King René d'Anjou and His Seven Queens. Staley Edgcumbe
and Jeanne: for the latter I have chosen to reproduce the historical imaginative fresco of M. Lepenveu, at the Pantheon in Paris; for the former the stained-glass window effigy at Le Mans Cathedral must do duty. Queen Isabelle is an enlargement of a miniature by René; Queen Marie is after a French picture of the School of Jean Focquet, now at the National Gallery, London, but wrongly entitled. Queen Giovanna II. is from an altar-piece in the National Museum at Naples. Queen Marguerite is from a miniature by her father—her portraits in England are eminently unsatisfactory and non-contemporary—Queen Jehanne is from the right wing of the Aix triptych, by Nicholas Froment.
There is, I think, nothing more to add to my preface, so I leave “King René and his Seven Queens” tête-à-tête with my discerning public. If they are found to be entertaining company I am repaid.
EDGCUMBE STALEY.
CHRONOLOGY
| 1399. | Marriage of Louis II. d’Anjou and Yolanda d’Arragona. |
| 1408. | Birth of René d’Anjou. |
| 1411. | Giovanna II. succeeds to throne of Naples. |
| 1417. | René adopted by Cardinal de Bar. |
| 1420. | Marriage of René and Isabelle de Lorraine. |
| 1422. | Marie d’Anjou marries Charles VII. |
| 1424. | René, Duke of Barrois. |
| 1429. | Jeanne d’Arc and René at Siege of Orléans. |
| 1431. | René, Duke of Lorraine; prisoner at Bulgneville. |
| 1433. | René’s campaign in Italy. |
| 1434. | René, King of Sicily, etc. |
| 1435. | Giovanna II. dies; René, King of Naples. |
| 1437. | René released finally from Tour de Bar. |
| 1441. | René retires from Italy. |
| 1442. | Queen Yolanda dies. |
| 1445. | Marriage of Marguerite d’Anjou and Henry VI. |
| 1448. | Order of the Croissant established. |
| 1453. | Queen Isabelle dies. |
| 1455. | Marriage of René and Jehanne de Laval. |
| 1463. | Queen Marie dies. |
| 1465. | René proclaimed King of Catalonia. |
| 1470. | Jean, Duke of Calabria, King of Catalonia, dies. |
| 1473. | René retires from Anjou, which is seized by Louis XI. |
| 1480. | René dies. |
| 1482. | Queen Marguerite dies. |
| 1498. | Queen Jehanne dies. |
KING RENÉ D’ANJOU AND HIS
SEVEN QUEENS
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY
“René, King of Jerusalem, the Two Sicilies, Aragon, Valencia, Majorca, Sardinia and Corsica; Duke of Anjou, Barrois, and Lorraine; Count of Provence, Forcalquier and Piemont,” so runs the preamble of his Will. To these titles he might have added Prince of Gerona, Duke of Calabria, Lord of Genoa, Count of Guise, Maine, Chailly, and Longjumeau, and Marquis of Pont-à-Mousson!
He was famous as a Sovereign, a soldier, a legislator, a traveller, a linguist, a scholar, a poet, a musician, a craftsman, a painter, an architect, a sculptor, a collector, a sportsman, an agriculturist, and incidentally a chivalrous lover. About such a many-sided character there is much to tell and much to learn. His times were spacious; the clouds of Mediævalism had rolled away, and the Sun of Progress illuminated the heyday of the Renaissance; art and craft had come into their own. Venus disarmed Mars, Diana entranced Apollo, and Minerva restrained Mercury, and all the hierarchy of heaven was captive to the Liberal Arts. René d’Anjou, figuratively, seems to have gathered up in his cunning hand the powers of all the spiritual intelligences alongwith the life-lines of practical manifestations. He has come down to us as the beau-ideal Prince of the fifteenth century.
“A Prince who had great and pre-eminent qualities, worthy of a better future. He was a great Justicier and an enemy to long despatches. He said sometimes, when they presented anything to signe, being a-hunting or at the warre, that the Pen was a kinde of Armes, which a person should use at all times”—so wrote the historian Pierre Mathieu, in his “History of Louis XI.,” in 1614. He goes on to say: “The reign of so good a Prince was much lamented, for he intreated his subjects like a Pastor and a Father. They say that when his Treasurer brought unto him the Royale Taxe—which was sixteen florins for every kindled fire, whereof Provence might have about three thousand five hundred—hee enformed himselfe of the aboundance or barenesse of the season; and when they told him, that a mistrall winde had reigned long, hee remitted the moiety and sometimes the whole taxe. Hee contented himself with his revenues, and did not charge his people with new tributes. Hee spent his time in paintings, the which were excellent, as they are yet to be seen in the city of Aix. Hee was drawing of a partridge when as they brought him newes of the loose of the Realme of Naples, yet hee could not draw his hande from the work and the pleasure hee took here in. … They relate that he dranke not wine, and when as the noble men of Naples demanded the reasons, he affirmed that it had made Titus Livius to lie, who had said that the good wine caused the French to passe the Alps. … He was perhaps better suited to make a quiet State happy than to reduce a rebellious one.”
King René’s career and work as a Sovereign, a soldier, a legislator, a traveller, a poet, and a lover, are treated in full in the letterpress of this volume. His work as an artist, a craftsman, an agriculturist, and a collector, is here given under different headings, as introductory to the expression of his personal talents.
I. Artistic Works of King René.
René’s