Posted on 05/15/2010 11:08:22 PM PDT by bruinbirdman
France has found a new political pin up: a charismatic leader who reduced the country's deficit by a third and embodied the legend of the tireless French lover - Henri IV.
Henri IV was stabbed to death in Paris 400 years ago today, while travelling in his carriage, by a Catholic fanatic on May 14, 1610. But that has not prevented a wave of national nostalgia, with his prowess being feted across the country with a series of books, exhibitions and articles.
Henri was a success for France in every sense – politically, economically and romantically.
Not even his reputation for stinking of garlic, feet and armpits seems to have dented the aura surrounding "good king Henry", who converted to Catholicism to end the war of religions, declaring "Paris is worth a Mass".
His stench was so bad that Henriette d'Entragues, one of the "Gallant Green" king's many female conquests, would spray him with perfume to keep the "smell of carrion" at bay. Despite this, he was married twice, had dozens of mistresses and 13 children.
"Were he to live today, he would gallop to the top of opinion polls," wrote Sud Ouest, the daily that covers his native southwest Bearn region.
"He would only need to lift the torch of a political party and supporters from all sides would rush to support him."
During his reign from 1589 to 1610, Henri converted from Calvinism while protecting the Huguenot minority, and in 1598 declared the Edict of Nantes, allowing Protestants freedom of worship.
He improved quality of life by building canals, draining marshland, and commissioning Paris' Pont Neuf and Place des Vosges, as well as boosting French industry, trade and agriculture.
He is perhaps best known for promising all French workers the "means to have a
(Excerpt) Read more at telegraph.co.uk ...
And here I ignorantly thought Henri had been a French national hero for centuries.
My understanding is that he remained an official hero even during the height of the Revolution.
“A chicken in every pot” and I thought that was said by Herbert Hoover first.
So, the it was the French.
Henri was a Huguenot..
He went back to the Catholic Church because only a Catholic could be king of France and he was the legitimate heir to the throne...
As king he could pass laws to protect both Catholics and Protestants...
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Better known for saying “Paris vaut une messe” Paris is worth a mass.
Henri, Prince de Navarre, was chosen by Catherine de Medeci to marry her daughter. Marguerite de Valois, aka Margot.To consolidate Catholic power and end the Wars of Religion . She plotted the massacre of Protestants, The Saint Bartholemew’s Day Massacre, as she did this.
A sumptious, excellent, although extremely bloody film starring the gorgeous Isabelle Adjani and Daniel Auteuil as Henri.
La Reine Margot is a 1994 French film based on the 1845 historical novel of the same name by Alexandre Dumas, père.
Isabelle Adjani stars as Margaret of Valois, better known as Margot, daughter of scheming Catholic power player Catherine de’ Medici (Virna Lisi). Although Margot herself is excluded from the throne by the Salic Law, her marriage to a Protestant prince offers a chance for domestic reconciliation during the late 16th century reign of the neurotic, hypochondriac King Charles IX (Jean-Hugues Anglade), a time when Catholics are vying for political control of France with the French Protestants, the Huguenots. Catherine decides to make an overture of goodwill by offering up Margot in marriage to prominent Huguenot and King of Navarre, Henri de Bourbon (Daniel Auteuil), although she also schemes to bring about the notorious St. Bartholomew’s Day Massacre of 1572, when thousands of Protestants are slaughtered. The marriage goes forward but Margot, who does not love Henri, begins a passionate affair with the soldier La Môle (Vincent Pérez), also a Protestant from a well-to-do family. Murders by poisoning follow, as court intrigues multiply and Queen Catherine’s villainous plotting to place her son the Duke of Anjou (Pascal Greggory) on the throne threatens the lives of La Môle, Margot and Henri of Navarre. A book with pages painted with arsenic is intended for Henri but gets King Charles poisoned by accident. Henri escapes to Navarre and sends La Môle to fetch Margot, but Guise apprehends him. La Môle is beheaded in the Bastille before Margot can save him, and King Charles finally dies. Margot escapes carrying La Môle’s embalmed head as Anjou is proclaimed King of France as Henry III.
I another Henry IV, that was so popular in France...
I read of a prophecy that a lame man of royal blood named Henri who would save Europe from invasion. He is called Henri the Lame because of his crippled leg forces him to noticeably limp.
Henri IV has been an icon of the french decline and icon of todays liberal france.He was praised by VOLTAIRE as an embodyment of a so-called tolerance which should rather be called relativism or secularism in VOLTAIRE’s case.
Between catholics and protestants fights,slaughters and wars which occured not only in France but widely in Europe had political and religious grounds/reasons.
Henri IV revealed himself as an opportunist changing several times religion for political reasons and as someone immoral and then unreliable since he had many misstresses like Gabrielle d’Estrée considered as a whore and he tried to force Charlotte de Montmorency,a girl of 15,to have a “love affair” with him despite she was already married ...
Henri IV showed a strange kind of tolerance only to grab the power .Before he became king against the will of the people and also after that he fought catholics
Great movie - but you had to watch it more than once to truly follow it.
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