Pod Insights Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society The Scandalous Royal Mistress Who Ruled France About this episode Is this strangest threesome in royal history?!
We're endlessly fascinated with the lives of royal mistresses, and this has to be one of the most notorious.
It takes place in 16th century France between Henry II, his wife Catherine de Medici and his much older mistress, Diane de Poitiers.
How does this three-way power dynamic play out, inside and outside the bedroom? And how does Diane claim more power than the Queen?
Joining Kate is the fantastic historian and author, Estelle Paranque, to take us back to this time and fill us in on the details.
This episode was edited by Tom Delargy and produced by Sophie Gee. The senior producer was Charlotte Long.
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0:00 Kate Lister? Do you want even more shocking and scandalous history? Like why the ancient Greek statues had such small manhoods? Or what went on behind closed doors in the Georgian era? Well, sign up to History Hit, where you can see me discover the scandalous side of history, as well as hundreds of hours of original documentaries, plus new releases every week, covering everything from prehistoric Scotland to the Treaty of Versailles. Sign up to join me in locations around the world and explore the past. Just visit historyhit.com/subscribe.
0:35 Kate Lister? Hello, my lovely betwixters! It's me, Kate Lister. You are you, I am me, and this is Betwixt the Sheets. So if you've wandered into the wrong podcast, now is your time to get out without disturbing everybody else. Have they gone? Right, okay, dedicated betwixters. You know the drill by now. I do have to tell you, this is an adult podcast spoken by adults to other adults about adulty things in an adulty way, covering a range of adult subjects, and you should be an adult too. Oh my god, I feel so much safer. Right on with the show.
1:08 Kate Lister? Hello, betwixters! Once again, I find myself lurking in a royal boudoir, one of my favourite historical hunting grounds. I know, I know, I probably should just leave them to it, but I do have to find out all the gossip for you, don't I? This time, I'm in 16th century France, and even though I am discreetly hidden behind a curtain, across the room, in the royal bed with King Henry II is his wife, Catherine de Medici, a formidable woman in her own right. Honestly, you wouldn't want to get on the wrong side of her. And Henry's mistress is there too, Diane de Poitiers. What an odd setup this one is. Diane was known as the Golden Mistress in her own day, and in ours, she's known as
1:53 Kate Lister? a Golden Mistress slash child abuser, but I think that we absolutely need to know, how did this bizarre manège d'or even come about? I am getting the hell out of here.
2:13 Speaker 01 What do you look for in a man?
2:14 Speaker 02 Oh, money, of course.
2:16 Speaker 03 You're supposed to rise when an adult speaks to you.
2:18 Speaker 02 I make perfect copies of whatever my boss needs by just turning a knob and pushing the button.
2:30 Speaker 03 Yes, social courtesy does make a difference.
2:33 Speaker 04 Goodness, what beautiful time. Goodness has nothing to do with it, darling.
2:41 Kate Lister? Hello and welcome back to Betwixt the Sheets, the history of sex scandal in society with me, Kate Lister. Without giving too much away, let me just say that one of the titles we thought of giving to this episode was "The Strangest Three Ways in Royal History." Need I say anymore? Well, I probably better had, actually. And joining me today is the fabulous historian Estelle Perank, who previously came on to tell us all about how incestuous the Hapsburgs were. And despite that being a really grisly subject, we all had loads of fun, so we had to ask her back on. I also wanted to give a little shout out to a listener all the way from California called Kelsey. Hi, Kelsey. Thanks for listening. Your friend Jasmine has put me up to this one, so you can thank her for this.
3:25 Kate Lister? And while we don't normally do shout outs, I couldn't resist this one. "Thank you so much for spreading the word on Betwixt over in the States." I mean, you lot could do with some cheering up right now, couldn't you? Right, on with the show!
3:44 Kate Lister? Well, hello and welcome back to Betwixt the Sheets. It's only Estelle Perank. How are you doing?
3:51 Speaker 05 Very well and so excited about this today's episode.
3:55 Kate Lister? Well, this has got to be one of the weirdest ménages à trois in not just French, in history, right?
4:04 Speaker 05 In history, in history.
4:06 Kate Lister? I love the history of the royal mistresses. I'm endlessly fascinated by how this worked, who they were. How is the Queen, you put up with the fact that your husband has got a girlfriend? And it's so weird, but this one... Is between Catherine de Medici, Henry the Second and Diane de Poitiers. And it is weird even by the standards of the time.
4:29 Speaker 05 Absolutely. And weird, but also like it tells us so much about women.
4:33 Kate Lister? Yes.
4:33 Speaker 05 Women power and something a bit unusual here between Henry and Diane.
4:40 Kate Lister? So weird. Well, wait, I'm getting ahead of myself already, but I can't wait to hear what on earth you think, what the hell was going on here? So let's, let's set the stage a little bit, introduce our cast of characters. So we're in France, 16th century, what's going on?
4:56 Speaker 05 First of all, like we have to remember a few things. We have to remember that the 16th century in general is a very turbulent time. There's like, you know, yeah, it's chaotic. It obviously means that it was chaotic in France as well. Maybe not as chaotic with Henry the Eighth and the X-Files, but chaotic. Let me explain to you who's Henry the Second, who's Catherine, and then we'll move on to Diane. So Henry the Second is the second son of Francis the First of France. And Francis wanted his son, his second son, to have a good alliance, a good marriage.
5:38 Speaker 05 But what he really wanted was to have more claim on the Italian territories because he had claims, but there was a lot, you know, lots of people had claims on the Italian territories and lots of wars happened. He organized a marriage between Lorenzo the Second of Medici with Madeleine de la Tour du Verne, a French noblewoman. And that union gave Catherine de Medici, what's crazy, you know, she's of the Medici family. And then what happens is tragically, she's gonna lose her mother, she's 10 days old. And then her father, she's three weeks old, she becomes the orphan of Florence. But she's not someone without, you know, a family. She's just someone who, like the link between France and Italy, right?
6:20 Speaker 05 And the reason why Francis the First wanted that marriage, because he was in control of de la Tour du Verne, the family. And he thought that Madeleine would give him. What he wants, give him a good claim, a strong claim to the Italian territories. He obviously envisioned here a very strong alliance between the Medici and the royal family.
6:39 Kate Lister? And the Medici's were pretty badass, without getting into them, because they could be a whole episode on their own, but they were.
6:45 Speaker 05 Absolutely. They were very like, like honestly, most, you know, powerful Italian family, the Borgias and stuff like, they're not that different. Or even from the French noble family, the Guises, talking about people who are in the heart of power. Now, what's very interesting for Catherine, obviously, everything seemed to be hmm, less appealing for Francis when both parents died. But then Catherine de Medici's uncle is gonna become the Pope.
7:13 Kate Lister? Well, that's handy.
7:14 Speaker 05 Exactly. And everything became way more interesting for Francis. So he's gonna organize the marriage between Catherine and his second son, Henry.
7:23 Kate Lister? Second son.
7:24 Speaker 05 Second son.
7:24 Kate Lister? Not the oldest.
7:25 Speaker 05 No, no, he wants a very big dynastic alliance for the oldest, but he wants one that will give him more territories, more claims to the Italian territories. Through the second son. So with Catherine.
7:37 Kate Lister? Okay.
7:38 Speaker 05 The Pope and Catherine are gonna arrive in Marseille in October fifteen thirty three, and she is there to marry Henry the second.
7:46 Kate Lister? How old is she?
7:47 Speaker 05 She's thirteen year old, fourteen, thirteen, fourteen. But the good thing, Kate, oh god, but she's marrying someone the same age, and it's very, very rare.
7:54 Kate Lister? Okay, it's not as awful.
7:56 Speaker 05 You always end up, when you're thirteen, twelve, fourteen, ten, like, let's not even go, you know, but you're always marrying someone who's thirty, in their mid twenties. And it's dreadful. It's absolutely dreadful. But here, she's marrying another teenager. So the same age, they, they were born the same year. And Catherine, I really believe that she fell in love.
8:17 Kate Lister? See, that's unusual too. We don't see that.
8:19 Speaker 05 No.
8:19 Kate Lister? Like, were they actually, like, real love here? Okay.
8:23 Speaker 05 You know, having said that, you say that, but like, I could give you lots of royal couples that actually loved each other.
8:28 Kate Lister? Oh, maybe I'm just being horribly cynical.
8:30 Speaker 05 I think we tend to forget, you know, some, some of them just got used to one another, you know what I mean? Like, you know, eager on me.
8:36 Kate Lister? Yeah.
8:37 Speaker 05 Wasn't my first choice, but. I might as well. But there are some that are love matches and and I think that they're very interesting for that as well. But that I guess again, that could be a total different episode because it's it's quite interesting to discuss this. But here Catherine fell in love with this teenage boy who was quite handsome. Henry is is quite handsome, but he's not in love with her.
8:58 Kate Lister? Okay, so we've got this Italian orphan from the Medici family, very young.
9:04 Speaker 05 Well, half French, half Italian.
9:06 Kate Lister? French, half French, half Italian.
9:07 Speaker 05 Because people always forget that Catherine is actually half French.
9:10 Kate Lister? She's come over, she married another teenager, second son. Why do you think she fell in love with him? Was he particularly dashing? Like you said, he's good looking. What was he like?
9:19 Speaker 05 I think also because he's young and I think because she's relieved that finally her life is getting stability. You have to remember, like, you know, her life when she was young was really horrible. Because she was a Medici, because of her family, she was under attack, she was a pawn. And here it felt like, oh, my God, I'm marrying in a French royal family. She knows also like it's the land of her mother. So she's very attached to the memory of her mother and she's just eager to make it work. And here she's relieved is her age is, you know, not bad looking. And it's so easy, you know, like, I mean, Kate, I don't know, remember when you were a teenager?
9:55 Kate Lister? Really stupid, yeah.
9:57 Speaker 05 I mean, you know, if someone just says hi to you and it's not bad looking.
10:01 Kate Lister? You're all of a quiver, aren't you?
10:03 Speaker 05 Yeah, it's fine, it'll be my husband.
10:06 Kate Lister? Yeah, good point. Why did she fall in love with him? Because she was thirteen, that's why, because you just you fall in love with everyone.
10:11 Speaker 05 Okay, come on, he's a prince, he's there.
10:14 Kate Lister? Yes, marry him, yeah, okay, that makes sense.
10:16 Speaker 05 But lots and lots of problems are gonna happen very quickly. Henry is already in love with someone else.
10:23 Kate Lister? Disaster, that's not good, that's not good when that happens.
10:26 Speaker 05 She's twenty or ninety years, nineteen years, not ninety, nineteen years older.
10:33 Speaker 05 That woman is Diane de Poitiers. She was supposed to teach him languages and classics.
10:39 Kate Lister? She taught him something.
10:39 Speaker 05 She, oh, she taught him everything.
10:42 Kate Lister? She's twenty years older than him, like, and I know that there's a gender standard here because if it was a guy and he's twenty years older, we'd all kind of be going, oh, it's a bit weird, but okay. But like a woman, at the time, that would have been quite unusual.
10:54 Speaker 05 It was shocking and and it was more shocking when everyone realised how much power and influence she had over him. Because here you have to understand that this young teenage boy is completely and utterly smitten by Diane. First of all, she's, I'm gonna say she's the most beautiful woman at the French call, but if she's not the most, she's one of.
11:16 Kate Lister? She's a hottie.
11:17 Speaker 05 Oh, yeah. She's gorgeous for the beauty standards of the time, but even nowadays, if you look at a portrait, you're like, yeah, you're me. She's also extremely intelligent. She was married, she had children and she was now a widow. Let's talk about this, like the most powerful women at any court were the, like, the widows. Once you're a widow, if you don't remarried, you're you're sorted for life. Like, you're like.
11:43 Kate Lister? Yeah, done.
11:44 Speaker 05 So she has her own wealth, she's really well educated and she's a court. And she's gonna have her problems with the mistresses of Francis the First, because obviously, you know, people like to be at the centre of attention. And she's not a mistress to Francis the First, but she's extremely close to Henry. And it's gonna get even more complicated when Francis was going to become the second, he never become the second, if Francis, Duke of Volion, is gonna die. And it's gonna die in fifteen thirty six, and then it means that Henry and Catherine become Dauphin and Dauphine, so the heirs to the throne. And here's like, oh, my god, Diane now has so much influence and power over the future king of France.
12:25 Kate Lister? I just feel that we need to like just back and just remind ourselves that he was thirteen and that would have meant that she was thirty three years old.
12:33 Speaker 05 Yes, and she was shagging. It's horrible, isn't it? In a way, I find it so horrible.
12:40 Kate Lister? Like, when you think about a thirteen year old.
12:42 Speaker 05 I would not touch him with a spoon. Like, I don't know if it's an expression, but we're not touching with anything.
12:47 Kate Lister? Like, what? He's a mousketeer. What on earth does she think she's doing? She's, Jesus Christ.
12:57 Speaker 05 But I think here, I've never said that I think Diane was in love with Henry. I don't think she was.
13:02 Kate Lister? I don't think she was. Tell me about it. So you said that she's a widow, she's got her own children, thirty three and, oh god. Like, what on earth? How did they meet? What was this relationship?
13:12 Speaker 05 So she's a family and then with her husband, there's always been a court and she's from a noble family. So she's always been around and Francis thinks that it's a good idea to offer her the position of a tutor to his son, Henry.
13:29 Kate Lister? Was that normal protocol? Do you think he was setting them up somehow?
13:32 Speaker 05 No, probably not. But also I think he liked pleasing Diane. I think you have to remember, Diane is a femme fatale. It's not just, you know, about beauty. It's about how you carry yourself. It's about charisma. It's about her intelligence. It's about how she make people react, really.
13:49 Kate Lister? You see that a lot, don't you? Because, like, you know, beautiful women, beautiful men, they're ten a penny. There's loads of them in the courts. Like, parents are literally flinging their attractive children in front of rich people. And it might get you a throw down. It might get you like one or two nights. But if all you've got, if all you're bringing is pretty, then that you will be gone quite quickly. Like, the really great mistresses tend to be, exactly as you were saying, intelligent, witty, good company, very skilled at social diplomacy.
14:19 Speaker 05 You know, it's never about sex, Kate. Like, I mean, saying that in your podcast, you're gonna hate me now.
14:25 Kate Lister? No, it's true.
14:25 Speaker 05 But I've always said that a mistress, it can get you into the bed of the king for a few nights. But for you to remain there, you need to bring more. You need to be, you need to be something else. And it's all gonna be your mind. But here, let's, let's not forget, here, she's not talking to an adult. She's talking to a young boy.
14:43 Kate Lister? It's grooming.
14:44 Speaker 05 Absolutely. She's a predator. And if she had been a man, we would have said like, oh my God, she's dreadful. You know, it's the same today. You know, when you have like a university professor or lecturer or whatever. Uh, he's a man, he sleeps with students and they're seventeen, eighteen, nineteen, twenty, whatever. He's a predator, but if a woman does it.
15:01 Kate Lister? The Mrs. Robinson fantasy.
15:03 Speaker 05 I find it absolutely disgusting. I think you still have lots of power and influence over a young man that can't say no really. So as I said, like those two, like Henry and Catherine, because let's not forget my Catherine, please.
15:15 Kate Lister? No, no, we'll get to her.
15:17 Speaker 05 They're both like dolphin, dolphin, but he's always spending time with Rihanna. They're not consuming. People are starting to think that there's a problem.
15:31 Kate Lister? I'll be back with us still after this short break.
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16:44 Kate Lister? Are they having like a sexual relationship or is he so busy with Diane that nothing's happening?
16:49 Speaker 05 But that's where it gets interesting. So they're supposed to, honestly Kate, you're gonna love this, they're supposed to. So at first, you know, from fifteen thirty three to fifteen thirty six, no one is really paying attention to what's happening between Henry and Catherine because they're not heir to the throne. So they're hoping, like everyone was hoping they will have children, but at the same time, what happened? It's a crazy, crazy story. So you have Henry and Catherine and everyone's saying, oh my God, they're not, she has not been pregnant once. And to a point where there are rumours that are saying that he should divorce her or get an annulment, marry someone else. Catherine heard that rumour, very smart, very smart woman. I love Catherine Medeschi with all my heart.
17:34 Speaker 05 She goes to Francis the first and here, so humble, she said, I completely understand what you have to do to protect the dynasty. You know, your dynasty and the future of France, I will accept an annulment and I will go back to wherever you want me to go back. I will go to a convent, wherever, I just want you to be happy.
17:50 Kate Lister? Risky strategy, Catherine.
17:51 Speaker 05 And he said, oh my God, I adore you like a daughter to me. There will be no annulment, but we have to find a way. So then it's where she's gonna be like asked to drink urine of mules.
18:04 Kate Lister? Oh dear. I think I'd have rather gone back to Italy, but okay.
18:07 Speaker 05 I think I would have to. And there are all those things that she's gonna have to do, you know, go on pilgrimage and you know, all these things that, you know, it was the women. But Catherine is a smart woman and she's like, okay, there must be something wrong. And she always sees Henry and Diane together. So she's like, honestly, I don't understand what's going on because Henry does visit my chamber, but I'm obviously not getting pregnant. That's a rumour, but I believe that it's a true story. When you know what's gonna happen next, it makes a lot of sense. All right? So again, I wasn't there, but you can see that there's something here. She's gonna ask to have a peek to see what's actually going on when Henry and Diane are together. And she's gonna look in. Into a hall in their chambers and look into what they're doing.
18:50 Speaker 05 And she's gonna realise, oh my god, he doesn't do that to me.
18:53 Kate Lister? Do I wanna know, I do, oh god.
18:55 Speaker 05 They were having sex. I think what happened is that he was never having sex. He must have cuddled her. Never had sex, never pu- and and or never, okay, and and then I'm gonna become very graphic because it's very graphic in the sources and I'm a historian, I I quote sources. Catherine is gonna go to Jan because Jan is realising that there's a problem. If there's an annulment or if she doesn't. You know, produce any children. She's scared that actually Henry the second will be married to someone else and that person might be. More charismatic, more beautiful, younger, and that she will lose her influence on. Henry. So here we have the mistress and the wife that are into a partnership. She's like, okay, there's something that is not doing with you that he's doing with me. And she basically tells her, he can't get it up with you.
19:41 Speaker 05 He can't do it. You're not attractive enough.
19:43 Kate Lister? Thanks, Diane.
19:43 Speaker 05 Yeah, thanks for that. And so what she's gonna do, and it's why it's the weirdest ménage à trois of all time. They decide that they go together in the bedroom with Henry.
19:54 Kate Lister? Okay.
19:54 Speaker 05 She prepares him, he finishes in Catherine.
19:59 Kate Lister? How do, how do we know this? How do we know, what are the sources?
20:02 Speaker 05 Oh, first of all, we have the sources, we have, basically, it it is court rumours, but there's something that doesn't lie, Kate. She's pregnant.
20:10 Kate Lister? Boom, something happened.
20:12 Speaker 05 Fifteen forty six, she's pregnant. It worked.
20:15 Kate Lister? It's so weird. It's so intensely weird.
20:19 Speaker 05 They're having sex. Well, I think it's more Catherine, like, imagine you're on your back. Spreading your legs, waiting for those two to finish, like to do their stuff, and then he comes in you. And that's something that happens and happens and she she ends up having ten children.
20:35 Kate Lister? If you're thinking about like long term dynastic future security, Catherine has to get pregnant. She has to, like, that's her.
20:43 Speaker 05 She has to.
20:44 Kate Lister? And if this is the only way of, it's still intensely fucking.
20:47 Speaker 05 It's humiliating, Kate.
20:48 Kate Lister? Humiliating, and like, and Diane de Poitiers is like doing this with two teenagers. Like, how old would they have been at this point?
20:54 Speaker 05 At that time, they're no longer teenagers, right? They're in. Their twenties, but it's still very disgusting. It's still very. And also, we realised the problem was also Catherine, like there was something wrong. Well, the problem was never Catherine.
21:04 Kate Lister? No.
21:04 Speaker 05 Obviously, she got pregnant as soon as he did what he had to do. But he actually had an illegitimate child with a mistress that he shrugged in Italy when he went on a campaign. And he came back with saying, well, I can have children. So obviously, the problem is you. No, the problem, baby, it's not, it's not Catherine. It's probably like you didn't come inside her for you to have a child. But here Catherine builds up so much resentment and hatred for this mistress. And it's not just that, because it's not just about sex, we said that. Once they become king and queen of France, so it's in fifteen forty seven. Do you know who has a seat at the Privy Council?
21:43 Kate Lister? Oh, God.
21:44 Speaker 05 Diane.
21:45 Kate Lister? It's not just humiliating in the bedroom of what's going on here, but this.
21:49 Speaker 05 It's humiliated everywhere.
21:50 Kate Lister? This woman starts, she's basically regarded as the second queen.
21:53 Speaker 05 She's the queen.
21:53 Kate Lister? She's the queen?
21:54 Speaker 05 Yeah, she's the queen in all but name. She's in the Privy Council. Worse than that, and that's where Catherine really stood firm here, and I love it. Like, I wrote this on in Blood, Fire and Gold. Um, so it's a story of Elizabeth the first and Catherine de Chine, but I covered this. Because they're formative years for Catherine. It's where you can't understand Catherine, what she does later on in her life, how such a protective mother she becomes. If you don't understand the years and the year, the decades of humiliation. Not just in the bedroom, the fact that people think she's not attractive enough, the fact that, you know, she can't get her husband to get it up and to come in. Like, it's, it's beyond humiliation. But also on a political level, you know, her rival is in the Privy Council.
22:35 Speaker 05 And then she was like, stop, enough. It's when Diane de Pety tried to have, well, she didn't just try, she had an interest in the royal children's education. And then Catherine was like, enough, they are my children.
22:48 Kate Lister? Absolutely, yeah, that's.
22:49 Speaker 05 And I'll be the one writing to the um educators and tutors and not you. But Diane keeps doing it anyway. And there's this biggest resentment and rivalry to a point, you know, there's also Mary Stuart, you know, who's at the French court. And she loves Diane de Pety. She chose Diane's side. And that's why when people ask me, why do you think Catherine admitted she didn't like Mary Stuart that much? Because of that, because of that, because she loved her biggest rival more than she loved her mother-in-law.
23:19 Kate Lister? And there was things like when they got married, didn't the Pope send a wedding gift to Diane de Poitiers as well? Just like little things like that. Like it's, it's just humiliating on a global platform. Everybody knows about this.
23:34 Speaker 05 Everybody knows the power and influence of Diane and how much it affected Catherine. But remember here, I think what's the craziest part here is not just about sex. The sex part is, I think, a personal, an intimate humiliation.
23:51 Kate Lister? Yeah.
23:52 Speaker 05 Because rumors were everywhere. Like, I mean, let's face it, they, they could not conceal it.
23:56 Kate Lister? No.
23:57 Speaker 05 For years, she would not have had any children. And as soon as Diane accepted to join the royal bedchamber, do what she had to do, she became pregnant. That is very clear here, that we have three people naked together.
24:11 Kate Lister? It's so controlling from Diane de Poitiers. Like she's controlling every aspect of Henry's life now. Like his.
24:18 Speaker 05 She's controlling Henry.
24:19 Kate Lister? Sex life, she's controlling Henry. Was Diane well-liked at court? Because I don't like her and I'm hundreds of years later. And, and like when I listen to this, I'm just like, get in the bin, you awful, awful woman. But was she well-liked?
24:31 Speaker 05 She had lots of enemies, but she also had lots of allies, like the Guises were quite good friends. I mean, not, you know what I mean. I say friends, I mean, the French god in the 16th century. I don't think you can call anyone friends, but you know. But I think it's because they recognized her power. I think, you know, it's not about being liked. It's about being respected. It's about recognizing that you have power because you control the king. So then you had people obviously kissing your ass and others being like waiting for your downfall. Because there's one thing, Kate.
25:02 Kate Lister? It's coming.
25:02 Speaker 05 The table's always done. They always do.
25:05 Kate Lister? Yeah.
25:05 Speaker 05 I mean, it's, it's just a part of life. What's sad, and I'm going to tell you that before we go with like, you know, the triumph, I call the triumph of Catherine and the downfall of Diane, but let's talk just. Before that, what's very interesting is that towards the end of Henry the Second's reign, he start like around fifteen fifty five, fifteen fifty six, he's starting to get on it better and better with his wife. Because he realized that she's been loyal all the time. She only showed him love and respect. And he's starting to feel for her. Diane doesn't like that. And he's starting to laugh. We have recalls where they start laughing together and. And Catherine is showing that she does understand politics. Now I'm gonna tell you something that I wrote in my book, but also that most people don't know.
25:48 Speaker 05 Catherine de Medici is the reason why France got back Calais. She gave a speech to the Parlement de Paris and managed to get funds to send to Henry, her husband, who managed to get back. Okay, so we lost the war, but forget about that. We don't care. We got Calais back in fifteen fifty eight. And that is Catherine. And then Diane is like, oh my god. Her speech is, I quoted the, almost the whole thing in my book, because it's such a wonderful, powerful speech. It's when you realize, oh my god, she's so politically, diplomatically intelligent.
26:26 Speaker 05 And Henry is so proud of her. When he comes back, he, I mean, they lost the war. It's very difficult. I mean, I mean, lost is a big term. I mean, Spain, England and France had to stop this because it, you know, things were not working anymore. Everyone was like getting bunk rapped. But he's here like, oh my god, my wife is not that stupid. So when he dies on the tenth of July fifteen fifty nine, after a tournament that is gonna celebrate that peace between France, England and Spain, and where he marries his daughter to Philippe the Second of Spain. When he dies there, for Catherine, it is the first tragedy of life. She lost the love of her life. She says that. She was in love with Henry, completely in love with Henry, despite what he put her through.
27:09 Speaker 05 But then there's a downfall of Diane because she's like, all right, now it's my son who's in charge. Francis the Second married to Mary Stuart, and you, you go back. You're no longer welcome at court.
27:20 Kate Lister? Sling your hook.
27:21 Speaker 05 You give me back the magnificent Cheneau Castle, like it's gonna be. Chateau of Catherine de Medici. And she's gonna say, you can have a castle. She let her have like, everything that she had from her noble rights and, you know, noble birth. But she takes away a lot of things that Henry gave to her. The stuff that Diane refused to give back, some jewellery and stuff. I think there's a sentimental, I mean, to be fair, I still don't think she was in love with Henry. I think she was just in love with the idea of power and of having so much influence on a king. But it's a downfall. And then, you know, she retweets, and she even wrote a letter, Kate, to Catherine apologising for all the years of humiliation. But do you think she would have written that letter if Henry hadn't died?
28:06 Kate Lister? Not a chance.
28:07 Speaker 05 Exactly. You know, I'm just like, you're still a bitch.
28:15 Kate Lister? I'll be back with us, Del, after this short break.
28:29 Kate Lister? Hello, Betwixters. I'm jumping in here because I have some very exciting news. Betwixt the Sheets has set up camp on YouTube. That's right, it took us a while, but we are there now. So if you are the kind of person who likes to see your podcasts as well as hear your podcasts, you can now go and find us right there. And the link is in the show notes. And please remember to like and subscribe because the people in charge of the money really do like that.
28:58 Kate Lister? Right, let's get on with it.
29:11 Kate Lister? This is the thing that all royal mistresses and royal favourites have to contend with, is their power and their influence is absolutely contingent on, first of all, the king's being in love with you and wanting to have you around, and secondly, the king staying alive. Catherine de Medici, she's gonna have power no matter what, but Diane de Poitiers, it's completely dependent on Henry not getting killed.
29:35 Speaker 05 Exactly. And honestly, she didn't see that coming. He was forty, he died in a tournament. It's an accident. You know, he should not have died. That puts the whole country in a huge turmoil that is gonna, you know, then there's gonna be lots of problems in the second half of the sixteenth century for France and for Catherine. But in a way, so Catherine lost the love of her life, but she had a revenge.
29:57 Kate Lister? Oh, life begins at forty for Catherine, doesn't it?
30:00 Speaker 05 It does, it does.
30:02 Kate Lister? That makes you think that like, so then Diane is well into her forties by the time this happened. And she was famously beautiful. Didn't she have a secret for preserving her, her beauty?
30:13 Speaker 05 Yeah, there's other things that she put like gold on her face and that she was drinking things as well to appear still young. You know, honestly, Kate, I think that there are some people that have good genetics, right? Like they, they're just beautiful.
30:26 Kate Lister? Yeah.
30:26 Speaker 05 People, like there's nothing really you can do. You know, you see as well, like women or men, that some of them, they age gracefully and beautifully. And I think Diane was one of them, one of these lucky women. But also, I think that it was also, she started on someone so young. How does he get rid of her? There's almost like a maternal figure here.
30:49 Kate Lister? So, poor Catherine. I mean, like, just to have to have endured that for like twenty five years or whatever it was is just insane. And you can kind of look at Diane de Poitiers and be like, well, you're clearly a sexual predator and you're clearly somebody that is obsessed with power and you've manipulated this person. What on earth was Henry doing? What do you think his relationship to this was? Because it was bizarre how dependent and obsessed he was with her.
31:14 Speaker 05 Well, first of all, we have to remember that Henry lost his mother really young. Claude of France. So I really think here we have this kind of weird dynamic where he fell in love because she's beautiful. And also, like, can you imagine, you're, you're a teenage boy and you get the, the woman that everyone is like, everyone would love to share.
31:33 Kate Lister? Yeah, the pinup of the day.
31:35 Speaker 05 Yeah. And at the same time, I think as the relationship evolves and as she grows older, then it's like the allegiance and the lo- he's extremely loyal, like Henry is extremely loyal in lots of ways in his relationships. And I think this kind of loyalty towards her and the sense of maternal figure, mother figure, that he could not have with Catherine, who was the same age. So he didn't have that kind of relationship with her.
31:59 Kate Lister? It's grooming as well, isn't it? It's like long term grooming over, like she, he was so young and clearly quite a traumatised childhood. Cause wasn't he like taken hostage at one point?
32:09 Speaker 05 Yes, he was sent to, so, so his father was taken hostage by Charles the fifth of Spain and he was imprisoned in Spain. And his grandmother, because she absolutely wanted to have the king back, I mean, the situation in France was dreadful. She organised that the two princes should be sent instead of the king and the king would be released and it was accepted. So he was in prison in, in, in Spain for years before himself being released.
32:35 Kate Lister? As a little boy.
32:36 Speaker 05 Yeah, it really, I think, messed up with, with his head as well. And when he came back, maybe that's why his dad was like, well, I'm gonna give you a beautiful tutor to, to make up for all these years. Not expecting that Miss Tudor will actually take advantage of a young prince, the way she did.
32:51 Kate Lister? It's such a messed up story, isn't it? What happened to Diane in the end? Cause I, I love that for Catherine, just the moment. He's off his arse, right bitch, you are out of here, pack your bags, the Uber is on the way, you have been waiting for this.
33:04 Speaker 05 I never wanted to see you again. Like, it's basically this. But Jan just stay in the Chateau de Annette and just lives there until her death. Like she, she, she grows older now and like she loses her power and her influence at school. But at the same time, I wonder, you know, if it's not something she enjoys because finally she has a peaceful, do you see what I mean, Kate? Like I'm saying like for someone who's.
33:26 Kate Lister? Exhausting, isn't it? To be a mistress is exhausting.
33:28 Speaker 05 But also always in the middle of everything that was happening and somehow now she got like peace and quiet. She still had her wealth.
33:34 Kate Lister? Yeah.
33:35 Speaker 05 It's a revenge for Catherine because at least Catherine doesn't have to see her face anymore.
33:39 Kate Lister? Yes.
33:40 Speaker 05 But really, when you look at it, Jan has a peaceful end of life. Like she lose like power. But I guess when you're in your sixties, you're like, yeah, forget it, you can have it.
33:49 Kate Lister? Because tired by that point, aren't you? Just, you know, it'd be quite nice to retire to a little shatter. So I don't know if she ever got what we call a comeuppance, but she certainly got slung out of court.
33:59 Speaker 05 She had to give back things. I think giving back shouldn't also must have been, I mean, she also is is the most beautiful for me, like most beautiful castle in France. And I think giving it back when she knew that Henry gave it to her and wanted her to have it. It must have been like
34:16 Kate Lister? Yeah, must have
34:16 Speaker 05 Something she we, yeah, yeah, yeah, it must have burned her a little. But otherwise, it's not like she lost.
34:23 Kate Lister? Not really.
34:24 Speaker 05 She lost complete power and influence, that yes. But you, she was in her sixties when it happened, so.
34:29 Kate Lister? And what happened to Catherine? So Diane is gonna go and just go and live in this castle and just calm down you. Henry, dead and gone, God rest his wee bum. What happens to Catherine?
34:39 Speaker 05 Catherine is the rise of Catherine. So at first, not really. So in fifteen fifty nine, her son Francis become Francis the second. He's married to Mary Stuart. The geezer has become important accord there on the Privy Council. Catherine is on the Privy Council and she becomes an advisor. But at first, it's very hard because lots of people have more influence on the royal couple than she does. She's close to Francis, but he is sixteen, he does what he wants, you know, like mom, leave me alone. You know, like kind of an attitude. But he's gonna die in fifteen sixty, December fifteen sixty. That's very, very hard for Catherine to lose him. At the same time, that's a complete rise of Catherine because then her second son, Charles, is nine years old, he's gonna be Charles the ninth.
35:21 Speaker 05 And he's nine years old and it means that she has now to fight for the regency. And it's exactly what she's gonna do. And she managed to get it, maybe not in official terms, but she gets it. She doesn't get the official title. Antoine de Bourbon, who's gonna get it, but she shares it with him. Bourbon is in Navarre, so she's like, I'm fine, I can do whatever. And she has complete control. She has complete control over her boy, to the point that even when he becomes of age, which is twelve years old, fifteen sixty two. When he's crowned and everything, he literally said, my mother is still ruling for me.
35:55 Kate Lister? Wow.
35:57 Speaker 05 Sweet boy. But when he's in his fifteen, sixteen years old and then he's starting to argue with her, he's starting to say, mum, I know what I'm doing. And she's like, no, you don't. And she's still very much in power. She loses power or she's no longer in control in fifteen seventy four, when he died. And then it's Henry the Third, so her favorite son, but he's a favorite, but he's twenty five. He's twenty five, he becomes king. And he's like, mum.
36:20 Kate Lister? Chill.
36:21 Speaker 05 You'll be on the Privy Council. You'll be one of my most important advisors for sure. I will listen to you, but I won't do everything you do or you want me to do. Like she loves him so much. She loves Henry the Third so much. He's he's definitely the favorite. He looks like Henry the Second. He's very dashing. You'll see portrait. I like it. It's not just me saying that. You'll see like you. He really is. She's still very much like a very important advisor. She writes letters to everyone. She writes letters to Elizabeth the First all the time. I wrote this and Bloodfangol, like they're like.
36:51 Speaker 05 But at the same time, she's not the one in control. Henry is. But she had been in control before. She had been ruling. And that's the rise of Catherine. Like it's Catherine being constantly important politically and diplomatically. When she wasn't when she was younger. So really, when I, you know, when I hear women that says like, oh, you know, you can't succeed when you're in your forties, fifties. No, you can be rising. You can be like, I mean, she died, she was sixty nine. For twenty years, she had been like this powerhouse. And you can be too, like, you know, the age is nothing. If you want to achieve something, you can.
37:28 Kate Lister? Just make sure you get rid of your husband's mistress first and then you and then you are on your way.
37:33 Speaker 05 On your way to greatness. No, but she is. And I think Catherine is so like badly portrayed and and there's so many, there's a dark legend around her. None of it is true.
37:43 Kate Lister? None of it.
37:44 Speaker 05 Bullshit.
37:45 Kate Lister? I think I would have bumped Diane off if I was Catherine de Medici. I think I would have just had a word with somebody who knew about those kind of things. And I think, I think I might have taken her out.
37:54 Speaker 05 You think so?
37:54 Kate Lister? Well, I never understood why, why she didn't do that because she must have been a massive pain in the ass.
38:00 Speaker 05 Yeah, but Catherine was not that type of woman. She just focused on what she had to focus on, which was ruling. With her sons and making sure that France were, you know, that's the thing Catherine was so devoted to France and the Valois dynasty. She really married into the dynasty and really, really cared about it. I feel so sad, you know, that, you know, despite her father, she has ten children, is the end of the Valois dynasty. It should have never, never happened and yet.
38:25 Kate Lister? That shouldn't have happened.
38:25 Speaker 05 It's horrible for her.
38:27 Kate Lister? Estelle, you have been wonderful to talk to. I knew that you would be. And if anyone wants to know more about you and your work, where can they find you?
38:35 Speaker 05 So they can find me on Instagram. That's now my favourite social media platform. Obviously published above, but fine gold. And if you want to know more about Catherine de Medici and who she really was, that's the book for you. It's about her relationship with Elizabeth the First of England, because actually these two also have a very funny story, so.
38:53 Kate Lister? Amazing. We'll have you back to tell us about that one then. Thank you so much. You've been absolutely marvelous.
38:59 Speaker 05 Thank you so much for having me.
39:06 Kate Lister? Thank you for listening and thank you so much to Estelle for joining me. And if you like what you heard, don't forget to like, review and follow along, whatever it is you get your podcasts. Coming up, we've got an episode taking you inside the brothels of Tokugawa, Japan, and a special episode with none other than Philip Gregory on the betrayal inside Henry VIII's court. And if you want us to explore a subject or maybe you just wanted to say hello, then you can email us at [email protected] . This podcast was edited by Tom Delargy and produced by Stuart Beckwith. The senior producer was Charlotte Long. Join me again, Betwixt and Sheats, the history of sex scandal in society, a podcast by History Hit.
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