Counts of Bigorre - Jeanne III of Navarre (Paperback)

Purchase includes free access to book updates online and a free trial membership in the publisher's book club where you can select from more than a million books without charge. Excerpt: Jeanne III (16 November 1528 9 June 1572), also known as Joan III or Jeanne d'Albret, was Queen regnant of Navarre from 1555 to 1572. She married Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Vendme, and was the mother of Henry of Bourbon, who became King of Navarre as well as of France as the first Bourbon king. She was the acknowledged spiritual and political leader of the French Huguenot movement. Jeanne was born in Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Franceat five o'clock in the afternoon on 16 November 1528, the daughter of Marguerite of Angoulme and Henry II of Navarre. Her mother, the daughter of Louise of Savoy and Charles, Count of Angoulme, was the sister of King Francis I of France and Jeanne grew up at the French court. She was a Huguenot, raised in the French Protestant Reformed faith. In her youth she had been a frivolous and high-spirited princess, but she also, at an early age, had displayed a tendency to be stubborn and unyielding. In 1541, when Jeanne was twelve, her uncle, King Francis I, married her, against her will, to William "the Rich", Duke of Jlich-Cleves-Berg, brother of Anne of Cleves, the fourth wife of Henry VIII of England. Unwilling, she had to be carried bodily to the altar by the Constable of France, Anne de Montmorency. This political marriage was annulled four years later due to not having been consummated. After the death of Francis in 1547 and the accession of King Henry II to the throne, Jeanne married Antoine de Bourbon, "first prince of the blood", who by his marriage to her became heir to the French throne in the event that the Valois produced no male heirs. Her marriage to Antoine was a romantic match, despite the fact that he was a notorious philanderer. His frequent absences left Jeanne in complete charge of a household wh... More: http://booksllc.net/?id=25382632