Catherine de' Medici, By Victory Witherkeigh
They called me a devil worshiper, the serpent queen, an unfit mother, and a foreigner - the “Italian woman.” They purchased me for my husband at fourteen, an agreement between my uncle - a pope, and my future husband’s father, King Francis I of France. My parents died within days after I was born. My uncle ensured I was trained, raised, and educated by nuns in Florence to do one thing - advance our family name, the Medici name. At fourteen, arriving in France alone, the only thought they allowed me to have for myself was to survive. My husband, Henry, already had a long-standing relationship with an older mistress when I arrived, a woman who had been his tutor for many years.
As much as I tried to stick to the script given to me, I grew attached to my husband even though he rarely paid me any attention. Whatever they say about me now, I know I loved him. We were the same age, we should have been thick as thieves, the best of friends. Instead, he picked her - Diane, a woman nearly twenty years older than him. I had to enlist her help to convince the man I loved, the man I married to have a child with me. My network of so-called spies began with myself, crawling into a closet to watch at night, to endure the torture of watching my husband in the arms of another woman. That woman was given the first pick in raising our children once my husband agreed to bed me.
No one writes about how much his father loved me. He found me great company as we toured Europe, exploring the country. He enjoyed how much I loved food. Even the people of France relished what I brought back, artichokes to truffles, their cuisine flourished as I patron'd the arts. Instead, they discuss my use of fortune-tellers and spread rumors of my Machiavellian nature. The man wrote about my relatives; I have some relatability to the philosophy. My husband died from a jousting accident when we were forty. I had no one - all but one of my children loved Diane more than me. The only time I could ever lift a finger to her was at Henry’s death when I could finally throw her out of my life. He called for her at his deathbed. It was the one time I could lean down and whisper, “NO…” to him. The only time I was EVER given a say with him.
Of my ten children I gave that man, seven lived. My favorite was Henry, named after his father. He was my favorite because he was the only child who cried when he first saw Diane, the only one to reject her outright. I knew I was never pretty, but if there was anything I was good at, it was surviving. Looks don’t last, wealth doesn’t last. All my children bore witness to the real power of wielding the crown from behind the scenes when they saw me. I taught my daughter-in-law, Mary, a few things before she went back to her small island of Scotland. Everything I did ensured my family’s survival. People fought for God and Church, I ensured we endured it all. Yes, it cost lives, but what war doesn’t.
The soothe-sayers told me from an early age that I would have a life filled with suffering. Nostradamus saw my husband’s end before the rest of them. They thought me a witch for using what I had available, but they didn’t understand. People who’ve never had to fight for survival have no right to judge what it takes to survive. They are too weak-stomached to handle what is necessary to protect what is sacred to them. But I wasn’t. So let them call me what they wish. I died at seventy, vilified for my life, but it was MY life. It was what they needed then, and dare I say, if I had another chance, I would not change a thing... save Henry. I’d have told my husband I loved him.
Feature contributed by Victory Witherkeigh
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