General Notes

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b. April 13, 1519, Florence
d. Jan. 5, 1589, Blois, Fr.
Italian CATERINA DE' MEDICI, queen consort of Henry II of France (reigned 1547-59) and subsequently regent of France (1560-74), who was one of the most influential personalities of the Catholic-Huguenot wars. Three of her sons were kings of France: Francis II, Charles IX, and Henry III.

Early life.
Catherine was the daughter of Lorenzo de' Medici, duke of Urbino, and Madeleine de La Tour d'Auvergne, a Bourbon princess related to many of the French nobility. Orphaned within days, Catherine was highly educated, trained, and disciplined by nuns in Florence and Rome and married in 1533 by her uncle, Pope Clement VII, to Henry, duc d'Orléans, who inherited the French crown from his father, Francis I, in April 1547. Artistic, energetic, and extroverted, as well as discreet, courageous, and gay, Catherine was greatly esteemed at the dazzling court of Francis I, from which she derived both her political attitudes and her passion for building. Of the chateaus she designed herself--including the Tuileries--Chenonceaux was her unfinished masterpiece.

In spite of Henry's abiding attachment to his mistress Diane de Poitiers, Catherine's marriage was not unsuccessful and, after 10 anxious years, she bore him 10 children, of whom 4 boys and 3 girls survived. She herself supervised their education. Thus occupied, Catherine lived privately though she was appointed regent in 1552 during Henry's absence at the siege of Metz. Her ability and eloquence were acclaimed after the Spanish victory of Saint-Quentin in Picardy in 1557, possibly the origin of her perpetual fear of Spain, which remained, through changing circumstances, the touchstone of her judgments. It is essential to understand this in order to discern the coherence of her career.


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