The Serpent and the Moon: Two Rivals for the Love of a Renaissance King (30 page)

Other advice came from Jean de Lorraine, who recommended to Henri that he read the erotic poems of Horace for inspiration, but it seems Henri was not at all interested in “
les beaux poètes du diable
.” If Henri had been to blame for the couple’s childlessness, there were a number of horrific methods for lengthening, shortening, or enlarging “the virile member” to choose from. These included the application of unguents compounded of castor oil, spikehead seeds, earthworms, and fermented goat’s milk. Another popular cure for those that are “soft or flaccid” was “to apply leeches to the buttocks and groin; to anoint the
os sacrum
, the hips, kidneys, groin, lower belly and genital member with an oil of chervil to which has been added a powder reduced from the procreative parts of a bull or stag, as well as fine grains of onions
and dandelions.”
³
As Henri had fathered a child with Fillipa Duci, happily he was not subjected to any of these absurd remedies.

Diane de Poitiers had no difficulty in prompting the confidences of the miserably barren Catherine. While Diane was sympathetic to her cousin’s plight, it could not have been easy for her to help Catherine and encourage the man she loved to go to his wife’s bed. On balance, however, it was the lesser of two unpleasant choices. Thanks to her early training by Anne de Beaujeu, Diane’s decisions were always carefully considered. When the wretched dauphine revealed the horrors to which she had been subjecting herself, Diane immediately put an end to all Catherine’s disgusting spells, magical and religious alike. Then, taking her aside and talking to her gently, like a daughter, Diane was able to give Catherine a little practical advice, including some alternative positions for intercourse that would compensate for her retroverted uterus and Henri’s hypospadias. Diane suggested to the dauphine that she make love “
à levrette
.”
⁴
It was also Diane who persuaded Catherine to allow the famous doctor Jean Fernel to examine her in her bed.

The next step was much more difficult for all three of them. On designated evenings when Catherine’s conception was thought possible, Henri would retire as usual with his mistress, but after a while in her arms Diane would send him upstairs to Catherine’s room directly above her own. Shortly afterward, his duty done, he would return to his beloved Diane and remain with her throughout the rest of the night.

As Henri’s devotion to his mistress grew, so, too, did Catherine’s resentment and jealousy. Neither she nor Henri had chosen the other as partner, and both had been educated to accept the political or dynastic choice imposed on them. It was Catherine’s tragedy that she fell in love with Henri. Passionate, and constantly forced to suppress her feelings, she could not contain her curiosity about her husband’s fascination with Diane. Like every deceived woman, she longed to know what he found so irresistible in her much older rival. According to Brantôme, Catherine summoned an Italian carpenter to the Palace of Saint-Germain and ordered him to make two small holes in the floor of
her bedroom, directly above that of Diane de Poitiers. There, with her friend the duchesse de Montpensier beside her, the dauphine of France would lie on the floor and watch her husband making love to Diane in the room below. She saw her rival’s long, slim white body kept young and firm by daily exercise. A knife must have pierced fat little Catherine’s heart as she saw how “a beautiful, fair woman, fresh and half undressed, was caressing her lover in a hundred ways, who was doing the same to her.”

Brantôme recounts that she watched the lovers below on the huge bed, their playful caresses, their bodies lit by the glow of the great log fire until the heat of their passion was such that they rolled naked onto the floor and continued their caresses on a deep velvet rug. When Catherine saw for herself the passion and tenderness between them, she told her companion, sobbing, that her husband had “never used her so well.” Inevitably, Catherine’s lady told the court.

No matter how much the sight hurt her, the dauphine would not have her spy holes closed. With a fascination bordering on the perverse, she would watch the lovers until Diane chose the moment to send Henri upstairs to his wife and his duty—a duty in which he took no pleasure and certainly gave none. Making love
à levrette
, Catherine experienced the added shame of never seeing her husband’s face during intercourse—which no doubt made his duty easier.

T
HE dauphine was desperately unhappy. Her misery over her failure to conceive and her despair at her husband’s love for Diane took a toll on her already plain features. Her eyes bulged even more as her cheeks became drawn, and her podgy mouth dominated her face. But Catherine could “Hate and Wait.” The day would come when this unholy trinity of a marriage would make her queen of France. The key to her character was fear—which she had known all her life: fear as an orphaned child pushed around as a bargaining tool; fear as civil war raged outside her convent; fear as her family’s opponents wanted to hand her to the enemy or string her up on the walls of Florence; fear of the hostile French and unfriendly court; and fear of being disowned
and banished. When the dauphin François died and his Italian cupbearer, who had come with Catherine to France, was accused of poisoning him, she was certainly afraid for her safety. All her life, Catherine feared for her future. It is even possible that she thought Henri might reject her in favor of Diane once he became king. Perhaps it is not surprising that Catherine turned to astrologers for reassurance. Years later she would admit in a letter to her daughter Elisabeth, queen of Spain, that she had always been afraid of Henri.

The dauphin was fêted by the court and was regarded as a victorious general and father. His mentor and friend, Anne de Montmorency, was Constable of France and all-powerful; his trust and affection gave Henri courage and he grew bolder. As well as always dressing in Diane’s black and white, which he adopted as his own colors, Henri took on Diane’s symbol of the crescent moon for his personal cipher, either alone or under his crowned “H.” More often, he displayed her three crescents intertwined, a secret symbol of their
ménage à trois
. The intertwined crescents appeared on his arms, his clothing, the livery of his servants; even his horses sported the crescent on their saddlecloths. To the uprights of his monogram letter “H” he added a crescent on the inside of both, making them read “HD.” This could also be interpreted to read “HC”—ambiguous again, even though the crescent was Diane’s symbol. His motto under the crescent moon became “
Cum plena est, emula soils
”—“When full, she equals the sun.” Others interpreted the motto as Henri’s wish to fill the whole world with his glory.

The king had given Catherine a rainbow as her personal device, with the motto: “She brings light and serenity.” The rainbow represented Iris, messenger of the gods, in constant communication between earth and the firmament. Catherine was indeed a messenger, constantly moving among the courtiers, flattering them with charm and smiles, eking out information to pass on to Diane. There is no evidence that Catherine felt her spying for Diane was too great a price to pay for securing her place at court for the present, and to gain her illustrious future. To this end, the dauphine of France allowed her husband’s mistress to manage him and her household, and she reported her news to Diane each evening. Catherine even allowed Diane
to shine at all the court
fêtes
as if
she
were the dauphine of France. It made Diane’s enemy, Anne d’Etampes, choke with rage to be outshone, time and again, by the dauphin’s lady.

In revenge, Anne charmed Henri’s brother, the delightful Charles d’Orléans. Brantôme describes Charles at nineteen or twenty as being

A
LTHOUGH Montmorency remained as commander in chief of the army, slowly, one by one, his civilian offices were taken from him. The marginalized Constable withdrew to his château of Chantilly, a magnificent Renaissance building on an artificial island near Paris. Montmorency’s departure seriously vexed Henri, who no longer had an insight into what political moves were being made at court. Anne d’Etampes did all she could to alienate Henri from his father, and the antagonism between Anne d’Etampes and Diane de Poitiers divided the court.

In March 1541, François began to consolidate his alliances. He renewed all his treaties with the Sultan Suleiman, explaining to the Sultan that he had been under duress when he had allowed their joint enemy Charles V to traverse his kingdom. Then, to cement his alliance with the most important of the emperor’s German enemies, François decided to proceed with the marriage of his niece Jeanne d’Albret and the Duke of Cleves. Jeanne was just thirteen and the duke twenty-four.
The king’s sister, Marguerite, and her husband, Henri d’Albret, vainly refused to accept the marriage, but the king insisted. Jeanne was brought to Amboise, where she was to meet her fiancé.

Face-to-face with the king, however, little Jeanne d’Albret refused pointblank to marry the Duke of Cleves and swore she would rather throw herself down a well. In response, the king slapped her and had her taken to Châtellerault, where the wedding was to be held. As the château was still being renovated, a huge circular pavilion was constructed in the park with galleries and seats in the stands. On June 9, a splendid series of entertainments began, including parades and fencing competitions.

Men and horses were dressed in cloth of gold, silver, or velvet, and plumes bobbed on their helmets. The entire court, including the Constable Montmorency, watched as the king made his entrance with the royal family to the accompaniment of trumpets and tambourines. Diane was in rapture at the triumphal entrance of the Duke of Cleves, reflecting the glory of his house to which Diane’s family was now allied through the marriage of her daughter, Françoise. On June 13, the king took the bride and groom by the hand and presented them to the cardinal de Tournon, who betrothed them.

The marriage was to be celebrated the next day at eleven in the morning in the pavilion, which had been turned into a chapel. The king and the Duke of Cleves approached the altar, but little Jeanne stood at the entrance, immobilized by her unwillingness and the weight of her dress of cloth of gold and silver, layered in precious stones. Faced with this impasse, the king ordered Montmorency, the Constable of France, third most important person in the realm, to pick up and carry his stubborn little niece to the altar as if he were a mere lackey. In full view of the entire court, Montmorency did as he was bidden. The next day, the Constable left the court of François I forever.
⁵

Henri and Diane were distressed at the shame and departure of their friend, but they could not refuse to remain for the rest of the celebrations as Henri had arranged a tournament where he was to
publicly honor his “Lady” and wear her colors. Four champions competed in this game of valor: the dauphin, his brother, the duc de Nevers; and the comte d’Aumale. Henri excelled at the tournament as Diane’s champion, while dukes and grandees were deposited in the dust. Diane sat serenely in the stand, secure in the knowledge that the Constable’s absence gave her complete control of the future king of France.

After the marriage of the Duke of Cleves and his niece, the king felt he could count on the allegiance of the German princes to the north. In order to confirm France’s treaty with the Sultan Suleiman, François sent two trusted agents to Venice to make an alliance with the Serene Republic, en route to Constantinople. They never reached Venice. The emperor’s governor of Milan had them assassinated at Pavia. Once again the king felt misled by Montmorency’s advice and he named Chabot de Brion to replace the Constable as commander-in-chief. On the advice of Diane, the dauphin agreed, reluctantly, to serve under Chabot. Another war was on the horizon, and no one doubted that this one would be long and drawn out. The king raised money and melted gold and silver from his vaults. Once he received the confirmation that the Sultan had come onto his side, François I declared war on the emperor. That same year, Chabot had a heart attack; he died soon afterward.