April 24, 1558
Mary Queen of Scots & Francis, the Dauphin of France

Mary Queen of Scots was born a Queen, literally. She was only six days old when her father King James V of Scotland died after the Battle of Soloway Moss on April 10, 1542.  Scotland was a treacherous, barbarous place filled with warring clans and the always-present threat of the English. Because of this, Mary’s mother, the intelligent and extremely tall French woman Marie of Guise, accepted a proposal from the French royal family. Mary would be raised in France and one day become Queen of France while her mother ruled Scotland as regent.

The young Queen was sent to France at the tender age of five and grew up with her future husband Francis and his siblings at the court of Henry II and his wife, the formidable Marie de Medici. By all accounts the weak and awkward Francis worshiped the slightly older, pre-naturally graceful and clever Mary.  Mary adored him in return. By all accounts she had a very happy childhood, surrounded by playmates and coddled by her mother’s powerful family, the Guises.

On April 24^th, 1558 the 5’11 Mary and the much shorter Francis were married at the Cathedral of Notre Dame. It was an extremely sumptuous ceremony, with a magnificent banquet and grandiose entertainments.  Mary bucked tradition by wearing a “dress as white as lilies.” White was the traditional color of mourning for Queens of France and one can only feel a tingle of foreboding in this choice, when one considers what fate had in store for the two teenagers.

A year later Henry II died and Francis and Mary were crowned King and Queen of France. Scarcely a year afterwards, in Dec. 1560, Francis himself died of an abscess on the brain. Mary chose to return to rule Scotland (her mother had died many years before) and lived a turbulent and tragic life. She was married twice more and had one son, the future King James VI of Scotland and England. After almost 20 years of imprisonment in England she was executed for plotting the death of her cousin Elizabeth I on Feb. 8, 1587.