Charles de Lorraine de Mayenne ¹

   Another name for Charles was Charles de Guise.

  General Notes:

Son of François de Guise and brother of Henri de Guise. He first bore arms in 1569 beside Henri de Guise at the defence of Portiers against Coligny, then at the battle of Moncontour and at the siege of Brouage. After the close of this war he went to Venice to engage in the campaign against the Turks, became a Venetian lord, and embarked with a fleet to assist the expedition of Don Juan of Austria. He did not return to France until after the massacre of St. Bartholomew. He took part in the fourth Huguenot war, and accompanied the Duke of Anjou to the siege of La Rochelle (1573). Later he followed the duke to his domain in Poland, and when the death of Charles IX made the duke King of France, under the name Henry III, Mayenne escorted him thither. He took part in the sixth and seventh Huguenot wars, capturing Poitou (1577) and Dauphiny (1580). His policy was that of his brother, Henri: alliances with Spain against Henry of Navarre, ultimately against Henry III, to bring about the succession to the throne of the Cardinal de Bourbon and ultimately the Guises. Henry III, it is true, had allied himself with the League by the Treat of Nemours, but Mayenne soon realized the uncertainty of the royal attitude. The Maréchal de Matignon, who governed Guyenne for the king, hindered more than he favoured Mayenne's campaign against the Protestants of the south. When the assassination of Henri de Guise revealed the extent of royal duplicity, Mayenne was at Lyons. Warned by Bernardo de Mendoza, the Spanish ambassador, he had time to gain a place of safety before the arrival of Colonel d'Ornano, whom Henry VIII had sent to arrest him. He retired to his government of Burgundy, roused that province and also Champagne, of which his dead brother had been governor, marched on Paris, and began his active share in the history of the League.

Henry III, who had caused the assassination of Henri de Guise, was denounced by the preachers as a traitor, a heretic, and excommunicate. The Sorbonne and the Parlement proclaimed his disposition. Together with the aldermen and the city councillors, representatives of the Parisian middle classes, Mayenne organized the General Council of Union (Conseil général d'union). This council undertook measures in behalf of the whole kingdom, decreased taxes by one-fourth, prepared to defend Paris against Henry of Navarre, called for material assistance from Philip II and for moral aid from the pope, and entered into communion with most of the large cities of the kingdom.

Civil war now raged in France, and many cities took the side of the League and Catholicism against the Protestant Henry of Navarre and the indecision of Henry III. After vainly endeavouring to enter into negotiations with Mayenne, who naturally distrusted the assassin of his brother, Henry III joined forces with the Protestant troops of Henry of Navarre (1 May, 1589). For some time Mayenne waged war against the allied forces, but after the defeat of the Duc D'Aumale at Senlis (17 May), he felt that Paris was threatened and was obliged to fall back for its defence. The united Royalist and Protestant forces received assistance from Switzerland and Germany, while the troops of Mayenne and the League, shut up in Paris (1 June), were cut off from all reinforcements, weakened by desertions, and reduced to 8000 men, when Henry III and Henry of Navarre, with a force of 42,000 began an active siege of the capital (28 July). A sort of terror now seized upon the Parisian populace. Suspicion fell on all; domiciliary visits and proscriptions were the order of the day. Finally the Dominican monk, Jacques Clément, assassinated Henry III, whereupon Henry of Navarre, abandoned by some of his troops, raised the siege.

The throne was now vacant, the Catholics who formed the majority of France being unwilling to recognize the protestant Henry of Navarre. Had Mayenne dared to seize the throne and proclaim himself king, his boldness might have succeeded. With Henri de Guise, however, he had five years previously designated the aged Cardinal de Bourbon as heir presumptive, and while the latter lived it was difficult for Mayenne to pretend to the throne. But the sick and aged prelate was a prisoner of Henry of Navarre; the members of the League were therefore unable to place their candidate securely upon the throne, since he was in the hands of the Protestant pretender. Mayenne assumed the title of Lieutenant-General of the Kingdom, took the offensive, and set out for Normandy. At Arques, near Dieppe, he vainly offered battle to Henry of Navarre, and after eleven days of skirmishing (September, 1589), withdrew to Amiens. Learning suddenly that Henry of Navarre had stolen on Paris, and had taken by surprise the suburbs of of the left bank of the Siene, he hastened to the capital to compel the retreat of Navarre.

A certain number of moderate Catholics, known as les Politiques, were in favour of the latter, and he agreed with them that within six months he would submit the religious question to a council, and until that event would offer no hindrance to the practice of the Catholic religion. Among the Politiques were some who already cherished the hope that Henry of Navarre would become a Catholic. One of them, Faudoas de Belin, urged Mayenne to join the Politiques and to entreat Henry IV to become a Catholic. While the violence of the Leaguers in Paris caused Mayenne to reflect, he nonetheless did not accept Belin's proposal, and in the spring of 1590, being reinforced from Flanders and Lorraine, he attacked Henry IV on the plain of Ivry (14 March 1590). Being defeated, he was compelled to return to Paris, where he announced to the inhabitants that he was going to seek reinforcements in Flanders, and called upon them to defend themselves energetically. The death of Cardinal de Bourbon (8 May, 1590) left the members of the League uncertain on an important point, namely, who was the Catholic heir to the throne.

Then began, in Mayenne's absence, the famous siege of Paris by Henry IV. Each day the Spanish ambassador, Bernardo de Mendoza, distributed 120 crowns' worth of bread, the papal legate gave his plate to pay the troops, and even the ornaments of the churches were sold. The people satisfied their hunger at the street corners, where they ate from great cauldrons, in which a mixture of oats and bran was boiling, and spent the days in the churches, where twice a day the preachers encouraged them. They assured the people that Mayenne and Alessandro Farnesse, Duke of Parma, would come to their relief. Mayenne, however, tarried, and the famine continued. Henry of Navarre permitted the beggars, women, and students to leave the city, but the provisions still grew less. Men ate the skin of animals, ground and boiled their bones, disinterred the bodies in the cemetery of the Innocents and made food of them.

Mayenne, meanwhile, was negotiating with Alessandro Farnese, governor of the Spanish Low Countries, for reinforcements. He succeeded in sending some troops to the relief of Paris (17 June), and the arrival of Farnese (23 Aug.), who joined Mayenne at Meaux, made it possible to revictual the city. Henry of Navarre was compelled to retire, and Mayenne re-entered Paris (18 Sept.). The war dragged on, but the capture by Mayenne of Château-Thierry in 1591 could not offset the damage done by the occupation by Henry of Navarre of the city of Chartres, regarded as the granary of Paris.

The League now suffered from divided counsels. The young son of Duke Henri de Guise had just left his prison at Tours, and the more enthusiastic members of the League planned his marriage to a Spanish princess, after which they would make him king. Mayenne was considered too lukewarm, and when Gregory XIV, elected 5 Dec., 1590, and more resolutely devoted to the League than Sixtus V, had renewed the excommunication of Henry of Navarre, and hurled anathema against his adherents (March-June, 1591), the faction of the Sixteen, a body drawn from the councils (nine members each) which directed the various quarters of Paris, and about which were gathered more than 30,000 adherents, desired the establishment of radical laws, according to which every heretic, whether prince, lord, or citizen, should be burned alive, also that the new king should make war on all foreign heretical princes. If the young Duke of Guise could not or would not become king, the Sixteen were quite willing, under certain conditions, to accept Philip II as King of France. To assert their power and intentions, they forthwith hung several Catholics of the moderate party; Brisson, first President of the Parlement, and the two councillors Larcher and Tardif (15 Nov., 1591).

This news reached Mayenne at Laon, and he returned precipitously to Paris (28 Nov.); he caused four of the Sixteen to be strangled (4 Dec.) and ranged himself decisively on the side of the moderate party. Negotiation with the victor was henceforth a matter of time. President Jeannin transmitted Mayenne's conditions to Henry of Navarre (8 May, 1592). These were that the latter should abjure Protestantism, that all the places in possession of the Catholics should remain for six years under the protection of the League, that Mayenne should become hereditary Duke of Burgundy and Lyonnais, and grand constable or lieutenant-general of the realm, and that all the members of the League should retain their posts. Henry IV rejected these conditions, and many members of the League were also dissatisfied with them. Mayenne then convoked the States-General (26 Jan., 1593) and announced that they were confronted by the task of electing a king. He adjourned the body until 2 April. Mayenne desired neither a Protestant king nor a Spanish queen, hence his delays. But he was in the midst of the Parisians who were for the most part inclined to have as Queen of France the Spanish Infanta, daughter of Philip II, on the condition she should wed the young Duke of Guise. Mayenne could not openly oppose the project, but he shrewdly caused the Parlement to issue a decree forbidding the transfer of the crown to foreign princesses or princes (28 June, 1593), the result of which was the abandonment of the Spanish match.

Henry IV made his abjuration 25 July, 1593, and on 31 July signed a truce with Mayenne. While the satire "Ménippée", professing to speak for France, held up to public ridicule the favour exhibited towards Spain by certain members of the League, another pamphlet, the "Dialogue du Maheustre et du manat", issued by the Leaguers of the extreme left, cast aspersions on the ability of Mayenne and all but accused him of treason. On 3 January 1594, the Parlement rallied to Henry IV and expressed the desire that Mayenne should treat definitely with him. Paris, moreover, had ceased to be in sympathy with the League, and was preparing to welcome Henry IV (22 March, 1594). Mayenne kept up the struggle for two years longer, assisted by the Spaniards, who, nevertheless, distrusted him since he had prevented their Infanta from becoming Queen of France. Finally, Mayenne retired, discouraged, to his government of Burgundy, and by a definite treaty with Henry IV (January, 1596), declared the League dissolved, retained three places of safety, Soissons, Chalon-sur-Sâone, and Seurre, obtained that the princes of the League should be declared innocent of the assassination of Henry III, and that the debts which he had contracted for his party should be paid by Henry IV to the sum of 350,000 crowns. He resigned his government of Burgundy; but his son, Henri de Lorraine, became governor of the Ile de France (exclusive of Paris) and grand chamberlain. Until his death Mayenne remained a faithful subject of Henry IV and the regent, Marie de' Medici. By his wife, Henriette de Savoie, he had two sons and two daughters.

  Noted events in his life were:

• He was a Duke of Mayenne.

Charles married Henriette de Savoie. (Henriette de Savoie died in 1611.)