Charles de Lorraine-Guise

Portrait drawing of Charles' de Lorraine-Guise by François Clouet , 1555

Charles de Lorraine-Guise (born February 17, 1524 in Joinville , † December 26, 1574 in Avignon ) was a French cardinal and diplomat. Under the kings Heinrich II. And especially under his son Franz II. He directed the politics of the French crown and represented France at the Council of Trent . He was the brother of François de Lorraine, duc de Guise and Marie de Guise .

Life

Cardinal coat of arms

Charles de Lorraine-Guise in a Cardinal's Choir Dress (painting by El Greco , 1571)

Charles was the second son of the first Duke of Guise, Claude de Lorraine , and Antoinette de Bourbon , a close relative of the Valois dynasty then ruling France . As a younger son, a spiritual career was decided for him. Nevertheless, he received the title of Duke of Chevreuse . He completed his theology studies at the Collège de Navarre in Paris . At the age of only 14, King Francis I appointed him Archbishop of Reims . Nine years later he carried out the coronation of King Henry II in this capacity and was one day later on July 27, 1547 by Pope Paul III. raised to the rank of cardinal and appointed cardinal priest of Santa Cecilia on November 4, 1547 . Charles quickly became the richest and most powerful church prince in France. This was primarily due to the fact that with the title of his uncle, the diocese of Metz and the wealthy monasteries of Cluny and Fécamp had also passed into his possession.

As a church prince of the Renaissance , he also devoted himself to the sciences and the arts. He founded the University of Reims in 1547/49 and was a great patron of the poets Pierre de Ronsard and François Rabelais .

The cardinal was known for trying to put members of his family in lucrative positions in the state and administration ( nepotism ). For example, he tried to bring the county of Provence into Guisian hands, but this failed. He was much more successful in arranging the marriage of his niece Maria Stuart with the Dauphin Franz (later Franz II). In 1555 Cardinal Guise received the titular church of Sant'Apollinare through Paul IV .

He gained importance above all in connection with the politics of France. As a member of the royal council, for example, he helped draft the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis in 1559 . His influence assumed threatening proportions when he and his brother became regents of the underage Franz II after the death of Henry II. As already explained, he was married to Karl's niece, and the Scottish Queen seems to have put her uncles at the French court in an ideal light. Even under Henry II, the crown pursued an intolerant ecclesiastical policy and acted sharply against the Huguenots . The cardinal did his part in the repression and persecution of the followers of the “new” faith and did not hesitate to introduce the Inquisition in France ( Chambre ardente ). As the regent, this attitude towards the Huguenots should not change. In September 1561 Katharina von Medici managed to invite both religious parties to a joint conversation in Poissy (Religious Discussion of Poissy). As was to be expected, the Protestant representatives (especially Théodore de Bèze and Pietro Vermiglio) found their most stubborn adversary in Charles. When the Amboise conspiracy was uncovered six months later , all the hatred and fear of the Cardinal were released in punishing those involved. After the early death of the king and the associated loss of reign ( Charles IX appointed his mother to be regent), the position of the cardinal was subject to constant change. The new king, or rather the regent, sent him as ambassador of France to the Council of Trent and he soon became one of the spokesmen there. In the name of his king, Guise should work out a comparison with the German council representatives who wanted to achieve a reform of the church and demanded the lay chalice , the abolition of celibacy and prayers in the vernacular. He sent the relevant articles to Pius IV in Rome on January 2, 1563 . However, the latter did not want to know anything about the articles, and serious tensions arose between the Pope and the cardinal, who, due to the stubborn attitude of Pius IV, identified Rome as the source of the ecclesiastical abuses. But the tension between Rome and France was also due to two other facts. On the one hand, the Huguenots had made several concessions with the Edict of Amboise ; on the other hand, the French ambassadors wanted to preserve the freedom of the Gallican Church when reforming the Catholic Church.

In 1564 the cardinal returned to France and had to enforce the decisions of the council there, although they did not correspond to his wish to leave the freedom of the Church of France untouched. Charles had therefore fallen out again with the Pope after he wanted to convene a French national council with representatives of the Huguenots.

Under Charles IX. and his mother, the situation in France had dramatically come to a head; one civil war followed another. The religious moment faded more and more into the background. Actually, the clashes were about politics at the highest level. Three factions (the King, the Bourbons and the Guises ) fought for power in France. Katharina de Medici did everything possible to keep the influence of the Guisen as low as possible. With her chancellor Michel de l'Hôpital, she managed to keep the cardinal away from almost all political matters. Charles now tried desperately to consolidate the influence of his family at court and sought a marriage of his nephew, Henri I de Lorraine, duc de Guise , with the sister of the king, Margaret of Valois . Hereby he drew the annoyance of the regent, who wanted to marry her daughter to Henry of Navarre in order to end the Huguenot Wars . The cardinal was then banished from the Privy Council.

On May 30, 1574, King Charles IX died and his brother Heinrich III. ascended the French throne. Even before Cardinal Charles de Lorraine-Guise could win the favor of the new ruler, he died on December 26, 1574 in Avignon.

Charles is one of the most important church princes of his time. The cardinal took part in four conclaves : 1549/1550, April 1555, May 1555 and 1559. He is mentioned in Friedrich Schiller's Maria Stuart and plays a role in Hans Pfitzner's opera Palestrina .

Web links

Commons : Charles de Lorraine-Guise  - collection of images, videos and audio files

• Charles de Lorraine-Guise in the Saarland biographies
• Charles de Lorraine-Guise. In: Salvador Miranda : The Cardinals of the Holy Roman Church. ( Florida International University website, English)
• Entry on Charles de Lorraine-Guise on catholic-hierarchy.org

predecessor	Office	successor
Jean de Lorraine	Archbishop of Reims 1538–1574	Louis II. De Lorraine-Guise
Jean de Lorraine	Bishop of Metz 1550–1551	Robert II. De Lénoncourt