As a Protestant, she faced threats from Englands Catholic faction, which favored a rival claim to the thronethat of Mary, the Catholic Queen of Scotsover hers. He was ultimately found with Henry VII. Marys promiscuous reputation was largely invented by her adversaries, while Elizabeths reign was filled with rumors of her purported romances. [104] Over the next two days, a disillusioned Darnley switched sides and Mary received Moray at Holyrood. But in June of 1560, Marys mother died in Scotland at the age of 45. [134] The marriage was tempestuous, and Mary became despondent. [140] Moray was made regent,[141] while Bothwell was driven into exile. She fled to England and begged in letters for her cousin Elizabeth's support and help regaining her throne. [118] At the start of the journey, he was afflicted by a feverpossibly smallpox, syphilis or the result of poison. As biographer Antonia Fraser explains, Marys story is one of murder, sex, pathos, religion and unsuitable lovers. Add in the Scottish queens rivalry with Elizabeth, as well as her untimely end, and she transforms into the archetypal tragic heroine. [121] On the night of 910 February 1567, Mary visited her husband in the early evening and then attended the wedding celebrations of a member of her household, Bastian Pagez. In July, Elizabeth sent Sir Henry Sidney to cancel Mary's visit because of the civil war in France. This fear-driven logic even extended to the queens potential offspring: As she once told Marys advisor William Maitland, Princes cannot like their own children. Mary married Francis in Notre Dame de Paris. [107], Mary's son by Darnley, James, was born on 19 June 1566 in Edinburgh Castle. [58] On 11 June 1560, their sister, Mary's mother, died, and so the question of future Franco-Scots relations was a pressing one. Wed to the dauphin in April 1558, 16-year-old Maryalready so renowned for her beauty that she was deemed la plus parfaite, or the most perfectascended to the French throne the following July, officially asserting her influence beyond her home country to the European continent. On 24 July 1567, she was forced to abdicate in favour of her one-year-old son. [68], To the surprise and dismay of the Catholic party, Mary tolerated the newly established Protestant ascendancy,[69] and kept her half-brother Moray as her chief advisor. [205], On 11 August 1586, after being implicated in the Babington Plot, Mary was arrested while out riding and taken to Tixall Hall in Staffordshire. [31] The English left a trail of devastation behind them once more and seized the strategic town of Haddington. Link will appear as Hanson, Marilee. The daughter of King Henry VIII and the Spanish princess Catherine . The lords took Mary to Edinburgh, where crowds of spectators denounced her as an adulteress and murderer. After spending the night at Dundrennan Abbey, she crossed the Solway Firth into England by fishing boat on 16 May. Henry Stuart, styled as Lord Darnley until 1565, was the son of Matthew Stuart, 4th Earl of Lennox, and his wife, Margaret Douglas. [57] Instead, the Guise brothers sent ambassadors to negotiate a settlement. "[224] Her servants, Jane Kennedy and Elizabeth Curle, and the executioners helped Mary remove her outer garments, revealing a velvet petticoat and a pair of sleeves in crimson brown, the liturgical colour of martyrdom in the Catholic Church,[225] with a black satin bodice and black trimmings. Meilan Solly [74] However, she assured Maitland that she knew no one with a better claim than Mary. In February of 1567 they had Darnleys house, Kirk o Field, blown up; Darnleys strangled body was found in the garden. [55], In Scotland, the power of the Protestant Lords of the Congregation was rising at the expense of Mary's mother, who maintained effective control only through the use of French troops. [181] Elizabeth considered Mary's designs on the English throne to be a serious threat and so confined her to Shrewsbury's properties, including Tutbury, Sheffield Castle, Sheffield Manor Lodge, Wingfield Manor, and Chatsworth House,[182] all located in the interior of England, halfway between Scotland and London and distant from the sea. Aged five Mary Queen of Scots was sent to France by her mother Marie of Guise because she was contracted to marry Francis (Francois), the eldest son of King Henri II of France and Catherine de Medici. [36] At the French court, she was a favourite with everyone, except Henry II's wife Catherine de' Medici. Marys second husband was Henry Stuart Lord Darnley, her cousin. [145] She landed at Workington in Cumberland in the north of England and stayed overnight at Workington Hall. Mary, Queen of Scots became Queen of Scotland at six days old. George Lasry, Norbert Biermann, Satoshi Tomokiyo, Two of the commissioners were Catholics (, Walter Stewart, 6th High Steward of Scotland, abdicate in favour of her one-year-old son James, Cultural depictions of Mary, Queen of Scots, "National Records of Scotland; Hall of Fame A-Z - Mary Queen of Scots", "Elizabeth and Mary, Royal Cousins, Rival Queens: Curators' Picks". Mary as queen: 10 July 1559 . This is a painting of Mary Queen of Scots (1542-1587), and her second husband Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley (1545/46-1567). The original letter is in French, this translation is from. Francis II With Angela Bain, Richard Cant, Guy Rhys, Thom Petty. [109] The ride was later used as evidence by Mary's enemies that the two were lovers, though no suspicions were voiced at the time and Mary had been accompanied by her councillors and guards. They traveled from one royal palace to another Fontainebleau to Meudon, or to Chambord or Saint-Germain. Moray refused, as Chastelard was already under restraint. In the immediate aftermath of Darnleys murder, he met with Mary about six miles outside of Edinburgh. The king consort had been murdered and many believed Mary had played a part in his death. From the beginning, her life was mired in struggle as she grappled with the demands of the Scottish throne and the deaths of several husbands. [95], Mary's marriage to a leading Catholic precipitated Mary's half-brother, the Earl of Moray, to join with other Protestant lords, including Lords Argyll and Glencairn, in open rebellion. Cookie Settings, Its unsurprising that the tale of these two queens resonates with audiences some 400 years after the main players lived. They were Mary Fleming, Mary Seton, Mary Beaton and Mary Livingstone. In France the royal arms of England were quartered with those of Francis and Mary. At the centre of the Scottish court, 1561-68. Three months later the future James VI of Scotland was born and congratulations came from all over Europe. The frail infant, named Mary Stuart, was the. The murder 25 years later of Henry Lord Darnley, her consort and the father of the infant who would become King James I of England and James VI of Scotland, remains one of history's most notorious unsolved crimes. There are incomplete printed transcriptions in English, Scots, French, and Latin from the 1570s. Unfortunately, this choice turned out to be very poorly thought out; instead of safety, Mary became a prisoner of her cousin the queen. The castle was the site of the birth of King James VI, also James I of England from 1603, to Mary Queen of Scots in 1566. Mary, Queen of Scots marries Prince Francis, the future King Francis II France. Mary Queen of Scots picks up in 1561 with the eponymous queen's return to her native country. [50] Henry II of France proclaimed his eldest son and daughter-in-law king and queen of England. It was reached by two or three steps, and furnished with the block, a cushion for her to kneel on, and three stools for her and the earls of Shrewsbury and Kent, who were there to witness the execution. They sent him to France ostensibly to extend their condolences, while hoping for a potential match between their son and Mary. [18] Cardinal Beaton rose to power again and began to push a pro-Catholic pro-French agenda, angering Henry, who wanted to break the Scottish alliance with France. She was known as Bloody Mary for her persecution of Protestants in a vain attempt to restore Roman Catholicism in England. She became queen at 6 days old. [91] Their children, if any, would inherit an even stronger, combined claim. Rejoice don't weep These words of comfort were spoken by Mary to one of her servants as she faced execution. All too frequently, representations of Mary and Elizabeth reduce the queens to oversimplified stereotypes. The fact that she married her third husband, the Earl of Bothwell, shortly after the murder, did little to help her cause. [194] Elizabeth's principal secretary William Cecil, Lord Burghley, and Sir Francis Walsingham watched Mary carefully with the aid of spies placed in her household. When Mary left for Scotland, she travelled with the children of Scotland's nobility, including the 'Four Maries,' the women who would stay with her throughout her later imprisonment and execution. 04 July 2022 | The story of the three husbands of Mary Queen of Scots: Francis II of France, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley and James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell. The portraits were made by an unknown artist in around 1565, at the time of their marriage. James Feder. [21] Mary was crowned in the castle chapel on 9 September 1543,[22][17] with "such solemnity as they do use in this country, which is not very costly", according to the report of Ralph Sadler and Henry Ray. At the same time, Post Walton says, the fact that the cousins never stood face-to-face precludes the possibility of the intensely personal dynamic often projected onto them; after all, its difficult to maintain strong feelings about someone known only through letters and intermediaries. [202], In February 1585, William Parry was convicted of plotting to assassinate Elizabeth, without Mary's knowledge, although her agent Thomas Morgan was implicated. [6] She was the great-granddaughter of King Henry VII of England through her paternal grandmother, Margaret Tudor. Whereas Mary aged in the relative isolation of house arrest, Elizabeths looks were under constant scrutiny. Marys third and final marriage began and ended with controversy. Her husband, Francois II, King of France had died unexpectedly, and . At the same time, shes quick to point out that the portrayal of Mary and Elizabeth as polar oppositesCatholic versus Protestant, adulterer versus Virgin Queen, beautiful tragic heroine versus smallpox-scarred hagis problematic in and of itself. [24] The Treaty of Greenwich was rejected by the Parliament of Scotland in December. In October, she was put on trial for treason under the Act for the Queen's Safety before a court of 36 noblemen,[209] including Cecil, Shrewsbury, and Walsingham. Its unsurprising that the tale of these two queens resonates with audiences some 400 years after the main players lived. The letters were never made public to support her imprisonment and forced abdication. [3] Now, they were angry that Bothwell would be all-powerful and they decided to wage war against him. The crown had come to his family through a woman, and would be lost from his family through a woman. Mary Queen of Scots was married three times, to: Francis II of France (1558-1560) Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley (1565-1567) Expert webinar 9 May, 6.30pm. [200], In 1584, Mary proposed an "association" with her son, James. Marys blood claim was worrying enough, but acknowledging it by naming her as the heir presumptive would leave Elizabeth vulnerable to coups organized by Englands Catholic faction. She issued a proclamation accepting the religious settlement in Scotland as she had found it upon her return, retained advisers such as James Stewart, Earl of Moray (her illegitimate paternal half-brother), and William Maitland of Lethington, and governed as the Catholic monarch of a Protestant kingdom. Mary, Queen of Scots, was barely one week old when she succeeded to the throne in 1542. Darnley shared a more recent Stewart lineage with the Hamilton family as a descendant of Mary Stewart, Countess of Arran, a daughter of James II of Scotland. They claimed Riccio had undue influence over her foreign policy but, in reality, they probably meant to cause Mary, from watching this horrific crime, to suffer a miscarriage, thus losing her child and her own life as well since one usually meant the other in the 16th century. [34] Janet, Lady Fleming, who was Mary Fleming's mother and James V's half-sister, was appointed governess. . The nobles demanded that Mary abandon Bothwell, whom they had earlier ordered her to wed. She refused and reminded them of their earlier order. Both Protestants and Catholics were shocked that Mary should marry the man accused of murdering her husband. His death occurred soon after an unsuccessful rebellion in the North of England, led by Catholic earls, which persuaded Elizabeth that Mary was a threat. [149] In mid-July 1568, English authorities moved Mary to Bolton Castle, because it was farther from the Scottish border but not too close to London. James went along with the idea for a while, but eventually rejected it and signed an alliance treaty with Elizabeth, abandoning his mother. On 15 May, at either Holyrood Palace or Holyrood Abbey, they were married according to Protestant rites. Language links are at the top of the page across from the title. By running to England, Mary hoped Elizabeth I would protect her from harm. 'Deciphering Mary Stuarts lost letters from 1578-1584', "Stewart, Henry, duke of Albany [Lord Darnley] (1545/61567)", "Deciphering Mary Stuart's Lost Letters to Michel de Castelnau Mauvissire", https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Mary,_Queen_of_Scots&oldid=1152038397, People executed by Tudor England by decapitation, People executed under the Tudors for treason against England, Heads of government who were later imprisoned, Kingdom of Scotland expatriates in France, Short description is different from Wikidata, Pages using Sister project links with wikidata namespace mismatch, Pages using Sister project links with hidden wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 27 April 2023, at 19:51. Mary's life and subsequent execution established her in popular culture as a romanticised historical character. Beaton's claim was based on a version of the king's will that his opponents dismissed as a forgery. Mary and Bothwell confronted the lords at Carberry Hill on 15 June, but there was no battle, as Mary's forces dwindled away through desertion during negotiations. Mary Stuart's (Saoirse Ronan's) attempt to overthrow her cousin Elizabeth I (Margot Robbie), Queen of England, finds her condemned to years of imprisonment before facing execution. They next met on Saturday 17 February 1565 at Wemyss Castle in Scotland. The originals, written in French, were possibly destroyed in 1584 by Mary's son. She refused to attend the inquiry at York personally but sent representatives. [129] A week later, Bothwell managed to convince more than two dozen lords and bishops to sign the Ainslie Tavern Bond, in which they agreed to support his aim to marry the queen. [138] Between 20 and 23 July, Mary miscarried twins. Elizabeth had succeeded in maintaining a Protestant government in Scotland, without either condemning or releasing her fellow sovereign. Registration now open. In her lifetime, Mary married three times her final husband causing her downfall. For myself, I beg you to believe that I would not harbour such a thought. [53] Two of the Queen's uncles, the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorraine, were now dominant in French politics,[54] enjoying an ascendancy called by some historians la tyrannie Guisienne. "[213] She protested that she had been denied the opportunity to review the evidence, that her papers had been removed from her, that she was denied access to legal counsel and that as a foreign anointed queen she had never been an English subject and thus could not be convicted of treason. [98] Unable to muster sufficient support, Moray left Scotland in October for asylum in England. In June, the much awaited French help arrived at Leith to besiege and ultimately take Haddington. 7. On the promise of French military help and a French dukedom for himself, Arran agreed to the marriage. 1558 - 1603. [81], In contrast, a French poet at Mary's court, Pierre de Boscosel de Chastelard, was apparently besotted with Mary. [237] Her entrails, removed as part of the embalming process, were buried secretly within Fotheringhay Castle. Barely a month after the marriage, rebel nobles and their forces met Marys troops at Carberry Hill, 8 miles south-east of Edinburgh. | [71], Modern historian Jenny Wormald found this remarkable and suggested that Mary's failure to appoint a council sympathetic to Catholic and French interests was an indication of her focus on the English throne, over the internal problems of Scotland. She was concerned that the killing of a queen set a discreditable precedent and was fearful of the consequences, especially if, in retaliation, Mary's son, James, formed an alliance with the Catholic powers and invaded England. In February 1567, Darnley's residence was destroyed by an explosion, and he was found murdered in the garden. Francis and his new wife became king and queen of France less than a year after their wedding ceremony at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris. Mary's guardians, fearful for her safety, sent her to Inchmahome Priory for no more than three weeks, and turned to the French for help. . Norfolk was executed and the English Parliament introduced a bill barring Mary from the throne, to which Elizabeth refused to give royal assent. Meanwhile Mary. Although she was famously dubbed the Virgin Queen, Elizabeth only embraced this chaste persona during the later years of her reign. Mary, Queen of Scots (8 December 1542 8 February 1587), also known as Mary Stuart[3] or Mary I of Scotland,[4] was Queen of Scotland from 14 December 1542 until her forced abdication in 1567. 8 Dec 1542. As she settled into her new rolealthough crowned queen of Scotland in infancy, she spent much of her early reign in France, leaving first her mother, Mary of Guise, and then her half-brother James, Earl of Moray, to act as regent on her behalfshe sought to strengthen relations with her southern neighbor, Elizabeth. John Knox, a Protestant reformer who objected to both queens rule, may have declared it more than a monster in nature that a Woman shall reign and have empire above Man, but the continued resonance of Mary and Elizabeths stories suggests otherwise. Both queens were surprisingly fluid in their religious inclinations. Mary had one ally leftor so she thought. [248] There is no concrete proof of her complicity in Darnley's murder or of a conspiracy with Bothwell. This decision proved to be disastrous, since Mary was soon a prisoner of the queen and would spend the next nineteen years as Elizabeths prisoner, before she was executed for plotting against the queen on 8 February 1587 at Fotheringay Castle. [30] In February 1548, Mary was moved, again for her safety, to Dumbarton Castle. [186] Her bedlinen was changed daily,[187] and her own chefs prepared meals with a choice of 32 dishes served on silver plates. [204] At Christmas, she was moved to a moated manor house at Chartley. James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, was a vainglorious, rash and hazardous young man, according to ambassador Nicholas Throckmorton. During her childhood, Scotland was governed by regents, first by the heir to the throne, James Hamilton, Earl of Arran, and then by her mother, Mary of Guise. He had a violent temper and, despite his differences from Darnley, shared the deceased kings proclivity for power. Mary, once the fragile last hope of the Stuart dynasty, was just 23 years old and had fulfilled one of a monarchs greatest duties providing a healthy son and heir. Which is precisely what happened. [230], When the news of the execution reached Elizabeth, she became indignant and asserted that Davison had disobeyed her instructions not to part with the warrant and that the Privy Council had acted without her authority. A queer historian assesses the historical accuracy of the gay stuff in the Mary Queen of Scots movie. The only surviving legitimate child of James V of Scotland, Mary was six days old when her father died and she inherited the throne. The brief brush with freedom Guy refers to took place in May 1568, when Mary escaped and rallied supporters for a final battle. [176] In Fraser's opinion, it was one of the strangest "trials" in legal history, ending with no finding of guilt against either party, one of whom was allowed to return home to Scotland while the other remained in custody. When she was six months pregnant in March of 1566, Darnley joined a group of Scottish nobles who broke into her supper-room at Holyrood Palace and dragged her Piedmontese secretary, David Riccio, into another room and stabbed him to death. Here are 10 facts about Mary Queen of Scots. [156] Mary denied writing them and insisted they were forgeries,[157] arguing that her handwriting was not difficult to imitate. LOVE SCOTLAND'S HISTORY? The French fleet sent by Henry II, commanded by Nicolas de Villegagnon, sailed with Mary from Dumbarton on 7 August 1548 and arrived a week or more later at Roscoff or Saint-Pol-de-Lon in Brittany.[33]. To avoid the bloodshed of battle, she turned herself over and the rebels took her to Edinburgh while Bothwell struggled to rally troops of his own. Get the latest History stories in your inbox? Mary, Queen of Scots was queen of France and Scotland. [241] After the accession of James I in England, historian William Camden wrote an officially sanctioned biography that drew from original documents. The denouement of Mary and Elizabeths decades-long power struggle is easily recalled by even the most casual of observers: On February 8, 1587, the deposed Scottish queen knelt at an execution block, uttered a string of final prayers, and stretched out her arms to assent to the fall of the headsmans axe. The Tudor queen pressured Mary to ratify the 1560 Treaty of Edinburgh, which wouldve prevented her from making any claim to the English throne, but she refused, instead appealing to Elizabeth as queens in one isle, of one language, the nearest kinswomen that each other had., To Elizabeth, such familial ties were of little value. Over 50 dagger wounds were counted on his body. [77] Her own attempt to negotiate a marriage to Don Carlos, the mentally unstable heir apparent of King Philip II of Spain, was rebuffed by Philip. [42] At some point in her infancy or childhood, she caught smallpox, but it did not mark her features. [52], When Henry II died on 10 July 1559, from injuries sustained in a joust, fifteen-year-old Francis and sixteen-year-old Mary became king and queen of France. [65] Scotland was torn between Catholic and Protestant factions. However, this newfound love turned dark quickly, and Marys initial happiness soon faded. [62] Mary returned to Scotland nine months later, arriving in Leith on 19 August 1561. 5. Her first husband was Francis II of France, who she married when she was just fifteen years old. Many nobles were implicated in the murder of Lord Darnley, most particularly James Hepburn, the Earl of Bothwell. After Riccios death, the nobles kept Mary prisoner at Holyrood Palace. This time, the victim was Darnley himself. How Mary dealt with this incident sealed her fate. Terms of Use Marys mother Marie de Guise had arranged the marriage when Mary and Francis were infants, and so Mary was brought up knowing she would one day be queen of France and Scotland. Mary's illegitimate half-brother, the Earl of Moray, was a leader of the Protestants. [41], Portraits of Mary show that she had a small, oval-shaped head, a long, graceful neck, bright auburn hair, hazel-brown eyes, under heavy lowered eyelids and finely arched brows, smooth pale skin, a high forehead, and regular, firm features. Not only were the two absolute rulers in a patriarchal society, but they were also women whose lives, while seemingly inextricable, amounted to more than their either their relationships with men or their rivalry with each other. According to most contemporaries, they were close and affectionate with one another even as children. [128] Lennox, Darnley's father, demanded that Bothwell be tried before the Estates of Parliament, to which Mary agreed, but Lennox's request for a delay to gather evidence was denied. The wedding took place at Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, however less than a year after the ceremony, Franciss father Henry II died and the young couple became king and queen of France. Following her brief period as queen of France, the widowed Mary [Francois died in December 1560] returned to Scotland in 1561, aged 18, and ready to take up the burden of personal sovereignty. Mary married Francois in 1558. [73], Mary sent William Maitland of Lethington as an ambassador to the English court to put the case for Mary as the heir presumptive to the English throne. In May 1567 they wed at Holyrood and Mary wrote to the foreign courts that it was the right decision for her country. Even the one significant later addition to the council, Lord Ruthven in December 1563, was another Protestant whom Mary personally disliked. She assumed the throne as queen of Scotland when she was just six days old, upon the death of her father. Around 8 a.m. on February 8, 1587, the 44-year-old Scottish queen knelt in the great hall of Fotheringhay Castle and thanked the headsman for making an end of all my troubles. Three axe blows later, she was dead, her severed head lofted high as a warning to all who defied Elizabeth Tudor. When Moray rushed into the room after hearing her cries for help, she shouted, "Thrust your dagger into the villain!" [78] Elizabeth attempted to neutralise Mary by suggesting that she marry English Protestant Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester. [61] Her mother-in-law, Catherine de' Medici, became regent for the late king's ten-year-old brother Charles IX, who inherited the French throne. [231] Items supposedly worn or carried by Mary at her execution are of doubtful provenance;[232] contemporary accounts state that all her clothing, the block, and everything touched by her blood was burnt in the fireplace of the Great Hall to obstruct relic hunters. [Marys] failures are dictated more by her situation than by her as a ruler, she says, and I think if she had been a man, she would've been able to be much more successful and would never have lost the throne.. [123] There were no visible marks of strangulation or violence on the body. [246], Historian Jenny Wormald concluded that Mary was a tragic failure, who was unable to cope with the demands placed on her,[247] but hers was a rare dissenting view in a post-Fraser tradition that Mary was a pawn in the hands of scheming noblemen. English troops then intervened in the Scottish civil war, consolidating the power of the anti-Marian forces. [148] Elizabeth was cautious, ordering an inquiry into the conduct of the confederate lords and the question of whether Mary was guilty of Darnley's murder. Queen of Scotland (r. 15421567) and Dowager Queen of France, Consorts to debatable or disputed rulers are in, Sadler to Henry VIII, 23 March 1543, quoted in, Sadler to Henry VIII, 11 September 1543, quoted in, A dispensation, backdated to 25 May, was granted in Rome on 25 September (, Confession of James Ormiston, one of Bothwell's men, 13 December 1573, quoted (from. [96] Mary set out from Edinburgh on 26 August 1565 to confront them. 2023 Smithsonian Magazine Did you know that Mary Queen of Scots had three husbands? It condemned Buchanan's work as an invention,[242] and "emphasized Mary's evil fortunes rather than her evil character". [229] Cecil's nephew, who was present at the execution, reported to his uncle that after her death, "Her lips stirred up and down a quarter of an hour after her head was cut off" and that a small dog owned by the queen emerged from hiding among her skirts[230]though eye-witness Emanuel Tomascon does not include those details in his "exhaustive report". [94] The union infuriated Elizabeth, who felt the marriage should not have gone ahead without her permission, as Darnley was both her cousin and an English subject. The versions of Mary and Elizabeth created by Saoirse Ronan and Margot Robbie may reinforce some of the popular misconceptions surrounding the twin queensincluding the oversimplified notion that they either hated or loved each other, and followed a direct path from friendship to arch rivalrybut they promise to present a thoroughly contemporary twist on an all-too-familiar tale of women bombarded by men who believe they know better.
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