Renée of France

Renée of France was a Valois princess and duchess of Ferrara who became an important protector of Protestant and reform-minded thinkers in the sixteenth century. Born in 1510, she was the younger surviving daughter of Louis XII of France and Anne of Brittany. Although her elder sister Claude inherited Brittany, Renée received substantial French lands and a humanist education before marrying Ercole II d’Este, heir to Ferrara, in 1528.

At Ferrara, Renée maintained a court that attracted French writers, scholars and religious refugees, including for a time John Calvin. Her sympathy for Protestant ideas brought growing conflict with her husband and with Catholic authorities, and under pressure she made a formal return to Catholic observance in 1554. Widowed in 1559, she returned to France and settled at Montargis, where she protected Huguenots during the Wars of Religion while attempting to preserve a degree of political independence. She died in 1574.

In Rozsa Gaston’s Queen of Diamonds, After Mary Tudor returns to England, Anne Boleyn remains in France and enters the household of Queen Claude. In Keira Morgan’s The Importance of Pawns, After Anne of Brittany’s death, her daughters Claude and Renée become valuable pieces in the politics of France and Brittany.