The Serpent and the Moon: Two Rivals for the Love of a Renaissance King (42 page)

Diane believed unswervingly that the so-called reformed religion was a heresy against God, His Church, and His divinely appointed king. She shared the view of most of her class that to preserve the Catholic Church and the monarchy, this heresy had to be eradicated. Although she was a highly educated lady who read Erasmus, Thomas More, Guillaume Postel, Tommaso Campanella, and who qualified as a Humanist, she dreaded and detested the new ideas, and had no sympathy for anyone who stepped outside the existing religious hierarchy. Diane embraced the High Renaissance, and shared the vision and dream of François I to create an intellectual, artistic climate in France that could rival the great courts and seats of learning in Italy; but she was also a woman of her time, deeply embedded in the social fabric of French public life. Diane de Poitiers could not be perceived to be anything other than a most pious Catholic.

As the mistress of Henri II, Diane’s position vis-à-vis the church was difficult. By the standards of the previous reign, Diane and Henri led very sober lives, and their attitudes and behavior were instrumental in effecting a dramatic change in the morals of the day. Because of her vehement support of her faith, Diane was still regarded as the “pure one,” and neither she nor Henri allowed any reference, indelicate or otherwise, to be made about their relationship. She had been born in the land of the troubadours and brought up on their tradition of Courtly Love, where only pure love was permitted to transcend the bonds of marriage. Therefore, Catherine was expected to silently acquiesce to her husband’s enduring love for Diane. It is proof of her fear, and her love of Henri, that she did so.

As the unfortunate tailor’s remarks indicated, not everyone was impressed by Diane’s behavior. One person who wished Diane ill was France’s great enemy, the Emperor Charles V. Diane was a royal favorite he knew he could not buy. The emperor, who had expected little opposition from the weak successor to the formidable François I, saw Diane as the source of Henri’s strength, and he was right. His ambassador had reported that Henri II was the “slave” of the duchesse Diane; that he discussed everything with her and was more than ever under her spell.

As Charles V’s ambassador reported, the king was physically infatuated with Diane. She wore a lightly peppered scent especially made for her, and it acted on Henri as a potent aphrodisiac. One evening, in the presence of Montmorency and the duc d’Aumale, the king leapt on Diane and almost dragged her to the bed while the other two looked aside. The bed could not withstand this onslaught of passion and collapsed under them, Diane rolling on the floor with laughter. This was not a unique occasion. In a letter home dated October 1549, the Venetian ambassador Alvarotti recounts how on one occasion, Diane went to bed with the king, who began to caress her with such passion that again the bed collapsed and Diane exclaimed, “Sire, do not jump on my bed so violently or you will break it.”

It was not unusual for serving women to remain in the room at all times, even during intimacy. These claimed that “
Madame
” never
showed herself naked or undressed, and so “one never saw her with hanging breasts as she was always wearing a bustier.” Maids and valets slept on the floor or in corners of their master’s or mistress’ bedrooms, the rooms leading one into the other. Privacy was almost nonexistent, and it was never long before information from the servants reached the courtiers.

Of course, Catherine was aware of such incidents. Her marriage forced her to endure constant humiliation, private and sometimes public. The queen had grown grotesquely fat from constant childbearing and the rich Italian food she preferred, and the sight of Diane’s ageless beauty and slender grace made her hate her husband’s mistress the more. Henri’s gift of Chenonceau to Diane had caused quite a stir in Paris, especially among the queen’s entourage. For once, Catherine dared express her fury over losing the château she had come to regard as hers by right. Her rage was so violent that Diane took notice and asked her powerful friend the cardinal de Lorraine to calm the queen. But for the most part her shame, anger, and pain were private and silent. After all, Catherine had time on her side. She was much younger than Diane and could afford to hate and wait.

The Medici queen began to turn again to her quacks, magicians, alchemists, and apothecaries, this time to help her in her struggle with her rival. Diane’s friends warned her to watch out for poison in her food and drink. Although Catherine did not buy the château of Chaumont-sur-Loire (with her own money) until 1560, she used the house for some time before her purchase and installed her sorcerers there. At this time, the queen’s main soothsayer was the famous mystic and healer “Albert le Grand,” although the Italian, Cosmo Ruggieri, played an important part. Ruggieri’s family had been soothsayers to the Medici for generations and he had come to France with Catherine from Italy. Then there was the great Nostradamus, who lived in Provence and would be summoned by Catherine to court. According to one source, “the real pope of Catherine’s strange religion was Ruggieri, not the occupant of the Vatican.”
¹⁰

The nineteenth-century writer Balzac, who admired Catherine de’
Medici, claimed the queen kept a private room at Chaumont, barely lit, with green glass in the only window.
¹¹
It was empty save for shelves holding rows of jars containing ingredients for the “great work.” The “alchemical Athana, the philosopher’s egg, the crucibles and the alembic” were kept under the giant chimneyhood. Beside the altar was the purification fountain, “with its pentacles and avocatory spells.” A book, inkstand, pen, knife, and a piece of virgin parchment were left on the altar, ready for “supernatural pacts.” There was also a death’s-head and an incense burner to drive away spirits. Hebrew inscriptions covered the left-hand wall and circles were drawn on the floor here and there. On the right-hand wall hung the famous magic mirror: an astrolabe, a divining wand, an hourglass, balance, pentachord, and a sphere were all placed on a table.

The queen had good cause to hate Diane de Poitiers, but all she could do was plot in secret, while publicly continuing to smile politely
at her rival. Catherine made almost no references to Diane in her correspondence until almost twenty years after Diane’s death, in a letter written in her own hand to Secretary of State Belliévre, the contents of which were to be passed to her daughter Marguerite, queen of Navarre. In it Catherine wrote that she was polite to Diane, as it was her husband’s wish, but that she always let him know how unhappy his relationship made her as “no wife who loves her husband can also love his harlot; as one cannot call her anything but that no matter how vulgar the word”—a revealing comment from this pupil of Machiavelli! By today’s standards, we may sympathize with Catherine; but by the rules of the time she had only one purpose for her dynastic partner—to provide heirs to the throne. Her love for Henri, and her obsession for his love in return, was regarded as her personal affliction, almost a curse, rather than an injustice done to her.

Catherine was very conscious of her power as queen, but dared not make a move against Diane for fear of Henri’s wrath (or that of Diane’s friend, the Constable). The Medici queen was not a fool. She knew she would always be a foreigner in a hostile court, and forced herself to hide her burning hatred of the favorite. As long as the king felt as he did toward “
Madame
,” Catherine never lost sight of the very real possibility of her exile and disgrace. Quietly, and only among her own circle, would she dare to vent her spleen. But when the duc de Nemours offered to cut off Diane’s nose, and another, Gaspard de Saulx-Tavannes (who hated Diane), suggested throwing vitriol at her and scarring that lovely face for life, Catherine demurred, repeatedly assuring the courtiers that she felt nothing but goodwill toward the duchesse de Valentinois. Of one thing the queen could be confident—that her own time would come. She could wait until nature took its course and removed her much older rival. Given time, her husband would grow to appreciate his clever wife. Yes, she could hate and wait.

Whatever Catherine de’ Medici lacked in real power, she made up for in magnificence. Brantôme describes the splendor of her court, the opulence of her banquets, the abundance of gold plate, rich carpets, tapestries, and
objets d’art
. The rooms were decorated in bright colors,
with many gold touches and trims. Gilded leather painted with flowers and arabesques covered some of the walls. Oriental carpets imported from Venice were scattered on the parquet floors. Clothes were not just designed to adorn, they were also meant to indicate the wearer’s social position, and could cost a fortune. Her courtiers wore the most ornate clothing in France, made from heavy cut velvets and rich silk brocades in bright colors, covered in gold and silver lace, all imported from Italy.

Ladies followed the fashion for paint on their faces, especially rouge, and the servants were clad in clothes half red, half yellow. As there were still no pockets in clothes, ladies carried a purse, which hung from their waists next to their rosary.

The gentlemen were as brightly dressed as the ladies, with much gold lace at their wrists. They wore tight silk hose with shining garters; their exaggerated codpieces were stuffed and padded like their doublets as they preened and strutted. In their midst sat Catherine on a low padded stool, with another, slightly higher but always empty, beside her. Catherine herself dripped pearls and was the acknowledged queen of this glorious assembly.

According to Brantôme, Catherine “took great pleasure in her shoes and in them being well dressed and tied, and I believe she had the prettiest hands I have ever seen. In addition, she dressed magnificently, and always with some new and clever fashion.” The queen adored “dressing up” and adorning herself—she even wore extensions in her hair. He adds that she “loved noble exercise such as dancing, in which she showed much grace and majesty.… Nowhere in the world,” claimed Brantôme, “was there anything to equal the sight.” Diane’s one real concession to Henri’s wife was her tolerance of Catherine’s personal extravagance. After all, “
Madame
” had the satisfaction
of seeing wherever she looked, on the ceilings, the chimneypieces, furniture, tapestries, and silver—even on the window catches—that ambiguous symbol: three intertwined crescent moons. No matter how rich or powerful she was, Catherine could never rid her life of the one person she envied the most.

_____________________

1
. Arthur Duke of Albany, one year younger than James V, died the same year.

2
. Such a mechanical lion was kept (and even modified) from one royal entry to the next. It had certainly been used for the entry of François I into Lyons some years earlier. The beast would bare his chest, revealing the arms of the monarch. It is possible that Lyons’ mechanical lion was designed by Leonardo da Vinci. Leonardo was employed by the French governor of Milan, Charles de Chaumont, in 1506, and Louis XII asked the artist to meet him there the following year. Leonardo was known to have worked on pageants for Louis XII’s entry into Milan, and his
Virgin of the Rocks
was already in the king’s collection.