DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.45257#0369
RENEE DE FRANCE
221
her son, Charles Emmanuel of Savoy ; and Michel
de 1’Hopital declared that this Prince owed the
success of his career entirely to her. The French
Ambassador at Constantinople left to her his entire
fortune, and the poet Du Bellay on his death-bed
wept bitterly because he was unable to take a last
farewell of her. When she herself died there
perished with her all that was best in the spirit of
the neo-Platonism initiated by her aunt, the first
Marguerite; so that it presently fell entirely to
pieces under the influence of the third Marguerite,
youngest daughter of Catherine de Medicis.
A likeness of Renee de France^ which bears
some affinity to the portrait of her sister Queen
Claude is also to be found at Chantilly. It repre-
sents her at the time of her marriage to Ercole, Duke
of Ferrara, son of Lucrezia Borgia : nuptials which
were celebrated in the Sainte Chapelle at Paris. Like
the other French princesses of her day she was ex-
tremely intelligent and studious, and during her time
the Court of Ferrara became renowned as an intel-
lectual centre to which French visitors were always
warmly welcomed. To the complaints of her Italian
courtiers that she spent too much money upon
her compatriots she replied, "Que uoulez-vous ?
Ces sont pauvres Frangais de ma nation lesquelles
st Dtett m eut donne barbe au menton, et que je
fusse homme, seraient maintenant tons mes sujets,
et st cette mecliante loi Salique ne me tenait trop
de rigueurd Renee was a strong adherent of the
1 See Plate LVII.
221
her son, Charles Emmanuel of Savoy ; and Michel
de 1’Hopital declared that this Prince owed the
success of his career entirely to her. The French
Ambassador at Constantinople left to her his entire
fortune, and the poet Du Bellay on his death-bed
wept bitterly because he was unable to take a last
farewell of her. When she herself died there
perished with her all that was best in the spirit of
the neo-Platonism initiated by her aunt, the first
Marguerite; so that it presently fell entirely to
pieces under the influence of the third Marguerite,
youngest daughter of Catherine de Medicis.
A likeness of Renee de France^ which bears
some affinity to the portrait of her sister Queen
Claude is also to be found at Chantilly. It repre-
sents her at the time of her marriage to Ercole, Duke
of Ferrara, son of Lucrezia Borgia : nuptials which
were celebrated in the Sainte Chapelle at Paris. Like
the other French princesses of her day she was ex-
tremely intelligent and studious, and during her time
the Court of Ferrara became renowned as an intel-
lectual centre to which French visitors were always
warmly welcomed. To the complaints of her Italian
courtiers that she spent too much money upon
her compatriots she replied, "Que uoulez-vous ?
Ces sont pauvres Frangais de ma nation lesquelles
st Dtett m eut donne barbe au menton, et que je
fusse homme, seraient maintenant tons mes sujets,
et st cette mecliante loi Salique ne me tenait trop
de rigueurd Renee was a strong adherent of the
1 See Plate LVII.