Gaston of Foix, Duke of Nemours

Gaston belonged to the Foix-Grailly dynasty and was a nephew of Louis XII. Appointed to high command in Italy during the War of the League of Cambrai, he conducted a rapid campaign against Spanish, papal and Venetian forces and won the Battle of Ravenna in April 1512.

Gaston became one of the most celebrated young French commanders of the Italian Wars before his death at Ravenna. Gaston of Foix, Duke of Nemours was born in Mazères and died in Ravenna.

Rozsa Gaston’s Marguerite and Gaston turns Gaston of Foix into both a Renaissance court figure and a young commander whose public career destroys the possibility of a private future. The novel imagines an attachment between Gaston and Marguerite of Angoulême, but dynastic planning and Marguerite’s place within the royal family make marriage impossible. Gaston’s appointment to command French forces in Italy then draws him into the War of the League of Cambrai. His spectacular victories and death at the Battle of Ravenna give the romance its historical limit: military glory advances French power while abruptly ending the life around which the imagined relationship has been built.