The Husbands of Mary Tudor

Part 1: The French Marriage

I am being purposefully clickbaity with that title; though we are going to be talking about Mary Tudor’s husbands, they are not the focus of this 2-part newsletter. This is going to be the story of 4 very different women whose lives happened to intersect because of the men they married: Mary Tudor, Anne of Brittany, Joan of France, and Katherine Willoughby. Two were princesses, one was a queen twice over, and one was a wealthy heiress. All of them lived interesting lives full of twists and turns. And, of course, some scandals along the way. Let’s dive in.

Enough books have been written about the Tudors to fill entire libraries. Who hasn’t heard about Henry VIII and his many wives? You have probably heard the refrain “divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived” which denotes the order and denouements of his marital adventures (Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, Anne of Cleves, Catherine Howard, Catherine Parr). But you may be less familiar with the marital histories of Henry’s 2 sisters, Margaret and Mary Tudor, both of whom experienced plenty of Sturm und Drang in that quarter. Today, we are going to talk about Mary, the youngest of Henry VII’s children to survive infancy, and Henry VIII’s favourite sister.

Mary was born in March 1496, the fifth child of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. Henry VII was the first Tudor monarch, and a descendent of the Lancastrian branch of the Plantagenet kings of England. His wife Elizabeth was the daughter of Edward IV, a member of the Yorkist Plantagenets; their marriage had been meant to cement the peace following the War of the Roses (between the Lancastrian and Yorkist factions) and secure Henry’s own claim to the throne. Think of it as a sort of real-life Montague and Capulet situation, minus the star-crossed lovers. Henry and Elizabeth’s marriage was initially a purely dynastic arrangement. On the plus side, nobody died in a tragic misunderstanding.

Actually, over time, their marriage does seem to have become a relatively happy one, at least by the standards of the time. Look, the bar was low, but they did clear it! Henry and Elizabeth developed mutual affection and respect for each other, which is as nice a love story as we are going to get in this saga. Henry was reportedly shattered by Elizabeth’s untimely death at the age of 37 following the birth of their last child (a daughter who did not survive). And, unlikely the other men we are going to meet later, he didn’t re-marry … though he did think about it (including the possibility of marrying his former daughter-in-law, Catherine of Aragon).

Mary enjoyed a fairly typical princess childhood. At 6, she was given her own “household” aka a bunch of servants and ladies to boss around. She was taught French, Latin, music, dancing and embroidery, which would have made her a fairly accomplished woman for her times. Mary’s health may have been fragile, but she grew up to be considered one of the most beautiful princesses in Europe. She was tall with reddish hair, like her brother Henry, and was vivacious and spirited.

In 1507, at the age of 11, Mary was betrothed to Charles, the Holy Roman Emperor (and future Charles V of Spain). The Holy Roman Empire was neither holy nor Roman, but it did cover a huge swath of Europe. As such, Charles (who was 4 years younger than Mary at the time) was a great catch. He was also the nephew of Catherine of Aragon who, in 1509, married Mary’s brother Henry. We can only speculate what Mary’s life would have been if she had gone on to marry Charles. But it was not to be. The betrothal was called off by Henry VIII in 1513. Emperor Charles went on to marry someone else and father Philip II of Spain, who would one day marry another Mary Tudor – Henry VIII’s daughter aka Bloody Mary, who had been named after his sister. Family relations in the 16^th century were VERY COMPLICATED!

Back to (our) Mary. In another round of political musical chairs alliance-making, Henry VIII married her off to the king of France, Louis XII, in October 1514. Mary was 18, Louis was 52. Louis was old enough to be Mary’s grandpa and was described as looking “very antique” at the time of their wedding. The age disparity was significant enough even then to generate plenty of sniggering, all of it at Louis’ expense. It was, you might say, un petit scandale. Not that Louis cared; he was immediately smitten. At their first meeting, he kissed Mary passionately in front of the assembled crowd as if, it was said, he was a young man and she a “nymph from heaven”. BLERGHHH.

 In his youth, Louis had been handsome and dashing; his early life had been a tumultuous one and his ascension to the throne of France anything but a foregone conclusion – the result of, what else, Salic law playing kingmaker once more. As a king, Louis wasn’t bad. Indeed, he was popular enough to be given the honorific “Father of the People” for some of the tax and legal reforms he ushered in. To put this in perspective, nobody else ever got that title. Still, none of this was likely to fire up the imagination of a beautiful, spirited 18-year old.

In fact, before her wedding, Mary made a deal with Henry VIII; she agreed to marry Louis only on one condition: that she would be free to pick her second husband once Louis died. Did Mary have someone in mind? Of course she did … but more on that next week. It was a shrewd move. Henry was a fond brother and he was keen to pacify Mary and push ahead with her French marriage, so he agreed. And it turns out that Mary had assessed the odds of Louis’ long-term survival accurately.

This wasn’t the first or last time that a young woman was sacrificed to her family’s political aspirations, but it says something about Mary that she was not a passive figure in a story as old as time. Granted, she couldn’t and didn’t defy patriarchal authority outright, but she cleverly maneuvered to achieve some measure of personal autonomy. How much happiness this brought her, in the end, is somewhat debatable as we shall see later, but kudos to Mary for trying.

But, first, she needed to get through the marriage with Louis. And EVERYBODY was talking about it. Back in those days, a king’s ahem bedroom affairs were political gossip fodder. Foreign ambassadors dutifully wrote home to report on Louis’ private business – what was and wasn’t happening, who said what, and who heard what. One of them opined that Louis’ young wife was “very dangerous to his state of health.” In Paris, they even made up a ballad about it: “The King of England has given the King of France a new young filly who will carry him off … either to hell or to paradise.” And you thought TikTok was savage.

Things didn’t start off great; Louis sent away most of Mary’s English entourage – French ladies-in-waiting were apparently more “encouraging” when he wanted to “be merry with his wife” – so she had few people to confide in. Fun fact: Anne Boleyn was one of 4 English “maids” who had been allowed to stay with Mary. Further fun fact: Mary hated Anne Boleyn. But the French court was not a place for a lively and affable young princess to be miserable for long. It was a fun, racy environment, especially with all the wedding celebrations that went on for weeks. Plus, whatever his other faults, Louis was a charming, gracious and VERY generous husband. He showered Mary with gifts. It was also speculated that, regardless of his public displays of affection, Louis wasn’t in a position to pester Mary in the bedroom. He was already quite ill. Louis’ son-in-law and heir is reputed to have said that he was sure Louis and Mary wouldn’t have any children, and we can safely assume that he made it his business to know these things.

And then, suddenly, less than 3 months after the wedding, it was all over. Louis was dead. Whether from exertions in the bedroom or, more prosaically, from gout, we can’t know for sure. You can probably imagine that the gossips of the time (and historians ever since) had a field day with that. Mary probably didn’t care too much; she was free and she was ready to take matters into her own hands – she wasn’t about to let herself be fobbed off with another old man.

And so concluded Mary’s brief French marriage. Before we turn to her second, English marriage, let’s pause and rewind. Because, before Mary, Louis XII was married twice and each of his other wives deserves her own spotlight.

We will start with the second – the only woman in history to have been queen of France twice over.

Anne of Brittany was born in 1477, the oldest daughter and heir of Francis II, Duke of Brittany. Descriptions of her vary, but it seems that she was very petite, yet able to project an imposing presence through sheer force of will. She was also highly educated and intelligent, and these things came in handy when she became ruling Duchess in her own right at the age of 11 upon her father’s death.

Her position was a very difficult one. Female rulers have never been popular in history, and that’s even when they were allowed to rule at all. And Brittany was an important duchy; its strategic location on the Atlantic coast made it an irresistible target for the expansionist plans of the kings of France. In fact, for most of Anne’s childhood, Brittany and France were engaged in a series of conflicts. Anne’s father was constantly on the lookout for allies against the French, which meant that, like Mary Tudor a generation later, Anne was destined to be a marital pawn in her family’s hands.

One of her early betrothals was to the heir of Edward IV, one of the Princes who later disappeared while in captivity in the Tower of London. Needless to say, that marriage never happened. Her next betrothal was to Maximilian I, the then Holy Roman Emperor. In case you are wondering, Maximilian was the father of Charles V, the one who almost married Mary Tudor. This arrangement REALLY didn’t suit the French, whose country would be sandwiched between enemy territory should Brittany join up with the Holy Roman Empire (which occupied territory to the west of France). The conflicts between Brittany and France intensified. Anne’s father died in 1488, but not before he made her promise to defend Breton independence at any cost. It was a promise that Anne would spend the rest of her life trying to live up to.

So we have an 11-year old girl, left to figure out how to win a war against a more powerful enemy and convince people that she is fit to rule. That’s, like, A LOT to handle. But Anne had plenty of moxie. In 1490, she went ahead and married Maximilian by proxy to secure the help of the Holy Roman Empire against France. Being married by proxy means that Maximilian wasn’t actually there for the wedding. He sent someone to take his place in the marriage ceremony; later, when it came time for the “bedding” of the married couple, the proxy touched his leg against Anne’s to signify … well, you get the idea. Technically, this meant that the marriage had not been consummated and, therefore, could be easily annulled if, oh you know, it should become expedient to do so. Which it did.

Maximilian did not prove to be especially useful as an ally or as a husband. In fact, Anne never did end up meeting him in person. The timing was just bad. Maximilian was busy with his own battles during this time, and Brittany wasn’t a huge priority for him. By 1491, it looked more and more likely that France would completely overrun Brittany. But Anne wasn’t the type to sit down and accept defeat.

Instead, she pivoted. And ditched one unsatisfactory quasi spouse in favour of a better prospect. A French one.

And not just any French husband. Anne was too wily for that. As part of Brittany’s peace treaty with France, she was offered marriage with a number of French princes. She refused them all. The only person she would accept was the French king himself: Charles VIII. This was a major power move in the circumstances. Brittany had very little bargaining power since France had already defeated its military forces. For Anne to have even tried dictating terms like this was ballsy. She must have decided that her best chance at protecting the independence of her duchy was from inside the French government – and not simply as the wife of a French lord, but from the very very top. As queen of France.

Anne and Charles became engaged in November 1491 and married a month later. She was 13 years old.

Now you might be thinking “but wasn’t Anne already married to Maximilian?” and you are correct. Not to mention that Charles also happened to be betrothed to Maximilian’s daughter – AWWWWWKWARD! So yeah, Anne and Charles’ marriage was technically illegal for the first few months, until they bribed the Pope to fix it all up and formally annul Anne’s marriage to Maximilian.

Let’s pause here and note some rather interesting details in Anne’s marriage contract with Charles. Who doesn’t love a good contract? No? Just me? Ookay then. The first item of interest was a clause stipulating that whichever spouse outlived the other would retain possession of Brittany. This meant that, if Charles died first, Brittany would revert to Anne and the duchy would not be absorbed into the French Crown. The second item of interest was a further clause stating that if Charles VIII died without male heirs, Anne would marry his successor. Ostensibly, the idea here was to give the French Crown a second kick at the cat annexing Brittany permanently. But put a pin on that for now because there is more to this clause that meet the eye.

Let’s talk about Anne’s new husband first. At first glance, he wasn’t much of a catch – apart from the whole, you know, being a king thing. Twenty-one at the time of his marriage to Anne, Charles VIII had been living for nearly a decade under the thumb of his domineering elder sister, Anne de Beaujeau; she had been regent during Charles’ minority and wasn’t eager to give up the reins of power once he turned 18. Charles was not physically prepossessing, either: he had a big head, which seemed too large for his body, and was quite short. On the plus side, he was a “perfectly nice boy, with excellent manners” and, though perhaps a little dull, no one had terrible things to say about him. Charles’ royal nickname was, in fact, “the Affable”. Not the makings of a great king, perhaps, but not the worst material for a husband.

It's hard to say what Anne thought about Charles when she first met him. He wasn’t likely to have swept her off her feet, but he probably made a decent impression with his gallant manners. But you know who probably made a better first impression, though? Charles’ cousin, Louis of Orleans. Eight years older than Charles and a seasoned fighter (who had previously allied himself with Anne’s father, duke Francis, against the French Crown), Louis was tall, handsome, and dashing. He also just happened to be Charles’ heir. A HA!! And he was in love with Anne. DOUBLE A HA!! Honestly, this is a plot twist worthy of a torrid romance novel.

Charles’ and Anne’s marriage started rather inauspiciously; Anne brought TWO beds with her when she arrived at the Chateau de Langeais for her wedding. It didn’t go unnoticed or un-commented upon; like I said, people LOVED gossiping about the royals’ sex lives. Plus ça change, plus c'est la même chose. But what started as a marriage of political necessity seems to have turned into a love match, and against significant odds at that. Charles was an inveterate womanizer – being charming and a king helped a lot – and spent a good chunk of his reign fighting hopeless campaigns in Italy. Despite living part most of their marriage, Charles and Anne had 7 children in about as many years, and all evidence suggests that they were very happy together. Forget separate beds; maybe separate chateaux are the key to a happy marriage.

Because of her frequent pregnancies, Anne was not able to play a major role in French governance during her marriage to Charles. Both desperately wanted an heir but, tragically, their only son died in infancy and none of their other kids survived either. That meant that when Charles died in a freak accident – after hitting his head on the lintel of a door while on his way to watch a game of tennis (tennis in France was clearly a risky hobby) – his heir was … Louis of Orleans. AKA Louis XII.

As a 21-year old widow and once more a duchess in her own right, Anne was an even more alluring marriage prospect than she’d been years before as a child bride. By all accounts, Louis had already been in love with Anne for some time. Suddenly, he was lucky twice over: the throne of France was his, as was the woman of his dreams. There was just one problem: Louis was already married.

What about Anne? Given she had loved her first husband, infidelities and all, she would have been probably mourning his death. At the same time, his death also freed her – she was once more in control of her own territories. And in the background, there was Louis: the man who had fought alongside her beloved father, and who was plainly very much in love with her. There was a lot going on! Anne demonstrated her level-headed moxie once more. She lost no time in returning to Brittany and taking over the administration of her domains, and she told Louis that he had one year to sort out an annulment, otherwise their marriage wasn’t gonna happen.

Which brings us to the 3^rd fascinating woman in this story: Joan of France.

Joan of France was born in April 1464. She was the second daughter of King Louis XI and his wife, Charlotte of Savoy. Her siblings were the future Charles VIII and Anne of Beaujeau. As a princess of France, Joan had an exalted status but much of her life came to be defined by something else. She was born with an abnormal curvature of the spine which made her, in the eyes of her family and contemporaries, “deformed”. This seems to have led people to assume that she was sterile for reasons that probably had more to do with gross prejudice than anything else. As such, despite being a princess, Joan was not considered an attractive marriage prospect in an age when procreation was a woman’s primary function. Sounds awful when you put it like that, doesn’t it?

It's worth pausing here to note that Joan’s situation provides a rather interesting contrast to Anne’s. Anne, too, had been born with a physical disability – a misalignment of her hips, resulting in one leg being much shorter than the other. Yet neither Anne’s family nor her husbands seemed to have treated her differently because of it. Perhaps Anne’s disability was less obvious at birth, which meant that she was not ostracized before she even had a chance to develop.

But if you thought Joan’s lot was unfair, well, it got worse. Shortly after her birth, her father betrothed her to her second cousin, Louis of Orleans (the future Louis XII). This was not your typical dynastic alliance, however. Jean’s father forced the match because he wanted to make sure that Louis would not have any children so that his family line would die out. If you smell another dysfunctional family drama here, you are correct … but we don’t have time to get into that now. Imagine, however, knowing you are being married off as someone’s “punishment”. That HAS to got to hurt.

The marriage didn’t take place immediately, as both Joan and Louis were still infants. Joan was entrusted to the care of a noble couple, and here she was lucky: they were kind and, having no children of their own, lavished all their affection on Joan. Her childhood was, therefore, a relatively happy one. She was well-educated and grew up to be an intelligent and accomplished woman. Joan was also deeply religious, and spent a lot of time in prayers from an early age. She would need all the consolations she could get, because at the age of 12, her marriage to Louis took place. It didn’t go well.

Forced into the marriage, Louis was not especially nice to Joan. The best that can be said is that he stayed away from her as much as possible. Even so, he did plenty of other things that probably hurt Joan … like embarking on a series of military campaigns against the French Crown AKA Joan’s family. You think your Thanksgiving dinners are awkward? Louis ended up being imprisoned for his trouble-making for a few years, but still somehow managed to squeeze in fathering an illegitimate child during this period. Joan bore all of this with the patience of a saint – foreshadowing! – and worked tirelessly to administer Louis’ territories in his absence, even going as far as pleading with her family to have him freed. And if you think that Louis was grateful for any of Joan’s hard work or loyalty, you’d be wrong.

By the time that Charles VIII and Anne of Brittany were getting married, in 1491, Louis was back in favour at the French court. He and Charles seemed to have had a decent relationship – it was Charles’ dad and sister who had REALLY hated Louis – and the two men ended up going off to Italy together on one of Charles’ ill-fated campaigns. Remember that Louis also happened to be (secretly or not so secretly) in love with Charles’ wife, Anne. MESSY!

And so we come to 1498, the accidental death of Charles VIII, and Anne’s ultimatum to Louis: get an annulment pronto, or forever lose me AND my duchy. She didn’t need to tell him twice.

Thus began what has been described as “one of the seamiest lawsuits of the age”. It didn’t have to be so; Louis could have chosen the high road and argued his case using the typical (and respectable) excuse in those days – consanguinity, aka the fact that he and Joan were second cousins. But no. Instead, Louis threw the bar to hell and proceeded to dig under it. He argued that the marriage should be annulled because it had never been consummated due to Joan’s physical deformities, which he went on to describe in great detail. Gross, dude! But if he thought that Joan would wilt under pressure or back down, he was in for a surprise.

Much like Catherine of Aragon a generation later when faced with a bullsh*t annulment suit, Joan fired back on all cylinders. She produced witnesses who confirmed they had heard Louis boasting about his sexcapades with Joan the morning after their wedding. Tbh, his reputed claim to have had sex not just once or twice, but 3 or 4 times in one night, sounds an awful lot like the baseless boasting of a teenage boy (which Louis had been at the time of his marriage). On the other hand, we have no reason to think that Joan was lying when she said that she’d had sex with Louis. Especially since Louis’ next ambit was to argue that his sexual performance had been inhibited by witchcraft. Well, did you or didn’t you have sex, my dude? Like the latter-day Elle Woods, Joan demolished his arguments one by one. All in all, Louis’ case was suuuuuper shaky, and it looked like he wouldn’t get his annulment.

Enter the Borgias.

Yes, those Borgias.

You see, at this time, the Pope was Rodrigo Borgia AKA Alexander VI. Corrupt was his middle name. Pope Alexander wanted things from Louis and, in exchange, was willing to give him an annulment. So, they worked out a deal. Louis would help Pope Alexander in his squabbles with Milan’s Lodovico Sforza, plus he would make Cesare Borgia a French duke and find him a French princess to marry. Honestly, everything I’ve read about Cesare makes him sound revolting, but apparently the wife they got for him – a beautiful heiress named Charlotte d’Albret – didn’t seem to mind him too much. I guess that makes this whole scenario a tiny bit more palatable? I dunno. Cesare was made duke of Valentinois and proceeded to be a big enough pain in the arse for the French that they eventually had to bribe him to return to Italy and raise his mayhem there.

But at least Louis XII was single again, amirite?

Joan accepted the annulment with grace, merely saying that she would pray for her former husband. I would have read him for filth all over Europe, but I am a petty bitch like that. Joan was made Duchess of Berry and retired to Bourges where she decided to embrace monastic life. She went on to establish a new religious order – a major career trajectory for any woman at that time which, again, speaks volumes about Joan’s accomplishments. She died in February 1505 and … wait for it … later became a saint. That’s right. Joan was canonized in 1950 by Pope Pius XII. Take that, Louis!

As for Louis, he did go on to marry his beloved Anne of Brittany. And Anne, whatever her personal feelings for Louis at this point, negotiated her marriage contract as shrewdly as before. This time, Anne retained the title of Duchess of Brittany after the marriage, leaving Louis able to exercise power over those domains only in her name. The contract also stipulated that, since Anne remained the ruler, the duchy would pass on her death separately from the French Crown – it would go to Anne and Louis’ second child, whether a boy or a girl. Sadly, Anne’s continued efforts to maintain Breton independence were subsequently thwarted by, who else, Louis. GODDAMMIT, LOUIS!

In her new marriage, Anne once again tried to provide the much-desired male heir. But despite several pregnancies, she and Louis only had 2 children who survived to adulthood, both girls: Claude and Renee. Pending the birth of a son, Claude was her mother’s heir to the Duchy of Brittany, and Anne wanted her to marry Charles of Austria, heir to the Holy Roman Empire (the future Charles V of Spain) – coincidentally, the son of Anne’s first husband, Maximilian. The same man to whom Mary Tudor was briefly betrothed. I am telling you, EVERYBODY WAS RELATED TO EVERYBODY ELSE IN THOSE DAYS! This match would have helped preserve Brittany’s independence from the French Crown. But Louis had other ideas. Once it became clear that he and Anne weren’t going to have a son, and his heir would be Francis of Angouleme (the future Francis I), Louis moved to have Claude marry Francis in order to ensure that Brittany would stay part of France. Anne was NOT happy with this but no matter how much she opposed this plan, Louis persisted. He loved her, but not enough to respect her political decisions.

In her own way, Anne made her dissatisfaction clear. Once the plans for Claude’s marriage to Francis were finalized, she went on an extended visit to Brittany – alone. She was obviously making a point, and who can blame her. Louis reportedly missed her terribly – serves him right! – and repeatedly implored her to return, as often as 6 times a day. Considering everything was done by letter back then, that’s a lot of imploring! Anne did eventually return and resumed her life with Louis, though, I should think, she was probably pretty disenchanted. It’s hard to say which one of Anne’s husbands was the most disappointing one: Maximilian, who never bothered to meet her, Charles with his innumerable infidelities and absences, or Louis with his utter disregard for Anne’s wishes. Marriage in the 15^th century was a bit of sh*t buffet, I guess.

There was one final act of betrayal in store. Exhausted from a lifetime of endless pregnancies, Anne died at the age of 36 from an attack of kidney stones in 1514. In her will, she had left the Duchy of Brittany to her second daughter, Renee, in a last-ditch effort to keep it from the clutches of the French Crown. This was consistent with her marriage contract, by the way, which had stipulated the duchy would go to her second-born son or daughter. But Louis ignored it! Because Louis sucked! He made Claude Duchess of Brittany and married her off to Francis the year after Anne’s death. And so, after Francis’ ascension to the throne, Brittany was permanently subsumed within France.

It is tempting to see the parallels between Mary, Anne, and Joan. Each one was the daughter of a sovereign, well-educated and accomplished in her own right. Each one was compelled to marry for political expediency, with more or less unfortunate results and plenty of scandal in the bargain. Yet each one managed to exert her agency to some degree in shaping the course of her life. It’s not my intent to “girl bossify” these women; drawing any sort of parallels to our contemporary norms is unrealistic and pointless. But I think it’s fair to say that Mary, Anne, and Joan were exceptional in their own time, not just by virtue of their birth but also for their audacity and resiliency.

Next week, we are going to talk about Mary’s Breaking Bad moment and meet another very interesting woman (and a mediocre white guy).

Selected Bibliography

Leanda de Lisle, Tudor – Passion, Manipulation, Murder: The Story of England’s Most Notorious Royal Family

Rozsa Gaston, Anne of Brittany series (fiction)

David Baldwin, Henry VIII's Last Love: The Extraordinary Life of Katherine Willoughby, Lady-in-Waiting to the Tudors