Catherine De Medici: Madame Snake

Years of enmity and hatred were now unleashed. Huguenot homes were burned and shops looted. Areas of Paris inhabited by Protestants of all denominations and Jews were cordoned off and their inhabitants butchered. Up to 4000 were killed in Paris alone, but the killings were soon to spread throughout the country. A Royal Order was issued for the killings to cease but it was done so half-heartedly and no effort was made to enforce it. In no time the massacres had spread to Rouen, Bourges, Lyon, Orleans and Bordeaux. The killings continued for another three months. It has been estimated that as many as 50,000 Huguenots and others were slaughtered. Thousands of others were forced to flee, many to London. De Coligny had been dragged from his sick bed and murdered on 24 August, his naked body then being tossed unceremoniously out of the window.

The Catholic world rejoiced, though some with a deep sense of guilt. Pope Gregory XII was not one of them. He did not hide his delight and ordered that Te Deums be sung and medals struck to commemorate the event. Catherine, despite her initial attempt to be peacemaker had displayed her hostility towards the Huguenots before. She had previously withdrawn all their rights of worship and forced their Ministers to flee the country on pain of being tried as heretics. Already disliked and mistrusted by her people her constant manoeuvrings as she wavered between reconciliation and open hostility only increased the antipathy. She alienated the powerful Guise family whose hard line Catholicism was winning them popular support and who were to effectively set up a State within a State in direct opposition to Catherine. Unable to grasp either the depths of hatred that existed or the complex theological issues at play, she floundered as she tried to secure the French throne for her family. A shrewd and scheming woman she was nonetheless often politically out of her depth. Following the death of Charles IX in 1574, and the succession to the throne of her third son, Henry, Catherine’s influence declined. She died of pneumonia on 5 January, 1589. Her death, it was said, made no more stir than that of a goat.

Catherine had been an Italian and a Medici, she understood that deceit and assassination were admirable tools in the sphere of political activity. That she was insensitive to the pain of others there seems little doubt. Whereas her son was overwhelmed with remorse at the events of St Bartholemew’s Day, Catherine merely basked in the spotlight and gladly received the plaudits. But despite all her best endeavours she could not save her family; with the murder of her son Henri, the House of Valois became extinct.

In 1589, the year of Catherine’s death, Henry of Navarre, whose wedding had sparked off the St Bartholemews Day Massacre, became King Henry IV of France. He converted to Catholicism to better serve his country, and sought toleration for all religions. His Edict of Nantes, 1598, promised freedom of conscience, freedom of worship, and civil rights for Protestants. He publicly stated that “We are all Frenchmen and fellow citizens of the same fatherland; therefore we must be brought to agreement by reason and kindness and not by strictness and cruelty”. Not long after, Henry IV was brutally stabbed to death by a Catholic fanatic, Francois Ravaillac.