An Imperial Match: Anne Boleyn marries Charles V

[pandizzy]

London, England. 20th of May, 1554.​

John tapped his fingers against his desk, watching the minutes fly by as he pondered about life. The Boleyns in Württemberg had made an offer for his daughter Mary, they had an heir named Karl, as their firstborn son had died after an illness, and the boy was some years older than his child. Four years, a difference that would seem less and less as the pair grew. And he was prone to accepting it.

She wouldn't be a queen like Katherine or Isabella, but neither would Philippa, if he had to be honest. The Boleyns were not an old family, and there was still the threat that one of the Württembergs would make a bid for the stolen throne, but they seemed secure. Rich, well-connected with the Austrian branch of the Habsburgs, neighbouring most of the major German realms. And they were English. They originated from his own lands. John considered all of the factors to be in their favour.

“I shall send William Cecil to Stuttgart to arrange the match,” he told his private secretary. “Mary is nearly two and I wish for her to sit for a portrait before he leaves.” His daughter was very rowdy, however, and refused to keep still, which was why they hadn’t had anything beyond basic sketches for her. But she needed to do so. John could only imagine what sort of tricks her nannies would use to convince her to sit properly for the court painter. “Inform my sister, the Lady Dudley, so that the Lady Mary may be brought here at once.”

His private secretary nodded. “Yes, Your Majesty,” he said, leaving quickly to send out the orders. John took advantage of the moment to stand up, walking to his window, which was turned towards the palace’s entrance. He was tired, in need of a good stretch, and his heart was practically still in his chest, his body calm. He took a goblet of wine in his hands and Alfred, his cupbearer, moved to stand by him, ready to fill up his cup once more.

“Once your sisters are all married, we’ll have to find a good English girl for you,” John said to his second son. He wiggled his eyebrows as Alfred scowled. “Has anyone caught your eye yet?” The boy was only eight, but John remembered childhood fantasies at his age. Nothing too malicious, but enough to let him know what he wanted.

“Girls are disgusting,” Alfred replied. He started coughing, covering his mouth with his palm as John chuckled.

“I’m sure you think that now, my son, but someday, you’ll change your mind.” He looked at Alfred who had not stopped coughing and placed his hand over his shoulder, leaning in to look at his face, that seemed now paler than ever. “Affie, are you alright?”

His son said nothing, but he brought his hand forward and John held his breath as he saw the blood streaked over his palm. That did not bode well at all.

--

Windsor Castle, England. 2nd of June, 1554.​

The world was covered in black cloth, a cloud of grief hanging all around them. The walls, the horses, the people, all seemed shrouded in dark mourning garbs, their faces twisted in expressions of mourning and sadness. Some thought they could taste grief itself in their mouths as the court moved to a more secluded castle, where the young Duke of York would be buried with his grandparents. Government was held away as the King grieved for his child, all talks of sending young Princess Katherine early for her marriage snuffed out like a candle. She was the chief mourner for her little brother, and her father could not possibly spare her now.

The Queen looked miserable in her dark attire, her face veiled but the visage of utter heartbreak visible on the pale skin that stood out beneath the dark fabric. She moved slowly down the aisle that led to the chapel, trembling, her husband beside her as they both walked to their son’s body, lying in state. She was as small as their daughters next to him, holding tightly to his arm, as if she would fall without him by her side.

The King was silent, his face an unreadable mask, but his eyes were glossy as he stood firm for his wife and surviving children, looking down at his second son who had been taken from them all much too early. He had only been eight, he had yet to truly live beyond playing with boys his age and attending his lessons.

The physicians said consumption, a tragically common disease, but there were some who whispered of poison. The Duke of York was rather healthy, much like his siblings, and never had much of a sniffle before his final illness. The Howards influence had only grown with each child born from the King and Queen’s marriage, and the King was endlessly considerate of his wife’s kin, some would say to a fault. There were families that could easily be accused of jealousy, when they were treated as an afterthought. Older families, and prouder by half.

But if any son of the King’s seed ought to be killed to curb Howard’s influence, then it should be Prince William, should it not? He was heir to the throne, raised under the guardianship of Charlie Howard, the King’s closest friend and the boy’s own uncle. Alfred Tudor was kept much closer at home, surrounded by other boys and raised by a Courtenay, cousin to the king through Catherine of York. He could be the hope of a non-Howard king.

Others whispered of a curse. All dukes of York so far, born of the most recent kings, had either died without heirs, or ascended to the throne. First was young Richard of Shrewsbury, then Henry who ascended to the throne, and now… Was the title as cursed as the old Plantagenets? Perhaps that was why young Henry, now second in line to the throne, would not inherit his brother’s honours, but remain as Duke of Somerset until his own time came, hopefully after fathering many healthy sons.

Whispers ran that the King considered doing away with the title of Duke of York altogether, or conflating it with another title to see the lands managed under a new honour. But such a decision would belong to Prince William, when the time came for him to be king and to have a second son of his blood.

The Queen stopped before the corpse of her second son. She was only thirty, the veil covering her face as her expression crumbled, watching the waxy mask that now covered young Alfred’s features.

“My boy!”

A sound ripped through the air, like fabric tearing harshly at its seams, and the Queen’s sobs filled the chapel as she fell, hugging the limp body of her son and wailing mournfully. The King fell to his knees beside her, pulling her off of the boy and into his arms, clasping her hands in his.

“We must pray for his soul now, Kitty. He sits at God’s right hand and is surely full of joy. We must pray for him so that he may know we carry him in our hearts.” He petted her hair and tried to console her. “He is with my father and mother now. He is among our lost kin. He will be there waiting for us when our own time comes to pass.” He kissed the side of her face. “I need you, Kitty.”

The Queen’s shuddering sobs slowed and she flung herself into an embrace with her husband, clinging to him tightly. She trembled and regained her footing, holding close to the King and resting her head against his chest as the funerary Mass marched on. All she could do was silently pray that God would spare her other children.

 

[pandizzy]

Wawel Royal Castle, Poland. 10th of June, 1554.​

Zygmunt August glared down at the parchment in his hands, rereading it as if to verify before flinging it away in disgust. “A delay. A delay. The nerve of these Englishmen to suggest such a thing! I ought to summon that fat fool and tell him his king will have to search elsewhere for a bridegroom, for I will have none of that girl!”

Marguerite frowned at her husband’s outburst, quietly eating her supper and doing her best to ignore the man she so loathed. “It is an affront to all courtesy. Refusing to send over a child after her mother suffers such a loss,” she spoke dryly, not turning to address the King.

“Your father was hardly cold in his grave when we married and your brother had no qualms about sending you to me,” he hissed. “Not that I would have minded a delay to the scourge of your presence.”

“Your Majesty has had too much to drink, and I would remind you that my noble father was not yet dead when he sent me to marry the miserable excuse for a man sitting before me.” She eyed him with disgust and turned away, as if unable to stomach looking at him for another moment. “If he had been, he would turn in his grave to see me suffer with a fool who refuses to give me a child and flaunts his whores before my own eyes.”

“No child would survive in the hostile environment that is your womb,”

“As if your seed is potent enough to create a healthy child. That boy the pitiful Austrian mouse gave you must have been nothing short of a divine intervention to preserve the Jagiellon line.”

"Speak not of Liesl," Zygmunt said in a low tone. "My dear late wife is no subject to be soiled by your foul tongue." Marguerite rolled her eyes, shaking her head.

"You mean the sickly girl you neglected until your mother and mistress snuffed her out?" Marguerite asked, clearly believing the story that Elisabeth of Austria had been poisoned.

“Rumours and calumnies, little more than whispers,” Zygmunt snarled, sipping the last of his wine and snarling into the cup. “Barbora would never, she understood the value of my alliance with Austria. Damn boy, fetch me more!”

“The bottle is empty, sire.” The young cupbearer stammered, a mere boy sent to serve the King by some noble family or another.

“Empty? Empty?! Well go and get more! The King of Poland demands it!” His voice was practically a roar and the boy quickly darted off.

“You frightened an innocent child for nothing, you fool. And if you are so offended by the English, might I offer another bride for Staśko?” Marguerite offered, taking the opportunity to press an idea that had gnawed at her. “My niece, Claude d’Orléans, is of appropriate age and from a noble family. She has connections to Lorraine and France.”

Zygmunt chuckled, a hard cold sound as he looked across the table at his wife. “I would sooner face a thousand men by myself than see my son marry so beneath him. The heir to the Polish throne married to a mere duke’s child. To think such a match would be appropriate, you are much too ambitious, wife.”

The boy returned with a bottle and Zygmunt grabbed it, opening it himself and pouring heavily into his cup. “A toast to the English princess who will be marrying my son. May she be as good to him as his mother was to me, and may she live a long healthy life.”

The wine spilled red down his chin as he drank clumsily, staining the front of his clothes. Marguerite grimaced and eyed the bottle. “Boy, you made a mistake. That was a bottle sent to me earlier this very week as a gift. It is not from the king’s stor—”

The boy and Marguerite both started at an ugly gurgling sound, a sputtering gasp as Zygmunt clutched at his throat, coughing as his eyes bulged from his head.

“The King… the King has been poisoned! Quick, fetch someone! Anyone!” Marguerite ran to her husband, who stumbled out of his chair and onto the floor, spitting up deep scarlet wine onto the cold stone. His whole body shuddered with a rattling gasp and all at once, he fell into the mess.

His body went limp, like a painted marionette whose strings were cut, and Marguerite already knew it was too late.

---

Vienna, Austria. 17th of June, 1554.​

“There you are,” Juanita said as she entered the unused room, the back of her eight-year-old daughter turned to her. Her blonde hair was bound under a tight white bonnet, wearing the simple blue gown accepted by the informal household of the Archduke of Austria and she didn’t turn to look at her mother, merely staring up at a portrait hanging high on the wall. “Anna?”

“Is this her?” her child asked. Juanita approached her, placing a pale hand over her narrow shoulders and she turned to look at the portrait, even though she knew well which one it was. The portrait of the deceased Empress, her dark hair and eyes familiar even nearly twenty years after her death. Her father had been displeased by the shape of her nose and Juanita bought it from him, as she thought the expression of the figure to be similar to her mother’s, as far as she could remember.

But she still looked at her child. “Is it whom, my love?”

“My grandmother,” Anna responded. “The one I was named after.” Although both of their mothers were named Anne, or variations of it, Juanita had never hidden the fact that her eldest child was named after her own mother first. She had carried the child in her womb for months, had made her out of her own blood, sweat and tears. Juanita always thought that their children’s names were her decision, not Max’s and he agreed with her.

“It is,” Juanita said. She stroked the back of Anna’s head, careful not to jostle her headdress. “Why are you curious?”

Anna shrugged. “I think she’s pretty,” she murmured. She turned to look at her mother, with wide blue eyes, and her father’s nose. “How old were you when she died?”

“I was nine,” said Juanita. “Not much older than you are now.”

“That’s upsetting.” Anna scrunched up her nose and her eyes were shiny as she looked at her mother. “What was she like?”

Juanita smiled sadly. “She was incredible,” said the junior Queen of Hungary. “Proud. Bold. She knew her worth and never accepted anything less.”

“How did she marry my grandfather?” Anna asked. “I know they were not betrothed like me and Uncle Karl are.”

Juanita took her child’s hand. “Come, my daughter, and I shall tell you the story of an Emperor and a knight’s daughter, and how they fell in love.”

 

[pandizzy]

Madrid, Castile. 7th of August, 1554.​

The air was heavy with meaning, wide eyes flying all around the room. The figure laying down took deep and shuddering breaths, weaker and weaker by the passing seconds. The young servant cleaning her sweaty brow with a wet cloth moved away quickly, dismissed by a flick of the Princess' wrist.

Joana sat by her grandmother's bed, tall and dark-haired, thirty-two years of age. She leaned in closer to look at her face, her husband and cousin standing just behind her. Felipe placed a hand over Joana's shoulder, she who had been named after the royal lady who brought the Habsburgs to Iberia and mothered the greatest line in the world and sighed.

The Queen was seventy-four and had suffered more than any other woman in the land. For her great love, and loyalty towards her husband, she was called mad and locked away from the world. She opened her blue eyes weakly, looking around herself for a brief moment and Joana placed a hand over her fragile wrist, the bones threatening to poke out of her skin.

“Are you in pain?” asked the granddaughter dutifully. “Thirsty?”

The Queen shook her head. “I see no reason to delay that which is already coming,” she said in a raspy voice. “Death comes to me and I do not intend to fight it."

"Don't be silly," said Joana even as Fernando stepped forward, ready to perform the final rites for Her Majesty. "Grandmother, I beg you."

"Don't beg, child," said Juana de Castilla. "What I long for is no more days of suffering in this prison, but for my husband, who awaits me.” She closed her eyes again and gulped, surrounded by her grandchildren. Joana, Felipe, Fernando. And the news of others who shared her blood.

Charles, recently arrived in the Low Countries to see his grandchildren and visit his son's grave. Stanisław, the new King of Poland. Her son Ferdinand had recently sent a letter and a gift, while her grandchildren Afonso and Catalina grieved for their son Paulo and infant daughter Teresa, both taken by the flu. Isabel had recovered from her daughter's birth. Juanita was expecting again. Infanta Luisa had left to meet Paolo Sforza, her distant cousin and the Duke of Milan for her marriage. News, all around her. Life, passing by. The people moving on.

“Oh if only my dear Philip could see you, sweet boy. He would have liked your mother, and he would have loved you very dearly, I know it to be so. You will do great things when you bear the crowns of my father and mother, I know you will.” Her eyes were tired but still so very bright, as if she were still the sixteen-year-old girl who travelled to Flanders in her heart.

Felipe knelt beside his grandmother, his eyes filling with tears. He took her hand and watched her tired, and wrinkly face. “There is medicine,” he whispered. “For your pain.” His grandmother shook her head again. “Life has already been unkind to you. I'd not have your death be the same."

"I'm not in pain," Juana murmured. "All my suffering is the Lord's will, my boy. I can't do anything about it." She closed her eyes again. "I have lost a mother, a husband, a father. Sisters, a brother. I've lost daughters, grandchildren and more. It is only right for my time to come as well."

"And what of us?" Felipe asked. "Those you leave behind?"

"It's only natural for a grandson to outlive his grandmother," she said. "For nearly fifty years, I've been locked away from the world. I'm only a memory. The last living thing from Queen Isabella's days. It is my time.”

Felipe said nothing, even as the tears slid down his cheeks. His children, or the ones that remained in Castile, had wished to be with them at that moment, but he refused. It would be too much pain for such young minds and even then, he thought he ought to have stayed away, and not suffered through the wait.

Fernando stepped forward. “Abuela,” he said, “I’d hear your confession now.” He was wearing his scarlet robes, blonde hair slipping past his cardinal’s cap, but he looked more like a child than a holy brother. Scared and still clinging to their mother’s skirts.

“I have no regrets,” the Queen said. “I have been the only way I knew how. I’ve lived a life. I have loved and I have lost. I owe the Lord no explanation for my actions, save that I’ve atoned already for all that I’ve done.”

It was not a confession, not in the way one ought to speak, but Fernando said nothing. He merely crossed himself and said, “May our Lord Jesus Christ absolve you; and I, by His authority, absolve you from every bond of excommunication and interdict, in as much as I am able and you require. Thereupon, I absolve you from your sins in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit. Amen.”

“Amen,” said Joana and Felipe together, crossing themselves.

As if waiting for her absolution, the Queen looked at her grandchildren with a smile. A final wheeze left her body, and she went still. Felipe felt a sob torn out of his throat and Joana clutched his hand, crying bitter tears.

"The Queen is dead," Fernando said, tears sliding down his cheek as he closed their grandmother's eyes. "And our father is now the sole ruler of Spain."

 

[pandizzy]

Castello Sforzesco, Milan. 28th of August, 1554.​

Caterina de’ Medici watched the mournful procession of men in the Emperor’s livery, the great carriages swathed in black bearing mournful ladies-in-waiting. Servants with downcast eyes. It almost made her want to roll her eyes. The Mad Queen of Castile and Aragon was dead, finally mouldering alongside the husband she faithfully clung to decades beyond his death.

She grimaced to think that the woman's great-grandchild would rule alongside her precious Paolo, as much as she did when she was forced to recall her own husband was the madwoman’s grandson. It mattered little though. Paolo was a Medici in all but name, the blood of Lorenzo the Magnificent, and he would do great things for Milan.

She looked at him and smiled, her son, a man grown at sixteen and handsome as his father had been, with eyes as dark as onyx and hair to match. He was tall and proud, looking even older for the dark mourning clothes he wore and the fledgling beard on his slightly protruding chin. It was a strong chin for a strong man.

A gilded carriage came to a halt in the courtyard before all of them, and the very air stood still as Luisa de Austria stepped out.

Caterina sniffed slightly, appraising the girl. She was a small thing. Delicate, and shorter even than Caterina herself. Pale, but not worryingly so. Her face was long, her hair a light ruddy brown that fell as straight as a pin down her shoulders and back. Her eyes were blue, a deep blue to match the sky above them, and Caterina felt her back stiffen as she noticed they held Paolo’s gaze.

The girl carefully bowed in time with the Milanese court, and Paolo stepped down from Caterina’s side to take the hand of his intended, pressing a kiss to the delicate fingers as he quietly bid her welcome. They talked in intimate whispers, and Caterina remembered the hundreds of letters sent back and forth between the two over the years past.

The girl was only fourteen and had already entranced Paolo from afar. She smiled at him, soft and sweet, her eyes hooking him in deeper still. Paolo leaned down, as if desperate to be closer to her, to hold her in his embrace. Caterina was suddenly thankful for her son’s insistence on observing mourning. The wedding had been delayed by a month. She could still recover.

The girl held his arm, confident as Paolo led her back up the steps and stopped before her. “Luisa, it is so wonderful to finally introduce you to my mother, Caterina de’ Medici, Dowager Duchess of Milan.”

The girl looked at Caterina and smiled graciously. Caterina smiled in turn, careful with so many eyes upon her. She gently pried the girl off of Paolo’s arm and took her on her own, her fingers digging into the little mouse’s wrist. She hoped it might break.

“Be welcome. I’m certain you will bring much joy to this court, once we have observed the proper mourning for the great Queen of Castile and Aragon.” She leaned in, so that only the girl might hear her. “Please, do not hesitate to come to me if you find anything not to your satisfaction.”

“You are too kind, mother.” The little archduchess grimaced slightly and Caterina released her grip, smiling amiably.

“You needn’t call me that, dear girl. Donna Caterina will do nicely.”

--

Vienna, Austria. 30th of August, 1554.​

Juanita raised her head as the door opened behind her, quick and familiar steps entering her room. She looked at her altar and crossed herself, careful to stand up with her belly pending forward. She was to give birth only in January, but Juanita found herself easily gaining weight with each successive pregnancy, especially after the twins and this one was no different.

Max approached her carefully. “You’re still awake?” he asked her. “In your condition, I thought it best to rest as often as possible.”

“I can’t sleep,” Juanita admitted. She looked at her husband and cousin and he walked to her, extending a hand forward to caress her belly. She smiled sadly and the child kicked him, though it was too weak for him to feel. Unlike her, who could recognize the signs of movement of the baby inside her. “I keep thinking of our poor and dear grandmother.”

“What happened to her will not happen to you,” said Max. “You’re not mad.”

Juanita shook her head. “She was never mad, but misunderstood.” She remembered well the visits that her mother arranged for them to see their grandmother. She liked to play with them, and see that they were studying well, that they were healthy. She loved them. “They locked her away from the world so as to steal her throne.” Her face crumbled. “She was a king’s daughter, a king’s wife, a king’s mother.”

“Juana.” Max cupped her face. “The tragedies of our ancestors are not ours to pay for.”

“She is dead,” Juanita murmured, tears flowing down her eyes. “Mi abuela.” Her husband embraced her then, kissing the side of her face and Juanita allowed herself to be weak. To cry on his shoulder as she thought about her poor grandmother. When she felt calm again, she looked at Max, who was stroking her face gently. “Our grandmother… She suffered more than most women.”

“It was because of her father,” said Max. “He couldn’t handle the loss of Castile and committed a great crime towards his own flesh and blood, but he is gone. Dead.”

“I suppose that is a poor comfort,” she said. “Promise me something, my love.” She gripped the collar of his shirt, pulling him close and he nodded earnestly. “No matter what, if you outlive me or not, you won’t treat our daughters the same way. Even if they are mad, even if they are insane.”

“I promise,” he said. He kissed her then. “I promise, I promise to all the saints. I promise on the Virgin herself.”

Juanita nodded, believing him. “There is another thing,” she murmured. “Not just my fear for our girls, but a fear for ourselves.”

“What is it?” Max asked. “Tell me, and allow me to assuage your fears.”

“Our grandmother’s death may change everything between the family’s branches,” said Juanita. “Our fathers have barely spoken since the damned inheritance problems. I wonder… will their mother’s death bring them closer? Or tear them apart once and for all?”

Max said nothing and that was how Juanita knew he didn’t know either.

 

[pandizzy]

Flanders, Low Countries. 2nd of September, 1554.​

“It’s a good likeness,” Anne declared behind him, a hand on his shoulder. “Is it not?”

Charles stared at the large painting before him, taller than him and wider than life. It was his family, at least himself, Anne and their children. All of his children painted according to other miniatures and sketches made by Titian, since the Dutch painter had never met Felipe, Catalina, Margarita or María. Or even Anne herself, but Charles twisted his lips, displeased.

“There is something wrong,” he said. “Eduardo’s hair was darker than that, I’m certain.” He pointed at the black strands painted on his youngest son's likeness, the boy painted at the same age he died.

“I think it’s correct,” Anne said. “There is no darker paint, my love. And it’s been nine years since Eduardo came to me. Your memory may be failing.”

“No,” said Charles. “Never.” He couldn’t admit the possibility of forgetting his son’s hair colour, or even anything about it. “The painter is wrong, I’m sure of it.”

“My love, the painting is not the problem,” Anne said. She stroked the back of his head and he turned to look at her face, which remained just as young and healthy as he remembered. “Why do you surround yourself with these paintings? Of myself, of our lost children. And these clocks…” She pointed at all of the clocks that surrounded him, perhaps two dozen of them. Ticking and moving towards an end. “Why do you do this?”

“It’s time,” he murmured. “What I have been waiting for for years has happened. My mother is dead and I may finally rest. To seclude myself away from all the politics and gossip that have plagued me for over thirty years.”

Anne smiled sadly, knowing well that he wouldn’t risk his immortal soul by ending his life earlier. “Once, you told me you’d never abdicate,” she said. “You told me God trusted you to inherit your grandparents’ dominions and rule them until the day of your death.”

“That was before,” said Charles. “Before your death.”

“My death should not signify your end,” she murmured. “I may be dead, but I’m at peace.”

“And that is what I want too,” he said. “Peace under the Spanish sun.” He shook his head. “When our son Juan came of age, I gave him the rules over the Low Countries, then inherited by his son, Archduke Philippe. Now it is time for the Empire and Spain to be given over to their respective heirs as well.”

“Why?” Anne asked. Charles grasped her hands, which were cold, but still soft.

“You were an Empress, my empress,” he said. “The Queen of Queens.” Her black eyes pulled him in, like dark hooks for his soul. Charles could see his own face reflected in her pupils. “Why should I enjoy the honours and riches of the Empire while you’re cold and rotting in your grave?”

“What is this guilt?” she asked. “All this time, all these years and you still blame yourself for my death? For María and Eduardo? Margarita and Juan?”

“It is my fault,” he said. “Margarita and Juan inherited their sickness from me.” Tears burned in his eyes. “María was too weak to be married and Eduardo… If I had paid more attention to him, if I had been a better father, he would still be here.” His son had asked him to come with him, for the two to ride together after the snow fell. But Charles refused. He was too busy and now his son was dead, and he was still alive. “I failed them, just as I failed you.”

“Is that really what you think?” she asked. “We lived the lives God intended for us. It’s no one’s fault and especially not yours.” She smiled, the same gentle smile that he would kill to see again.

“Your kind heart forbids you from seeing the truth,” he said.

Anne looked at him, really looked at him. “If this is your penance, then do so,” she said. “Abdicate and live out the rest of your days in peace, until the time comes for you to be with me.” Her smile grew brighter. “I’m waiting for you.”

---

Madrid, Castile. 10th of September, 1554.​

Felipe held the paper in his hands, his heart racing deep in his chest. Joana stood beside him, reading in tandem with him, reaching the same conclusion as he did. The idea that this couldn’t be possible and yet, with the flick of a quill, his father had done it. He had transformed everything.

“Can he do this?” Joana asked him. “Abdicate Naples and Sicily like that?” Felipe looked at his wife.

“He can and he did,” he said. “Naples is a papal fiefdom and since the sack, the Pope has done everything my father wished.” He shook his head. “But this means something. My father is proud, he wouldn’t abdicate such a foothold in Italy without a reason.”

“He abdicated the Low Countries and Burgundy for your brother,” Joana said.

“That was different,” said Felipe. “My brother gained the rule as soon as he came of age. Such as it was with me and the regency.” The first regency, that was. After that, it took years for Felipe to gain his father’s trust again. His young self sometimes surprised him with his own stupidity, even if he had intended well. Though María still died and his father still trusted Tavera with the regency. “I’m thirty-one. Why does he make me a king now?”

“Does it matter?” Joana asked. “You’re a king. Let us travel to Naples and see Carlos installed as Duke of Calabria.” Their son was now first in line to Naples and Sicily, his heir apparent where no one save the Lord could see him removed.

“I can’t,” said Felipe, gesturing to the end of the letter, where his father wrote, It is my command to convoke you on the 25th day of the month of October of this year of the Lord, not giving you the option to refuse or postpone the fulfilment of this will which is an order. On this day, I expect all of you without fail, here by my side. “It is for Fernando and I, surely.”

“What does he want?” Joana asked.

“How could I know?” said Felipe. “What matters is that you will stay here. I’ll give you the regency and command of the country until my return.” He looked away, wondering what his father could possibly want now.

 

[pandizzy]

Prinsenhof, Low Countries. 25th of October, 1554.​

Felipe approached his aunt as soon as he saw her, bowing his head to a woman of great age and respect. She offered him her hand and he took it, pressing a small kiss to her knuckles as he raised himself to look in her eyes. Catalina of Austria was a tiny and fat woman, with a fleshy neck but kind eyes who looked at him motherly.

“Dearest aunt,” said Felipe, “How is my child? How is my Infanta Luisa?”

His aunt smiled. “Well,” she said. “The damned woman that married my poor son did me the honour of inviting me to the wedding. Luisa looked beautiful and very happy.” Felipe nodded.

“My only hope is that she will enjoy the same love and satisfaction that you and I have enjoyed in our own marriages,” he said. His aunt nodded, clutching a medal in her chest that he imagined held a portrait of her deceased husband. “I hear your grandson Philipp von Wittelsbach has finally married my cousin, Archduchess Barbara.”

“He has,” said the Dowager Duchess of Milan. “I intend to visit them in the Palatine both once my business with your father is done.” She cupped his face. “You look well, my boy. It has been so long since I last saw you.” His aunt married soon after his birth, once the arrival of a male heir secured his father in his Castilian throne. “After my marriage, I thought I’d never see another Habsburg again.”

Felipe smiled, though he said nothing because at that moment, the herald struck his staff against the floor and shouted, “Their Royal Highnesses, Maximilian and Juana of Austria.” He turned and looked at the faces that he had not seen in years. His little sister, miniscule next to her muscled husband, swollen with another pregnancy. His cousin, wearing a large feathered hat and a serious expression on his face.

“What are they doing here?” his aunt asked behind him. “I thought that after the war, surely…”

“Look around, tía,” said Felipe. “All of the estates are represented.” He sighed. “Even Saxony has sent an ambassador. And the Dowager Duchess of Burgundy.” He looked at the man, wearing the Duchess’ colours. She couldn’t bother to come meet with his dying father. Or to allow her son to see his grandfather a final time.

“Surely, you don’t mean to say what I think,” said his aunt. “Charles would never…” He didn’t respond to her. Instead, Felipe walked to greet his sister, who was whispering something in German to her husband. Fernando had already gone to speak with them and his sister embraced their little brother, her eyes closed when he stopped before them.

“Sister,” said Felipe. He looked at Maximilian. “Cousin.”

“Felipe,” Juanita said. “It’s great to see you again.” She didn’t move to embrace him though and Felipe understood that the strains of his father’s actions still hung between them. He sighed, eyes moving down to her large belly and attempted a smile.

“I’m happy to see you, Juana,” he said. “And to see so much of you.”

Juanita smiled, running a hand down her stomach. “Children are a continuous blessing, though I would have liked for Father to have waited for me to give birth before he summoned us here.”

“An emperor doesn’t wait,” said Fernando. “I’m certain that all of our questions will be answered.”

Before Felipe could speak, the herald banged his staff against the floor again, and the sound of trumpets echoed in the room, indicating a royal arrival. Having been standing in the corridor, they entered the great hall, large enough to hold all of the two hundred or so people who were present. Minor lords, members of minor branches of ruling families. He could see even a man with reddish-brown hair sporting the Württemberg coat of arms that could be no one except his cousin, the Duke himself.

His father entered the room from a side entrance, limping heavily on his cane. As he passed, the people bowed deeply for their Emperor and Felipe saw, from the corner of his eye, as his aunt stopped beside him. He was standing before the throne as his father sat down, tired and old, sickly, and he couldn’t stop the racing of his own heart, mind wondering what was happening even though he already knew.

“I’d like to say some things first,” said the Emperor. His trembling hands opened a folded piece of paper and Felipe could see how weak his father was, how tired. “A short time ago, in Castile, my mother died, who, too long ago, gave birth to me between these walls.” He stopped and looked around himself. Charles felt his own heart race as he wondered about the young woman of just twenty who brought him to the world inside a privy. “Her sacrifice allowed me to govern these lands at the age of seventeen. Then, and being still a youngster, I was called upon to rule the Empire of my grandfather, at the same time as I ruled Naples, Sicily and the Spanish kingdoms, as well as the oversea lands.”

The room was entirely silent save for his words, all eyes turned to him. Charles looked at his family. His sister, his son, his daughter and his nephew. The only ones that he trusted to make the journey. Isabel and Catalina belonged to their husbands. Juanita was clutching Maximilian’s arm, her eyes as wide as saucers.

“I sought the imperial crown not in order to rule over a multitude of kingdoms but merely to ensure the welfare and prosperity of the country and my other kingdoms, and to preserve peace and concord in the whole of Christendom.” He hesitated, the weight of so many years giving him fatigue and pain. “To this purpose have I made many arduous journeys and have been compelled to wage many wars, but never wantonly, always very much against my own will. I had great hopes. Only few have been fulfilled and few have remained to me, and at the cost of what travails! This has made me sick and weary. I must for my part confess that I have often misled myself, either from youthful inexperience, from the pride of mature years, or from some other weakness of human nature..” He looked up again. “My life has been one long journey.”

He looked at Felipe. His son. His poor son. He remembered still the day they placed in his arms for the first time, that happy day where he declared that his son would bear the name of his grandfather.

Charles returned his eyes to his papers, continuing to read the speech he prepared. “A journey which has not only consumed this body of mine, but also took me away often from my most beloved companies.” He looked at Felipe. “Of my children.” He looked at Juanita, who had tears running down her cheeks. “Of my wife, to whom I would have liked to give all of my days.”

He looked at Maximilian, the nephew he didn’t know and barely trusted. “I have battled, often obligated, to defend myself from the ambitions of others, and from those whom I thought to be my only enemy, the Turks.” He looked at Catalina, his little sister. The sister he only met when he was seventeen. “And from that punishment-made king that was Francis of France to me.” He thought of Elisabeth, dead from puerperal fever, who would have lived if he hadn’t married her to the French king. The sister who died hating him. “Besides I had to fight against the outbreak of heresy in the very empire I was trusted to protect, and lived to see the Protestants and Catholics brought closer together. But none of these labours have ached as much as what is now to be my final farewell.”

Those present looked at each other, confused and afraid. Charles paused for a moment before he continued, “I no longer have the strength to rule these lands that God has entrusted me with. And the little I have left will soon run out.” He looked down at his paper. “Being so tired now, I cannot do to you any service that those who receive my legacy will do on their own.” He looked up. “To Felipe, my firstborn son, I give the Spanish kingdoms, the Italian lands and the Indies. To my grandson Philippe, as was decided in its day, I bequeath the Low Countries and Burgundy, now converted to the rank of the Kingdom of Burgundy, to rule it as ably as his father would have done.” His heart ached as the image of Juan as he was came to his mind. A happy boy, who was studious and gentle. “And the Empire…” He looked at Juanita and Maximilian. “The Empire will remain in the hands of my brother Ferdinand, whom I wished had come here so I could look in his eyes as I give it to him, were it not for the strains that brotherly relations have over the years.”

Maximilian opened and closed his mouth, knowing that it was not yet the moment to speak.

“I know he will govern it with the same brightness which he has ruled with for the past thirty years, with the happiness of having, in my son, as his most trusted ally,” Charles continued. “Although there are many enemies, the power of that union alone will defeat them, as I know well. I nonetheless declare to you that I never knowingly or willingly acted unjustly. If actions of this kind are nevertheless justly laid to my account, I formally assure you now that I did them unknowingly and against my own intention. I therefore beg those present today, whom I have offended in this respect, together with those who are absent, to forgive me.” He looked up again. “Soon I will leave for Spain and never come back. Stay faithful to God, children, for in my heart, you will all remain safe and sane.”

Juanita burst into tears, clutching her husband’s hand. Fernando placed a hand over his sister’s shoulders, his own cheeks wet with sadness. Charles stood up and the people bowed to him one final time. The man that walked out of the room was limping on a cane, dressed in simple black clothes with white hair and a face covered in wrinkles. He did not look like an emperor, because he wasn’t one.

Not anymore.

 

[pandizzy]

Charles of Austria died on 21 September 1557 at the age of fifty-seven. Though he had suffered through years of ill health due to gout and other afflictions, his death came to be because of a bout of malaria at the Monastery of Yuste in Extremadura, where he retired after his abdications. Following his death, there were a plethora of commemorations in his empire, including in Mexico and Peru. Some 30,000 masses were arranged for the soul of the emperor and some 30,000 gold ducats that he had set aside for the ransom of prisoners, poor virgins, and paupers were distributed, but he owed huge debts from his constant warfare far beyond the funds on hand, which his son, Felipe the Rich, mostly paid off in the first decade of his reign.

He was originally buried in the chapel at the Monastery, until his son had him moved to the royal chapel in the Alhambra, as it was Charles’ desire to be buried next to his wife and daughter, Infanta María. At his death, seven of his thirteen children were still alive, five of those born to his marriage to Anne Boleyn. He had thirty-six living grandchildren, two of them illegitimate, and two great-grandchildren. Of his illegitimate children, only one, Margherita di Parma, had living children at the time of his death, a son named Alessandro whom she sent to Spain to be educated by his uncle, King Felipe II.

Emperor Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire (February 1500-) m. Anne Boleyn (1503-May 1536)

1. Felipe, Prince of Asturias (April 1523-) m. Infanta Joana of Portugal (1520-);
   1. Ana de Austria (February 1538 -) b. Philippe d'Autriche, Duke of Burgundy (December 1543-);
   2. Luisa de Austria (January 1540-) M. Paolo Sforza (March 1538- );
      1. Francesco Sforza (May 1557-)
   3. Fernanda de Austria (March 1541-) b. Ferdinánd von Österreich (June 1544-);
   4. Carlos de Austria (June 1543-) b. Isabella Tudor (June 1544-);
   5. Elena de Austria (August 1545-).
2. María of Austria (April 1524-March 1542) m. Afonso, Prince of Portugal (August 1522-);
   1. Jorge de Portugal (April 1540-) m. Anna von Kleve (1540-)
      1. Afonso de Portugal (January 1557-)
   2. António de Portugal (March 1542-) b. Johanna of Bavaria (February 1545-)
3. Juan, Duke of Burgundy (January 1526-May 1552) m. Elizabeth of England (June 1527-);
   1. Philippe d'Autriche, Count of Charolais (December 1543-);
   2. Jean d'Autriche (January 1545-) b. Isabella d'Este ;
   3. Anne Élisabeth d'Autriche (November 1545-) b. Wilhelm von Wittelsbach (1543-);
   4. Marie d'Autriche (January 1547-) b. François de Lorraine (January 1547-);
   5. Marguerite d'Autriche (April 1548-April 1548);
   6. Henri d'Autriche (April 1549-) b. Maria Elisabeth von Wettin (January 1553-);
   7. Christine d'Autriche (April 1550-) b. Filips Willem van Oranje (November 1552-);
   8. Charles d'Autriche (August 1551-). Entrusted to a monastery;
4. Juana of Austria (December 1526-) m. Maximilian of Austria (July 1526-);
   1. Ferdinánd von Österreich (June 1544-);
   2. Anna von Österreich (January 1546-) b. Karl of Austria (June 1540-);
   3. Mária von Österreich (October 1547-) A novice in a convent.;
   4. Tamás von Österreich (September 1548 -) b. Margaret Stewart (June 1549-);
   5. Erzsébet von Österreich (January 1550-) b. Johann Georg von Wettin (May 1548- );
   6. Matyas von Österreich (February 1551-). Twin to Lajos.
   7. Lajos von Österreich (February 1551-). Twin to Matyas;
   8. Margit von Österreich (August 1553-). A novice in a convent;
   9. Eleonóra von Österreich (January 1555-September 1555). Died a sickly infant;
   10. Károly von Österreich (September 1556-)
5. Margarita of Austria (March 1529-April 1552) m. Emmanuel Philibert (July 1528 -);
   1. Carl dë Savian (March 1546-) b. Claude de Orléans (August 1545-);
   2. Emanuel dë Savian (July 1548- );
   3. Ana Beatris dë Savian (May 1551-).
6. Catalina of Austria (November 1531-) m. Afonso V of Portugal (August 1522-);
   1. Ana Leonor de Portugal (February 1547-) b. Andrew, Duke of Rothesay (November 1547-)
   2. Maria de Portugal (September 1548 -);
   3. Diogo de Portugal (October 1549-);
   4. Paulo de Portugal (January 1551-August 1554). Died of the flu;
   5. Teresa de Portugal (January 1554-August 1554). Died of the flu;
   6. Pedro de Portugal (July 1555-);
   7. Catarina de Portugal (September 1556-February 1557). Died a sickly infant;
7. Cardinal Fernando of Austria (August 1533-);
   1. Juana de Austria (October 1550-). Illegitimate.
   2. Carlota de Austria (January 1553-). Illegitimate.
   3. Unnamed daughter. Lived for only a few hours.
8. Eduardo of Austria (July 1534-November 1545);
9. Isabel of Austria (May 1536-) b. Francoys, Dauphin of France (June 1534-);
   1. Louis-Charles, Count of Montfort (May 1552-)
   2. Anne de Valois (April 1554-)
   3. Marie Louise de Valois (June 1556-)

At the time of his father’s death, Felipe II already ruled the Spanish dominions for nigh on three years. Considered one of the greatest monarchs Spain ever had, he ruled for nearly forty years, dying in June of 1593 at the age of seventy. The king initiated the Spanish Golden Age (1560-1640), reformed the tributary system and finished the conquest of the Inca Empire, started during the reign of his father. He was especially keen on fixing the mistakes of his predecessors, such as working to end the Inquisition and bring the Jewish people back to Iberia, although he encountered many difficulties in that end. The king’s religious tolerance was attributed to his mother, who was known to have Protestant leanings and his granddaughter Maria’s marriage to the Lutheran King of Denmark, Christian III Augustus was considered to be his final achievement.

However, his life-long dream of formally uniting the Spanish kingdoms was only achieved fifty years after his death, by his grandson Philip III. By his death, however, the population in Castile had doubled, and Aragon enjoyed a period of great prosperity. Addled by age and illness, Felipe died in the arms of his son, Carlos, who became Charles II of Spain upon his death. Since then, the kings of Spain have alternated the names of Philip and Charles through each generation, ending in the current king, Philip VIII (1997-).

Although this tradition might have come to an end with the death of the Prince of Asturias, Carlos, who died in a car accident in 2013. His younger brother, Fernando, is now first in line to the throne, though he doesn’t use the title Prince of Asturias in respect to his brother.

King Philip VIII and Queen Maddalena​

King Felipe II was buried at El Escorial, the first monarch to be buried at the now-traditional Monastery. A year after his death, his son Charles II had his mother’s coffin, who predeceased her husband by five years, moved to lay next to Felipe. He often honoured his parents, and held yearly masses for their souls.

He was, however, a poor king when compared to his father, save for the fact that he continued many of his father’s programs. His war with France (1612-1615) was ruinous and ended with the marriage of his grandson, Carlos (1585), with Nicole de Lorraine, as a French proxy after this death as the king had died of a stroke after hearing about the Aragonese Invasion (1614). The reign of his son was much more successful and brought twenty years of peace to the Spanish empire.

Nicole de Lorraine, Queen of Spain.​

King Philip II, much like his successors, remained loyal to the Habsburg family, and often assisted his nephew, King Philip I of Burgundy, in his military disappointments. Two of his daughters married their cousins, Anne and Ferdinanda, and he was known to cherish his grandchildren through them, often sending letters and presents through his ambassadors. The three courts remained allied throughout the centuries-long Habsburg, a triarchy that was only broken when a branch of the Wittelsbachs came to rule Burgundy in the XVIII century. Even then, the Austrian and Spanish branches of the family continued to be friendly up until the War of Dukes (1894) ended the Austrian monarchy.

Many marriages were arranged, though, following the demands by King Charles II, brides for Princes of Asturias were carefully selected to lessen the effects of inbreeding, common in the royal houses of Europe. The Spanish throne is currently held by King Philip VIII of the House of Galicia-Habsburg-Cantabria, a male-line branch of the Habsburg dynasty. He is a direct descendant of King Philip II through three of his children, as the lineage of Infanta Ana died upon her granddaughter’s death in childbirth in 1617, and Infanta Elena never had children herself. All of the other European monarchs, as of 2023, are his descendants as well.

Grave of King Philip II.​

 

[pandizzy]

King John and Queen Katherine in the tv show The Tudors.​

The death of his son Alfred, Duke of York broke King John II. He was never the same after the youth died due to tuberculosis, being a more miserly and rigid king in the later years of his reign. He and the Queen become more recluse, less willing to host masques and balls. Not even the birth of Princess Margaret in 1555 helped to lift up their spirits, and she was their last child.

The King’s mood was temporarily better during the wedding of his son, William (later William III), to Mary of Scotland in 1558. The pair were well-matched and fond of each other since childhood and would have a happy marriage for the most part, save for their disagreements in the matter of religion. William leaned more towards Protestantism and began the process that would become the English reformation, while Queen Mary was a strong Catholic as befitted her upbringing. But after the wedding celebrations were finished, John returned to his sullen and miserly ways.

Thankfully, with the exception of Mary and George, all of his surviving children had happy marriages. Despite her many attempts, Mary failed to make her husband Charles Boleyn (1548-1599) fall in love with her, and he continued to prefer the company of his male lovers to her, using his wife for breeding purposes only. And save for Mary (who became Duchess of Württemberg) and Philippa (who became Duchess of Parma), all of his daughters became queens of different European countries (Poland, Spain and Sweden). George, as a bishop never married, and Margaret Tudor tragically died at the age of twelve, while her father was in the midst of negotiating her marriage to Afonso de Avis, heir to Portugal.

Young Katherine Tudor, named for her mother, was famous for her beauty and had a positive relationship with her husband, Stanisław I. Although he was well-known for his mercurial temperament, the young king had a considerable soft spot for his wife and she had a calming influence on him, helping him stop with his affairs and excessive drinking.

They had thirteen children together, of whom eight survived past childhood, and Queen Katarzyna often said: “I hope the Lord doesn’t take me first, for I fear for the Polish people during my husband’s grief.” Sadly, her prediction would come true after she miscarried what was to be their fourteenth child and the ensuing infection took her at the age of thirty-nine, to the great grief of her husband. The mourning king had twenty of her servants executed and the following four years until his own death were dubbed mroczne lata, or the dark years. The King was succeeded by their son, Władysław, who undid many of his father’s actions and pardoned around three thousand prisoners in the first year of his reign.

King John’s fifth daughter, Jocasta, married Karl Gustavsson, who became King of Sweden after the death of his father in 1573, at the age of twenty. She became a queen immediately upon her marriage in the same year and was crowned six months later, already four months pregnant with what was to be the fourth Swedish Vasa monarch, named John after her father.

Although she was a Catholic and he was Lutheran, Jocasta and Karl IX enjoyed a friendly and happy relationship. The King never acknowledged any affair during their thirty-year-long marriage, though a woman from Uppsala named Ebba Gustavsdotter claimed to be his illegitimate child after his death. They had eight children together and when Karl died in 1603, Jocasta claimed that all other men were dead for her. She wore black for the rest of her life.

Tomb of Jocasta Tudor, Queen of Sweden.​

Even though the marriages of his children gave the King much to rejoice, he would never forget Alfred and Margaret. He died in 1578 at the age of fifty-five, holding onto a shirt of Alfred, still stained with the boy’s blood, now brown with age. His heartbroken wife followed him two years later and they were buried at Westminster Abbey. King William III was crowned with his wife and their fifteen-year-old son, also named William, carried his father’s train during the ceremony.

It was during his reign that the young playwrights, Kit Marlowe, and William Shakespeare, gained prominence. William was fond of plays and often hired both men and others to write plays that represented the royal family in a good light for the commons. Famously, the play Maria Regina (1594) by William Shakespeare was funded in an attempt to cheer up Queen Mary after the death of her granddaughter-in-law, Princess Elizabeth, in childbirth, and was a religious play, much different than Shakespeare’s usual work (This author will not discuss the idea that King William himself wrote the play and paid for Shakespeare to assume it himself. Such a theory is ludicrous).

William III failed, however, in cheering up the Queen after the loss of Elizabeth of Denmark, and her son, and the Queen sadly died not too long after. Depressed, the ageing king retired after handing the reins of government to his son and died, heartbroken, in 1611, at the age of seventy.

Queen Mary after Princess Elizabeth's death.​

The Tudor dynasty oversaw the expansion of English interests abroad in the New World, with the small provinces in the Americas forming the collective “New England'' amidst the larger colonies of France, Scotland, Spain and Portugal. The union of Scotland and England under a single monarch also came about under the authority of John II’s great-great-grandson, Edward VI, whose marriage to Elizabeth Stewart allowed their son William to be crowned King of England and Scotland upon the deaths of both his father and childless uncle, James IX.

Henrietta Tudor, Duchess of Norfolk.​

However, the Tudor dynasty only held both crowns for another generation, with William’s sons predeceasing him and the unified crown of England and Scotland falling to George Howard, the Duke of Norfolk, whose close connection to the royal House of Tudor allowed him a blood claim to Scotland as well due to royal intermingling between the two crowns. His mother, Henrietta, was King Edward’s youngest child with Elizabeth of Scotland and famously married for love to the Duke of Norfolk, Charles Howard. King George I (1720-1789) as he would be known by history, succeeded to both thrones after his victory in the War of Scottish Succession (1743-1749) against his Catholic cousin, Albert VII of Bavaria. This was the first time since the Yorkists came to power that an English duke became ruler of England.

The 2023 referendum on Scottish independence, however, seems to breed trouble for young King William V, who inherited the throne in 2020 at the age of twenty-three after his father’s brief seven-day reign. The COVID-19 pandemic shook the United Kingdom to its core as it managed to kill both George III and George IV along with their respective wives in quick succession, leaving William the sole heir of the main Howard line. Descended from King John II through his son William and two of his daughters, only time will tell what this young man’s reign will be remembered as.

King William V of the United Kingdom​

 

[pandizzy]

The birth of Mademoiselle Anne de Valois seemed to be the prelude of young Isabella of Austria’s mental troubles. Much like her older sister Joanna and grandmother, she had great difficulties with depression and anxiety, which manifested in a deep religious faith, and an enormous dependency on her mother-in-law. The Dauphin despaired of what to make of his young wife, whose relationship with Mary Tudor the Younger, Queen of France bordered on that of a penitent and their confessor. The Queen exerted such influence on Isabella of Austria and by extent the Dauphin François that both were spurred to action against the rising trend of Protestants—or Huguenots, as they were contemporarily known—in France.

Events came to a head when François II of France (1546-1557) was assassinated by a Huguenot radicalist known simply as Jean de Lyon during a procession to Notre Dame to celebrate the engagement of Louis-Charles, Count of Montfort to Anne Beatrice of Savoy, an engagement which ultimately ended when the interests of France and Savoy irrevocably came to odds.

The violent assassination of his father sent the newly-instated François III (1557-1599) into a rage against the Huguenots, and the Dowager Queen Mary’s devotion to Catholicism stoked his fury to a fever pitch. Upon her untimely death of cancer in 1558, the English princess who would be known to the Huguenots as “Bloody Mary”, was rumoured to have convinced her son of a terrible evil.

The Massacre of St Bartholomew's Day​

It was on the 23rd of August, 1558, the eve of St Bartholomew’s Day that François III ultimately acted. Having summoned Huguenots from every corner of France that would heed his call, the King declared there would be a summit to discuss the religious question and put an end to the debate of Catholicism versus Protestantism, as had begun at the Council of Trent some thirteen years before. François III welcomed the greatest theologians of the Huguenots’ numbers as well as many of his own people who had converted to the Calvinist faith, and set about destroying them.

Some historical records of dubious validity indicate the deaths over the next three days may have reached as high as twenty thousand Huguenots, and even those accounts seeking to absolve François III cannot deny there were at least some eight or nine thousand Huguenots put to death. Prominent Huguenots were burned at the stake, while lesser heretics were run through by roving bands of Swiss mercenaries bought by the crown or zealous Catholic neighbours. So violent was the massacre that Queen Isabella of Austria notably said to her ladies as they saw the chaos: “It is as if the very mouth of Hell has opened to spill its horrors upon us all.”

The massacre did not have its intended effect. Much to the frustration of François III, it began the French Wars of Religion (1557-1593) where the remaining Huguenots, led by Jean IV of Navarre, continually aroused trouble in the south of France with the aid of Louis, Duke of Gascony, the King’s own half-uncle. The Wars of Religion only came to an end with the ageing François III submitting to the Huguenots freedom of religion with the Edict of Nantes. This edict only brought temporary peace and was eventually revoked by his grandson François V some forty years later in another campaign that unfortunately managed to send Huguenots fleeing to Protestant Germany or the Baltics rather than face his violent rule.

Queen Isabella and her youngest son, Henri, who died at the age of two.​

But the massacre had greater effects on the family. The mad Queen Isabella, pregnant with her fourth child at the time, declared that she could still hear the screaming Huguenots and that they intended to take her soul away for being married to their killer. For fear of their safety, her children were removed from her care after she reportedly attempted to attack the newborn Prince François, seeing him as a demon from hell and a Huguenot ‘reborn’ to taunt her with her complacency to their murder.

It took two years for her to recover her mental faculties and modern historians believe she may have suffered from postpartum depression or postpartum psychosis, exacerbated by each subsequent pregnancy. In twenty-five years, Isabella had fifteen children, most of whom were given over to the care of governesses for fear that she’d harm them.

By 1560, the people of Paris already spoke of ‘la reine folle’, or the mad queen, and how the halls of the royal palaces were filled with her screams. King Francis, who loved his wife, fervently prayed for a recovery and even after he had her removed from the Louvre, continued to visit her. Such meetings often ended with the Queen grasping her husband and refusing to let go, crying and begging for forgiveness.

But there was no avail. In 1579, she was permanently placed in Château de Vincennes for her own protection, surrounded by attendants that reported to the king alone. She was so isolated that her fifth daughter, Charlotte, was reportedly surprised to see that her mother was still alive in 1593 after the queen was brought to court to see her off to her marriage to King Philippe II of Burgundy.

La Reine Folle ultimately ended her life in a nunnery, having been placed there by her son, Louis XIII. Isabella of Austria reportedly refused to believe her husband had died for the sixteen years she outlived him. Often, she spoke to the nuns that attended to her of how her husband would ride out to see her every morning and blamed his failure to arrive on the weather or the affairs of state. When one inevitably attempted to tell her that the King was dead, she slapped them for their ‘insolence and lies’, refusing to believe them and to have them in her presence until the moment she forgot all that happened once again. Captivity, many said, had rendered her docile, and her granddaughter Nicole de Lorraine, who visited on her journey to Spain for marriage to Philip III, noted “She is the very picture of tranquillity. I believe I have never met a gentler soul.”

King Louis XIII had a more peaceful reign than his father. Unmarried when he came to the throne, he wed the Protestant Maria Anna of Brandenburg, reportedly as a show of good faith towards the Huguenots. The marriage was a failure, however, and it was childless, so the throne was inherited by his younger brother, François IV, who married the Catholic princess Elisabeth of Portugal. Their son François V would undo the majority of his uncle’s reforms within the first months of his reign, declaring that “God has not appointed me to this seat to see heretics live freely in these kingdoms.”

To this day, relations between Catholics and Protestants in France are problematic. In 2018, a young Protestant woman was killed for refusing to attend a mass demanded by her university, sparking week-long protests that caused 20,000 livres in damages on the capital alone. King Henri III has famously refused to comment on the allegations of police brutality during the protest and claimed the fifty deaths are ‘enemy propaganda’, despite evidence that several of the people killed in the riots were innocent bystanders swept up in the mob and attacked without cause.

No progress has been made towards the investigation of the person or persons unknown who killed the young woman, and a pitiful settlement of 800 livres was quietly paid to her family. The King has a low popularity, with many calling for his abdication in the name of his son, Philippe de Valois, or for the dissolution of the monarchy as a whole. The French royal family have refused to comment on the possibility of a national referendum and tensions rise as a whole in the nation.

King Henri, called The Butcher of Paris by his political enemies.

​

Dauphin Philippe, the hope of his house for a continual in the monarchy.

 

[pandizzy]

Although his brother’s will intended for him to be emperor after his abdication, Ferdinand I was only accepted as ruler of the Holy Roman Empire in the Imperial Diet of May 1558. He was fifty-five, having recently suffered the death of his wife Anna and daughter Johanna during the interregnum, and relied heavily on his son Maximilian to maintain order in the empire. Some have suggested the new emperor still felt the pain of the loss of his friend, George I of Württemberg, who stepped away from the then-archduke when it was suggested that their friendship was the reason why young Archduke Georg was dead. This view, and the theory that the pair were lovers, has not been seen well by most historians, with George Boleyn’s main biographer, Charles Douglas, calling it “A load of hogwash.”

However, the Austrian Habsburgs continued to maintain close relationships with the Württemberger Boleyns in the following centuries, even raising them to the rank of an electoral principality in 1688. The two families often intermarried up until the male-line extinction of the Boleyns in 1769, which saw the inheritance of Württemberg by Emperor Ludwig I through his mother, Holy Roman Empress Anna Maria Bullen.

Emperor Ferdinand I died in 25 July 1564 at the age of sixty-one and was succeeded by his son Maximilian, who was thirty-eight. Maximilian II already had thirteen living children with his cousin and wife, Joanna of Austria. His eldest son and heir, also named Ferdinand, was also married to a cousin and had three children. They were both careful and tolerant towards the Protestants in Germany, which helped to assuage the tensions with Lutheran countries during the French Wars of Religion. Ferdinand’s eldest son would even end up marrying a distant relative, Anna Maria of Hesse, who was Lutheran, to showcase their friendship and brotherly relations with their neighbours.

1. Juana of Austria (December 1526-) m. Maximilian of Austria (July 1526-);
   1. Ferdinánd von Österreich (June 1544-) b. Fernanda de Austria (March 1541-);
      1. Ferdinand Josef of Austria (October 1560-)
      2. Maria Anna of Austria (April 1562-)
      3. Maximiliana Maria of Austria (December 1563-)
   2. Anna von Österreich (January 1546-) b. Karl of Austria (June 1540-);
      1. Charles of Austria (December 1562-);
      2. Aloisia of Austria (November 1563-);
   3. Mária von Österreich (October 1547-) A novice in a convent.;
   4. Tamás von Österreich (September 1548 -) b. Margaret Stewart (June 1549-);
      1. Maria Eleonora of Austria (February 1564-)
   5. Erzsébet von Österreich (January 1550-) b. Johann Georg von Wettin (May 1548- );
   6. Matyas von Österreich (February 1551-). Twin to Lajos.
   7. Lajos von Österreich (February 1551-). Twin to Matyas;
   8. Margit von Österreich (August 1553-). A novice in a convent;
   9. Eleonóra von Österreich (January 1555-September 1555). Died a sickly infant;
   10. Károly von Österreich (September 1556-);
   11. Ilona von Österreich (December 1558-January 1560). Died of meningitis;
   12. Ulászló von Österreich (April 1560-);
   13. János von Österreich (March 1562-);
   14. Gizella von Österreich (February 1563-);
   15. Ágnes von Österreich (June 1564-).

Maximilian’s eldest daughter married her paternal uncle Karl, and had fourteen children with him. Named for her grandmothers, Anna remained her mother’s favourite child and the Empress would regularly visit her in her husband’s holdings in Further Austria. The couple were happy and devoted to each, being of similar age and character. When her husband and uncle died in 1590, the Archduchess wore black for the rest of her life, and secluded herself away to allow her son’s wife, Johanna of Württemberg, to take over the reins of the court at Further Austria.

Anna and Karl and their eldest children.​

Emperor Maximilian II died in 1576 after a long period of illness and was succeeded by his son, who became Ferdinand II. His devoted wife, who spent days and weeks nursing him, succumbed to exhaustion and died of consumption two weeks after. They were buried together at Innsbruck.

Grave of Emperor Maximilian II and his wife.​

The Holy Roman Empire notably remained under Habsburg rule from 1452 to its ultimate collapse in 1747, five years shy of its three-hundredth anniversary of Habsburg rule. The prolonged decline of the Holy Roman Empire paled in comparison to the Austrian Empire, which could not hope to attain the same longevity with its civil unrest, ineffective leadership, and periods of bankruptcy offset by rare moments of economic surplus.

Lasting only 147 years, 1894 saw the death of the Austrian monarchy with the War of the Dukes (1894). The scant remains of the once illustrious royal line are now headed by Friedrich von Habsburg, who ultimately found a new home in Arles. Friedrich, the sole great-grandson of the last Austrian Emperor of the same name, and his three children by his wife Liesl Schäfer; Heinrich, Sophie and Jakob, are the only legitimate Habsburgs recorded as of 2020, and enjoy a relatively peaceful existence out of the public eye. Most recently, in 2022, the family made international headlines when an aspiring paparazzo seeking pictures of the then-pregnant Liesl during a family outing was hospitalised by Friedrich. No official comments have been made by the Habsburg family as to the sex or name of their most recent child.

Seeking privacy and seclusion after nearly a millennium of great feats, the Habsburg family seems doomed to be forgotten, as so many former dynasties are. But at long last, they are at peace.

Friedrich von Habsburg and wife Liesl Schäfer in 2013 with their eldest child, Heinrich.​

 

[pandizzy]

Well, friends, it's over. After two years, over 450k words, the story of Anne Boleyn and Emperor Charles V has reached its end. Thank you for following me in this journey and until next time.