Claude of France

Claude was born on 13 October 1499, in Romorantin-Lanthenay, France. She was the eldest daughter of King Louis XII of France and his wife, Anne of Brittany.

Claude was named after Claudius of Besançon, a saint her mother had invoked so she could give birth to a living child. During her two marriages, Anne had at least fourteen pregnancies, but only two children survived to adulthood: Claude and her younger sister, Renée.
On 9 January 1514, when her mother died, Claude became Duchess of Brittany in her own right. Four months later, she married her cousin Francis, Duke of Valois. With this union, it was secured that Brittany would remain united to the French crown, if the third marriage of Louis XII with Mary Tudor would not produce an heir. However, this union was short-lived and childless: Louis died less than three months later, on 1 January 1515. Francis succeeded him and they were now King Francis I and Queen Claude of France.

As Queen, Claude was eclipsed at court by her mother-in-law, Louise of Savoy, and her sister-in-law, Margaret of Angoulême. Unlike her younger sister Renée, Claude never showed any interest in her inheritance nor had any disposition for politics; she preferred to devote herself to religion.

After Francis became King, Anne Boleyn stayed as a member of Claude's household. Anne would return to England in 1521, where she eventually became Queen of England as Henry VIII's second wife. Diane de Poitiers was another of Claude's famous ladies: she would become the lifelong mistress of Claude's son, Henry.

Claude spent almost all her marriage in an endless round of annual pregnancies (poor thing...). Her husband had many mistresses, but was usually relatively discreet. The pawn of so much dynastic manoeuvring, Claude was short in stature and was afflicted with scoliosis. The successive pregnancies made her appear continuously plump, which drew mockeries at court. Foreign ambassadors also noted her claudication, the strabismus affecting her left eye, her small size and her ugliness. They did acknowledge her good qualities, though. Claude was little loved at court after the death of her parents.

Claude and Francis would have seven children: Louise, Charlotte, Francis, Henry, Madeleine, Charles and Margaret. Only two of them lived past the age of 30.

Queen Claude died on 20 July 1524, at the Château de Blois; she was only 24 years old. The exact cause of her death is disputed: some alleged she died in childbirth or after a miscarriage; others thought she died of exhaustion after her many pregnancies or after suffering from bone tuberculosis like her mother; and, finally, some believed she died from syphilis caught from her husband.

Queen Claude 
(16th century)

Claude of France surrounded by her daughters, 
her sister and her husband's second wife 

(1550)