throne. Mary returned to Scotland nine months later, arriving in Leith on August 19, 1561. Having lived in France since the age of five, Mary had little direct experience of the dangerous and complex political situation in Scotland.

After a tumultuous reign which ended with her abdicating the throne to her one year old son, James VI of Scotland, from her second marriage to Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, Mary was in prisoned in England by her cousin and rival Queen Elizabeth I of England. After eighteen and a half years in custody, Mary was found guilty of plotting to assassinate Elizabeth in 1586, and was beheaded the following year at Fotheringhay Castle.

On this date in History: April 24, 1558, the marriage of Mary I, Queen of Scots and The Dauphin of France.

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Francis II of France, Henry II of France, House of Stewart, House of Stuart, James V King of Scots, King Henri II of France, King Henry VIII of England, Kings and Queens of England, kings and queens of Scotland, Kings of france, Margaret Tudor, Marie de Guise, Mary I of Scots, Mary of Guise, Mary Queen of Scots, The Dauphin

Mary was born on December 8, 1542 at Linlithgow Palace, Scotland, to King James V of Scots and his French second wife, Marie de Guise. Mary was said to have been born prematurely and was the only legitimate child of James V to survive him She was the great-niece of King Henry VIII of England, as her paternal grandmother, Margaret Tudor, was Henry VIII’s sister. On December 14, 1542 six days after her birth, she became Queen of Scotland when her father died from drinking contaminated water while on campaign following the Battle of Solway Moss.

Mary I, Queen of Scots

Since Mary was an infant when she inherited the throne, Scotland was ruled by regents until she became an adult. From the outset, there were two claims to the regency: one from Catholic Cardinal Beaton, and the other from the Protestant Earl of Arran, who was next in line to the Scottish throne. Beaton’s claim to the regency was based on a version of the King Jame V’s will that his opponents dismissed as a forgery. Arran, with the support of his friends and relations, became the regent until 1554 when Mary’s mother managed to remove and succeed him.

Henry VIII, King of England and King of Ireland.

King Henry VIII of England took the opportunity of the regency to propose marriage between Mary and his own son and heir, Edward (future Edward VI of England) seeking to unite Scotland and England. On July 1, 1543, when Mary was six months old, the Treaty of Greenwichwas signed, which promised that, at the age of ten, Mary would marry Edward and move to England, where Henry could oversee her upbringing. The treaty provided that the two countries would remain legally separate and that if the couple should fail to have children, the temporary union would dissolve. Cardinal Beaton rose to power again and began to push a pro-Catholic pro-French agenda, angering Henry, who wanted to break the Scottish alliance with France.

The French king, Henri II, desired to unite France and Scotland and proposed marrying the young queen to his three-year-old son, the Dauphin Francis. On the promise of French military help, and a French dukedom for himself, the regent Earl of Arran agreed to the marriage. In February 1548, Mary was moved, for her safety, to Dumbarton Castle. The English left a trail of devastation behind once more and seized the strategic town of Haddington. In June, the much awaited French help arrived at Leith to besiege and ultimately take Haddington. On July 7, 1548, a Scottish Parliament held at a nunnery near the town agreed to a French marriage treaty.

Mary I, Queen of Scots

With the promise of her marriage agreement in place, five-year-old Mary was sent to France to spend the next thirteen years at the French court. The French fleet sent by Henri II, commanded by Nicolas de Villegagnon, sailed with Mary from Dumbarton on August 7, 1548 and arrived a week or more later at Roscoff or Saint-Pol-de-Léon in Brittany.

At the French court, she was a favourite with everyone, except Henri II’s wife Catherine de’ Medici. Mary learned to play lute and virginals, was competent in prose, poetry, horsemanship, falconry and needlework, and was taught French, Italian, Latin, Spanish, and Greek, in addition to speaking her native Scots. Her future sister-in-law, Elisabeth of Valois, became a close friend of whom Mary “retained nostalgic memories in later life”.Her maternal grandmother, Antoinette de Bourbon, was another strong influence on her childhood, and acted as one of her principal advisors.

King Francis II and Queen Mary I of France and Scotland

Mary was eloquent and especially tall by sixteenth-century standards (she attained an adult height of 5 ft 11 in (1.80 m), while Henri II’s son and heir, Francis, stuttered and was abnormally short. Henri commented that “from the very first day they met, my son and she got on as well together. On April 4, 1558, Mary signed a secret agreement bequeathing Scotland and her claim to England to the French crown if she died without issue. Twenty days later, April 24,1558 she married the Dauphin at Notre Dame de Paris, and he became king consort of Scotland. When Henri II died on July 10, 1559 from injuries sustained in a joust, the fifteen-year-old Dauphin became King Francis II of France and sixteen-year-old Mary I, Queen of Scots became Queen of France.

Henri IV was crowned King of France at the Cathedral of Chartres on February 27, 1594.

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Anne of Brittany, Catholic League, Duke of Guise, Henry II of France, Henry III of France, Henry IV of France & Navarre, House of Bourbon, Huguenot, Kingdom of France, Kingdom of Navarre, Louis XIII of France, Salic Law, War of the Three Henries, Wars of Religion

On this date in History: Henri IV was crowned King of France at the Cathedral of Chartres on February 27, 1594.

Henri IV (December 13, 1553 – May 14, 1610), also known by the epithet “Good King Henry”, was King of Navarre (as Henri III) from 1572 to 1610 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first monarch of France from the House of Bourbon, another branch of the Capetian dynasty (through Louis IX, as the previous House of Valois had been through Philippe II). He was assassinated in 1610 by François Ravaillac, a fanatical Catholic, and was succeeded by his son Louis XIII.

Henri was born in Pau, the capital of the joint Kingdom of Navarre with the sovereign principality of Béarn. His parents were Queen Joan III of Navarre (Jeanne d’Albret) and her consort, Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme. Although baptised as a Roman Catholic, Henri was raised as a Protestant by his mother, who had declared Calvinism the religion of Navarre. As a teenager, Henri joined the Huguenot forces in the French Wars of Religion. On June 9, 1572, upon his mother’s death, the 19-year-old became King of Navarre.

At Queen Joan III’s death, it was arranged for Henri to marry Margaret of Valois, daughter of Henri II and Catherine de’ Medici. The wedding took place in Paris on August 18, 1572 on the parvis of Notre Dame Cathedral.

Henri became heir presumptive to the French throne in 1584 upon the death of François, Duke of Anjou, brother and heir to the Catholic Henri III of France who had succeeded Charles IX in 1574. Because Henri of Navarre was the next senior agnatic descendant of King Louis IX, King Henri III of France had no choice but to recognise him as the legitimate successor. Salic law barred the king’s sisters and all others who could claim descent through only the female line from inheriting. Since Henri of Navarre was a Huguenot, the issue was not considered settled in many quarters of the country, and France was plunged into a phase of the Wars of Religion known as the War of the Three Henries. Henri III of France and Henri III of Navarre were two of these Henries.

The third was Henri I, Duke of Guise, (the eldest son of François, Duke of Guise, and Anna d’Este. His maternal grandparents were Ercole II d’Este, Duke of Ferrara, and Renée of France, herself the second daughter of Louis XII of France and Anne of Brittany) who pushed for complete suppression of the Huguenots and had much support among Catholic loyalists. The Catholic League accepted Henri, Duke of Guise because of his staunch Catholicism, despite his claim to the throne being in contention with the Salic Law for his claimed descent from Louis XII of France, his great-grandfather, was through the female line. Political disagreements among the parties set off a series of campaigns and counter-campaigns that culminated in the Battle of Coutras.

In December 1588, Henri III of France had Henri I of Guise murdered, along with his brother, Louis Cardinal de Guise. Henri III thought that the removal of Guise would finally restore his authority. Instead, however, the populace were horrified and rose against him. In several cities, the title of the king was no longer recognized. His power was limited to Blois, Tours, and the surrounding districts. In the general chaos, the king relied on King Henri of Navarre and his Huguenots.

The two kings were united by a common interest—to win France from the Catholic League. Henri III acknowledged the King of Navarre as a true subject and Frenchman, not a fanatic Huguenot aiming for the destruction of Catholics. Catholic royalist nobles also rallied to the king’s standard. With this combined force, the two kings marched to Paris. The morale of the city was low, and even the Spanish ambassador believed the city could not hold out longer than a fortnight. But Henri III was assassinated shortly thereafter (August 2, 1589) by a fanatical monk.

When Henri III died, Henri of Navarre nominally became king of France. The Catholic League, however, strengthened by support from outside the country—especially from Spain—was strong enough to prevent a universal recognition of his new title. Most of the Catholic nobles who had joined Henri III for the siege of Paris also refused to recognize the claim of Henri of Navarre, and abandoned him. He set about winning his kingdom by military conquest, aided by English money and German troops. Henri’s Catholic uncle Charles, Cardinal de Bourbon, was proclaimed king by the League, but the Cardinal was Henri’s prisoner at the time. Henri was victorious at the Battle of Arques and the Battle of Ivry, but failed to take Paris after besieging it in 1590.

When Cardinal de Bourbon died in 1590, the League could not agree on a new candidate. While some supported various Guise candidates, the strongest candidate was probably the Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain, the daughter of Felipe II of Spain, whose mother Elisabeth had been the eldest daughter of Henri II of France. In the religious fervor of the time, the Infanta was recognized to be a suitable candidate, provided that she marry a suitable husband.

The French overwhelmingly rejected Felipe II’s first choice, Archduke Ernest of Austria, the Emperor’s brother, also a member of the House of Habsburg. In case of such opposition, Felipe indicated that princes of the House of Lorraine would be acceptable to him: the Duke of Guise; a son of the Duke of Lorraine; and the son of the Duke of Mayenne. The Spanish ambassadors selected the Duke of Guise, to the joy of the League. But at that moment of seeming victory, the envy of the Duke of Mayenne was aroused, and he blocked the proposed election of a king.

The Parlement of Paris also upheld the Salic law. They argued that if the French accepted natural hereditary succession, as proposed by the Spaniards, and accepted a woman as their queen, then the ancient claims of the English kings would be confirmed, and the monarchy of centuries past would be nothing but an illegality. The Parlement admonished Mayenne, as Lieutenant-General, that the Kings of France had resisted the interference of the Pope in political matters, and that he should not raise a foreign prince or princess to the throne of France under the pretext of religion. Mayenne was angered that he had not been consulted prior, but yielded, since their aim was not contrary to his present views.

Despite these setbacks for the League, Henri remained unable to take control of Paris.

On July 25, 1593, with the encouragement of his great love, Gabrielle d’Estrées, Henri permanently renounced Protestantism and converted to Roman Catholicism—in order to obtain the French crown, thereby earning the resentment of the Huguenots and his former ally Queen Elizabeth I of England. He was said to have declared that Paris vaut bien une messe (“Paris is well worth a mass”), although there is some doubt whether he said this, or whether the statement was attributed to him by his contemporaries. His acceptance of Roman Catholicism secured the allegiance of the vast majority of his subjects.

Since Reims, the traditional location for the coronation of French kings, was still occupied by the Catholic League, Henri IV was crowned King of France at the Cathedral of Chartres on February 27, 1594. He did not forget his former Calvinist coreligionists, however and was known for his religious tolerance. In 1598 he issued the Edict of Nantes, which granted circumscribed toleration to the Huguenots.