On this date in history… January 28.

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Charlemagne, Charles the Great, Edward VI of England, Emperor of the Romans, Henry VII of England, Henry VIII, Holy Roman Emperors, Holy Roman Empire, King Henry VIII of England

814 – The death of Charlemagne, retroactively considered the first Holy Roman Emperor, brings about the accession of his son Louis the Pious as ruler of the Frankish Empire.

1547 – Edward VI, the nine-year-old son of Henry VIII, becomes King of England on his father’s death. Henry VIII died at the age of 55, ironically, on the same date of the birth anniversary of his father, Henry VII, king of England (d. 1509), who was born on this date in 1457.

Today I will highlight the death of Emperor Charlemagne.

Charlemagne (Charles the Great (April 2, 748 – January 28, 814), numbered Charles I, was the King of the Franks from 768, the King of the Lombards from 774, and the Emperor of the Romans from 800. During the Early Middle Ages, he united the majority of western and central Europe. He was the first recognised emperor to rule from western Europe since the fall of the Western Roman Empire around three centuries earlier. The expanded Frankish state that Charlemagne founded is called the Carolingian Empire. He was later canonised by Antipope Paschal III.

In 813, Charlemagne called Louis the Pious, king of Aquitaine, his only surviving legitimate son, to his court. There Charlemagne crowned his son as co-emperor and sent him back to Aquitaine. He then spent the autumn hunting before returning to Aachen on 1 November. In January, he fell ill with pleurisy, inflammation of the membranes that surround the lungs and line the chest cavity. In deep depression (mostly because many of his plans were not yet realised), he took to his bed on 21 January and as Einhard tells it:

He died January twenty-eighth, the seventh day from the time that he took to his bed, at nine o’clock in the morning, after partaking of the Holy Communion, in the seventy-second year of his age and the forty-seventh of his reign.

He was buried that same day, in Aachen Cathedral, although the cold weather and the nature of his illness made such a hurried burial unnecessary. The earliest surviving planctus, the Planctus de obitu Karoli, was composed by a monk of Bobbio, which he had patronised. A later story, told by Otho of Lomello, Count of the Palace at Aachen in the time of Emperor Otto III, would claim that he and Otto had discovered Charlemagne’s tomb:

Charlemagne, they claimed, was seated upon a throne, wearing a crown and holding a sceptre, his flesh almost entirely incorrupt. In 1165, Emperor Frederick I re-opened the tomb again and placed the emperor in a sarcophagus beneath the floor of the cathedral. In 1215 Emperor Frederick II re-interred him in a casket made of gold and silver known as the Karlsschrein.

Charlemagne’s death emotionally affected many of his subjects, particularly those of the literary clique who had surrounded him at Aachen.

November 17, 1558: Death of Queen Mary I of England and Ireland.

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Henry VIII, History, King Henry VIII of England, Kings and Queens of England, Mary Tudor, Philip II of Spain, Queen Mary I of England

Mary I (February 18, 1516 – November 17, 1558), also known as Mary Tudor, was the queen of England and Ireland from July 1553 until her death. She is best known for her aggressive attempt to reverse the English Reformation, which had begun during the reign of her father, Henry VIII. The executions that marked her pursuit of the restoration of Roman Catholicism in England and Ireland led to her denunciation as “Bloody Mary” by her Protestant opponents.

Mary was the only child of Henry VIII by his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, to survive to adulthood. Her younger half-brother Edward VI (son of Henry VIII and Jane Seymour) succeeded their father in 1547 at the age of nine. When Edward became mortally ill in 1553, he attempted to remove Mary from the line of succession because he supposed, correctly, that she would reverse the Protestant reforms that had begun during his reign. On his death, leading politicians proclaimed Lady Jane Grey as queen. Mary speedily assembled a force in East Anglia and deposed Jane, who was ultimately beheaded.

Mary I, Queen Regnant of England and Ireland. Queen Consort of Spain, Naples and Sicily, Archduchess of Austria, Duchess of Milan.

Mary was—excluding the disputed reigns of Jane and the Empress Matilda—the first queen regnant of England. In 1554, Mary married King Felipe II of Spain, becoming queen consort of Habsburg Spain on his accession in 1556.

During her five-year reign, Mary had over 280 religious dissenters burned at the stake in the Marian persecutions. After Mary’s death in 1558, her re-establishment of Roman Catholicism was reversed by her younger half-sister and successor, Elizabeth I, daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, at the beginning of the 45-year Elizabethan era.

After Felipe II’s visit in 1557, Mary thought she was pregnant again, with a baby due in March 1558. She decreed in her will that her husband would be the regent during the minority of their child. However, no child was born, and Mary was forced to accept that Elizabeth would be her lawful successor. Mary was weak and ill from May 1558.

Felipe II, King of Spain, Portugal, Naples and Sicily, Archduke of Austria and Duke of Milan.

In pain, possibly from ovarian cysts or uterine cancer, she died on November 17, 1558, aged 42, at St James’s Palace, during an influenza epidemic that also claimed the life of Reginald Pole later the same day. She was succeeded by her half-sister Elizabeth. Felipe II of Spain who was in Brussels, wrote to his sister Joan: “I felt a reasonable regret for her death.”

Although Mary’s will stated that she wished to be buried next to her mother, she was interred in Westminster Abbey on December 14, in a tomb she would eventually share with Elizabeth. The Latin inscription on their tomb, Regno consortes et urna, hic obdormimus Elizabetha et Maria sorores, in spe resurrectionis (affixed there by James I when he succeeded Elizabeth), translates to: “Consorts in realm and tomb, we, sisters Elizabeth and Mary, here lie down to sleep in hope of resurrection.”

Elizabeth I, Queen of England and Ireland.

This date in History. October 1, 1553: Coronation of Queen Mary I of England and Ireland.

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coronation, Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, Duke of Suffolk, Elizabeth I, Henry VIII, Kings and Queens of England, Lord Guilford Dudley, Mary I, Mary Tudor, Third Succession Act, Westminster Abbey

Mary I (February 18, 1516 – November 17, 1558), also known as Mary Tudor, was the Queen of England and Ireland from July 1553 until her death. She is best known for her aggressive attempt to reverse the English Reformation, which had begun during the reign of her father, Henry VIII and return England to Roman Catholicism. The executions that marked her pursuit of the restoration of Roman Catholicism in England and Ireland led to her denunciation as “Bloody Mary” by her Protestant opponents.

Accession

On July 6, 1553, at the age of 15, King Edward VI died from a lung infection, possibly tuberculosis. He did not want the crown to go to his sister Mary, because he feared she would restore Catholicism and undo his reforms as well as those of his father Henry VIII, and therefore he planned to exclude her from the line of succession. His advisers, however, told him that he could not disinherit only one of his half-sisters: he would have to disinherit Elizabeth as well, even though she was a Protestant. Guided by John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland, and perhaps others, Edward excluded both from the line of succession in his will.

Contradicting the Third Succession Act, which was enacted by Henry VIII and passed by the Parliament of England in July 1543; the Act restored Mary and Elizabeth to the line of succession, Edward named Dudley’s daughter-in-law Lady Jane Grey, the granddaughter of Henry VIII’s younger sister, Mary, as his successor. Lady Jane’s mother was Frances Brandon, Mary’s cousin and goddaughter. Just before Edward VI’s death, Mary was summoned to London to visit her dying brother. She was warned, however, that the summons was a pretext on which to capture her and thereby facilitate Lady Jane’s accession to the throne. Therefore, instead of heading to London from her residence at Hunsdon, Mary fled into East Anglia, where she owned extensive estates and Dudley had ruthlessly put down Kett’s Rebellion. Many adherents to the Catholic faith, opponents of Dudley’s, lived there. On July 9, from Kenninghall, Norfolk, she wrote to the privy council with orders for her proclamation as Edward’s successor.

On July 10, 1553, Lady Jane was proclaimed queen by Dudley and his supporters, and on the same day Mary’s letter to the council arrived in London. Despite Edward’s desire to exclude Mary from the throne it was never approved by Parliament which mean that the Third Succession Act was still the extant law of the land which meant Mary was still her brother’s legal heir and successor.

By July 12, Mary and her supporters had assembled a military force at Framlingham Castle, Suffolk, Dudley’s support collapsed, and Jane’s attempt at usurpation was halted on July 19. Although truth be told Jane and her husband were mere pawns of Dudley’s schemes. Jane and Lord Guilford Dudley were imprisoned in the Tower of London. Mary rode triumphantly into London on August 3, 1553, on a wave of popular support. She was accompanied by her half-sister Elizabeth and a procession of over 800 nobles and gentlemen.

One of Mary’s first actions as queen was to order the release of the Roman Catholic Duke of Norfolk and Stephen Gardiner from imprisonment in the Tower of London, as well as her kinsman Edward Courtney. Mary understood that the young Lady Jane was essentially a pawn in Dudley’s scheme, and Dudley was the only conspirator of rank executed for high treason in the immediate aftermath of the coup. Lady Jane and her husband, Lord Guildford Dudley, though found guilty, were kept under guard in the Tower rather than immediately executed, while Lady Jane’s father, Henry Grey, 1st Duke of Suffolk, was released. Mary was left in a difficult position, as almost all the Privy Counsellors had been implicated in the plot to put Lady Jane on the throne. She appointed Gardiner to the council and made him both Bishop of Winchester and Lord Chancellor, offices he held until his death in November 1555. Susan Clarencieux became Mistress of the Robes. On October 1, 1553, Gardiner crowned Mary at Westminster Abbey.

Birth of Queen Mary I of England and Ireland, February 18, 1516.

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Bloody Mary, Catherine of Aragon, Edward VI, Felipe II of Spain, Ferdinand & Isabella, Henry VIII, King Henry VIII of England, Kings and Queens of England, Mary Tudor, Philip II of Spain, Protestant Reformation, Queen Mary I, Queen Mary I of England

On this date in History. February 18, 1516, birth of Queen Mary I of England and Ireland.

Mary I (February 18, 1516 – November 17, 1558) was the Queen of England and Ireland from July 1553 until her death. She is best known for her aggressive attempt to reverse the English Reformation, which had begun during the reign of her father, Henry VIII. The executions that marked her pursuit of the restoration of Roman Catholicism in England and Ireland led to her denunciation as “Bloody Mary” by her Protestant opponents.

Mary was the only child of Henry VIII by his first wife, Catherine of Aragon, to survive to adulthood. Her younger half-brother Edward VI (son of Henry and Jane Seymour) succeeded their father in 1547 at the age of nine. When Edward became mortally ill in 1553, he attempted to remove Mary from the line of succession because he supposed (accurately) that she would reverse the Protestant reforms that had begun during his reign. On his death, leading politicians tried to proclaim Lady Jane Grey as queen. Mary assembled a force in East Anglia and deposed Jane, who was ultimately beheaded. Mary was—excluding the disputed reigns of Jane and the Empress Matilda—the first queen regnant of England.

When Mary ascended the throne after the death of her brother Edward VI, she was proclaimed under the same official style as Henry VIII and Edward VI: “Mary, by the Grace of God, Queen of England, France and Ireland, Defender of the Faith, and of the Church of England and of Ireland on Earth Supreme Head”. The title Supreme Head of the Church was repugnant to Mary’s Catholicism, and she omitted it by Christmas 1553.

In 1554, Mary married the future King Felipe II of Spain, becoming queen consort of Habsburg Spain on his accession in 1556. Both Mary and Felipe were descended from legitimate children of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster, by his first two wives, a relationship which was used to portray Felipe as an English king. Mary descended from the Duke of Lancaster by all three of his wives, Blanche of Lancaster, Constance of Castile, and Katherine Swynford. On her mother’s side Felipe and Mary were first cousins once removed.

Under the English common law doctrine of jure uxoris, the property and titles belonging to a woman became her husband’s upon marriage, and it was feared that any man she married would thereby become King of England in fact and in name. While Mary’s grandparents, Fernando II-V and Isabella I of Castile and Aragon (Spain’s) had retained sovereignty of their own realms during their marriage, there was no precedent to follow in England. Under the terms of Queen Mary’s Marriage Act, Felipe was to be styled “King of England”, all official documents (including Acts of Parliament) were to be dated with both their names, and Parliament was to be called under the joint authority of the couple, for Mary’s lifetime only.

England would not be obliged to provide military support to Felipe father in any war, and Felipe could not act without his wife’s consent or appoint foreigners to office in England.Felipe was unhappy at the conditions imposed, but he was ready to agree for the sake of securing the marriage. He had no amorous feelings toward Mary and sought the marriage for its political and strategic gains; Philip’s aide Ruy Gómez de Silva wrote to a correspondent in Brussels, “the marriage was concluded for no fleshly consideration, but in order to remedy the disorders of this kingdom and to preserve the Low Countries.”

Under Mary’s marriage treaty with Felipe, the official joint style reflected not only Mary’s but also Felipe’s dominions and claims: “Philip and Mary, by the grace of God, King and Queen of England, France, Naples, Jerusalem, and Ireland, Defenders of the Faith, Princes of Spain and Sicily, Archdukes of Austria, Dukes of Milan, Burgundy and Brabant, Counts of Habsburg, Flanders and Tyrol”. This style, which had been in use since 1554, was replaced when Philip inherited the Spanish Crown in 1556 with “Philip and Mary, by the Grace of God King and Queen of England, Spain, France, both the Sicilies, Jerusalem and Ireland, Defenders of the Faith, Archdukes of Austria, Dukes of Burgundy, Milan and Brabant, Counts of Habsburg, Flanders and Tyrol”.

During her five-year reign, Mary had over 280 religious dissenters burned at the stake in the Marian persecutions. After Mary’s death in 1558, her re-establishment of Roman Catholicism was reversed by her younger half-sister and successor Elizabeth I, daughter of Henry and Anne Boleyn, at the beginning of the 45-year Elizabethan Era.

Ancestry

On this date in History, February 8, 1587. The execution of Mary I, Queen of Scots.

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Elizabeth I, Elizabeth I of England, Fotheringhay Castle, Henry VIII, Kingdom of England, Kingdom of Scotland, Kings and Queens of England, kings and queens of Scotland, Mary I of Scotland, Mary of Scotland, Mary Queen of Scotland

On this date in History, February 8, 1587. The execution of Mary I, Queen of Scots.

In November 1558, Henry VIII’s elder daughter, Queen Mary I of England, was succeeded by her only surviving sibling, who became Queen Elizabeth I. Under the Third Succession Act, passed in 1543 by the English Parliament, Elizabeth was recognized as her sister’s heir, and Henry VIII’s last will and testament, excluded the Stuarts from succeeding to the English throne. Yet, in the eyes of many Catholics, Elizabeth was illegitimate because they did not view Henry VIII’s divorce from his wife, Catherine of Aragon, as legal and binding. Therefore, to many Catholics, Mary Stuart, (Queen Mary I of Scotland) was recognized as the legitimate senior descendant of Henry VIII’s elder sister, and was the rightful queen of England. When Elizabeth I succeeded to the English throne King Henri II of France proclaimed his eldest son and daughter-in-law king and queen of England, and in France the royal arms of England were quartered with those of Franḉois and Mary. Mary’s claim to the English throne was a perennial sticking point between her and Elizabeth I.

In 1567 Mary I, Queen of Scots was deposed and replaced on the Scottish throne with her son, who became James VI, King of Scots (1567-1625). Mary sought refuge in England. Elizabeth I, never trusting her cousin, eventually had Mary in custody in England. On August 11, 1586, after being implicated in the Babington Plot, Mary was arrested while out riding and taken to Tixall. The Babington Plot was a plan in 1586 to assassinate Queen Elizabeth I, a Protestant, and put Mary I, Queen of Scots, a Catholic, on the English throne.

From letters written by Mary that were smuggled out of Chartley it was clear that Mary had sanctioned the attempted assassination of Elizabeth. To keep a better eye on her activities Elizabeth had Mary moved to Fotheringhay Castle on September 20, 1586. In October Mary was put on trial for treason under the Act for the Queen’s Safety before a court of 36 noblemen, including Cecil, Shrewsbury, and Walsingham. Mary denied the charges. She told her triers, “Look to your consciences and remember that the theatre of the whole world is wider than the kingdom of England”. She protested that she had been denied the opportunity to review the evidence, that her papers had been removed from her, that she was denied access to legal counsel and that as a foreign anointed queen she had never been an English subject and thus could not be convicted of treason.

Mary was convicted of Treason on October 25 and sentenced to death with only one commissioner, Lord Zouche, expressing any form of dissent. Nevertheless, despite the conviction, Elizabeth hesitated to order her execution. Elizabeth faced great pressure from the English Parliament to carry out the sentence. However, Elizabeth had many concerns in executing a fellow anointed sovereign who was also her cousin. She was concerned that the killing of a queen set a discreditable precedent and was fearful of the consequences, especially if, in retaliation, Mary’s son, James VI of Scotland, formed an alliance with the Catholic powers, such as France, whom Mary was a former queen consort of France via her marriage to King Franḉois II of France (1559-1560) would invade England.

Elizabeth asked Paulet, Mary’s final custodian, if he would contrive a clandestine way to “shorten the life” of Mary, which he refused to do on the grounds that he would not make “a shipwreck of my conscience, or leave so great a blot on my poor posterity”. On February 1, 1587, Elizabeth reluctantly signed the death warrant, and entrusted it to William Davison, a privy councillor. On February 3, ten members of the Privy Council of England, having been summoned by Cecil without Elizabeth’s knowledge, decided to carry out the sentence at once.

Execution

At Fotheringhay on the evening of February 7,1587, Mary was told that she was to be executed the next morning. She spent the last hours of her life in prayer, distributing her belongings to her household, and writing her will and a letter to the King Henri III of France. The scaffold that was erected in the Great Hall was two feet high and draped in black. It was reached by two or three steps and furnished with the block, a cushion for her to kneel on and three stools, for her and the earls of Shrewsbury and Kent, who were there to witness the execution. The executioners (one named Bull and his assistant) knelt before her and asked forgiveness, as it was typical for the executioner to ask the pardon of the one being put to death. She replied, “I forgive you with all my heart, for now, I hope, you shall make an end of all my troubles.” Her servants, Jane Kennedy and Elizabeth Curle, and the executioners helped Mary to remove her outer garments, revealing a velvet petticoat and a pair of sleeves in crimson brown, the liturgical colour of martyrdom in the Catholic Church, with a black satin bodice and black trimmings. As she disrobed she smiled and said that she “never had such grooms before … nor ever put off her clothes before such a company”. She was blindfolded by Kennedy with a white veil embroidered in gold, knelt down on the cushion in front of the block, on which she positioned her head, and stretched out her arms. Her last words were, In manus tuas, Domine, commendo spiritum meum (“Into thy hands, O Lord, I commend my spirit”).

Mary was not beheaded with a single strike. The first blow missed her neck and struck the back of her head. The second blow severed the neck, except for a small bit of sinew, which the executioner cut through using the axe. Afterward, he held her head aloft and declared, “God save the Queen.” At that moment, the auburn tresses in his hand turned out to be a wig and the head fell to the ground, revealing that Mary had very short, grey hair. A small dog owned by the queen, a Skye Terrier, is said to have been hiding among her skirts, unseen by the spectators. Following the beheading, it was covered in her blood and refused to be parted from its owner’s body until it was forcibly taken away and washed. Items supposedly worn or carried by Mary at her execution are of doubtful provenance; contemporary accounts state that all her clothing, the block, and everything touched by her blood was burnt in the fireplace of the Great Hall to obstruct relic-hunters.

When the news of the execution reached Elizabeth, she became indignant and asserted that Davison had disobeyed her instructions not to part with the warrant and that the Privy Council had acted without her authority. Elizabeth’s vacillation and deliberately vague instructions gave her plausible deniability to attempt to avoid the direct stain of Mary’s blood. Davison was arrested, thrown into the Tower of London, and found guilty of misprision. He was released nineteen months later after Cecil and Walsingham interceded on his behalf.

Mary’s request to be buried in France was refused by Elizabeth. Her body was embalmed and left in a secure lead coffin until her burial, in a Protestant service, at Peterborough Cathedral in late July 1587. Her entrails, removed as part of the embalming process, were buried secretly within Fotheringhay Castle. Her body was exhumed in 1612, when her son, King James VI and I, ordered that she be reinterred in Westminster Abbey in a chapel opposite the tomb of Elizabeth I. In 1867, her tomb was opened in an attempt to ascertain the resting place of James I-VI of England and Scotland; he was ultimately found with Henry VII, but many of her other descendants, including Elizabeth of Bohemia, Prince Rupert of the Rhine and the children of Anne, Queen of Great Britain, were interred in her vault.

Anne of Brittany: Conclusion

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Anne of Brittany, Brittany, Claude of France, Duchess of Brittany, Francis I of France, Henri III of France, Henry VIII, King Henri II of France, King Henry VIII of England, Louis XII of France, Margaret Tudor, Salic Law

Three days after the death of Charles VIII the terms of Anne’s marriage contract became an issue. The contract stipulated that Anne had to marry her husbands successor if Anne and Charles did not have an heir. This clause in the contract was made so France would be able to maintain control over the Duchy of Brittany. There was one significant obstacle to adhering to the clause in the contract. The new King, Louis XII, was already married, to Joan of France, daughter of Louis XI and sister to the recently deceased Charles VIII. On August 19, 1498, at Étampes, Anne agreed to marry Louis XII if he obtained an annulment from Joan within a year. Days later, the process for the annulment of the marriage between Louis XII and Joan of France began. In the interim, Anne returned to Brittany by October of 1498 and began the administration of her Duchy.

(Louis XII of France & Naples)

With Anne being a fierce defender of the independence of Brittany it may seem odd that she agreed to abide by the contract and marry Louis XII. It has been theorized by many historical scholars that Anne was hoping that Pope Alexander VI would not grant the annulment. That was not the case, for Pope Alexander VI dissolved the marriage between Louis XII and Joan of France before the end of the year. * At Nantes, on January 7, 1499 Anne’s signed her third marriage contract and was married to Louis XII that very same day. Anne was 21 and Louis XII was 37.

Since Anne was no longer a child as she was at her first two marriages, she was now a Dowager Queen of France and about to turn the ripe old age of 22 two weeks after her marriage to Louis XII, she was determined to ensure the recognition of her rights as sovereign Duchess of Brittany from the start of this marriage.

Although after the marriage Louis XII exercised Anne’s powers in Brittany, and issued decisions in her name, he did formally recognize her right to the title “Duchess of Brittany” and allowed her to formally use her title. The marriage contract settled the issue of the succession to Duchy. The Contract ensured that their second child, son or daughter, would inherit the duchy of Brittany. Sadly this was a clause that would not be respected in the future. Anne also had her second coronation ceremony as Queen of France which took place on November 18, 1504, again at St. Denis Basilica.

Since Anne, as the reigning Duchess of Brittany fiercely defended the independence of her Duchy, she arranged the marriage of her daughter, Claude, heiress of the Duchy, born October 13, 1499, to Archduke Charles of Austria, (future Holy Roman Emperor Karl V, King of Spain) to reinforce the Franco-Spanish alliance and ensure French success in the Italian Wars. This marriage contract was signed on August 10, 1501 in Lyon by François de Busleyden, Archbshop of Besançon, William de Croÿ, Nicolas de Rutter and Pierre Lesseman, all ambassadors of Archduke Philipp of Austria, reigning Duke of Burgundy, Charles’ father.

After several years of marriage, and with Claude being the only surviving child of Anne and Louis XII, it became readily apparent that Anne would not produce a male heir. Therefore, Louis XII had the arranged marriage between Claude and Archduke Charles of Austria canceled. Alternatively, Louis XII arranged a marriage between Claude and the perspective heir to the French throne, Francis of Angoulême. This would continue to bring Brittany under the direct control of the French Crown. Anne was determined to maintain independence for her Duchy and refused to approve of this union. Anne continued to support the planned marriage between Claude and Archduke Charles, and added the addendum that her other daughter, Renée, would inherit the Duchy, forever keeping it out of the clutches of the French Crown. She was so against the marriage between Claude and Francis of Angoulême that she withheld any support or sanctioning of the union until her dying day.

Death

At the still young age of 37 Anne died at 6 a.m. on January 9, 1514 of a kidney-stone attack while at the Château de Blois. It has been theorized that her health declined, hastening her demise, due to her many pregnancies and miscarriages. According to her will her body was partitioned. The customary partitioning of her body (dilaceratio corporis, “division of the body” in heart, entrails and bones) allowed for multiple burials, a privilege of the Capetian dynasty, which also allowed for multiple ceremonies.

(Arms of Anne of Brittany)

Anne’s will also granted the succession of Brittany to her second daughter, Renée. Louis XII ignored Anne’s Will and confirmed Claude as Duchess of Brittany. On May 18, 1514, Francis of Angoulême married his second cousin Claude, the new reigning Duchess of Brittany. The younger daughter, Renée (1510–1575), married Duke Ercole II of Ferrara. After the death of Anne, Louis XII married Mary Tudor, the sister of Henry VIII of England, in Abbeville, France, on October 9, 1514. This represented a final attempt to produce an heir to the French throne, for despite two previous marriages the king had no living sons. On December 24, 1514, Louis was reportedly suffering from a severe case of gout. In the early hours of January 1, 1515, he had received the final sacraments and died later that evening. Louis XII was interred in Saint Denis Basilica. He was 52 years old and had reigned for 17 Years.

Succession

The succession to the throne of France followed Salic Law, which did not allow women to inherit the throne or pass on succession right to their issue. As a result, Louis XII was succeeded by Francis I. Born to Louise of Savoy, on September 12, 1494. Francis I was the son of Charles, Count of Angoulême and he was a great-great grandson of King Charles V of France. This meant that the Duchy of Brittany was once again the property of the queen consort of France.

(Tomb of Anne of Brittany and Charles VIII of France)

Anne’s marriage with Louis XII of France, produced at least another nine pregnancies:

* Claude of France (13 October 1499 – 20 July 1524), who succeeded her as Duchess of Brittany and later also became Queen consort of France as wife of Francis I.
* miscarriage (1500).
* Stillborn son (21 January 1503).
* miscarriage (end 1503).
* miscarriage (1505).
* miscarriage (1508).
* miscarriage (1509).
* Renée of France (25 October 1510 – 12 June 1574), married Ercole II d’Este, the Duke of Ferrara, and became Duchess of Ferrara of Chartres, and Lady of Montargis on occasion of her wedding.
* Stillborn son (January 1512).

Each miscarriage or stillbirth is said to have delighted the ambitious Louise of Savoy, whose son Francis was the heir apparent under the Salic Law. There even existed contemporary rumours that Louise used witchcraft to kill Anne’s sons. Anne’s male bloodline ended with her great-grandson Henri III of France in 1589.

Through her granddaughter Margaret, Duchess of Savoy (Claude’s youngest daughter), Anne of Brittany was the ancestor of Vittorio Emanuele IV, Prince of Naples, and the current pretender to the throne of Italy. Through her great-granddaughter Claude, Duchess of Lorraine (daughter of Henri II of France), Anne is also the ancestor of Karl II von Habsburg, Archduke of Austria, the current pretender to the throne of Austria. Through her granddaughter Anna d’Este (Renée’s eldest daughter), Anne of Brittany is also the ancestor of the Houses of Guise and Savoy-Nemours.

* The marriage and annulment between Louis XII and Joan of France was rather complex and the details of this will be addressed in a future blog post.

Legal Succession: Elizabeth I of England & James VI of Scotland: Part 2

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Catherine Gray, Elizabeth I of England, Henry VIII, Isabella of Spain, James I of England, Lord Beauchamp, Philipe II of Spain

As I mentioned previously James VI, King of Scots was the heir of Elizabeth I of England via the principle of primogeniture. Even though he did eventually become King James I of England it wasn’t as cut and dried as it seems. Henry VIII had barred the Scottish line in his will and an Act of Succession. There was also a law on the books barring foreigners from inheriting property. Some ministers thought to get around that last rule by claiming that Scotland was a part of England as many Scottish kings had paid homage to English kings which demonstrated that Scotland was a fiefdom of England.

If James VI of Scotland was barred from the succession who else were the possible heirs to Elizabeth’s throne? One was Lady Catherine Gray the younger sister of the ill-fatted 9 day Queen, Jane Gray. She was the senior heir of Henry VIII’s sister Mary. Catherine Gray married Edward Seymour, Earl of Hertford, a descendant of King Edward III of England. They married and had their first son, Edward, Lord Beauchamp, and this infuriated Queen Elizabeth who often feared that those who saw her rule as illegitimate would replace her on the throne with one of these hires.

For that reason Elizabeth had Catherine and the Earl of Hertford thrown in the Tower of London. Evidently they were not watched too much because they were able to have another child, Thomas, while imprisoned in the tower. Since the only witness that this marriage had actually occurred had died, Elizabeth considered the marriage illegal and had the couple separated and Lord Beauchamp was considered illegitimate. However, after Catherine’s death in 1568 many considered Lord Beauchamp to be Elizabeth’s heir.

Another candidate was Infanta Isabella of Spain, daughter of King Felipe II of Spain and Princess Elizabeth de Valois of France. Infanta Isabella had a stronger claim to the throne than Elizabeth I. As we have seen the Tudor dynasty descends from a third marriage of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, son of King Edward III of England. At first the children of that union were born illegitimate but later legitimized with no succession rights. Isabella, on the other hand, descended from the first two legal marriages of John of Gaunt.

John of Gaunt’s first marriage was to Blanch of Lancaster (a descendent of King Edward I of England) and their daughter, Philippa, married King John I of Portugal. From them descended Isabella of Portugal wife of Holy Roman Emperor Karl V (Carlos I of Spain) the grandparents of Infanta Isabella of Spain. John of Gaunt’s second marriage to Infanta Constance of Castile produced a daughter, Catherine, who married her cousin, King Enrique III of Castile. Catherine of Lancaster’s great-granddaughter Catherine of Aragon, first of the six wives of Henry VIII of England, was named after her. From this line descends the Kings of Spain culminating in the English heir, Isabella of Spain.

By the end of 1602 when it became apparent that Elizabeth I was dying the need for her to name her successor was crucial. The problem was that not many wanted to point out to the queen that she was dying, it had also become treason to discuss the succession issue!

Stay tuned for Part III!

Legal Succession: Elizabeth I of England & James VI of Scotland: Part I

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Elizabeth I of England, Henry VIII, James VI of Scotland, Mary Queen of Scots, Philip II of Spain, Queen Elizabeth I of England, William III and Mary II

Where we left of last was with the accession of Mary I on the English throne. Her husband, King Felipe II of Spain, also held the title King of England. Under the Act for the Marriage of Queen Mary to Felipe of Spain, Felipe was to enjoy his wife’s titles and honours as King of England and Ireland for as long as their marriage should last. In reality Felipe was a King Consort and held his title by right of his wife. Although all Acts of Parliament were called under the joint authority of the couple, sovereignty was vested in Mary. England and Scotland would have true joint rulers where sovereignty was vested in both, with the reign of William III and Mary II. We will discuss them at a later date.

Queen Mary I’s reign was short, lasting only 5 years. Mary & Felipe did not have any children and upon Mary’s death, Felipe ceased to be “King of England.” Mary’s half-sister, Elizabeth, the last surviving child of Henry VIII, with the ill-fatted Anne Bolyne, became the last monarch of the House of Tudor. Elizabeth reigned for 44 years and saw the defeat of the Spanish Armada in 1588. One of the great struggles for Elizabeth during her reign was to beget an heir. There were many suitors for her hand, among them her former brother-in-law, Felipe II of Spain, and also his cousin, Archduke Karl of Austria and the French Princes, Henri and Francois both Duke of Anjou. Elizabeth kept many in suspense concerning her marriage, even well past her child-bearing years. However, Elizabeth let it be known that she did not want a man ruling over her.

During her reign the genealogical heir was her cousin Mary, Queen of Scots, a great-granddaughter of Henry VII. * Many Catholics saw Mary as the rightful Queen of England and viewed Elizabeth as a usurper. This attitude would eventually lead to the down fall and execution of Mary, Queen of Scots at Fotheringhay Castle in 1587. Mary, Queen of Scots was also a Queen Consort of France as she was briefly married to the sickly Francois II of France. Mary’s second husband, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, was also her cousin and he himself also had rights to the English throne as a great-grandson of Henry VII. They had one son, who became James VI, King of Scots after her mother was deposed in 1576. He was just thirteen months old.

Although looking back it is easy to see how clear the claim that James VI, King of Scots had to the English throne after the death of Elizabeth. It was not however, as clear of a choice as it seems. First off Henry VIII’s will excluded the descendants of his elder sister, Margaret Tudor, owing in part to Henry’s desire to keep the English throne out of the hands of the Scots monarchs, and in part to a previous Act of Parliament of 1431 that barred foreign-born persons, including royalty, from inheriting property in England. Since James was technically foreign-born and a double descendent of Margaret Tudor, it seem James’ chances of inheriting the English throne were slim.

Stay tuned to Part II to see how this was overcome and who else was considered heir to the English throne.

* An interesting side note. Mary, Queen of Scots is often listed without an ordinal. Technically she was Mary I, Queen of Scots because her great-great granddaughter, Mary II, who was both queen of England and queen of Scots.

Legal Succession: Mary & Jane Part II

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Duke of Northumberland, Henry VIII, James IV, John Dudley, King Edward VI, King of Scots, Roman Catholic Church, Third Succession Act

In the summer of 1553 the 15-year-old King Edward VI was dying. His Catholic half-sister Mary was still the heiress presumptive to the throne. However, Edward VI, under the pressure from the Duke of Northumberland, bypassed his cousin, Frances Brandon, and named her eldest daughter, the Protestant Lady Jane Grey, as his successor. All of this information was placed in his will, which he passed via letters patent on June 21. These changes to the succession were co-signed by 102 notables, among them the entire Privy Council, peers, bishops, judges, and London aldermen. Edward desired that these changes be passed in Parliament in September. However, prior to the final legal steps, Edward VI died on July 10, 1553.

The privy Council proclaimed Lady Jane Grey as the first Queen Regnant of England. Jane, who just happened to be married to Lord Gilford Dudley, the youngest son of the Duke of Northumberland, was transferred to the Tower of London to await her coronation, per tradition.

One of the grave mistakes Northumberland made at this point was that he forgot to take hold of Mary herself prior to the death of the King. With Mary still free, she was able to easily claim her throne from Jane. The defacto reign of Queen Jane lasted 9 days.

Edward’s failure to have his letters passed by an Act of Parliament still mean that not only was the Third Act of Succession still the law of the land, so was the 1547 Act of Treason. The Treason Act made it high treason to change the line of succession to the throne that had been established by Third Act of Succession. Of course as king, Edward VI could have had both the Third Act of Succession and the Treason Act replaced with new laws, but since he died prior to accomplishing that requirement that his sister Mary was the legal Queen per the terms of the Third Succession Act.

Queen Mary entered London in a triumphal procession on August 3rd, and the Duke of Northumberland was executed on August 22, 1553. In September, Parliament declared that Mary was the rightful queen and denounced and revoked Jane’s proclamation and labeled her a usurper. Jane and Lord Guildford Dudley were both charged with high treason, together with two of Dudley’s brothers and the former Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer. Their trial, by a special commission, took place on November 13, 1553.

All defendants charged were found guilty and sentenced to death. Jane was to “be burned alive on Tower Hill or beheaded as the Queen pleases.” However, Mary planned on pardoning her cousin and this was reported to the imperial ambassador to Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain. Mary was planning on marrying her cousin, Prince Felipe of Austria, future King of Spain, son of Charles V.

Sadly, Jane’s fate took a turn for the worst with the Protestant rebellion of Thomas Wyatt the younger in January of 1554. Jane had nothing to do with this rebellion which was triggered by the prospective marriage of Mary and Felipe. What sealed her fate was the fact that Jane’s father, the Duke of Suffolk, and his two brothers joined the rebellion, which caused the government to go through with the verdict against Jane and Guildford. Their execution was first scheduled for February 9, 1554 , but was then postponed for three days so that Jane should get a chance to be converted to the Catholic faith. This attempt at conversion failed and both Lady Jane and her husband, Lord Guilford, were beheaded on the morning of February 12, 1554.

The tale of Lady Jane is tragic. She was only 17 and many historians believe she was and unwilling pawn of those around her. Steadfast in her Protestant faith she became a martyr for the Protestant cause.

Legal Succession: Mary & Jane: Part I

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Duke of Northumberland, Henry VIII, James IV, John Dudley, King Edward VI, King of Scots, Roman Catholic Church, Third Succession Act

Although Henry VIII caused the upheaval of many lives in trying to secure a male heir, he ended up leaving a sickly male child on the throne. King Edward VI was only 9 years old when he mounted the throne. Because of his age he ruled under a Regency Council.  The Council was first led by his uncle Edward Seymour, 1st Duke of Somerset, (1547–1549), and then by John Dudley, 1st Earl of Warwick, from 1551 Duke of Northumberland.

Edward did not live long and died at the age of 15 from consumption (Tuberculosis). His death saw another struggle for the crown. A new element was introduced for the struggle for the crown that had not been an issue in other battles for the throne. The issue was religion. In trying to secure a male heir and a divorce from Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIII broke from the Roman Catholic Church and created the Protestant Church of England with himself as its head. This move would cause great strife and pain and have historical repercussion that would stretch into today.

During the reign of Henry VIII and his struggle for an heir, his children were on a roller coaster of being accepted and rejected. Edward’s sisters, Mary & Elizabeth, were at times removed from the succession and batserdized, only to be returned to the succession and legitimized later. Their final acceptance came in Henry VIII’s last Will which restored both Mary & Elizabeth to their rights to the throne and were once and for all declared legitimate.

In 1543 Henry enacted the Third Succession Act. This Act gave the children of Henry VIII the succession. The Act gave the descendents of Henry’s sister Mary rights to the throne and barred the right of succession to the Scottish descendants of his sister Margaret who married James IV, King of Scots. According to the Act if Edward VI had no issue the throne would go to his elder sister, Mary, a devout Catholic. John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, was regent at the time and a Protestant. He and others in power did not want the crown to go to the Catholic Mary.

Part II will examine, in-depth, who had the legal right to be England’s first Queen regnant, Jane or Mary?