v42_0133 - FRANCIS II. COINAGE AT THE NAME OF HENRY II Demi-teston au buste lauré, 2e type 1559 Bayonne

FRANCIS II. COINAGE IN THE NAME OF HENRY II

(10/07/1559-4/12/1560)

Eldest son of Henri II and Catherine de Médicis, François II was born in Fontainebleau in 1544. In 1558, he married Marie Stuart, Queen of Scotland and niece of the Duke of Guise and the Cardinal of Lorraine. Ascended to the throne in 1559 after his father's fatal accident, the very young king abandoned the effective exercise of power to the Guises and disgraced the constable of Montmorency, favorite of the previous reign. The Guise government alienated part of the nobility and the Bourbon family. He continued the persecutions against the Protestants and repressed in blood the conspiracy of Amboise (1560), assembled to seize the person of the young king. The assembly of notables gathered at Fontainebleau the same year disavowed the Guises and Queen Mother Catherine began to establish the influence she was to retain under subsequent reigns. Thus began the civil wars, which under the name of wars of religion, would last until 1593. Foreign to the course of business and the crisis which was beginning, in fragile health, François II died in 1560, barely sixteen years old..