skeins-archive

‘these jewel-lakes, these skeins of railroad line’

just a blog to keep my research organized.(‘all spoke to her, and she answered.’ —anne morrow lindbergh)

541 posts

The Succession To The County Of Auvergne, Throughout The 16th And In The Early 17th Century, Encapsulates

The succession to the county of Auvergne, throughout the 16th and in the early 17th century, encapsulates a series of dynastic conflicts. Catherine de Medici inherited the county from her childless maternal aunt, Anne, duchess of Albany, and then offered it to her son Henri, then duke of Anjou, in 1569. Her daughter Marguerite challenged her will after her death, asserting that as the only surviving child of her late mother, she should have been the recipiendary of the county, which was at the time the property of her bastard nephew, Charles de Valois-Angoulême, only surviving child of her late brother Charles IX and adoptive child of Henri III. She was supported in her efforts by her former husband, Henri IV, who had interests in her winning her case. The new king viewed the matter as the perfect way to tie the soon to be extinguised royal house of Valois to the Bourbon family, by suggesting that Marguerite, childless and divorced, made the Dauphin, future Louis XIII, her heir in the succession. She was eventually granted the usufruct, in large part because her bastard nephew had himself been condemned for treason after actively plotting with his half-sister Henriette d'Entragues and Spain to have the Dauphin replaced by his bastard brother born from the marchionness.