Why Is Catherine De Medici Important?

Catherine was viewed in two different ways; she was either a great regent, or she was hated. The people who supported her were usually Catholic, and the people who did not like her were usually , Huguenots. (Huguenot means a French Protestant) They were very against Catherine and her beliefs. Catherine de Medici was a women who should have been noticed a more throughout her lifetime due to her family, the kind of lifestyle that she lived, her beliefs and the responsibilities she had while she reigned. Catherine de Medici, born April 13th, 1519 and died January 5th, 1589. “Catherine was born in 1519 to a powerful Italian prince from the Medici Family,” (Catherine de Medici Biography 2). She was the daughter of Lorenzo II de Medici and Madeleine de La Tour d’Auvergne. But, she was “orphaned a month later when her mother
“Catherine de Medici has been held partly responsible for starting the French wars of Religion.” (Truemen 1) She “witnessed the first three civil wars... struggled against the Catholic extremists for the independence of her crown.” (Sutherland 5) Catherine became governor of France on the 5th of Deecember 1560. (Queen Regent: Catherine de Medici 5) In 1560 Catherine had a plot set against her by the French Aristocrats to overthrow her, this was called Conspiracy of Amboise (Sutherland 3). Then in 1562 The Edict of January was signed (Sutherland 5). This “granted protestants freedom to worship publicly outside towns (Donald 348). The “edict was law, which the protestants accepted and the Catholics rejected,” (Sutherland 5). Since “the Catholics rejected the edict this was one element of outbreak of civil war…Catherine fell,” (Sutherland 6). Then in March of 1563 the Edict of Amboise was signed, this was signed at Chateau of Amboise (Sutherland 3). “Catherine ended the first civil war in March 1563 by the Edict of Amboise,” (Sutherland