everythingieverloved: 27 March 1615 - The Death of Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre and Prince
everythingieverloved:27 March 1615 - The Death of Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre and Princess of FranceIt was a very cold winter, and she caught a chill. Over the next three months, the chill gave way to fever, and she became seriously ill. On March 26, 1615, she was told the end was near and heard last rites. Louis XIII sent his own physician to attend the queen, but the surgeon was unable to help her. Sometime between eleven and midnight the following evening, Marguerite de Valois, once queen of Navarre and princess of France, succumbed to infection at the age of sixty-one.“On 27 March, there died in Paris Queen Marguerite, the sole survivor of the race of Valois; a princess full of kindness and good intentions for the welfare and repose of the State, and who was her only enemy,” the count of Pontchartrain, minister of state under Marie de’ Medici, reported. “She was deeply regretted,” he added sadly.In contrast to their hostility toward her mother [Catherine de’ Medici], the citizens of Paris grieved openly over Marguerite’s passing. The queen’s body was placed on public display, and throngs of visitors came to view her remains and pay their respects. “There is a crowd as great as at any ballet,” observed an eyewitness. The entire royal family went into mourning, and when, as it happened with Catherine, Margot’s creditors descended upon her chateau demanding payment, Marie de’ Medici undertook to settle the deceased queen’s debts. This was only fitting, as in a last act of generosity Marguerite had left her entire estate, with the exception of a few small bequests, to Henry and Marie’s son, the thirteen-year-old king of France, Louis XIII. Margot was buried at Saint-Denis, in the abbey where her father, Henri II, and her four brothers were interred. Catherine’s remains had also been quietly moved from Blois to the same sanctuary in 1610 after Henry’s assassination, so the family that had been so bitterly divided in life was finally reunited in death.“The Rival Queens: Catherine de’ Medici, Her Daughter Marguerite de Valois, and the Betrayal that Ignited a Kingdom,” Nancy Goldstone. -- source link
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