Epilogue

On Sunday 24 April, in the year 1558, just a few months short of her sixteenth birthday, Mary Stuart married Francis, the Dauphin of France. The ceremony, which took place in the cathedral of Notre Dame in Paris, was one of unequalled splendour and Renaissance pageantry. To signify her new position as wife of the future King of France, a new crown embedded with rubies, pearls, and sapphires was placed on Mary’s head. At one point during the banquet that followed, her head and slender neck began to ache under the weight of the crown, and King Henry directed his own Lord-in-waiting to remove it. Some people took it as an omen of the future of the vulnerable and soon-to-be-embattled young Queen of the Scots.

In November 1558, scarcely seven months after Mary’s marriage to Francis, Mary Tudor, Queen of England, died, leaving no heirs. Her half-sister, Elizabeth, became Queen. Elizabeth was unmarried. Some thought that Elizabeth was not a legitimate heir to the throne of England since her father’s divorce from his previous wife was never recognized by the Catholic Church. Thus his marriage to Elizabeth’s mother was considered invalid. So, immediately upon the death of Mary Tudor, Mary Stuart’s father-in-law, Henry II of France, proclaimed that his daughter-in-law, Mary, was the Queen of not only Scotland but also of England. Such a move hardly endeared Mary to Elizabeth or the people of England. She could be viewed only as a usurper.