Henri IV of France. His Wives and Mistresses. Part I.

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Catherine de Médici, Jeanne d'Albret, King Charles IX of France, King Henri IV of France and Navarre, King Philip II of Spain, Pope Gregory XIII, Princess Margaret de Valois, Queen Joan III of Navarre, Queen of France and Navarre, St. Bartholomew's Day massacre

Henri IV of France’s wives and mistresses played a significant role in the politics of his reign.

Henri’s womanising became legendary, earning him the nickname of Le Vert Galant. His sexual appetite was said to have been insatiable, and he always kept mistresses, often several at a time, as well as engaging in random sexual encounters and visits to brothels. Even so, he tended to elevate one mistress above the others and shower her with money, honours, and promises.

First Marriage

After the signature of the peace of Saint-Germain, Catherine de’ Medici, the powerful mother of King Charles IX, was convinced by François of Montmorency to marry her daughter Margaret with Henri III of Navarre.

The match was in fact assumed almost thirteen years earlier by the late King Henri II. Catherine, who believed in dynastic marriage as a potent political tool, aimed to unite the interests of the Valois and the Bourbons, and create harmony between Catholics and Huguenots in the reign of France.

By all accounts, Margaret of Valois was deemed highly attractive, even sexually magnetic: “The beauty of that princess is more divine than human, she is made to damn and ruin men rather than to save them”, said about her Don Juan of Austria came to court just to see her.

King Henri IV of France and Navarre

Margaret had also an enterprising and flirtatious character. Shortly before this marriage plan with Henri of Navarre, she had been involved in a scandal: it was discovered that she encouraged the handsome Henri of Guise, who intended to marry her, entertaining a secret correspondence with him. When her family discovered it put an end to the crush between them and sent Henri of Guise away from court.

Some sources claim the duke of Guise was Margaret’s first lover, but this is highly unlikely. For political reasons, the duty of a Daughter of France was to be a virgin at the wedding and for this she was very guarded.

If Margaret had really compromised her reputation, Jeanne d’Albret (Queen Joan III of Navarre) would not accept the marriage between her son Henri and the princess. Although certainly after the wedding, Margaret was unfaithful to her husband, many of the extramarital adventures are the result of pamphlets that have had to politically discredit her and her family: the most famous was Le Divorce Satyrique (1607), who described her as a nymphomaniac.

Margaret complied with her mother’s desire to marry Henri of Navarre, provided she was not forced to convert to Protestantism. When Jeanne d’Albret arrived at the French court after receiving numerous pressures from Catherine, she was extremely impressed by Margaret: “She has frankly owned to me the favourable impression which she has formed of you.

With her beauty and wit, she exercises a great influence over the Queen-Mother and the King, and Messieurs her younger brothers.” The problems began when the Protestant Jeanne discovered that Margaret had no intention of abjuring Catholicism. Meanwhile the marriage negotiations were repeatedly impeded by the Pope Gregory XIII and King Felipe II of Spain.

Tired of the duration of the negotiations, Charles IX decided that the wedding would be celebrated by the Cardinal of Bourbon even without papal dispensation, so Jeanne gave her consent to the wedding by promising that Henri could remain a Huguenot.

When Jeanne arrived in Paris to buy clothes for the wedding, she was taken ill and died, aged forty-four; and Henri succeeded her as the King Henri III of Navarre. Henri arrived in Paris in July 1572 and saw Margaret after six years of separation (they had spent their childhood together with the French court). Despite subsequent historiographic interpretations, contemporaries do not point out any mutual dissatisfaction between future spouses.

Princess Margaret de Valois, Queen of France and Navarre

The controversial wedding took place on August 18, 1572 at Notre-Dame, Paris. After a nuptial lunch, four days of balls, masques and banquets ensued, only to be interrupted by the outbreak of violence in Paris.

After the attempted assassination of the Huguenot leader Gaspard de Coligny on August 18, 1572, Dowager Queen Catherine and King Charles IX, to forestall the expected Huguenot backlash, ordered the murder of the Huguenot leaders gathered in Paris for the wedding. The result was the St. Bartholomew’s Day massacre, in which thousands of Huguenots were killed in Paris and throughout the reign.

Margaret later described in her Memoirs the chaos and bloodshed in the Louvre Palace, where she and her new husband were lodged. Henri found himself escorted to a room with his cousin Henri of Condé, and told to choose between death and conversion to Roman Catholicism.

Henri chose the latter. After the massacre, the Queen-Mother proposed to her daughter that the marriage be annulled, but Margaret replied that this was impossible because she had already had sexual relations with Henri and was “in every sense” his wife. She wrote in her Memoirs: “I suspected the design of separating me from my husband was in order to work some mischief against him.“

September 27, 1590: Death of Pope Urban VII after a 12 day reign

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Bishop of Rome, Ferdinando I de' Medici, Giovanni Battista Castagna, Grand Duke of Tuscany, Pope Gregory XIII, Pope Sixtus V, Pope Urban VII, Roman Curia, Sovereign of the Papal States

Pope Urban VII (August 4, 1521 – September 27, 1590), born Giovanni Battista Castagna, was Bishop of Rome Pope of the Catholic Church, and sovereign ruler of the Papal States from September 15 to 27, 1590. His thirteen-day papacy was the shortest in history.

Giovanni Battista Castagna was born in Rome in 1521 to a noble family as the son of Cosimo Castagna of Genoa and Costanza Ricci Giacobazzi of Rome.

Castagna studied in universities all across Italy and obtained a doctorate in civil law and canon law when he finished his studies at the University of Bologna. Soon after he became auditor of his uncle, Cardinal Girolamo Verallo, whom he accompanied as datary on a papal legation to France.

He served as a constitutional lawyer and entered the Roman Curia during the pontificate of Pope Julius III as the Referendary of the Apostolic Signatura. Castagna was chosen to be the new Archbishop of Rossano on 1 March 1, 1553, and he would quickly receive all the minor and major orders culminating in his ordination to the priesthood on March 30, 1553 in Rome. He then received episcopal consecration a month after at the home of Cardinal Verallo.

He served as the Governor of Fano from 1555 to 1559 and later served as the Governor of Perugia and Umbria from 1559 to 1560. During the reign of Pius IV, he settled satisfactorily a long-standing boundary dispute between the inhabitants of Terni and Spoleto. Castagna would later participate in the Council of Trent from 1562 to 1563 and served as the president of several conciliar congregations.

He was appointed as the Apostolic Nuncio to Spain in 1565 and served there until 1572, resigning his post from his archdiocese a year later. He also served as the Governor of Bologna from 1576 to 1577. Among other positions, he was the Apostolic Nuncio to Venice from 1573 to 1577 and served also as the Papal Legate to Flanders and Cologne from 1578 to 1580.

Pope Gregory XIII elevated him to the cardinalate on December 12, 1583 and he was appointed as the Cardinal-Priest of San Marcello.

Papacy
Election

After the death of Pope Sixtus V, a conclave was convoked to elect a successor. Ferdinando I de’ Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany had been appointed a cardinal at the age of fourteen but was never ordained to the priesthood.

At the age of thirty-eight, he resigned from the cardinalate upon the death of his older brother, Francesco in 1587, to succeed to the title. (There were suspicions that Francesco and his wife died of arsenic poisoning after having dined at Ferdinando’s Villa Medici, although one story has Ferdinando as the intended target of his sister-in-law.) Ferdinando’s foreign policy attempted to free Tuscany from Spanish domination.

He was consequently opposed to the election of any candidate supported by Spain. He persuaded Cardinal Alessandro Peretti di Montalto, grand-nephew of Sixtus V, to switch his support from Cardinal Marco Antonio Colonna, which brought the support of the younger cardinals appointed by the late Sixtus.

Castagna, a seasoned diplomat of moderation and proven rectitude was elected as pope on September 15, 1590 and selected the pontifical name of “Urban VII”.

Activities

Urban VII’s short passage in the office gave rise to the world’s first known public smoking ban, as he threatened to excommunicate anyone who “took tobacco in the porchway of or inside a church, whether it be by chewing it, smoking it with a pipe or sniffing it in powdered form through the nose”.

Urban VII was known for his charity to the poor. He subsidized Roman bakers so they could sell bread under cost, and restricted the spending on luxury items for members of his court. He also subsidized public works projects throughout the Papal States. Urban VII was strictly against nepotism and he forbade it within the Roman Curia.

Death

Urban VII died in Rome on September 27, 1590, shortly before midnight, of malaria. He had reigned for 13 days. He was buried in the Vatican. The funeral oration was delivered by Pompeo Ugonio. His remains were later transferred to the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, on September 21, 1606.

His estate, valued at 30,000 scudi, was bequeathed to the Archconfraternity of the Annunciation, for use as dowries for poor young girls.

Juky 13, 1621: Death of Archduke Albrecht VII of Austria, Governor General of the Australian Netherlands

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Archbishop of Toledo, Archduke Albrecht VII of Austria, Governor General of the Austrian Netherlands, Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II, Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain, King Felipe II of Spain, Pope Clement VIII, Pope Gregory XIII, Pope Leo XI

Archduke Albrecht VII of Austria (November 13, 1559 – July 13, 1621) was the ruling Archduke of Austria for a few months in 1619 and, jointly with his wife, Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain, sovereign of the Habsburg Netherlands between 1598 and 1621.

Archduke Albrecht VII of Austria

Prior to this, he had been a cardinal, archbishop of Toledo, viceroy of Portugal and Governor General of the Habsburg Netherlands. He succeeded his brother Archduke Matthias as reigning Archduke of Lower and Upper Austria, but abdicated in favor of Ferdinand II the same year, making it the shortest (and often ignored) reign in Austrian history.

Archduke Albrecht was the fifth son of Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II and Infanta Maria of Spain, daughter of Holy Roman Emperor Charles V (King Carlos I of Spain) and Infanta Isabella of Portugal.

Archduke Albrecht was sent to the Spanish Court at the age of eleven, where his uncle, King Felipe II, looked after his education, where he was apparently quite intelligent. Initially he was meant to pursue an ecclesiastical career.

On March 3, 1577 he was appointed cardinal by Pope Gregory XIII, with a dispensation because of his age of eighteen, and was given Santa Croce in Gerusalemme as his titular church.

King Felipe II planned to make Albrecht Archbishop of Toledo as soon as possible, but the incumbent, Gaspar de Quiroga y Sandoval, lived much longer than expected; he died on November 12, 1594.

In the meantime Albrecht only took lower orders. He was never officially ordained a priest or bishop, and thus he resigned the See of Toledo in 1598. He resigned the Cardinalate in 1598.

After the dynastic union with Portugal, Albrecht became the first viceroy of the kingdom and its overseas empire in 1583. At the same time he was appointed Papal Legate and Grand Inquisitor for Portugal.

As viceroy of Portugal he took part in the organization of the Great Armada of 1588 and beat off an English counter-attack on Lisbon in 1589. In 1593 Felipe II recalled him to Madrid, where he would take a leading role in the government of the Spanish Monarchy. Two years later, the rebellious Hugh O’Neill, Earl of Tyrone and Hugh Roe O’Donnell offered Albrecht the Irish crown in the hope of obtaining Spanish support for their cause.

While pursuing a war with Spain, Albrecht made overtures for peace with Spain’s enemies, but only the French King Henri IV was disposed to enter official negotiations. Under the mediation of the papal legate Cardinal Alessandro de’Medici — the future Pope Leo XI — Spain and France concluded the Peace of Vervins on May 2, 1598.

Spain gave up its conquests, thereby restoring the situation of Cateau Cambrésis. France tacitly accepted the Spanish occupation of the prince-archbishopric of Cambray and pulled out of the war, but maintained the financial support for the Dutch Republic.

Only a few days after the treaty, on May 6, 1598, Felipe II announced his decision to marry his eldest daughter, Infanta Isabella to Archduke Albrecht and to cede them the sovereignty over the Habsburg Netherlands. The Act of Cession did however stipulate that if the couple would not have children, the Netherlands would return to Spain

Here is some background on Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain (August 12, 1566 – December 1, 1633)

Infanta Isabella Clara Eugenia of Spain

Infanta Isabella was the eldest surviving daughter of King Felipe II of Spain and his third wife, Elisabeth of Valois, who was the eldest daughter of King Henri II of France and Catherine de’ Medici.

Engagement

At the age of two, Isabella was promised to marry her cousin Rudolph II, Holy Roman Emperor (1552 — 1612), son of her aunt Maria. However, Isabella had to wait for more than 20 years before the eccentric Rudolph declared that he had no intention of marrying anybody. Meanwhile, she served as her father’s primary caretaker during the last three years of his life, when he was plagued by gout and frequent illness.

Marriage

As mentioned King Felipe II decided to cede the Spanish Netherlands to Isabella on condition that she marry her first cousin, Albrecht VII, Archduke of Austria. He was her former fiancé’s younger brother the former Viceroy.

Archduke Albrecht VII and Archduchess Isabella of Austria, Sovereigns of the Austrian Netherlands

They were to reign over the Netherlands jointly and be succeeded by their descendants according to the male-preference cognatic primogeniture but should a female succeed, she was required to marry the King of Spain or the person chosen by the King of Spain.

It was stipulated that, should they have no children, the Netherlands would revert to the King of Spain upon the death of either spouse.

As Albrecht was the Archbishop of Toledo, he had to be released from his religious commitments by Pope Clement VIII before the wedding could take place.

Shortly before King Felipe II died on September 13, 1598, he resigned the thrones of the Netherlands in favor of Isabella and her fiancé. The Pope celebrated the union by procuration on November 15, at Ferrera. On April 18, 1599, 33-year-old Isabella married the 40 year old Albrecht in Valencia.

1590-1591: The Reign of Three Popes.

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Bishop of Rome, Cardinal, French Wars of Religion, King Philip II of Spain, Pope Clement VIII, Pope Gregory XIII, Pope Gregory XIV, Pope Innocent IX, Pope Sixtus V, Pope Urban VII

From The Emperor’s Desk: Between September 15, 1590 to December 30, 1591, a time period lasting 1 year, 3 months, 15 days, saw three Pope’s reign over the Roman Catholic Church.

Pope Urban VII ( August 4, 1521 – September 27, 1590), born Giovanni Battista Castagna, was head of the Catholic Church, and ruler of the Papal States from September, 15 to 27 1590. His twelve-day papacy was the shortest in history.

Giovanni Battista Castagna was born in Rome in 1521 to a noble family as the son of Cosimo Castagna of Genoa and Costanza Ricci Giacobazzi of Rome.

Castagna studied in universities all across Italy and obtained a doctorate in civil law and canon law when he finished his studies at the University of Bologna. He served as a constitutional lawyer and entered the Roman Curia during the pontificate of Pope Julius III as the Referendary of the Apostolic Signatura.

Castagna was chosen to be the new Archbishop of Rossano on March 1, 1553, and he would quickly receive all the minor and major orders culminating in his ordination to the priesthood on 30 March 30, 1553 in Rome. Pope Gregory XIII elevated him to the cardinalate on 12 December 1583 and he was appointed as the Cardinal-Priest of San Marcello.

After the death of Pope Sixtus V a conclave was convoked to elect a successor. Castagna, a seasoned diplomat of moderation and proven rectitude was elected as pope on September 15, 1590 and selected the pontifical name of “Urban VII”.

Activities

Urban VII was known for his charity to the poor. He subsidized Roman bakers so they could sell bread under cost, and restricted the spending on luxury items for members of his court. He also subsidized public works projects throughout the Papal States. Urban VII was strictly against nepotism and he forbade it within the Roman Curia.

Death

Urban VII died in Rome on September 27, 1590, shortly before midnight, of malaria. He was buried in the Vatican. The funeral oration was delivered by Pompeo Ugonio. His remains were later transferred to the church of Santa Maria sopra Minerva, on 21 September 1606.

Pope Gregory XIV (February 11, 1535 – October 16, 1591), born Niccolò Sfondrato or Sfondrati, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from December 5, 1590 to his death in 1591.

Niccolò Sfondrati was born at Somma Lombardo, then part of the Duchy of Milan, in the highest stratum of Milanese society. His mother, of the house of Visconti, died in childbirth. His father Francesco Sfondrati, a senator of the ancient comune of Milan, was created Cardinal-Priest by Pope Paul III in 1544.

In his youth he was known for his modest lifestyle and stringent piety. He studied law at Perugia and Padua, was ordained a priest and swiftly appointed Bishop of Cremona, in 1560, in time to participate in the sessions of the Council of Trent from 1561 to 1563. Pope Gregory XIII made him a Cardinal-Priest of Santa Cecilia in Trastevere on 12 December 12, 1583.

After the death of Pope Urban VII on September 27, 1590, the Spanish ambassador Olivares presented the conclave a list of the seven cardinals who would be acceptable to his master King Felipe II of Spain. On December 5, 1590, after two months of deadlock, Sfondrati, one of Felipe II’s seven candidates but who had not aspired to the office, was elected pope. Alessandro Cardinal Montalto came to Sfondrati’s cell to inform him that the Sacred College had agreed on his election and found him kneeling in prayer before a crucifix.

On the day after he was elected Pope, Gregory XIV burst into tears and said to the cardinals: “God forgive you! What have you done?” In his bull of March 21, 1591, Cogit nos, he forbade under pain of excommunication all betting concerning the election of a Pope, the duration of a pontificate, or the creation of new cardinals.

Papacy

Gregory XIV’s brief pontificate was marked by vigorous intervention in favour of the Catholic party in the French Wars of Religion. Instigated by King Felipe II of Spain and the Duke of Mayenne, he excommunicated Henri IV of France on March 1, 1591, reiterating the 1585 declaration of Pope Sixtus V that as a heretic (Protestant) Henri was ineligible to succeed to the throne of Catholic France and ordered the clergy, nobles, judicial functionaries, and the Third Estate of France to renounce him.

Gregory XIV levied an army for the invasion of France, and dispatched his nephew Ercole Sfondrati to France at its head. He also sent a monthly subsidy of 15,000 scudi to Paris to reinforce the Catholic League. By coming down solidly on the side of Spanish interests, in part because Gregory XIV was elected due to the influence of the Spanish cardinals, the recent papal policy of trying to maintain a balance between Spain and France was abandoned.

Gregory XIV created five cardinals, among whom was his nephew Paolo Emilio Sfondrati, his Secretary of State. The biographers mention that Pope Gregory XIV had a nervous tendency to laughter, which occasionally became irresistible and even manifested itself at his coronation. Gregory XIV, who was in poor health before his election to the papacy, died due to a large gallstone.

Pope Innocent IX ( July 20, 1519 – December 30, 1591), born Giovanni Antonio Facchinetti, was head of the Catholic Church and ruler of the Papal States from October 29 to December 30, 1591.

Prior to his short papacy, he had been a canon lawyer, diplomat, and chief administrator during the reign of Pope Gregory XIV (r. 1590–1591).

Giovanni Antonio Facchinetti, whose family came from Crodo, in the diocese of Novara, northern Italy, was born in Bologna on July 20, 1519. He was the son of Antonio Facchinetti and Francesca Cini. He studied at the University of Bologna – which was pre-eminent in jurisprudence — where he obtained a doctorate in both civil and canon law in 1544. He was later ordained to the priesthood on March 11, 1544 and was appointed a canon of the church of Saints Gervasio and Protasio of Domodossola in 1547.

He travelled to Rome and he became the secretary to Cardinal Nicolò Ardinghelli before entering the service of Cardinal Alessandro Farnese, brother of the Duke of Parma and grandson of Pope Paul III (1534–1549), one of the great patrons of the time.

Pope Gregory XIII made him a cardinal on December 12 ,1583 as the Cardinal-Priest of Santi Quattro Coronati and he was to receive the red hat and title on January 9,1584. Pope Gregory XIV made him the Prefect of the Apostolic Signatura in 1591.

Papacy

Even before Pope Gregory XIV died, Spanish and anti-Spanish factions were electioneering for the next pope. Felipe II of Spain’s (r. 1556–1598) high-handed interference at the previous conclave was not forgotten: he had barred all but seven cardinals. This time the Spanish party in the College of Cardinals did not go so far, but they still controlled a majority, and after a quick conclave they raised Facchinetti to the papal chair as Pope Innocent IX.

It took three ballots to elect him as pope. Facchinetti received 24 votes on October 28 but was not successful in that ballot to be elected as pope. He received 28 votes on October 29 in the second ballot while the third saw him prevail.

The cardinal protodeacon Andreas von Austria crowned Innocent IX as pontiff on November 3, 1591. He elevated two cardinals to the cardinalate in the only papal consistory of his papacy on December 18, 1591.

Mindful of the origin of his success, Innocent IX supported, during his two months’ pontificate, the cause of Felipe II and the Catholic League against Henri IV of France (r. 1589–1610) in the French Wars of Religion (1562–1598), where a papal army was in the field. His death, however, prevented the realisation of Innocent IX’s schemes.

Death

On December 18, the pope made a pilgrimage of Rome’s seven pilgrimage churches, despite being ill, and caught a cold as a result. This became a heavy cough combined with a fever that led to his death.

Innocent IX died in the early morning of December 30, 1591. He was buried in the Vatican grottoes in a simple tomb.

Pope Innocent IX was succeeded by Pope Clement VIII who’s pontificate lasted for 13 years.

Excommunication of Queen Elizabeth I of England and Ireland

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 Act of Supremacy of 1559, Church of England, Church of Ireland, Duke of Norfolk, Irish Catholics, Mary I of Scotland, Papal Bull, Pope Gregory XIII, Pope Pius V, Pope Sixtus V, Queen Elizabeth I of England and Ireland, Regnans in Excelsis, Ridolfi Plot, Thomas Howard

The other day I wrote about how Thomas Howard, 4th Duke of Norfolk was arested for his role in the Ridolfi Plot. The Ridolfi Plot was the plan to murder Queen Elizabeth I, and replace her on the English throne with Mary I of Scotland. The historical event that paved the way for this plot was the excommunication of Queen Elizabeth I.

Regnans in Excelsis (“Reigning on High”) was a Papal Bull that Pope Pius V issued on February 25, 1570. The Bull excommunicated Queen Elizabeth I of England, referring to her as “the pretended Queen of England and the servant of crime”, declared her a heretic, and released her subjects from allegiance to her, even those who had “sworn oaths to her”, and excommunicated any who obeyed her orders: “We charge and command all and singular the nobles, subjects, peoples and others afore said that they do not dare obey her orders, mandates and laws. Those who shall act to the contrary we include in the like sentence of excommunication.” Among the queen’s alleged offences, “She has removed the royal Council, composed of the nobility of England, and has filled it with obscure men, being heretics.

The Bull, written in Latin, is named from its incipit, the first three words of its text.

Background

The Papacy had previously reconciled with Mary I, who returned the Church of England and Church of Ireland to Catholicism. After Mary I of England’s death in November 1558, Elizabeth’s Parliament passed the Act of Supremacy of 1559, which re-established the Church of England and Church of Ireland’s independence from papal authority. This bull can be seen as an act of retaliation for the religious settlement, but as it was delayed by eleven years, caused in part by a number of royal Catholic suitors who hoped to marry Elizabeth, and because she had tolerated Catholic worship in private.

Content

Pius V issued the bull in support of, but following, the failed Rising of the North of 1569, by which Catholic nobles attempted to depose Elizabeth and replace her with Mary I of Scotland, and the first Desmond Rebellion in Ireland, which broke out in June 1569. Although the Desmond Rebellion’s main goal was to preserve the independence of feudal lords from the English throne, it developed religious overtones as James FitzMaurice FitzGerald sought support from Catholic Europe.

The bull declared Queen Elizabeth excommunicated and absolved her subjects from any allegiance to her. It also excommunicated any that obeyed her orders. Its argument drew on the hierocratic theory of the papacy established by medieval canonists.

Pius did not consult any Catholic rulers. Both Felipe II of Spain and the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian II disagreed with his approach. Felipe thought, correctly, that it would only harden the Crown’s treatment of English Catholics. According to Evelyn Waugh, It provided a convenient pretext for those in Elizabeth’s court, looking for an excuse to do so, to persecute Roman Catholics, and they took full advantage of it. To take effect in church law the bull had to be promulgated. This logistical effort relied on individuals such as John Felton.

Aftermath

The Bull provoked the English government into taking more repressive actions against the Jesuits, whom they feared to be acting in the interests of Spain and the papacy. This reaction soon seemed justified: it was the publication in England of Pius’s exhortation that gave the impetus in 1571 to the Ridolfi Plot, in which the Duke of Norfolk was to kidnap or murder Queen Elizabeth, install Mary I of Scotland, on the English throne, and then become de facto king by marrying her. Heinrich Bullinger of Zurich published a critique of the bull in 1571.

Suspension from 1580–84

At the request of the Jesuits and to relieve the pressures on Catholics in England, Pope Gregory XIII issued a clarification or suspension in 1580, explaining that Catholics should obey the queen outwardly in all civil matters, until such time as a suitable opportunity presented itself for her overthrow. How widely this was communicated to, and understood by, Catholics in England and Ireland is unknown. Later that year Pope Gregory XIII sponsored an abortive expedition to Ireland in support of the Second Desmond Rebellion that ended in the Siege of Smerwick, so the suggestion that the Bull was suspended earlier in 1580 cannot be taken seriously. Soon after the start of the Anglo-Spanish War (1585–1604), an English Act “against Jesuits, seminary priests and other such like disobedient persons” was passed into law.

Renewal in 1588

In 1588, Pope Sixtus V, in support of the Spanish Armada, renewed the solemn bull of excommunication against Queen Elizabeth I, for the regicide of Mary, Queen of Scots, in 1587 as well as the previously catalogued offences against the Catholic Church. During the threat of invasion by the Spanish Armada, it transpired that most of the Catholic residents in England remained loyal, and that those who were a real threat to the throne, like William, Cardinal Allen and Robert Persons, were already exiles.

While the bull had little impact in England, it caused a rift in Elizabeth’s Kingdom of Ireland where most of the population remained Roman Catholic; Gerald FitzGerald, 14th Earl of Desmond, had used the bull as justification for the Second Desmond Rebellion. While divisions had existed before 1570, after the bull the official world based in Dublin conformed to Anglicanism while the majority of the Parliament of Ireland were Catholics until 1613.