Alum Foil Boat Holding Pennies

The Great Steward, Diane de Poitiers (1499-1566) Martyr

The July 10, 1559, King Henry II of France died after participating in a tournament during the celebration of peace-Cambresis Cateu. His body was keeping inherte Catherine de Medici, Queen of France. But his true love, Diana de Poitiers was unable to be at his side. The queen had forbidden it.

A high-born lover

Diane de Poitiers was born in 1499 in the heart of one of the most important aristocratic families in France. His father, Jean de Poitiers was the Count of Saint-Vallier and Estoile Viscount. After the death of his mother, Jeanne de Batarnay, when Diana was only six years, was taken to court where he spent nearly ten years as Lady Anne of France daughter of Louis XI.

When Diana was a beautiful 15-year marriage was agreed with Luis de Breze, forty years her senior. The Count and Lord of Anet Maulevrier represented the king in Normandy as regent and the royal family descended from an illegitimate branch originated from the relationship between Charles VII and his mistress, Agnès Sorel .

During the years of their marriage, Diana was a wife and mother. Despite the age difference, Diana loved and respected her husband, with whom she had two daughters. But the disappearance of Luis changed Diana's fate.

courted by Henry

Diane de Poitiers in 1531, with 31 years, was a widow. A year earlier, the two eldest sons of King Francis I of France had returned from his stay in Madrid as a hostage for his father's defeat at the Battle of Pavia Charles V occurred in 1525. The emperor was taken prisoner the French king and was released only after the Treaty of Madrid which claimed her two children hostage. Henry was then eleven years old when Diana was reunited with whom he remembered as the last person who had comforted his despair when he had to leave to Madrid. Since then, Henry had fallen in love with the beauty and personality of Diana.

Now a widow, Diana has reinvented itself. His model would be Artemis, daughter of the king of Halicarnassus, took the white and black as your basic colors, in their coat included the inverted torch, symbol of widows and honored her husband disappeared in a mausoleum in the chapel of the castle Anet.

Diana was more than twenty years Henry's age, but admitted his public worship wrapped in a similar trappings of courtly love. Surrounded herself his person and his relationship with Henry by a halo of mystery giving them a mythological and sacred and transforming the exemplary widow goddess of Olympus 1. Even Diana was portrayed as a huntress.

symbols continued when in 1547 Henry ascended the throne and did not hesitate to create the famous shield with his initials intertwined.

power over the monarch

Diana was not just a lover. The ascendancy and power over Henry used it to interfere in government affairs to exercise a similar role that of a prime minister.

In his role as adviser to the king did not hesitate to drive the king into the arms of the legitimate queen, Catherine de Medici, to give the kingdom an heir. When the offspring arrived, she took care of their education.

Time for

Queen Catherine de Medici

spent the first years of his reign endure the presence of Diana in court. He did it quietly and accept the situation. But their power to come with the death of her husband. When Henry was mortally wounded in 1559, Catherine made his first gesture of rejection Diana. Prohibited their presence next to Henry and for his funeral. After her away from the court and the education of their children.

Digna until the end

Although Diana was expelled from the court, he continued to have relations with the kingdom's leading families. From his exile in the castle of Anet Diana continued to travel to Paris and kept his place in aristocratic society.

Not surprisingly, Catherine called the crown jewels she had worn Diana and took the castle of Chenonceau but instead handed the de Chaumont. Queen knew about the influence that kept even his eternal rival in Paris, and that revenge was not favorable for her.

Diana died in his castle of Anet in 1566.



-------- 1. Lovers and queens, Benedetta Craveri

If you want to read about it


Lovers and queens, Benedetta Craveri
Genre: Essay Collection
the lives of several queens and lovers related to the French crown.

Diane de Poitiers and Catherine de Medici , Michael of Kent
Genre: Essay
A wonderful story about two rival ladies told by someone who is direct descendant both.