Catherine de Medici, Or: The Queen Mother PDF Download

Author: Alexandre Dumas
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 296

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Author: Leonie Frieda
Publisher: Harper Collins
ISBN: 0060744936
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 466

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Poisoner, despot, necromancer -- the dark legend of Catherine de Medici is centuries old. In this critically hailed biography, Leonie Frieda reclaims the story of this unjustly maligned queen to reveal a skilled ruler battling extraordinary political and personal odds -- from a troubled childhood in Florence to her marriage to Henry, son of King Francis I of France; from her transformation of French culture to her fight to protect her throne and her sons' birthright. Based on thousands of private letters, it is a remarkable account of one of the most influential women ever to wear a crown.

Author: R J Knecht
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1317896866
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 268

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Catherine de' Medici (1519-89) was the wife of one king of France and the mother of three more - the last, sorry representatives of the Valois, who had ruled France since 1328. She herself is of preeminent importance to French history, and one of the most controversial of all historical figures. Despised until she was powerful enough to be hated, she was, in her own lifetime and since, the subject of a "Black Legend" that has made her a favourite subject of historical novelists (most notably Alexandre Dumas, whose Reine Margot has recently had new currency on film). Yet there is no recent biography of her in English. This new study, by a leading scholar of Renaissance France, is a major event. Catherine, a neglected and insignificant member of the Florentine Medici, entered French history in 1533 when she married the son of Francis I for short-lived political reasons: her uncle was pope Clement VII, who died the following year. Now of no diplomatic value, Catherine was treated with contempt at the French court even after her husband's accession as Henry II in 1547. Even so, she gave him ten children before he was killed in a tournament in 1559. She was left with three young boys, who succeeded to the throne as Francis II (1559-60), Charles IX (1560-74) and Henry III (1574-89). As regent and queen-mother, a woman and with no natural power-base of her own, she faced impossible odds. France was accelerating into chaos, with political faction at court and religious conflict throughout the land. As the country disintegrated, Catherine's overriding concern was for the interests of her children. She was tireless in her efforts to protect her sons' inheritance, and to settle her daughters in advantageous marriages. But France needed more. Catherine herself was both peace-loving and, in an age of frenzied religious hatred, unbigoted. She tried to use the Huguenots to counterbalance the growing power of the ultra-Catholic Guises but extremism on all sides frustrated her. She was drawn into the violence. Her name is ineradicably associated with its culmination, the Massacre of St Bartholomew (24 August 1572), when thousands of Huguenots were slaughtered in Paris and elsewhere. To this day no-one knows for certain whether Catherine instigated the massacre or not, but here Robert Knecht explores the probabilities in a notably level-headed fashion. His book is a gripping narrative in its own right. It offers both a lucid exposition of immensely complex events (with their profound imact on the future of France), and also a convincing portrait of its enigmatic central character. In going behind the familiar Black Legend, Professor Knecht does not make the mistake of whitewashing Catherine; but he shows how intractable was her world, and how shifty or intransigent the people with whom she had to deal. For all her flaws, she emerges as a more sympathetic - and, in her pragmatism, more modern - figure than most of her leading contemporaries.

Author: Nancy Goldstone
Publisher: Little, Brown
ISBN: 0316409677
Category : Biography & Autobiography
Languages : en
Pages : 518

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The riveting true story of mother-and-daughter queens Catherine de' Medici and Marguerite de Valois, whose wildly divergent personalities and turbulent relationship changed the shape of their tempestuous and dangerous century. Set in magnificent Renaissance France, this is the story of two remarkable women, a mother and daughter driven into opposition by a terrible betrayal that threatened to destroy the realm. Catherine de' Medici was a ruthless pragmatist and powerbroker who dominated the throne for thirty years. Her youngest daughter Marguerite, the glamorous "Queen Margot," was a passionate free spirit, the only adversary whom her mother could neither intimidate nor control. When Catherine forces the Catholic Marguerite to marry her Protestant cousin Henry of Navarre against her will, and then uses her opulent Parisian wedding as a means of luring his followers to their deaths, she creates not only savage conflict within France but also a potent rival within her own family. Rich in detail and vivid prose, Goldstone's narrative unfolds as a thrilling historical epic. Treacherous court politics, poisonings, international espionage, and adultery form the background to a story that includes such celebrated figures as Elizabeth I, Mary, Queen of Scots, and Nostradamus. The Rival Queens is a dangerous tale of love, betrayal, ambition, and the true nature of courage, the echoes of which still resonate.

Author: Louisa Stuart Costello
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 470

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Author: Alexandre Dumas
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : Electronic books
Languages : en
Pages : 278

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The novel centers on the beautiful Marguerite Valois, whose mother Catherine de Medici arranged her marriage to the Huguenot leader Henry of Navarre in 1572. Just six days after the wedding, French Catholics slaughtered over 30,000 Huguenots on St. Bartholomew's Day.

Author: John Benson Rose
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : France
Languages : en
Pages : 224

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Author: Rayne Allinson
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
ISBN: 9781349435609
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 251

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This book examines Elizabeth's correspondence with several significant rulers, analyzing how her letters were constructed, drafted and presented, the rhetorical strategies used, and the role these letters played in facilitating diplomatic relations.

Author: Alexandre Dumas
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 278

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Following Margot, the daughter of the late King Henry II, €Marguerite de Valois tells the story of the French Wars of Religion and the reign of Charles IX. This is the second book in the two-volume set.

Author: Susan Broomhall
Publisher: BRILL
ISBN: 9004461817
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 408

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An innovative analysis of the representational strategies that constructed Catherine de’ Medici and sought to explain her behaviour and motivations.