Catherine de’ Medici

Author Mary Hollingsworth
Narrator Rachel Bavidge
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing
Run Time 15 hours and 24 minutes
Format Audio
Genre European history: Renaissance, History.

Listen to a sample

What to expect

Bloomsbury presents Catherine de' Medici by Mary Hollingsworth, read by Sophie Hunter and Rachel Bavidge.

A new biography of Catherine de' Medici, the most powerful woman in sixteenth-century Europe, whose author uses neglected primary sources to recreate the life and times of a remarkable – and remarkably traduced – woman.

History is rarely kind to women of power, but few have had their reputations quite so brutally shredded as Catherine de’ Medici, Italian-born queen of France and influential mother of three successive French kings during that country’s long sequence of sectarian wars in the second half of the sixteenth century. Thanks to the malign efforts of propagandists motivated by religious hatred, history tends to remember Catherine as a schemer who used witchcraft and poison to eradicate her rivals, as a spendthrift dilettante who wasted ruinous sums of money on building and embellishment of monuments and palaces, and most sinister of all, as instigator of the St Bartholomew’s Day massacre of 1572, in which thousands of innocent Protestants were slaughtered by Catholic mobs.

Mary Hollingsworth delves into contemporary archives to discover deeper truths behind these persistent myths. The correspondence of diplomats and Catherine’s own letters reveal a woman who worked tirelessly to find a way for Catholics and Protestants to coexist in peace (a goal for which she continued to strive until the end of her life), who was well-informed on both literary and scientific matters, and whose patronage of the arts helped bring into being glorious châteaux and gardens, priceless work of art, and magnificent festivities combining theatre, music and ballet, which display the grandeur of the French court.

Critics Review

At last an authoritative English biography of this most powerful and fascinating of queens of France. Mary Hollingsworth uses her unique knowledge of the Medici and Italian sources to illuminate this queen torn between rival dynasties and religions, tolerance and fanaticism, ballets and massacres. To be devoured.

Philip Mansel, author of King of the World: The Life of Louis XIV

Thoroughly engaging, a tour de force of scholarship that tells the story of Catherine de’ Medici as it should be told.

Josephine Wilkinson, author of Louis XIV

Mary Hollingsworth exhibits her trademark blend of meticulous scholarship and narrative verve – this time incorporating some fascinating new material to reinforce her skilful re-reading of Catherine’s character. Highly recommended, and highly readable.

Paul Strathern, author of The Medici

A nuanced and sympathetic portrait that does much to unpick the black legend woven by Catherine’s detractors and reveals how she used all her tenacity, resourcefulness and guile to try and bring peace to a nation torn apart by sectarian hatred and vicious rivalries.

Anne Somerset, author of The Affair of the Poisons

Thoroughly researched … Hollingsworth [makes] a compelling case that Catherine was not just a leading light of the French Renaissance but an unfairly maligned figure, whose foreignness and femininity made her an easy scapegoat

Sunday Times

Hollingsworth’s knowledge of Catherine’s life, as well as her mastery of Italian history, enables her to portray Catherine as the true European Renaissance queen she was … This expert biography reveals Catherine as a woman of virtue, loyalty and, ultimately, power … Hollingsworth’s eloquent prose and fine research sheds light on a Renaissance queen who truly deserves to be remembered as such.

BBC History Magazine

This book is a treat for fans of well-told history

Washington Post

Praise for The Medici:

This forensic study of the Renaissance banking dynasty conjures up a world of art, literature, philosophy – and brutality – Telegraph, Book of the Year

Likely to become the standard work of reference on the members of the family that dominated Florence – TLS

A lucid and beautifully illustrated family history – The Times, Book of the Week

A vital acquisition for anyone who studies the Renaissance and seeks the true role of the Medici in the history of Florence

Kirkus

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