Henry IV of Navarre. Biography

Henry IV is the first representative of the Bourbon dynasty, the last to rule the French throne. After Charlemagne, he became the first French king to be called the Great. The French associated the end of the religious (civil) wars of 1562 - 1594 with his name. and gaining the right to freedom of religion.

The personality of Henry IV has always attracted attention for its originality. As one of the king’s admirers, his contemporary V.-P., wrote. Palma Caye “There is hardly a sovereign in history whose dignity and position would cause so much controversy.” For the first time, a former heretic was on the French throne.

The successor of the most Christian kings, defenders of the Catholic Church, was a Calvinist and renounced the Protestant faith during the last act of the civil wars on the march before the gates of Paris. The sincerity of Bourbon's renunciation was questioned, raising the desire to understand the details of such proselytism. The king's private life aroused great curiosity: the slave of women was famous for his countless victories. And even the violent death of Henry IV, which shocked France, gave rise to many different rumors, giving impetus to the emergence of legends about the king and his deeds. A king appeared on the political arena of France, delighting and surprising his contemporaries with his unconventionality in his views and actions.

Henry IV was born on December 13, 1553 in Béarn in the family castle of Pau, which belonged to his maternal grandfather, King Henry d'Albret of Navarre. The heir was named after his grandfather. The baby's father is the first prince of the blood Antoine Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme, owner of the Duchy of Vendôme, as well as counties and baronies in the north of the Loire. Henry's mother, who gave him the title of King of Navarre, is Jeanne d'Albret, daughter of Margaret of Navarre and Henry d'Albret. On his mother's side, Henry was the great-nephew of King Francis I (1515 - 1547).

Henry's childhood was spent in Béarn, where the local nobility, in their way of life, was very different from the capital's aristocracy. Unpretentious and ardent southerners raised their children, early introducing them to hunting and long journeys on horseback or a mule. The first Bourbon grew up in an environment that knew neither court sophistication nor the conventions of high society. His grandfather wanted his grandson to be like his peasant children

age, were not pampered with food or clothing. A free life in harmony with nature from an early age instilled in the future king a freedom-loving disposition, endurance and unpretentiousness, rewarding him with good health.

At the same time, Henry, as the heir of the prince of the blood and the king of Navarre, began to instill a sense of royal dignity early on. He was not yet two years old when, after the death of his grandfather in connection with the accession of Jeanne d'Albret to the rights of inheritance, he was presented as a prince before a meeting of deputies from the estates of Béarn. At the age of five, at the court of the French king Henry II, he was welcomed as the heir of the first prince of the blood, Antoine of Bourbon, and king of Navarre. He was even named regent and viceroy general of the king and queen of Navarre, although the functions of the minor regent were performed by his guardian.

Beginning in 1560, the life of young Bourbon, barely seven years old, changed. The reason for this was two circumstances that played a significant role in the fate of Henry. The first was associated with the conversion of Jeanne d'Albret. The Queen of Navarre converted to Calvinism, publicly announcing her departure from the Catholic Church. Having received communion from the minister of the Reformed Church, she set about planting Protestantism in Navarre. Young Henry was converted by his mother to a new faith. Jeanne d'Albret found a tutor and teacher for her son from among the zealous Protestants. The little Christian, without resistance, accepted the new world that opened before him along with Calvinism; Along with faith, he became involved in the study of ancient languages ​​and reading, which had hitherto remained outside his interests.

Henry's conversion to Protestantism occurred during the years when France was rapidly approaching civil war. With the spread of Calvinism, the long-term social tension that accompanied absolutism was fueled by confessional differences, and the temporary weakening of the throne due to the sudden death of Henry II favored the satisfaction of the ambitions of the opposition-minded nobility. The first test of strength was the unsuccessful palace conspiracy in Amboise in 1560. Drowned in blood, it had a wide resonance in France, confronting the authorities with the need to urgently take action. Under these conditions, the regency under the young Charles IX, which was rightfully claimed by the first prince of the blood, Antoine Bourbon, seemed undesirable to the Queen Mother Catherine de Medici. Reserving this right, she made Bourbon governor general of France. The new position obliged the prince of the blood to be at court. So, in 1561, the family of Antoine Bourbon - his wife Jeanne d'Albret and two children Henry and Catherine - ended up in Paris. The 8-year-old heir of Bourbon was honored to sit at the same table - between the young Charles IX and his sister Margarita Valou. From that time on, the future king of France was forced to submit to someone else's will in the person of the Queen Mother, becoming a hostage to her policies. This was the second fatal event in Henry's life.

A heretic by faith and the legitimate heir of the first prince of the blood and king of Navarre bordering Spain, he was an invaluable gift for the French crown. And so they decided his fate without delay. Already in 1557, at the time of the presentation of the young Bourbon to the French court, a plan arose for the marriage of the heir of Navarre with Princess Margaret of Valoux, and which was destined to come true 15 years later.

Court life in Paris contributed to Henry's rapid maturation. In addition, serious changes took place in his family. Confessional differences between the parents and the political ambitions of the elder Bourbon made it impossible to preserve the family. The breakup occurred in 1562, a year after his stay in Paris. This forced Henry's mother Jeanne d'Albret to leave the court. In the absence of his mother, Antoine Bourbon tried to convert his son to the faith of his fathers, but he failed: the boy refused Catholic communion and did not go to mass.

The personal drama of young Henry played out against the backdrop of the general tragedy that France experienced when it entered into a civil war in 1562.

From this time on, the war would accompany Henry of Bourbon almost until the end of his life; it would shape the character of the future king. The hardening received in early childhood and instilling in Heinrich endurance, unpretentiousness and the habit of an ascetic lifestyle will prove useful; the acquired qualities will be useful in military campaigns.

In the year the civil wars began, Henry becomes the first prince of the blood: the death of his father allows him to take his place. The nine-year-old heir Antoine Bourbon is awarded all honorary titles. The Prince of Béarn is appointed governor and admiral of Guienne. At the age of 13, he was recognized as the heir to all the possessions of his mother Jeanne d'Albret. The Queen of Navarre took him to Béarn to meet with local Protestants.

15-year-old Henry of Bourbon received his first baptism of fire in La Rochelle in 1568 - 1569, being next to the head of the Protestant party, Prince Condé, and Admiral Coligny. The young man discovered remarkable military abilities in a clash with the Catholic army and rightfully shared the victory with the Protestants, who captured fortresses in the provinces of Ony, Saintonge and Quercy. In those years, through the efforts of Jeanne d'Albret, Larochelle turned into a stronghold of Protestantism. The future king received his first experience of rule here. Henry Bourbon gradually turned into a student learning the skills of government, into a politician endowed with power.

The maturity of the first prince of the blood made him an enviable groom and a contender for a worthy match. The old project of Henry's marriage to Margaret of Valois, despite the changed situation, was still attractive to both parties. Jeanne d'Albret hoped to strengthen her position not only in Navarre, but also in France by marrying her son. Catherine de Medici saw in the marriage of two families of royal blood a resolution of the confessional issue - the peaceful coexistence of two religions and, in addition, the expansion of the possessions of the French house by annexing the Protestant south. At the same time, the planned marriage had negative sides, primarily for the Queen of Navarre and the prince: their activities should have become controlled and the crown would have the right to take possession of Navarre. Marriage plans took on political significance. The circle of participants in the struggle included not only marrying families, but also very influential people outside of France. As for the young, marriage promised obvious benefits for Henry: it expanded the prospects for gaining more power. In addition, the temptation for the young man to possess the most attractive French princess was very great. However, it is unlikely that the eligible groom had the right to free choice and could refuse the offer: a captive of the French court, the prince of the blood could only dream about it. In turn, Margarita Valois did not object to the proposed marriage. She was attracted by the opportunity to become Queen of Navarre.

Meanwhile, civil wars, truces and new explosions of religious fanaticism had a negative impact on the upcoming wedding. Two months before the solemn event, Jeanne d’Albret died in doubt and fear for her son’s future. “I received the saddest news I could receive in this world - the news of the loss of the queen, my mother. God called her to himself. I cannot tell you how sad I am,” 1 wrote Heinrich. A month before the wedding, Henry Bourbon appeared at court in complete mourning. This time Paris greeted him not only as the first prince of the blood, but as the king of Navarre.

The wedding took place on August 18, 1572. In the wedding ceremony of a Catholic and a Protestant, all the necessary conventions for such an occasion were observed. The Cardinal of Lorraine betrothed the newlyweds in the Louvre, and then solemnly married them at the entrance to Notre Dame. As a Protestant, Henry of Navarre could not attend the solemn mass. “Our wedding,” Marguerite Valois will write in her memoirs, “was celebrated with such triumph and splendor as no other, the king of Navarre and his retinue were in rich and beautiful attire, and I was royally in a diamond

crown and ermine cape, the train of my blue dress was carried by three princesses, the wedding took place according to the custom reserved for the daughters of France.”

However, the long-awaited wedding did not live up to the hopes placed on it. Married life did not take place, despite the fact that Margarita of Valois and Henry of Navarre were officially considered spouses for 28 years. As one can assume, based on the memoirs of Margarita Valois, the reason for the failure of the marriage was Margarita’s physical hostility towards her husband. When dissolving this marriage, Henry of Navarre referred to Margarita's inability to bear children. The unusual relationship for newlyweds was discussed at court immediately after the wedding. The reason was the undisguised hobbies of the spouses. The passion of Henry of Navarre was Charlotte de Bon, Madame de Sauve, the wife of the Secretary of State. The chosen one of Marguerite Valois was Joseph Boniface Seigneur de La Mole. This story aroused curiosity among the court, greedy for such events. The strange marriage worried the Queen Mother Catherine de Medici, who pestered her daughter with questions. Margarita gave the answer to everyone’s question only in her memoirs, written in her later years. “She (Catherine de Medici) asked me,” wrote Marguerite Valois, “if my husband was a real man, adding that if not, then she would find a way to divorce me from him... In truth, then I could only answer like that a Roman woman who told her husband that his breath smelled bad, and he got angry with her and said that all men are like that” (referring to the wife of the Roman consul Gaius Duilius).

One way or another, the future king of France at the age of 19 suffered a defeat on the love front, which he did not know either before or after that. But this was not the only surprise that the wedding had in store for him. Before the wedding greetings had finished, the court was shocked by the news of the assassination attempt on Admiral Coligny, one of the Protestant leaders, and after this the massacre of the Protestants of Paris began. The events on the night of August 24 (on St. Bartholomew) were just one of the episodes of the civil wars. However, for the Protestants and Henry of Navarre this turned into a personal tragedy. By coincidence, it was here that the Protestant forces suffered a significant blow: Admiral Coligny was executed and the flower of the provincial Protestant nobility, who had gathered on the occasion of the wedding, was exterminated. Moreover, a threat also loomed over Henry of Navarre. The seriousness of the situation was aggravated by the fact that, unlike the previous years of civil wars, the crown, having retreated from its previous policy of religious tolerance, did not interfere with the reprisal of heretics. Under these conditions, Henry of Navarre had no choice. And the Navarrese was forced to renounce Protestantism and return to the fold of Catholicism. How this happened is unknown. There is only information that at the end of September of the same 1572, Henry of Navarre was present at the mass. If you believe Margarita Valois, then she played a decisive role in saving her husband. In her memoirs, where she tries to explain her rejection of Heinrich as a husband, it is said that “be that as it may, since my mother gave me away in marriage, I wanted to stay with Heinrich, suspecting that they were trying to separate us from him in order to play with tell him some cruel joke” 2. It is possible that Margarita exaggerated her role in this story. The memoirs were written during the reign of Henry IV, when the fate of the former ward of Bourbon's opponents depended on his mercy. Margarita, of course, wanted, if not to remind of her feat, then at least to come up with a legend about it in order to earn the royal favor.

There is no mention of this fact in Henry's extensive correspondence. It is possible that the victorious king did not want to remember the forced defeat, because at that time, having accepted the Catholic faith, he was drawn into the political struggle. The convert was used to pacify the center of resistance - Larochelle; he was forced to sign a decree on the restoration of Catholicism and the ban on the Protestant cult in Béarn. Not

it is impossible that proselytism could have been a tactical move by Henry of Navarre. During the years of forced captivity at the court of Charles IX and Henry II, the future king of France learned the political game that his entourage skillfully mastered. Court life - balls, masquerades, love pleasures, which the temperamental southerner indulged in, seemed to leave no room for serious thought. Meanwhile, the thought of returning to Béarn never left the Navarrese. In a letter to his former tutor (January 1576), he wrote that he hoped for God’s help in implementing his plans and shared his impressions of court life, reporting that the court was in a state of internecine war, where everyone was ready to cut each other’s throats. The prisoner of the Louvre dreamed of freedom, seeing the only opportunity to gain independence in escape. In February 1576, during a royal hunt, he managed to carry out his plan.

This began the most difficult and long period of Henry of Navarre's independent life. By the time the king of little Navarre left the French court, the Protestants of southern France had created a political organization - the “United Provinces of the South” - a confederation of southern French cities. This was a manifestation of Protestant separatism. After St. Bartholomew's Night, the separatists broke with Paris and left the obedience of Charles IX. Henry of Navarre supported his former associates. But to participate in the common struggle, he had to renounce Catholicism. The faith of the fathers became an obstacle on the path to power. And again the Navarrese changes his faith for the sake of worldly interests. 4 years after accepting Catholicism, he solemnly renounced it and in the same year entered the citadel of Protestantism. The Assembly of Estates in Montauban declares him king of Navarre and patron of the alliance of Protestants and moderate Catholics.

The newly-minted king, whose power was not sanctified (Protestants excluded this need), began to strengthen the army, turn cities into fortresses and prepare for war. At the same time, he carried out a partial secularization of the wealth of the Catholic Church. Having gained power over the southwestern part of France, located between Toulouse and Bordeaux, the Pyrenees and Poitou, the 24-year-old king took decisive steps to strengthen the Protestant unification. During these years, he developed his own principle of management, which he tried to adhere to later, when he became the king of France, to strengthen ties with the provinces. He believed that the strength of power lies in its support not so much in the center as in the provinces. Henry of Navarre saw the key to good governance in skillfully selected advisers. The young king selected members of his inner circle, focusing on the professionalism and vassal loyalty of advisers. And although he sought to rely on Protestants, there were also Catholics on his council.

The release from captivity in Paris and the acquisition of power favored the arrangement of the personal life of the King of Navarre, and the kind that he himself wanted to lead. Having escaped from the Louvre, where even in the bed of the captivating Madame de Sauve it was impossible to lose vigilance, Henry of Navarre surrendered to the power of unbridled passion. The handsome Navarrese did not lack attention from the ladies and seemed to be trying to take revenge for his humiliated manhood. Young Maximilian de Bethune, the future surintendent of Sully, who was Henry’s page at that time, presented a portrait of his king: “He was stately, strong, portly, had a good complexion and lively pleasant features, His manner was so friendly and attractive that even severity and the importance that he sometimes used never took away his innate kind and cheerful expression.”

Nerac, the capital of Navarre, became a place of passion and the cradle of Henry of Navarre's great love for the young widow Diane d'Andouin, Countess de Gramont. The same age as Henry and a Gascon by birth, Diana was a friend of the Navarrese sister Catherine of Bourbon. Henry's letters to his beloved are evidence of sincere affection for Diana d'Andu-

en, who not only became a mistress, but also replaced the mother of the King of Navarre. After the death of Jeanne d'Albret, Henry for the first time could be natural and trust the woman he loved, without pretending and without fear of betrayal. “There are two things that I have never doubted - your love and my loyalty to you,” he wrote to Diana.

In Nérac, Henry of Navarre was visited by Margaret of Valois. It was there that the final break between the spouses occurred. Not feeling tied by marriage and even finding piquancy in her position, Margarita Valois was offended by the cynicism of her husband, who had not considered her a wife for a long time and therefore, in a friendly manner, entrusted her with the care of his passion, who was in an interesting situation.

The peaceful Neracian period in the life of Henry of Navarre was interrupted due to the death of the younger Duke of Valois. Alençon, whose death meant the extinction of the ruling dynasty: the reigning 33-year-old Henry III had no offspring. The only legitimate heir to the throne remained the Prince of the Blood, Henry of Navarre, a representative of the new Bourbon dynasty. In his person, official Paris saw an ally who could resist the opposition to the absolute power of Henry III. Therefore, in Béarn, some of the king’s confidants replaced others, and the Queen Mother herself, Catherine de’ Medici, despite the Navarrese’s break with her daughter, persuaded her son-in-law to return to Paris and take the place of the prince of the blood. Bourbon refused; The price of return was too high - renunciation of the Protestant faith.

Meanwhile, foreseeing a possible alliance between Henry of Navarre and Henry III, the opposition, represented by the Catholic League, together with the pope launched a frantic attack on the Navarrese. In 1585, a bull of Pope Sixtus V was promulgated, in which Henry of Navarre was declared a heretic. This daring step was intended to deprive the rightful heir to the French throne of the right to the crown. The opposition triumphed, it nominated its candidate for the royal throne - old Charles of Bourbon, uncle of Henry of Navarre, demonstrating adherence to tradition and law, according to which the first prince of the blood, or his direct heir, or, in extreme cases, the closest relative in the male line, had the right to the crown . Never before under a living king has the question of the heir to the throne been so pressing. It was a challenge posed to the authorities, a manifestation of rejection of its policies. The situation was complicated by the fact that external forces interfered in the internal political affairs of France. The Spanish king Philip II supported the Catholic opposition and Charles of Bourbon, counting, if successful, on the recognition of the Spanish Infanta Isabella as the first contender in choosing the wife of the French king. The Catholic opposition allowed foreign interference in French affairs. However, thus defending confessional unity and fidelity to tradition, she did not take into account public opinion and the heightened national feelings. Years of civil wars, which divided the French by faith and made the country easy prey for their neighbors, forced the heirs of the ancient Gauls to choose a Protestant king, free from foreign pressure.

At this crucial time, the army of Henry of Navarre began military operations. In October 1587, she won a brilliant victory over the opposition at Coutra. But this was only the beginning, for 7 long years, repelling resistance and suffering defeats, Henry of Navarre fought for the throne and for an independent France. All these years, the Catholic opposition, supported by the church and the pope, stood in his way. In a mortal battle with the opposition in 1589, the last representative of the ruling dynasty, King Henry III, died.

The death of Henry III, as well as the August tragedy in Paris in 1572, became a lesson for Henry of Navarre, convincing the heir to the throne how futile a forceful solution to confessional and political issues was. The reign of the last Valois showed the danger of following confessional interests. The religiosity and even the tendency to exaltation of the faithful Catholic did not allow Henry III to rise above

religious interests and, even more so, to deviate from them when solving national state problems. Religion, power, national reconciliation - these three components were in no way combined in the king’s policy. Given the sad experience, Henry of Navarre became increasingly convinced that the key to pacification was not in the use of force, but in negotiations and mutual concessions - in compromise. The departure of Henry III from the political arena opened up a path to power for the legitimate heir to the French throne, albeit a very difficult one. The heretic with a small army of devoted people was opposed by the Catholic League, supported by the Pope and Spain. In addition, Henry of Navarre was not sure of the position of the majority of French Catholics, although they did not share the radicalism of the Ligers, but remained devoted to the faith of their fathers. The Navarrese was still faced with the question of whether to be or not to be. Catholics insisted on his abdication, Protestants feared the consequences of this conversion.

In August 1589, as the legal heir to the French throne, the Protestant Henry of Navarre made a declaration in which he promised to support the Roman Catholic religion in France in its integrity; moreover, he assured that he had a great desire to enlighten himself in the Catholic faith, for which he had intention to allow the Gallican Church to convene a national council. The declaration did not provide for a violation of the social status of either Catholics or Protestants, but it promised to return to Catholics the property taken from them.

The Navarrese's statement did not go unanswered: two princes of the blood - Henry Duke of Montpassier and Francis Prince of Conti, Bourbon's cousin, agreed with this declaration. They were joined by three more dukes and peers, two marshals and several representatives of the highest officials. This meant that Henry was supported as the rightful king in accordance with the fundamental law of the kingdom, but on the condition that he not only did nothing new in resolving the confessional issue, but also returned to the Catholic Church.

However, this was not enough; the consent of the princes of the blood and representatives of the nobility did not reflect the mood of the entire society. The nobility as a whole was dissatisfied with the statement of the pretender to the throne. Moreover, by the end of 1589, almost all major cities were in favor of the Catholic League. The southern and western cities remained on the side of Henry of Navarre, forming a center of loyalty. In contrast to Spain and the pope, the king of Navarre could count on the help of the English queen, German Protestant princes, the Netherlands and Venice. But the allies set their own conditions. The situation was not easy.

However, the letters of Henry of Navarre from that time reflect not pessimism, but the fatalism of a man who trusted his star. The failure of the plan to reach an agreement through peace negotiations and a national council forced the Navarrese to accept the challenge of the opposition and prepare for war, resorting to new tactics. He divided the army into three parts: he sent one to Champagne, the other to Picardy, and the third to Normandy. The northern coast opened up contacts with ally England.

The first victory was the capture of Dieppe. The army of Henry of Navarre was advancing from the north into central France. In 1590 it settled in the vicinity of Tours. “Trusting my star, even if fortune wants to ridicule us, I nevertheless affirm that nothing: neither inclement weather nor angry dogs will prevent me from following my path and settling in Paris,” wrote Henry of Navarre. After Dieppe and Tours, the next victory came at the Battle of Ivry in March 1590. It was described by Agrippa d'Aubigne, noting the fearlessness of the King of Navarre. With a smaller army and little help from foreign mercenaries, Henry of Navarre won battle after battle. His valor became the subject of discussion and was reflected in journalism. The King of Navarre was portrayed as a national hero, contrasting him with the Ligers, who

who decided for the Spanish king to control the fate of the French throne. This was a response to the ruler of Escorial, who declared his readiness to use all means, including sacrificing his life, to cleanse France of heresy.

Henry was preparing for the siege of Paris. Anticipating the difficulty of this operation and not wanting to expose the city to defeat, he decided to cut it off from its sources of supply and force the hungry Parisians to surrender. On his orders, mills were burned and bridges connecting Paris with Melun, Provins, Lagny and Montero were dismantled. On May 7, 1590, Henry of Navarre reached Paris. “I am in front of Paris, where God wanted my presence. I’m starting an assault... I forced all the mills to be burned... There is a great need for them, they need to experience hunger for 12 days, then they will surrender,” he revealed his plan in one of the letters. However, the Navarrese was mistaken: Paris continued to resist. The military forces of the Parisians outnumbered the army of Henry of Navarre by almost 4 times. In addition, the famine primarily affected the lower classes; wealthy townspeople bought grain and other provisions from soldiers on their way out of the city at high prices. At the same time, preachers from the Liger camp organized grandiose religious ceremonies, the participants of which had to swear an oath to destroy heresy and give their lives in defense of the true religion. Hungry Parisians were promised salvation for loyalty to the league and threatened with hell for treason.

The duration of the siege forced Henry to begin negotiations with the city authorities, which led to nothing, but forced him to fight on the outskirts of Paris. The Navarrese decided to distract the Ligers and the Spanish army from the walls of the city, calling their fire on himself: he led his troops in close proximity to the opponents. The operation was successful: the Ligers and Spaniards, who succumbed to the provocation, were defeated. But the capture of Paris was still far away. Henry of Navarre made more and more new attempts, while simultaneously confirming his declaration of August 4, 1589 of his readiness for reconciliation. However, his calls did not find a response: the fear of excommunication, inspired by the Pope, turned out to be stronger.

In January 1593, an assembly of supporters of the League met in besieged Paris. At this meeting, in violation of the tradition of succession to the throne, the question of electing a king was raised. The Liger debate continued for six months, but no solution was found. Meanwhile, this situation prompted Henry of Navarre to decide to renounce the Protestant faith, which had long been expected of him. Five years ago this would have been out of the question. “The devil entangles me,” wrote Henry of Navarre to Diana d’Andouin. If I am not a Huguenot, I will be a Turk. They want to subjugate me, they don’t let me be what I want” 3. But time changed the situation and confronted the heir to the throne with a choice.

What motivated Henry of Navarre to make such a responsible decision? Thirst for power or patriotic feelings - the salvation of France from the threat of Spanish rule? Rather, the desire to seize the throne, supported by confidence in the legitimacy of their claims. In-

The interests of the heir to the throne to a certain extent coincided with the national aspirations of the French. And this circumstance should have favored a quick and lasting victory for the Navarrese. But in reality everything was much more complicated. The confessional principle in self-awareness had priority over the national one.

The first person to notify Henry of Navarre about his decision was the Archbishop of Bourges, René de Beaune. He reported this to the Paris Assembly in 1593: “The king decided to renounce his faith in order to be recognized.” On July 23, 1593, the prelates assembled in Saint-Denis. They represented that very national council, which, according to the declaration of the Navarrese, should have enlightened him in the Catholic faith. However, this time the cathedral took upon itself the authority to forgive sins and return the pretender to the throne to the bosom of the Catholic Church. The French clergy acted against the will of the Pope. The very next day after the opening of the cathedral, the head of the Holy See declared his protest, threatening excommunication.

The abdication ceremony of Henry of Navarre was described by contemporaries - Pierre de L'Etoile and Pierre-Victor Palma-Caye. “On Sunday, July 25, the king, dressed in a doublet and trousers of white satin, a cloak and a black hat, accompanied by several princes and officers, as well as a guard consisting of Swiss and French cavalry, walked towards the Cathedral of Saint-Denis along the carpeted streets and strewn with flowers. Cries of “Long live the king!” were heard from all sides. At the entrance to the cathedral, the procession was awaited by the Archbishop of Bourges, Cardinal Bourbon, and several bishops and monks of Saint-Denis. A cross, a Bible and blessed water were prepared for the solemn act.

According to contemporaries, the dialogue with the Navarrese was conducted by the Archbishop of Bourges, Charles Bourbon. "Who are you? – asked the hierarch. In response, Henry said: “I am the king.” “What are you asking for?” “I ask,” answered the king, “to be accepted into the bosom of the Catholic Church.” “Do you wish this sincerely?” Answer: “Yes, I want it.” The king knelt down and made his confession: “I solemnly declare and swear before the Almighty to live and die in the Roman Catholic religion, to defend it from danger at the cost of my blood and life, renouncing all heresies against it.” This confession, as P. de L'Etoile reports, was written on paper, and the king gave it, signing it with his own hand. The Archbishop took this paper and gave him to kiss his ring and then performed absolution and blessed the king. After this, Henry of Navarre was allowed to enter the temple, where, in the presence of the hierarchs, he knelt before the altar and repeated his confession and oath on the Holy Gospel. The king was then led to the church throne, which he had to kiss before confessing. After confession, according to the ritual, one should attend mass, and the king, accompanied by his retinue, took part in this solemn service. Then the king went out to the people and, at the request of those gathered, scattered silver coins so that the laity could touch the gifts of the king blessed by the church 4 .

Meanwhile, renunciation of the Protestant faith and communion according to the Catholic rite could not have effective force without the sanction of the Roman throne. Henry of Navarre had to appear before the pope. However, not considering it possible at the moment to personally appear in Rome to Clement VIII, he limited himself to a message. The Pope did not answer the impudent Navarrese. And the heir to the throne, with the support of the Gallican Church, was crowned without papal blessing.

On February 27, 1594, contrary to tradition, a solemn coronation took place in Chartres, and not in Reims. Henry took an oath on the Gospel, promising to help his subjects live in peace with God's Church and expel all heretics from the royal land. The ceremony began with the consecration of the royal sword. Henry accepted it from the Bishop of Chartres in order to then, with the words of an oath, place it on the altar as a sign of protection of the church. The consecration of the sword was followed by the anointing of the king. According to tradition going back to Clovis, French kings had the privilege

to receive anointing not only with oil, but with “heavenly drops,” which, according to legend, were kept in a special ampoule in the Notre Dame Cathedral of Reims. The coronation at Chartres deprived Bourbon of traditional anointing, limiting this rite. Then the chief chamberlain of France handed over to the king the clothes required in such a case - a tunic, a mantle and a royal cloak, which in the church corresponded to the three components in the clothing of deacons and priests. Following this, the royal ring was consecrated - a symbol of the crowning of the kingdom, and the Bishop of Chartres presented the king with a scepter - a sign of supreme power. The solemn ceremony ended with a public confession and the king receiving communion with bread and wine, as the clergy did. On this day, the king became pontiff, a figure capable of performing miracles and healing scrofulous people.

Almost a month after the coronation, on the evening of March 22, 1594, Henry IV entered Paris without a fight. The garrisons of Philip II left the city. The Parisians awaited the first orders of the new king in doubt and fear. After many years of infighting, the inertia of the war could not be stopped immediately. Henry IV made the only reasonable decision - not to pursue his opponents and not to confiscate their property, hoping to disarm his former enemies with his peacefulness.

However, not all cities accepted the king unconditionally. Residents of a number of cities in both the north and south of France tried, not unsuccessfully, to buy back their city freedoms and the right to practice Protestant worship. The son of the murdered Henry of Lorraine, the Duke of Guise gave Reims to Henry IV for 3 million livres. Support in Paris itself cost the king 1 1/2 million livres. Henry IV entered into these deals without hesitation, trying to convince his new subjects that the main goal of his actions was not so much to earn the title of the first son of the church and the most Christian king, but to take care of the consent and unification of all the French.

These efforts of the king were counteracted by the activity of the still living Catholic League and its Spanish patron: Philip II kept his treasury open to pay soldiers in France. The abdication and coronation of Henry of Navarre without the sanction of the Roman throne caused a controversial reaction both in France itself and in Rome. The pope was afraid of the excessive independence of the French: the example of the English king Henry VIII could be contagious, and part of the French clergy was ready to threaten the pope with schism. Henry IV, having declared himself the defender of the Catholic Church, did not at all want a break with Rome. One way or another, in the fall of 1595 in Rome, Pope Clement VIII agreed to abdicate in absentia and, having absolved his sins, introduce the French king into the Catholic Church. Henry IV's confidants in Rome were the Abbot d'Ossa and Bishop Hervé Jacques du Perron. In their presence, the pope officiated, and these hierarchs took an oath of allegiance on the Gospel, after which the pope finally called Henry IV the most Christian king of France and Navarre. The papal sanction for abdication and coronation obliged the French king to fulfill a number of demands, including the restoration of a unified Catholic Church in Béarn and the promulgation of the decisions of the Ecumenical Council of Trent of the Catholic Church throughout France. In addition, the pope ordered Henry IV to confess and receive communion at least four times a year, to observe all church holidays if possible, and not to violate the commandments, especially the 6th and 9th (not to kill and not to bear false witness). Henry IV took on a heavy burden: a crown and a cross.

By the time Henry of Navarre was recognized as King of France and Navarre, he was 42 years old. The struggle for the throne and concerns about the future of the monarchy turned the once flourishing knight, proud of his good health, into an old man. Already in 1600, the Venetian ambassador wrote in one of his reports that the French king, at 48 years old, looked like he was 60: the mark of fatigue and worries lay on his face. It seemed that his strength, concentrated for many years on achieving one goal, was completely undermined. He was plagued by illnesses: kidney stones, bouts of fever and insomnia.

However, this frail old man was ready for a new battle to maintain and strengthen his power. He did not abandon his old habits: a passion for hunting and gambling, fast horse riding, walking and sensual pleasures. Sick kidneys and stomach did not turn him away from his usual table, game, fruits and oysters; he preferred to consume the latter directly in their thin, crispy shells.

When the Louvre became his court, he fell in love with his office. While pondering state affairs, he often walked along the galleries, along the alleys of the Tuileries, or saddled his horse. His favorite vacation spots were the castles of Monceau, Fontainebleau and Saint-Germain-en-Laye, where he felt in his element.

Having become king, the owner of the Louvre had to play his role better than his predecessors. The former heretic found himself under the gaze of both friends and enemies, who were looking for something wrong in his actions and even in his appearance; typical and discrediting features of the king. Henry IV's appearance was the talk of the town. French kings loved exquisite clothing, decorated with precious stones, like Francis I, and perfumes, especially incense, which Henry III was partial to. For Henry IV, clothing was not an object of worship. He laughed at the dandies, noting that they “carry on their shoulders” not only castles, but also groves, and was content with a modest minimum - a gray cloth camisole and a satin cloak. He was not embarrassed by the old, shabby clothes: he simply did not notice them. During the war years, he was so accustomed to wearing a cuirass (armor) on his back and a helmet on his head that they seemed to him like an ordinary dress. And since he spent most of his time in the saddle, he said that he rather wiped the tops than the soles of his boots. Contemporaries, in particular Tallemant de Reo, did not deny themselves the pleasure of emphasizing the lack of taste and even untidiness of Henry IV. The king's entry into Paris did not go unnoticed: evil tongues gossiped that Henry IV was dressed in a gray velvet camisole, tastelessly decorated with gold. Behind this manner of dressing was hidden the desire to present himself, in violation of tradition, even outwardly as a different king, caring primarily about state affairs to the detriment of the rules on the appearance of the monarch. At the same time, this behavior was reflected in the upbringing and Protestant spirit of the convert.

The descriptions emphasized the king's addiction to gambling. As King of Navarre, Henry loved to play rounders in Guienne. He became addicted to cards already in Paris, played big and could lose a lot. His partners were Duke Henry of Guise the Younger, Duke of Mantua and Edward of Portugal, President of the Court of Auditors, courtiers and representatives of high officials.

And yet, this impulsive, passionate old man, as he seemed to foreigners, managed to retain power. He streamlined the court system. Systematic trips to the provinces gave way to a sedentary lifestyle. The courtyard became not only a symbol, but also a place of power. All ceremonies, receptions of ambassadors, dynastic holidays were subject to protocol. The Louvre, and in summer and autumn Fontainebleau, Saint-Germain and Monceau served as the king's place of work.

Court holidays have changed. The famous tournaments were replaced by the carousel, theatrical performances: live paintings and ballet. Henry IV was known as a great lover of this art, one of the first balletomanes. The court ballet was a theatrical diversion: masked performers captivated the audience with their dances, turning everyone present into participants in the celebration. It became one of the main elements of court life and the cult of the monarchy. The plots of ballet performances were drawn up on the topic of the day; their heroes were often sorcerers and alchemists, whose actions aroused great interest, as well as Chinese princes and kings of the Black Moors, Turks and Saracens - representatives of an unknown, recently discovered (thanks to overseas expeditions) world. In addition to ballet, the court loved musical evenings. 24 court violinists delight

whether the rumor of French nobles. The poet Malherbe was honored, whose poems were set to music. The court of Henry IV inherited from the past a love for Italian comedy, which appeared in France during the reign of Catherine de Medici. The king loved the funny performances of the Italians.

The organization of court life became part of the state affairs of Henry IV. He attached great importance to it, because the court, like the façade of the monarchy, was also the face of the sovereign. Bourbon, more than his predecessors, cared about his subjects’ perception of his image. In Guienne, having become king of Navarre and uniting the Protestant south, he consciously created the image of a rebel. The crown of France and Navarre obliged to a new image: Henry IV tried to play the role of a courageous, fair and at the same time cheerful Don Juan. His exploits and deeds were sung by poets attracted to the court.

The courageous and cheerful owner of the Louvre was obsessed with the construction and restoration of old palaces. During his reign, restoration and construction work began at the Louvre, which was damaged during the civil wars. The king showed special concern for the castles of Fontainebleau and Saint-Germain-en-Laye. He came up with the idea of ​​building bridges across the Seine. But during his time they managed to rebuild only one bridge - the Pont Neuf, the construction of which began under Henry III. After the death of Henry IV, grateful subjects will install a bronze statue of Bourbon on horseback in the middle of this bridge. Henry IV's passion for construction and creation reflected the king's ardent desire to pacify society, the desire to encourage his subjects to establish a peaceful life.

He saw one of the main conditions for the implementation of his projects in attracting like-minded people to his council. The experience of governing in Guienne convinced him of the fidelity of following the rule - to entrust state affairs to personally dedicated professionals, regardless of their religious affiliation. The first Bourbon on the French throne did not want to act either as the patron of the reformed church, or as the most Christian king. State interests were placed above religious ones. In the king's council, almost all members were not hereditary nobles, but representatives of the judicial class, authorized for work in the state apparatus. All of them were devoted to the king, despite differences in religious affiliation. The greatest influences were Sully, Bellevre, Jeannin, Brulard and Villeroy. Henri IV's lord Sully had a long-standing friendship with Maximilian de Bethune. Serving as a page at the royal court in Nérac and participating together with the Navarrese in many operations, Sully was the alter ego of Henry IV. It is possible that the king and his minister were brought together by their Protestant upbringing and similar worldview. The king appointed a staunch Protestant surintendent of finance, chief road warden of France, superintendent of military fortifications, chief master of artillery, placing the Bastille in his charge, and made Sully duke and peer. The king valued the intelligence and loyalty of his adviser and friend.

At the same time, using the services of his advisers, Henry IV showed great independence, not allowing anyone to guide him. The basic principle of government was developed even before the coronation to the French throne. The 32-year civil wars convinced him that the key to peaceful society was following the course of negotiations and reasonable concessions - a policy of compromise. His own experience of the war and support for the separatist aspirations of Protestants in the South forced him to take urgent measures to strengthen ties between Paris and the provinces. Perhaps, until now, the question of the status of a subject of the French crown has never been so pressing as during the reign of Henry IV. Its resolution in a class society while maintaining class privileges was not an easy task. Finally, the inertia of the war persisted. This problem was complicated by the peculiarities of the French nobility, which inherited the knighthood - a professional military class with its ideas about its place and role in society.

After the end of the civil wars, not all French people rejoiced at peace. For veterans, war was a natural state, and peace was perceived as the absence of war. Therefore, the opinion of Marshal Biron: “Who will need us without war” was not an accidental phrase. Henry IV could not ignore these sentiments. Together with the foreign policy interests of France, they determined one of the king’s first steps. In January 1595, Henry IV declared war on Spain, which ended three and a half years later with the separate Peace of Vervins in 1598 based on the Status Quo.

Caring for the nobility was one of the main directions of royal policy. The widespread practice of annotation changed the face of the privileged class, which was replenished mainly by people from the service bureaucracy. Protecting the old nobility, Henry IV protected it from the onslaught of new nobles, retaining only for him the privilege of receiving pensions and awards. He loved his old warriors and saw himself as the first among them. At the same time, wanting to put the privileged class on its feet, he reacted with interest to the work of Olivier de Serres “The Theater of Agriculture” (1601) and to the advice of this author to more actively involve nobles in organizing their farms in the countryside, encouraging rational management methods.

As for the bureaucrats, highly appreciating the professionalism of these experts in law, finance and administration, Henry IV tried to benefit the royal treasury from their profitable intermediary activities. Pursuing this goal, he introduced a tax on the right of inheritance of office (“poletta”), which, thanks to the practice of selling government positions, promised big money. This innovation met the demands of an equally powerful part of French society, but led to the consolidation and independence of service men from the crown. The negative consequences of this reform will appear later. During the reign of the first Bourbon, the financial benefits of this action were obvious.

Taking into account the local tradition of clientele - patronage of nobles to groups of small landed nobility, Henry IV resorted to creating a new institution of intendants. Representatives of the king - intendants, who were entrusted with the implementation of royal decisions, were sent to the places. With their help, the provinces became more closely tied to the center. The constant change of these people was aimed at preventing abuse. In parallel, Henry IV significantly reduced the powers of local governors, depriving them of the right to intervene in financial and judicial matters and leaving them the right to command city troops if necessary.

Thus, through reasonable concessions combined with radical measures, the king strengthened his power. A special place was occupied by the resolution of the confessional issue. Its severity did not diminish even after the civil wars. The Counter-Reformation and the revival of the activities of the monastic orders, on the one hand, and the no less active activity of the Protestants: the holding of a national synod and almost annual local assemblies, on the other, forced Henry IV to determine his position. Moreover, behind the confessional one a political problem was clearly visible: the issue was being resolved not only about religious tolerance - the right of Protestants to worship, but also about relations with the opposition, with opponents of the absolute power of the monarch, who skillfully used confessional slogans.

Following the principle of compromise in his policy, Henry IV was inclined towards religious tolerance. He believed that in order to pacify French society, the status of Protestants and the Protestant Church should be officially recognized. An assembly consisting of the king's advisers, clergy and representatives of Protestant churches resolved this issue for two years - from 1596 to 1598, until in April 1598 an edict of pacification was signed in Nantes, recognizing the legal existence of a religious minority. The uniqueness of the Edict of Nantes was that it was one

one of the first attempts in France to create a declaration of the rights of subjects of the crown, proclaiming the equality of Catholics and Protestants.

The inseparability of religious and political problems predetermined the originality of the edict, which reflected the peculiarities of royal policy. The declared equality of rights could be realized by Protestants within extremely limited limits. This concerned the practice of worship and was associated with the introduction of a strict ban on Protestant meetings in Paris, in all major cities, as well as in bishoprics. This also applied to civil rights - the right to education, medical care and funeral services. The Edict did not deprive Protestants of these rights, but in Catholic France there was not a sufficient number of educational institutions of Protestant orientation, and hospitals, like cemeteries, were under the tutelage of the Catholic Church, which zealously guarded its privileges.

At the same time, Henry IV was forced to make a concession: to retain the Protestants' right to military fortresses in southwestern France, in fact recognizing the preservation of the Protestant confederation that arose in 1575. This concession was the price of internal peace and retribution for the military assistance provided by Protestants to Henry IV in the war with Spain in 1595 - 1598.

One way or another, the Edict of Nantes legally formalized the rights of Catholics and Protestants, and the king acted as the guarantor of these rights. Despite all the limited rights of Protestants, this edict proclaimed the principle of religious tolerance as the main one in royal policy. In addition, for Henry IV, the edict became the only opportunity to consolidate his victory, which cost him 18 years spent in campaigns and battles.

As soon as he put on the crown, Bourbon began organizing his matrimonial Affairs. The 42-year-old old man, as his contemporaries portrayed him, dreamed of an heir to the throne. To do this, he had to dissolve his marriage with Margarita Valois. Permission to divorce made him again dependent on the pope, giving the latter trump cards for the political game. It would hardly have been possible to find a more favorable opportunity for Rome to intervene in the affairs of the French crown. The pope hesitated, negotiating favorable terms for his consent. It took six years to obtain a divorce sanction.

At the end of 1599, Henry IV finally received the long-awaited divorce, which he took advantage of at the end of 1600, taking as his wife Maria de Medici, niece of the Grand Duke Ferdinand of Tuscany and cousin of Catherine de Medici. Bourbon did not change the tradition of French kings taking Italian wives. In the year of the divorce from Margarita Valois, the ambassador of the Grand Duke of Tuscany discussed with Henry IV the issue of the dowry of Maria de Medici, and at the same time the repayment of the debt; significant sums of money helped the Navarrese during difficult times of the struggle for the throne. The marriage contract was signed in Florence in April 1600. But the outbreak of war with Savoy in the summer of 1600 forced the wedding ceremony to take place in the absence of the groom: in Florence he was represented by the royal adviser Bellegarde. Rubens captured this unusual wedding on one of his canvases. After the ceremony, Maria de Medici went on her honeymoon to her husband. In February 1601, France had a new queen who did not speak French.

Marie de' Medici was able to make Henry IV a happy father, giving him four heirs. “God bless you, protect me and the whole kingdom,” he wrote to his wife, who was expecting a son, “do not doubt, I love you, because you do what I wish; this is real support for my rule” 5. However, the marriage did not change the king’s usual life. The slave of women could not give up his previous hobbies and was always ready for new ones. In 1600, only the page of the happiest years of great love was turned. Admitting his weakness, Henry IV, as Sully writes, loved to repeat: “They scold me because I love to build, that I am a hunter of women and love pleasures, I do not deny, but I will say that they should praise me more than scold me without knowing the limits, and in every possible way

to excuse the freedom of such amusements, which bring neither loss nor trouble to my people, considering them as a reward for so many of my sorrows, previous displeasures, labors, disasters and dangers that I have endured since childhood... Such weaknesses are inseparable from ardent human nature, and therefore are forgivable (but you should not give in to their power!)” 6.

Following the main rule in relations with women - “not to surrender to their power” - Henry IV, unlike his predecessors, did not allow his favorites to interfere in state affairs and lead themselves. In one of his letters to Gabrielle d'Estrées, he admitted: “If I were forced to choose one thing - to lose my mistress, or to lose a minister, I would more willingly agree to lose 10 people like you than one minister like Sully.” This letter was addressed to Henry IV's greatest love. Their relationship lasted nine happy years. Gabrielle d'Estrée, married to Madame de Liancourt, appeared wherever the king visited; she was present in Saint-Denis at his abdication and in Chartres at the coronation, at the assemblies and accompanied him on military campaigns. She gave him two sons and a daughter. The lovers were going to legitimize their relationship. But the proposed marriage had many opponents. “The people wanted the king to marry a princess, and not an obscene duchess.” The pope also opposed Gabrielle d'Estrée, hatching his plan for arranging the king's marriage. The fuss surrounding the upcoming wedding shortened the days of the beautiful Gabrielle: the stress caused the premature birth of a dead child and the woman in labor could not be saved.

Although Henry IV wrote in his letter to his sister that grief and regret would accompany him to the grave, he only had enough patience for four months. In the year of his beloved’s death, he was already writing love letters to his next passion, Henriette d’Entragues, and at the same time was infatuated with the Marquise de Verneuil. The favorites did not occupy his attention for long, leaving a trace only in the letters sent by the hot Béarnian at the moment of desire. The last passion of Henry IV was the 14-year-old heiress of the famous noble house of Montmorency, Charlotte. She danced in the court ballet, and old Henry sat for hours at rehearsals. Contrary to his rules, he began to dress up and even use incense. It is no coincidence that the Florentine ambassador, who visited his compatriot Maria de Medici in Paris, took with him an impression of bordello at court, the like of which he had never seen.

Meanwhile, Henry IV was known as a good father: he adored all his children, including illegitimate ones. And the birthday of the heir to the throne, the future Louis XIII, on September 27, 1601, became a national holiday, the solemnity of which was given by the fact that France had not known the Dauphin since the time of Henry II. The last Valois were childless and died at a young age. On this occasion, cannons were fired in all French cities and medals were minted with the image of the Dauphin Louis in the image of Hercules, dealing with snakes with his bare hands.

Henry IV surrounded his son with great attention and care. Contrary to the wishes of Marie de Medici and her pro-Catholic entourage, he chose a tutor for the boy, an educated and free-thinking man, because he wanted to see the future king of France free from the captivity of medieval ideas. This desire grew as the situation in the kingdom became more complicated.

The past did not want to retreat before Bourbon's determination. All his decrees, and above all the Edict of Nantes, were met with hostility. The Parisian parliament and after it the provincial judicial chambers refused to register the king's decisions. And Henry IV had to resort to extreme measures - personally appearing in parliament and demanding satisfaction. On January 7, 1599, he declared in the Paris Parliament regarding the Edict of Nantes: “You will do this not only for me, but also for yourself and for the benefit of the world. I made the world outside (France - S.P.), I want to make it

inside (France – S, P.). You must obey me, like all my subjects. Those who disobey my order must know that this is the path to the barricades, to the murder of the king. I will cut the root of evil and resistance. I will climb the walls of cities, I will climb the barricades that are not so high” 7. The idea of ​​compromise that Bourbon tried to implement was more rejected than understood. They saw the cunning of a heretic behind it, questioning the sincerity of his peace-loving policy.

Signs of a negative reaction to the appearance of Henry IV on the throne and to his policies were repeated attempts on his life. The first dates back to 1593. Then the leader Pierre Barrière, whose hand was guided by the Jesuits, chose the right moment - the abdication of the Navarrese. Convinced of the godliness of his actions, he planned to strike at the entrance to the temple of Saint-Denis. In 1594, the year of his coronation, Henry was wounded by Jean Chatel: an obedient Jesuit student aimed at the king's throat, but cut his lip and knocked out a tooth. The trial and execution of the murderer, causing a lot of noise, served as the basis for the expulsion of the Jesuits from France. The years 1595, 1598, 1599, 1600, 1601, 1605 were also marked by attempts to kill the king. Those who attempted, as a rule, were monks - Capuchins and Jacobins, not without the influence of the Jesuits. They were driven by the desire to deal with the Protestant who dared to seize the throne. This is confirmed by the positive reaction of the church to their actions. In “The Apology of Jean Chatel” (1595), written by curate J. Boucher, Henry IV was declared a tyrant, usurper and heretic.

However, fate was pleased to extend the time of Henry IV's trials until 1610 and force the king to meet death at his post. As Sully wrote: “Nature rewarded the sovereign with all the gifts, but did not give him a successful death.” In May 1610, he was preparing for a military campaign on the lower Rhine against the Austrian Habsburgs, who claimed to create a universal empire. On the day of the assassination attempt, Henry IV went to Arsenal to meet with Surintendent Sully. The killer managed to jump onto the step of the carriage during its forced stop and, through the window, inflict three fatal blows to the king in the chest with a knife. The repentant heretic, introduced by the pope into the bosom of the Catholic Church, was killed by Francois Ravaillac, a Feuillant monk from a new order that arose in Paris in the 16th century. The monk’s hand carried out the sentence passed on Henry IV not only by the Roman Catholic Church and the papists, but also by forces in France itself that did not recognize innovations and saw in the king’s actions an attack on the traditional rights of the nobility. The policy of compromise, the desire to put state interests above religious ones, turned into death for Bourbon.

On the evening of May 14, 1610, the body of the deceased was prepared for farewell. For a month and a half, the coffin with the embalmed corpse stood in the Louvre. The funeral took place in the royal tomb of Saint-Denis on July 1. The king's heart, according to his order, was transferred for burial in the chapel of the Jesuit college of La Flèche. As during his lifetime, Henry IV never ceased to amaze his contemporaries with his originality.

But it was too early for Bourbon’s opponents to celebrate victory. His death not only did not take his memory to the grave, but, on the contrary, gave new impetus to the legends, adding to the once created image of Henry IV the features of an innocently murdered man. Most often he was represented as a protector of widows and orphans, a sufferer and benefactor, and also a knight of the Renaissance. He was depicted next to Caesar, Alexander the Great, Charlemagne and even Hercules, supplementing the pictures with the words: “Beautiful among the most brilliant men” or “Gali Hercules.” In the ancient manner, he was depicted as a hero of Olympus: like Hercules, choosing between virtue and vice. In the year of the king’s death, Claude Billard wrote a tragedy in the ancient style, “The Tragedy of Henry the Great.” The Jesuits of the College of La Flèche, who were patronized by Henry IV, responded to the death of Bourbon. In their panegyric they compared him to Saint Louis and attributed to him the virtues of the emperors Constantine and Theodosius and the kings David and Solomon.

4. ESTOILE P. de. Jornal du regne de Henri IV, roi de France et de Navarre. Vol. 1. Le Haye. 1741, p. 45, etc.

5. Lettres missives, vol 8, p. 21.

6. See The Spirit of Henry IV, or a collection of all sorts of curious anecdotes, graceful actions, witty answers and several letters of this sovereign. M. 1789, p. 37.

7. ESTOILE P. de. Journal, vol. 2, p. 15.

Henry's mother, a consistent supporter of Calvin, did everything to raise her son to be a strong Protestant. But in his father, the young prince had a completely different example. He did not remain a supporter of the Geneva cause for long and returned to Catholicism after he entered the service of the French king as a lieutenant general and turned from a Protestant commander into a courtier. Henry then changed his religion for the first time, but after the death of King Antoine he again returned to his mother’s religion. He came of age in those years when France was shaken by the first religious wars. Fierce battles were followed by fairly long periods of peace, during which the young Béarnian had the opportunity to become acquainted with the court life of Paris. Intelligent, lively and practical, Henry learned a lot from these observations. The Valois family also managed to study it well. After the conclusion of peace in Saint-Germain in 1570, Catherine de Medici began to work for the marriage of her daughter Margaret with the King of Navarre. This marriage, in her opinion, was supposed to reconcile both parties and put an end to the bloody unrest. At first, things did not go well for a long time, but then they finally came to a happy end - in August 1572, the long-awaited marriage took place. As you know, he did not live up to the hopes placed on him.

Six days after the wedding, the Catholics insidiously attacked the Huguenots, who had trustingly gathered in Paris for the wedding celebrations, and inflicted a cruel massacre on them on the night of St. Bartholomew. Henry's entire retinue, located in the Louvre, was killed, but he himself, having promised to convert to Catholicism, avoided the common fate. For the next four years, Henry lived in Paris as a prisoner.
Outwardly, he seemed to have come to terms with his fate, but in reality he did not give up the thought of escaping. In February 1576, under the pretext of a hunting trip to Senlis, Henry with a small retinue of his followers rode along the Vendôme road to Alençon, from where he made his way to Anjou. He soon renounced Catholicism, accepted Calvinism for the third time, and from that time on became the leader of the French Huguenots for many years. Together with Henry III's brother, Francois, he began military operations against King Henry III, which ended with the conclusion of a profitable peace in Beaulieu.
Henry's wife, Margarita, whom he never loved, lived without her husband in Paris for another two years, changing one lover after another. The King of Navarre, however, was in no way inferior to her in the number of love affairs. He was generally loving and had relationships in his life with many women from various classes. Thus, during his captivity in Paris, for several years he was infatuated with Catherine de Medici's maid of honor, Charlotte de Bon-Samblance (known as Madame de Sauve). In 1578, Catherine de Medici brought Margarita to Gascony and stayed with her son-in-law for eighteen months. There appears to have been complete reconciliation between the two courts. Henry then became interested in the maid of honor Marguerite Franziska de Montmorency-Fosse (Fausseuse), and from 1582, Diana d'Andouin, Countess Gramont, nicknamed the Beautiful Corisande, became his chosen one for many years. She became the first of Henry's famous favorites. According to contemporaries, Corisande, in addition to beauty and intelligence, had many other virtues, including courage and selflessness. In the absence of his wife (from 1580 Margarita lived in Paris), Corisande played the role of queen at the Navarre court. In 1586, Henry completely decided to marry her. But Turenne and d'Aubigny, his faithful and stern friends, who knew how to bluntly speak impartial truths, had difficulty dissuading him from this rash step. And indeed, by 1589, the king's passion for Corisande had cooled.
At this time, the civil war reached its greatest ferocity. Irreconcilable Catholics united in a League led by Heinrich of Guise and his brothers. Under the cover of religious struggle, the Ligists began intrigues against Henry III, trying to overthrow him from the throne. Every month the king felt more and more uncomfortable in Paris. Finally, in May 1588, he fled to Chartres, and in November his bodyguards suddenly attacked Henry of Guise and stabbed him to death right in front of the king's office. After this desperate act, there could no longer be reconciliation between Henry III and the Parisians. The younger brother of the murdered Guise, the Duke of Mayenne, became the head of the League. Henry began to seek support from the King of Navarre and, since he did not have his own children, officially recognized him in April 1589 as his heir. Both Henrys united their troops and approached Paris. The siege was in full swing when, on August 1, the fanatic Clément stabbed the king to death with a dagger.
The Huguenots, who were besieging Paris, proclaimed Henry of Navarre king of France that same day. But the leaders of the Catholic part of the besieging army did not dare to unconditionally recognize him. They declared the King of Navarre the legal heir of Henry III, but with the condition of accepting Catholicism. The Parisians elected Henry IV's uncle, the old Cardinal Charles of Bourbon, as king, but in fact the Duke of Mayenne continued to rule the rebels. Henry did not have his own forces to siege Paris. Therefore, he retreated to Normandy and fought a war between the banks of the Seine and Loire for four years. He approached Daapp first. The Duke of Mayenne pursued him at the head of a larger army. Henry took a strong position between three rivers near the Arc Castle. For two weeks there were continuous skirmishes, and on September 21 a hot battle broke out, in which the king showed himself to be a brave warrior and forced the duke to retreat, although he had three times as many forces. Henry marched on Paris. On October 21, the Huguenots captured five suburbs on the left bank of the Seine and plundered them. Henry's successes were limited to this for now. He retreated to Tours, which became his temporary residence. The following months were very important for the king. Even earlier, he announced that the Huguenots would not receive from him any new rights, except for those that were determined by agreement with the former king, and that he was ready to submit all religious disputes to the court of a church council. For both Huguenots and Catholics these were acceptable conditions. The new king had an attractive appearance and a pleasant character. On the battlefield he captivated with his courage, and in peacetime he attracted with his wit and his good nature, sometimes feigned, but always amiable. Statesmen of both parties were increasingly convinced from his correspondence and from his way of acting that Henry was gifted with foresight and a clear mind, hated party intrigues and knew how to “deal blows with one hand, while the other gave out alms,” and was distinguished by nobility of ideas and strength of character . To the French people, tired of long decades of civil strife, he seemed to be exactly the person who would be able to restore inner peace.
In the spring of 1590, Henry approached Dreux. The Duke of Mayenne, wanting to free this fortress from the siege, entered into battle with the king near Ivry. According to Martin, Henry rushed into battle with the courage of a medieval knight. In a short time, the duke's army was scattered, and the royal troops pursued it until nightfall. Henry destroyed all the Catholic infantry, up to 1000 cavalry, and captured most of their artillery. The head of the League himself fled without an entourage to Mantes. This battle determined the outcome of the war. The Duke did not dare to return to Paris. The old Cardinal Bourbon soon died, and the Catholics had no one left to take his place. However, hostilities continued for several more years. Henry approached Paris and began a new siege. Soon famine began to rage in the city. If not for outside help, the townspeople would have had to surrender this time. But the Spanish king Philip II, who closely monitored the progress of affairs in France, moved the entire Dutch army to help the Catholics. In August, the Duke of Parma delivered food to Paris and forced the king to lift the siege. In 1591, Henry received significant financial assistance from the English Queen Elizabeth, recruited mercenaries and began to press out Catholics everywhere. Mant, Shatr and Noyon were taken.
In Mantes, the king first saw Gabrielle d'Etre, who became his new lover for several years. However, they write that Henry did not immediately achieve reciprocity from her. Noticing the king's courtship, Gabrielle left Mantes for Picardy, to the castle of Kevre. Despite the military time and while the forest surrounding Kevre was filled with enemy pickets, the loving Henry with five comrades galloped after her.Disguised as a peasant, with an armful of straw on his head, he again appeared before his beloved, but she drove him away with contempt. Then Henry changed tactics and arranged Gabrielle's marriage to the elderly widower de Liancourt, whom he later removed under a plausible pretext. Gabrielle finally gave in, but was not a very faithful friend to the king.
Meanwhile, the war continued. In 1592, Henry besieged Rouen, considered one of the strongholds of the Catholic League. To save the capital of Normandy, the Duke of Parma invaded France for the second time from the Netherlands. However, it again did not come to a decisive battle with the Spaniards. Henry retreated from Rouen, but maintained strong positions elsewhere. It was obvious that neither party could achieve victory by military means. In 1593, the Duke of Mayenne convened the Estates General in Paris to elect a new Catholic king. From the very beginning, the deputies were in great difficulty: Henry remained the only legitimate contender for the throne.
The only person who could oppose him was the daughter of Philip II, Isabella (on her mother’s side, she was the granddaughter of Henry II). The Infanta had many supporters among the deputies, but even the most zealous of them were aware that putting a woman, and a Spaniard at that, at the head of France would not be an easy task. Meanwhile, Henry hastened to cut the ground from under his enemies, announcing on July 23 his conversion to Catholicism. Presumably, he decided to take this step not without hesitation, although it was hardly of a religious nature. He was a sufficiently sober politician and a sufficiently inveterate freethinker that, when choosing between matters of faith and political benefits, he preferred the former to the latter. To the reproaches of his followers, the king, apparently jokingly, but in fact quite seriously, replied that “the crown of France is worth the Catholic liturgy” (or in another translation: “Paris is worth the mass”). And this was his sincere opinion. Doubts were raised by other considerations: whether he would become stronger from a change of religion, whether his former Huguenot supporters would remain loyal to him, and whether his old enemies, the Ligists, would be ready to reconcile with him.
He didn't have to wait long for answers to these questions. On July 25, the king attended a Catholic service for the first time in the church in Saint-Denis, after which the Bishop of Bourges solemnly announced his return to the bosom of the Roman Church. As soon as this became known in the capital, many Parisians, despite the prohibition of the Duke of Mayenne, hastened to Saint-Denis to greet their king. The Huguenots, although they condemned Henry for his change of religion, continued to side with him, realizing that this king would never begin religious persecution against them. The Duke of Mayenne called his followers to arms in vain and urged them not to believe the king's "feigned conversion." Nobody wanted to listen to him. Cities and nobles gradually stopped fighting, some voluntarily, others selling their allegiance on more or less favorable terms. Thus, Henry took possession of his kingdom “piece by piece and piece by piece,” as Sully put it. He entered Meaux in January 1594, which was surrendered to him by the commandant of this city, Vitry. Then he received Orleans and Bourges from La Chatre and Aix in Provence from the local parliament. In February, Lyon politicians surrendered their city. At Chartres, Henry was solemnly anointed according to the old custom of French kings and on March 22 entered Paris without a fight. At the same time, negotiations on the surrender of Rouen were completed. Laon, Amiens and other cities of Picardy, considered the cradle of the League, opened their gates one after another. Charles of Guise, nephew of the Duke of Mayenne, gave Champagne to Henry. Each of these treaties cost the king numerous concessions in the form of the distribution of honorary distinctions, political rights, and especially sums of money. Henry generously distributed titles, awarded pensions, paid other people's debts, preferring material costs to bloodshed. But where negotiations did not give the expected result, the king used weapons. In July 1595, at the Battle of Fontaine-Française, he defeated his old enemy, the Duke of Mayenne, and took Burgundy from him. But then he concluded a very tolerable agreement with him, trying in every possible way to spare his political and religious feelings: wherever possible, the king tried to be above personal enmity. In September, Pope Clement VIII, fearing that the French church might escape his influence, lifted Henry's excommunication and concluded a formal peace with him. But the war continued with the Spanish king, who stubbornly did not recognize Henry’s rights to the French crown. In 1595 the Spaniards took Cambrai, in 1596 Calais and finally in 1597 Amiens. But despite these successes, Philip still had no hope of deposing Henry. He did not have money to continue the war, and in May 1598 the Spanish king agreed to peace. All the provinces he conquered were returned to France. The last stronghold of the Ligists remained Brittany, captured by Duke Merker. Henry himself opposed him and forced him to submit.
The outcome of the religious wars in France was summed up by the Edict of Nantes, signed by the king in April 1598. This was an important act that approved the foundations of the state policy of religious tolerance. Although the Huguenots did not have free teaching and worship, they were completely equal in civil rights with Catholics and had access to all state public positions. Reformed worship was still prohibited in Paris. However, it was allowed everywhere where it had been introduced earlier, namely: in every administrative district, in the castles of nobles and even in the houses of ordinary nobles. All edicts and court sentences directed against the Huguenots during religious persecution were declared invalid. In La Rochelle, Montauban and Nîmes, the Huguenots were allowed to maintain their garrisons. They could hold congresses on political and religious issues, and also have their representatives at the court and in the State Council. As might be expected, both Catholics and Protestants were initially unhappy with the edict, believing that the other side had received too many concessions. The king had to spend a lot of effort before the edict became the basis of the religious world.
All these turbulent years, Gabrielle was the king's main favorite. During the second siege of Paris, she occupied a small pavilion on the heights of Montmartre, and in June 1594, at the castle of Coucy near Lyon, she gave birth to Henry's son Caesar. Having entered Paris, the king legitimized this child and announced that he was beginning a divorce from Margarita Valois. Obviously, he was going to marry Gabrieli later. In March 1595, the favorite was granted the title of Marquise of Monceau, and in 1597 - Duchess of Beaufort. According to Matthieu, the king informed Gabrieli about all the strife and tricks, revealed to her all his emotional wounds, and she always knew how to console the cause of his suffering. During the years of favor, she gave birth to Henry another daughter, Katerina Henrietta, and a son, Alexander. But Gabrielle never lived to see the king’s divorce. She died suddenly in April 1599 (as they thought then, from poison). When the unfortunate Henry learned about this tragedy, he had a nervous attack and went to bed.
However, the king could not indulge in sadness for long. Seven months after Gabrieli’s death, he received a formal divorce from Margarita and was soon preoccupied with two matters of the heart at once: matchmaking with Maria de’ Medici and courting Henrietta d’Antragues. Of all the king’s favorites, this turned out to be the most calculating. Before reciprocating Henry’s feelings, Henrietta demanded from him a formal written agreement: the king promised to enter into a legal marriage with her as soon as she gave birth to his son. In addition, Henrietta received one hundred thousand francs from him for the first night. Soon the favorite became pregnant. Henry, who had already agreed on a marriage with Marie de' Medici, found himself in a difficult situation. He granted Henrietta the Marchioness of Verneuil, promised to marry her to the prince of the blood of the Duke of Nevers, but she stubbornly refused to return the document given to her and threatened a scandal. In July 1600, Henrietta gave birth to a stillborn girl, and this is a misfortune freed the king from the need to fulfill his promise. The favorite lowered her tone and became more accommodating. The king continued to have tender feelings for her.
Meanwhile, in December 1600, Henry's wedding to Maria de Medici was celebrated. In January, Henry was already bored with his wife, and he returned to Henrietta’s arms. In 1601, both ladies gave birth to sons for the king: the queen was the Dauphine of Louis (later Louis XIII), the favorite was Gaston Henry (later the Duke of Verneuil). The following year the picture repeated itself: Maria de Medici gave birth to a daughter, Elizabeth, and Henrietta, Angelique. This idyllic connection was not destroyed even by a conspiracy against the king, discovered in 1604, in which the most active role was played by the favorite’s father, the old man d’Antragues. The conspirators planned to lure Henry to the Marquise of Verneuil, kill him, and proclaim her son Gaston king. The court sentenced d “Antraga led to death, and his daughter to lifelong imprisonment in a monastery, but the king allowed the old man to retire to his estate, and declared Henrietta innocent. He again became friends with his favorite, although he already knew well her evil and scandalous character. The Marquise shamelessly exploited the royal generosity, asking for money and estates for every kindness. She constantly tried to humiliate the queen and completely quarreled Mary with her husband.
Only Henry's new hobby saved him from this shameful connection. In January 1609, at a ballet given by Marie de Medici, Henry became infatuated with the fourteen-year-old daughter of Constable Montmorency, Marguerite. As usual, the king tried to marry off his new lover first and chose the Prince of Condé as her wife. But as soon as the prince assumed the rights of a husband, he began to protect Margarita from the king with all his might. In November 1609, he decided to flee to Flanders. The angry king began to seek the dissolution of their marriage. At this time he was energetically preparing for war with Austria. But both enterprises remained unfinished due to the tragic death of Henry. On May 14, 1610, the king went to the arsenal in a carriage to inspect new guns. It was a hot day and the window skins were down. On the narrow and winding street of the Iron Rows, the royal carriage had to stop to let a cart of hay pass. At that moment, a man quickly jumped onto the wheel, stuck his head through the window and plunged a dagger into Henry’s chest. Death was instantaneous, and Henry did not have time to utter a single groan. Those sitting with him in the carriage did not even notice his death at first. The killer, the Catholic fanatic Ravaillac, however, did not have time to escape, was captured by the guards and executed two weeks later.

Used sources.

1. Ryzhov K. All the monarchs of the world. Western Europe. - Moscow: Veche, 1999.
2. World history of wars. Book one. R. Ernest and Trevor N. Dupuis. - Moscow: Polygon 1997.

Henry IV of France. King of France

According to form and tradition, Henry IV, after the assassination of his predecessor, was the king of France. However, since when did he really become one? Until his conversion to the Catholic faith (1593), he remained what he had been before: a Protestant leader and “head of the party.” The capital was opened to him only in 1594. He was able to rule the pacified country by defeating the last supporter of the League from the highest aristocracy, the Duke de Merker, and after the end of the war with Spain in 1589. In the meantime, the capital refused to let its king in. Paris was completely in the hands of the League, its most radical priests and petty-bourgeois retinue. For the king, besides the Protestants, there were only those bourgeois and bureaucratic-noble strata who were disgusted with the radicalism of the Parisian clergy, the orthodoxy of the Sorbonne and the obvious readiness for violence of the Parisian population.

For four years, Henry IV tried to take control of the situation with the help of military force. The most important goal, the capture of Paris, which had been defended by a Spanish garrison since 1590, was not achieved. And even where Henry IV won victories over the troops of the nobility loyal to the League, for example, at Arc in 1589 and Ivry in 1590 - both battles were won, not least thanks to the personal, as courageous, as daring participation of the king - even political success did not come there. Here a remarkable personality trait of this king emerged, which has hitherto received little attention in research. It was convincingly emphasized by Babelon: Henry IV was a brilliant diplomat, a king with a true sense of what was politically necessary and possible, he was an outstanding tactician who knew how to change the course of a battle with an extraordinary decision; he was an excellent cavalryman and commander, but he was not a strategist who knew how to turn military success into political success. Between 1590 and 1592 we see a king who gives the impression of an easily inspired, slow-thinking, indecisive person, and not a new Caesar, going straight to the most important political goal and using all opportunities in this direction.

So, it is not surprising that during these years the king increasingly lost because of his religious worldview. His Catholic supporters demanded that he take a “deadly leap”, return to the bosom of the old Church, in order to create the preconditions for the recognition of his royal power. Having been ready for this step for a long time, the Béarnite hesitated, taking into account his fellow believers, all the time putting forward his main argument, as if he wanted a free Council to enlighten him regarding his errors. Only a few sensible Protestants knew that the “leap” could not be avoided. His most capable political adviser, Philippe du Plessis-Mornay, understood the need for this, but until the very end he thought to achieve more with the help of the Council and negotiations. For Mornay, the national Council still held the chance for general reconciliation, national-ecclesiastical unity on the issue of the content of faith and thereby the founding of a new Gallican church on the English type.

After 1589, Henry IV listened to his devoted military comrades for a very long time. However, when in 1593 there was a danger that the Catholics loyal to the king would break away from him and unite with the moderate supporters of the League to form a third party and nominate another, Catholic representative of the House of Bourbon as king, when the Spanish king began to increasingly openly advocate a Spanish solution to this issue , 25.07 in Saint-Denis Henry IV renounced the new religion.

The change of religion in itself did not open the gates of the capital to Henry IV; the famous words “Paris is worth a mass,” which Protestants later attributed to him, did not reflect the situation. All that was clear was that he had deprived his opponents, who were ready to reach an agreement, of the most important argument. Now, step by step, he solved further important problems diplomatically. At the beginning of 1594, he was anointed king in Chartres - the traditional place for this ceremony, Reims was in the hands of the League. In March he entered Paris and, as a result of negotiations, achieved the withdrawal of the Spanish garrison. In 1595, after much effort, his diplomats received absolution from the pope. In this way they removed the last obstacle to well-meaning Catholics openly and unconditionally accepting Henry IV. The fact that the papacy feared too much Spanish influence in Western Europe was the main political reason for this impressive success of French diplomacy.

It remained to solve three major tasks for the final pacification of the country: defeat the nobility of the League, which took command positions in numerous governorates; end the war with Spain and issue a new decree on religious tolerance. Henry IV set about solving these three problems with great enthusiasm and showed for the first time what his political skill consisted of. In dealings with the League, he relied exclusively on negotiations and money. Recklessly emptying the already meager state treasury and using every conceivable source of loans, between 1595 and 1598 he bought the devotion of all opponents and one by one brought them to his side, among them also Giza Mayenne. And with Spain, the king tried to quickly come to peace to the displeasure of his English and Dutch allies. When the Spaniards took Amiens in 1597 and began to threaten Paris, the king accepted the mediation services of Pope Clement VIII. On May 2, 1598, peace was signed in Vervain. Philip II of this world could not obtain any political or territorial benefit. When he died a few months later, the era of Spanish dominance in Europe came to an end.

Without a doubt, the publication of the Edict of Nantes (04/13/1598) was the largest action of Henry IV to establish peace in the country. Neither diehard Protestants nor orthodox Catholics became his supporters after the king's change of religion. The king was reproached for religious hypocrisy and continued to more or less openly wage journalistic battles against him, the echoes of which were heard in France for more than thirty years. The Protestants, having lost their leader, did everything to preserve their political, military and synodal organizational structure. Thus, Henry IV, soon after changing religion - now from the position of the king - learned to appreciate the danger that Protestantism posed to the unity of the kingdom with its tendency to develop into a "state within a state." Nevertheless, the king decided on an honest, not only tactically understood, policy towards his former co-religionists. He was deeply convinced that only the peaceful coexistence of both faiths could provide France with the peace that so many people dreamed of. His life experience helped him understand that it was not only Protestants who had a tendency towards class separation. Between 1589 and 1598 there were many “states within a state” in France, and the most stubborn was, of course, Paris, with a Spanish garrison within its walls and the ideas of the League at its heart. And even with him in 1594 the king treated him with royal mercy. So why then not a new edict for the Huguenots? Under such conditions, he met the expected resistance with his visor open and quickly issued an edict. This text, signed in Nantes on the occasion of reconciliation with Merker, did not essentially go beyond what Protestants had previously been entitled to: freedom of conscience throughout the country; freedom of worship in all places where services took place between 1596 and 1597, and also, depending on the circumstances, in official places and in the castles of the nobility; no religious services in Paris or within a radius of five miles; but unlimited legal capacity, unhindered access to all positions and the creation of an investigative chamber with mixed religious representation in some parliaments. Otherwise, the king, by special decree, provided the Huguenots with more than a hundred safe places for eight years and explained in a way that was sharply criticized by the Catholic side how seriously he took the safety of his former coreligionists and military comrades-in-arms. True, as the Protestant side later noted, this was a temporary concession. However, it clearly went beyond all previous concessions in this area, and in the following decades it turned out to be very valuable for French Protestantism. Moreover, after the expiration of the term, the king allowed negotiations to extend this concession.

The real innovation of Henry IV’s religious policy was not even this edict, but his attitude towards what he issued: for the first time during the religious wars, the French king kept his promise to take care in the following years about the implementation of the edict. Again and again, Henry IV sought direct explanations with members of the Paris and other parliaments who stubbornly resisted the ratification of the edict. To prove to them the unjustification of their resistance and narrow-mindedness, he referred to his own past and, from his rich life experience in religious matters, concluded that it was necessary to use a better political concept than the narrow-minded dogmatists of both parties: “For 20 years I have been leading the party of Religion (i.e. .e. Huguenots), this gives me information about everyone. I know who there wants war, who wants peace. I know those who wage war for the Catholic faith out of ambition or for the Spanish party, and I know those who want only to steal. Among the Protestants there were people of all kinds, just as among the Catholics...” (02/16/1599, speech to members of the Paris Parliament). And if necessary, the king showed the parliamentarians the way to the future, offered an alternative to a long, fruitless, destructive civil war: “We should not make any difference between Catholics and Huguenots, we should all be good Frenchmen.”

During such disputes, he consistently formed his image as a monarch independent of party quarrels and private interests, standing above momentary conflicts, whose life experience allowed him to know almost everything better than his subjects. This was not yet the argument of Louis XIV, who alone knew more than all his subjects simply because he was king. But even after 1598, Henry IV clearly showed a trait of authoritarian arrogance towards politicians of all stripes. Prominent representatives of the parties of past decades, both Catholics and Huguenots, and among them du Plessis-Mornay, were constantly forced to humbly endure the king’s arrogance, which on occasion was expressed in a joke: “I thank you,” the king reprimanded the delegation of the Paris Parliament, which sharply objected against the return of the Jesuits, - for the care that you show towards my person and my state. All your comments are stored in my memory, but mine are not in yours. You pointed out to me difficulties that seem great to you and worthy of attention, and you did not think that everything you told me I thought about and weighed eight or nine years ago; the best decisions for the future come from thinking about past events, and here I have more knowledge than anyone else.” This was already said by the absolute monarch of the 17th century, and Henry IV not only gave enough arguments, but also showed that he was not joking.

Henry IV in new studies is rightly called the founder of the absolute monarchy in France. This does not mean that the system and management technology under him looked the same as under Louis XIV. And this also does not mean that he did not in many ways refer to predecessors such as Louis XI, Francis I or Henry III. It is the comparison with them that shows what his originality was. He did not invent new means and ways to strengthen monarchical power; the past gave him enough examples and initiatives, especially the reign of Henry III. However, he reworked them and, in the form of intensive “personal rule,” ensured that supervision and control were exercised by the king.

The essence of this personal government was the effective organization of the process of giving advice. Henry IV did not change the royal council in principle. However, he took away from this large traditional advisory body the competence on all issues of “big politics”, both domestic and foreign, and transferred them to a small circle of trusted persons. This was also not the king’s invention, but according to contemporaries, he used this instrument so unconventionally and effectively that it was striking and seemed like an innovation. For appointments to this small body, which was also divided into departments, Henry mainly used Valois personnel, and this was also a remarkable feature of the political actions of this sensible politician. Undoubtedly, he found in them the best and most experienced people who mastered the technique of power: Cheverny, Bellievre, chancellor of Henry IV, Villeroy, one of the four secretaries of state and the “best man” of the king, except Sully; along with them Sillery, Jeannin, de Thou, Arley and others who came from the judicial class. Henry IV did not particularly favor these people and liked to sneer at their clerical manners; however, he knew well that he could not do without them, and gave no reason to doubt that their loyalty would be rewarded. Moreover, they represented only half of his political wisdom in the selection of personnel; the second half was represented by one single person - Maximilien de Bethune, Duke de Sully, who bore this high title only since 1607, but even during the Night of St. Bartholomew, as a Huguenot warrior-nobleman, he sided with Henry of Navarre and has since faithfully served the king .

Sully's career was one of a kind compared to all others in the 16th century. Sully held many resounding and lucrative titles, among them, from 1598, the title of "superintendent of finances", which he turned into a dominant function in the entire royal financial administration; but throughout his life he did not master the role of first minister, as Richelieu did under Louis XIII. He was and remained a devoted and close ally of the king, and there was never any danger that Sully would act differently than the king wanted. For we can assume that the reorganization of the financial administration, and with it the entire public administration, towards the creation of a centralized bureaucratic system, which took place under Sully, was in accordance with the wishes of the king and was a manifestation and result of his personal rule.

With the help of the financial council, a division of the royal council, Sully was able to gain an understanding of the kingdom's financial resources over several years. He did this completely independently of local and provincial officials, whom he immediately began to replace, in which, however, he succeeded as little as all other regimes of the 17th and 18th centuries. At the same time, wherever he could, he squeezed out the provincial class assemblies, since they had the right to participate in the financial administration of the provinces. Sully also questioned the Parisian and provincial chambers of accounts responsible for the control and controversial affairs of the financial administration; four times he created the so-called judicial chambers, extraordinary tribunals, where positions were occupied by loyal officials who, at least for a limited period, deprived the accounting chambers of significant powers. Henry IV and Sully sent crown officials to the provinces for a certain period of time and thereby abolished the powers of the corresponding authorities. Such “commissions” were the predecessors of intendants, and in certain provinces, especially in Lyon, where there was no parliament and provincial states, we see in the time of Henry IV (and his predecessor) such an intendant, although he was not yet called that. Neither Sully nor his master had much respect for the rights of the other higher judicial chambers and tried to limit or neutralize them. Whatever we are talking about, the following picture emerges: behind the open, friendly, cheerful face of the first Bourbon hides another, stern face of an absolute monarch conscious of his power.

It was in its last phase that the religious wars caused severe economic damage to the country. From the account books of large landowners and church tithe acts, we know how much grain production, the core of the French economy, declined during these years. The area of ​​uncultivated land increased everywhere. Production of linen and silk was reduced by half. Marauding armies, local and foreign, brought famine and epidemics—by the end of the century, once again plague was rampant in France. There was not only a religious war between large parties, but also a small war between peasant communities and wandering soldiers and bandits. In the South, in Limousin and Périgord, in 1594 and 1595. Major peasant uprisings occurred. The peasants fought against the triple tax burden imposed on them by landowners, the church and the king.

The way Henry IV responded to this situation was typical of his reign and his manner of behavior. With the help of his inventive superintendent Sully, between 1599 and 1602 he raised the already high direct taxes on land, while significantly reducing the tallu, mainly a “peasant tax”. This brought tangible relief, but the other side of the coin was revealed - indirect taxes increased significantly, especially the tax on salt (gabel). Of course, many French peasants felt better simply because the time of war and internal unrest had passed. However, the peasants had new enemies: on the one hand, the recovered church put its tithe administration in order, on the other, the old and new local nobility, which greedily coveted the property of indebted or ruined peasants. It was during these years of restoration that in almost all provinces the ownership share of the independent peasantry fell below 50%. The golden age of Francis I was effectively over.

The achievements of Henry IV in the field of development of crafts and trade policy were very important. He encouraged initiatives in this area and proved himself to be the first “mercantilist” of France, to whom Richelieu and Colbert owed much. The mass-produced and luxury clothing industry was greatly strengthened, and silk production was supported by incentives for the cultivation of mulberry trees and the breeding of silkworms. Consulted by competent business leaders (Olivier de Serres, Barthelemy de Laffema, etc.), the king aimed at a policy of trade surplus and encouraged French merchants to move into the North American colonies.

At least briefly, something should be said about Henry IV, the patron of the arts. Henry IV went down in the history of the French kingdom as one of the great architects. In the Louvre, on his personal initiative, a “grand gallery” was built, in Fontainebleau - an “oval courtyard”. In both cases, the king was more of a continuator. However, in Paris he acted completely independently, where he was a city planner: the Place Royale in the Marais, known since the early days of the Revolution as the Place des Vosges, is his creation, as is the Place Dauphiné on the western tip of the Ile de la Cité.

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Henry IV (reigned 1589-1610) - French king, third son of Anton of Bourbon and Joanne d'Albret, daughter and heiress of the king of Navarre and Béarn; genus. December 14 at Po Castle. The heir to Navarre through his mother, G. was the first prince of the blood of the French royal house through his father, a descendant of the Count of Clermont (see Bourbons). He grew up in freedom, under good physical conditions, surrounded by experienced educators. His mother, a strict Calvinist, raised him in the spirit of her religion. He knew the Latin classics, was somewhat familiar with the Greek language, read Plutarch, but in the French translation of Amiot; in any case, his education was rather higher than lower than the level characteristic of the then high society. His father died in the city, but G. was recognized as the leader of the Huguenots only after the death of Condé (). At the same time, he appeared on the battlefield for the first time. After the Truce of St. Germain, which temporarily put an end to the religious war, the French court invited G. to marry the king’s sister Margaret of Valois, to which he agreed as a sign of complete reconciliation with the Catholics. G.'s mother died on June 9, probably from poison. G. accepted the title of King of Navarre and married Margarita on August 18 of the same year. Six days later, St. Bartholomew's Night broke out over the Huguenots. G. was spared, but had to convert to Catholicism and remained a prisoner at court. Three years spent in the poisoned atmosphere of the court of the last Valois and Catherine de Medici left an indelible mark on G., developing all his sensual inclinations, but could not destroy the best sides of his nature. In February he managed to escape from Paris. Re-adopting Protestantism, he again became the leader of the Huguenots. In subsequent internecine wars, he played an outstanding role and contributed to the conclusion of peace. Enterprising, fearless, cheerful, he gained the love of his followers. After the death of the Duke of Anjou () G., as the prince of the blood closest to the throne, declared his claims to the inheritance after the bereft G. III; but his rights were recognized only by the cities of southern France and part of the army. The League, at the instigation of Henry Guise, declared the old and weak Cardinal of Bourbon heir to the throne; the war flared up again; G., excommunicated by the pope, defeated the Catholic army on October 20 at Cutra. After the murder of the Duke of Guise (), the king, who had long been burdened by dependence on the League, openly entered into an alliance with Guise and together with him besieged Paris, under whose walls he was killed. G. then became king; but his position was extremely difficult. For him, in addition to the Huguenots, there was a middle party - the so-called “politicians”, but on the side of the League there was powerful support from Spain, on its side was Paris, the siege of which G. was forced to lift and resume only after a double victory over the commander of the League, the Duke of Mayenne , under Arka and under Ivry (). The appearance of the Spaniards under the leadership of Farnese again forced him to retreat. The struggle continued for several years, without leading to anything decisive. The idea matured in G.’s mind that only a conversion to Catholicism would give him possession of France. In July he committed, in his own words, dangerous leap(le saut perilleux), which hardly cost him much moral torment in view of his undoubted inclination towards religious indifference. The calculation turned out to be correct; one province after another took his side; in February he was crowned in Chartres, and on March 22 of the same year he entered Paris. The pope lifted his excommunication, the league submitted to him in the city, and peace was concluded with Spain. The Huguenots were granted significant rights by the Edict of Nantes. They were not satisfied with this edict, but the protests against it from Catholics, the church and the university show that G. did everything possible given the then state of mind. Having divorced his first wife, G. married Maria de Medici (). Apart from a short war with Savoy over Saluzzo, Biron's conspiracy and the uprising of the Duke of Bouillon, G.'s reign after the year was calm, and he could devote himself to working for the benefit of the shocked country. Reforms in the areas of financial management, administration and legislation were aimed at improving its well-being. G. built canals and roads, patronized agriculture, trade and industry, and laid the foundation for the French colonies in America. In all this, his main collaborator was Sully. Germany's services to France also include the weakening of Spanish influence and the fight against the remnants of feudalism. But he is rightly accused of ingratitude towards those who sacrificed everything for him, and his extravagance in private life, while the people, devastated by internecine wars, were dying of poverty and hunger. His tender love for the people is a legend of later times; His popularity during his lifetime was incomparably less than after his death. The legend attributed to him aspirations and feelings that were in fact completely alien to him. He prepared the triumph of absolutism by restricting freedom of the press, limiting the independence of parliament and the university, and abolishing the rights of communities; his mistresses (

Plan
Introduction
1 Biography
1.1 Childhood and adolescence
1.2 King of Navarre
1.2.1 At the French court
1.2.2 Courtyard in Neraka
1.2.3 Heir to the French throne

1.3 King of France (beginning of reign - conquest of the kingdom)
1.3.1 Fight against the League
1.3.2 War with Spain

1.4 King of France (reconciliation of the kingdom)
1.4.1 Second marriage
1.4.2 Revival and reconciliation of the kingdom
1.4.3 Expansion of the royal domain
1.4.4 Period of economic recovery
1.4.4.1 French colonization of America

1.4.5 Murder

2 The image of Henry IV for posterity
3 Fate of the body
4 Family
Bibliography

Introduction

Henry IV Bourbon ( Henry of Navarre , Henry the Great, fr. Henri IV, Henri le Grand, Henri de Navarre; December 13, 1553 (15531213), Pau, Béarn - killed May 14, 1610, Paris) - leader of the Huguenots at the end of the Wars of Religion in France, king of Navarre from 1572 (as Henry III), king of France from 1589 (actually from 1594) , founder of the French royal Bourbon dynasty.

Henry IV's rights to the throne were confirmed by Henry III, who, being mortally wounded, ordered his supporters to swear allegiance to the Navarrese monarch, but he was able to become king of France only after a long struggle. In order to neutralize his rivals, on July 25, 1593, Henry of Navarre converted to Catholicism and entered Paris on March 22, 1594 (on this occasion, Henry IV is credited with the saying “Paris is worth a mass”). In 1595, the Pope granted Henry absolution, lifting his excommunication from the church and the declaration of a heretic. To end interfaith hostility, Henry IV signed the Edict of Nantes on April 13, 1598, which granted freedom of religion to Protestants, and soon after this the Huguenot Wars ended.

In foreign policy, Henry, inspired by Minister Sully, pursued far-reaching plans for a pan-European union of Christian sovereigns.

Killed in Paris on May 14, 1610 by Catholic fanatic François Ravaillac. He was buried on July 1, 1610 in the royal abbey of Saint-Denis. The widow, Marie de Medici, who ruled until 1617, was declared regent until the heir (9-year-old Louis XIII) came of age.

1. Biography

1.1. Childhood and youth

Henry IV was born in Pau, in the castle of his maternal grandfather, Henry d'Albret. According to legend, immediately after birth, the grandfather took his grandson in his arms, ran a clove of garlic over his lips and dripped wine on them. This custom was widespread in those days to prevent disease.

Henry spent his childhood in Coarraz (a small town and castle in Béarn). Although Henry was baptized according to the rites of the Catholic Church, true to the principles of Calvinism, his mother Jeanne d'Albret raised him in the spirit of Protestantism.

With the accession of Charles IX in 1561, Henry's father Antoine de Bourbon took him to France to court, where Henry lived next to the princes of the royal house, with whom he was about the same age. The issue of choosing a religion was a conflict for his parents. Mother insisted on Protestantism, father on Catholicism.

During the first of the religious wars, Henry lived in Montargis under the patronage of the Duchess of Chartres, Renee of France. A Protestant by religion, Renee, however, managed to turn her castle into an island of religious neutrality. After the war and the death of his father, Henry remained at court as guarantor of peace between France and Navarre. Jeanne d'Albret obtained from Catherine de' Medici a guarantee of his education and appointment as governor of Guienne in 1563.

From 1564 to 1566, Henry accompanied the French royal family on the Great Tour of France, a journey undertaken by Charles IX (King of France) at the insistence of Catherine de' Medici. The trip was intended to familiarize the royal court with the state of affairs in France, devastated by the first religious war. During this journey, Henry met his mother. In 1567, Jeanne d'Albret insisted on his return to Béarn.

In 1568, Henry took part in his first military campaign - the Third War of Religion. Under the leadership of the Protestant Admiral Gaspard de Coligny, he took part in the battles of Jarnac, La Roche l'Abaye and Moncontour.

1.2. King of Navarre

At the French court

In 1572, after the death of his mother Jeanne d'Albret, Henry became king of Navarre under the name Henry III. On August 18, 1572, he married Margaret of Valois in Paris, the sister of King Charles IX, also known as “Queen Margot.” This political marriage, which Jeanne d'Albret opposed, was intended to reconcile Catholics and Protestants. Since the newlyweds belonged to different faiths, the wedding took place not inside Notre Dame Cathedral, but on its porch. Several holidays followed.

However, due to the extremely tense situation in Paris, a few days later, on August 24, the massacre of the Huguenots by Catholics began, known as St. Bartholomew's Night. Henry escaped death due to his high position and timely conversion to Catholicism. Forced to stay at the French court, Henry became close to the king's brother Francis of Alençon and participated in the siege of La Rochelle in 1573. In April 1574, after the so-called “conspiracies of the dissatisfied,” he and Alençon were imprisoned in the Castle of Vincennes. Subsequently, Charles IX pardoned him and left him at court. With the accession of Henry III, he received a new royal pardon in Lyon and was present at the coronation in Reims.

Courtyard in Neraka

Henry IV of Navarre

After spending three years at court, Henry fled on February 5, 1576. Reunited with his supporters, he again converted to Protestantism (June 13 of the same year). He supported the “disaffected” (the association of Catholics and Protestants against the government), but leaning more toward moderate views, he did not find a common language with the Prince of Condé, who desperately fought for the triumph of Protestantism. Henry of Navarre tried not to quarrel with the French court and even continued to serve as governor (the king's military representative) in Guienne. In 1577 he took part in the sixth religious war.

From this time on, Henry faced distrust from Protestants, who reproached him for religious hypocrisy. He avoided Béarn, the stronghold of Calvinism. However, Catholics were also hostile to him. In December 1576, he almost died in an ambush in Oz, and Bordeaux, the capital of Guienne, which he ruled, closed its doors to him. Henry settled on the banks of the Garonne at Lectoure and Agen, next to which was his own castle at Nérac. The royal court consisted of nobles belonging to both religions.

From October 1578 to May 1579, Catherine de Medici stayed with him and tried to reconcile the kingdom. Hoping to gain leverage over Henry, she brought with her his wife, Margarita.

For several months the Navarre couple lived in grand style in the Neraka castle. The court amused itself with hunting, games and dancing, much to the displeasure of the Calvinists. The court also attracted educated people (for example, Montaigne and Du Bart).

Henry then took part in the seventh religious war, initiated by his fellow believers. The capture of Cahors in May 1580, where he escaped massacre and plunder despite three days of street fighting, helped to increase his popularity.

The gallant adventures of the king led to conflicts in the still childless family and forced Margarita to return to Paris. A quarrel in Agen in 1585 marked their final break.

Heir to the French throne

King Henry III of France Valois

In 1584, Francis of Alençon, brother of King Henry III and heir to the throne, dies without leaving an heir. Henry of Navarre, one of the leaders of the Protestant party, becomes the heir to the throne by law. The childless King Henry III sends Duke Nogaret d'Epernon to Henry to convince him to convert to Catholicism and return to court. However, a few months later, under pressure from the Guises, the leaders of the Catholic party, he was forced to sign the Treaty of Nemours, outlaw Protestants and start a war against Henry.

A conflict begins in which Henry of Navarre clashes several times with the Duke of Mayenne. The Pope again excommunicates him from the church, and in 1587 Henry defeats the royal army at the Battle of Cutra.

Significant changes in the political situation occur in 1588. The death of the Prince of Condé puts Henry at the head of the Protestants. The murder of the Duke of Guise reconciles Henry III and Henry of Navarre. At the castle at Plessis-les-Tours, both kings sign a treaty on April 30, 1589. Jointly fighting against the League, which controls Paris and most of France, they besiege the capital in July of that year. On August 1, 1589, Henry III dies from wounds inflicted on him by the fanatical monk Jacques Clement (being a pious man, the king ordered church leaders to be allowed to see him without hindrance). On his deathbed, Henry III officially recognizes Henry of Navarre as his heir, who henceforth becomes King Henry IV of France. True, this is still rather a formality, since three quarters of the king’s subjects do not recognize him as such. The Catholic League refuses to recognize the legality of such succession to the throne.

King of France (beginning of reign - conquest of the kingdom)

Fight against the League

Henry IV - winner of the League in the form of Mars, by Jacob Bunel (National Museum of the Castle of Pau)

Realizing his weaknesses, Henry IV begins to fight on the ideological front. Catholic royalists demand that he convert to Catholicism, but over the previous nine years, Henry has already committed three apostasies. He refuses, although he states in a hastily drafted declaration that he will honor the Catholic faith. This causes confusion and vacillation in the camp of his Protestant supporters. Some even leave the army (for example, Claude de la Tremouille), and Catholic supporters of Henry III (but not Henry IV) follow their example, not wanting to serve a Protestant. The army is halved overnight (from 40,000 to 20,000 people).