Imagine a king who is, I mean, just the ultimate
human contradiction. Right. On one hand, you
have this incredibly sensitive artistic soul.
A man who, and this is the story, literally held
Leonardo da Vinci in his arms as he took his
final breath. A true Renaissance man. Exactly.
He's the visionary who built these gorgeous chateaus
all over France. And, well, he basically invited
the entire Renaissance to pack its bags and move
to Paris. But then you flip that coin. Yeah.
You flip it over and this same guy is a brutal.
muddy boots warrior out there fighting in the
trenches himself. Yeah. He's the one writing
letters home from a Spanish prison cell, you
know, saying all's lost save honor. He's a king
who made alliances that just shocked the entire
Christian world. And who, when he was pushed,
could unleash this just. unbelievably fiery,
brutal persecution on his own subject. It's a
lot to hold to one person. It is. It is a lot
to reconcile. Welcome to the Deep Dive. Today,
we're unpacking the life and reign of Francis
I of France. He ruled from 1515 to 1547. And
if you look at the history books, the sources,
he's often called the father and restorer of
letters, a very lofty title. But the sources
we're looking at today. also highlight a different
nickname, one that was apparently pretty common
at the time. Francois Grande. Francis of the
Large Nose. Yep. France is of the large nose.
It paints a very specific picture, doesn't it?
But our mission today isn't just to, you know,
critique his profile. Right. We want to figure
out how this man, big nose, and all managed to
drag France kicking and screaming out of the
Middle Ages. We want to understand how he wrestled
with a Europe that was changing incredibly fast.
Religiously, politically, everything was in flux.
Everything. And how he, in the end, essentially
laid the cultural foundations for the modern
French state. And to really get Francis, you
have to get the exact moment he steps onto the
stage. Shut the scene for us. It's January 1st,
1515. He succeeds Louis XII, who was his cousin
and also his father -in -law. A little complicated.
A little, yeah. But the vibe in Europe at this
point is just electric. The Italian Renaissance
is in full bloom, right? But it's just starting
to kind of bleed northward over the Alps. So
France is still a bit behind the curve. Very
much so. Yeah. It's still quite medieval in a
lot of ways. You've got damp fortresses, feudal
lords, a lot of Gothic gloom. But Francis is
standing there, and he is ready to kick the door
wide open to the modern world. Okay, so let's
start with that. Let's unpack this Renaissance
patron side of him first. Because when you think
of the French Renaissance, he really is the face
of it. He is. The sources call him le père et
restaurateur des lettres, father and restorer
of letters. What does that actually look like
in practice? Was he just, you know, writing checks
to painters to look cool? It was so much more
active than that. I mean, he was personally deeply
obsessed with Italian culture. And the crown
jewel of this whole obsession, without a doubt,
is the Leonardo da Vinci connection. This is
the part of the story I absolutely love. He didn't
just buy his art. He actually convinced da Vinci
to move to France. He did. Yeah. He persuaded
an elderly Leonardo to leave Italy, to leave
Rome, and spent his final years in the Loire
Valley as a guest of the king. And this isn't
just a sweet little anecdote about being nice
to an old artist. This one move had a massive,
tangible impact on the world today. A huge impact.
Because when Leonardo came, he brought his luggage.
And in that luggage was a little painting you
might have heard of. The Mona Lisa. The Mona
Lisa. La Joconde. Wait, hold on. The reason the
Mona Lisa is in the Louvre today, the reason
millions of people line up to see it in Paris
and not in Florence or Milan, is simply because
Francis invited da Vinci to come crash at his
place. That's it. That's the whole story. Francis
acquired it, and it has stayed in the French
royal, now national, collection ever since. That
is incredible. And that image you mentioned,
the one of Francis holding Leonardo as he died,
it's a very powerful part of the legend. That's
probably not true. Well, we should note that
the famous painting of that scene, the one by
Ingres, is actually from 1818, so centuries later.
It's definitely romanticized. But it reflects
the reputation that Francis built for himself.
He wasn't just a patron who wrote a check. He
was a devotee. He genuinely revered these artists.
And looking at the roster in our notes, It wasn't
just da Vinci. It seems like he was trying to
import the entire Italian artistic ecosystem.
He really was. I mean, he had agents in Italy
whose entire job was to hunt down art and, more
importantly, to hunt down artists and convince
them to come north. Who else did he get? He brought
in Andrea del Sarto. He brought in Benvenuto
Cellini, the famous goldsmith, to create these
incredibly intricate works like famous Salt Cellar.
He hired Rosso Fiorentino to decorate his palaces.
So he was literally building a new visual identity
for the French monarchy. Exactly. Shifting it
away from the old, dark. gothic style toward
this new, brilliant, classical -inspired look.
And speaking of building, we have to talk about
the architecture. Because if you visit the Loire
Valley today, you are basically walking through
Francis's checkbook. You really are. Yeah. And
the standout, the one everyone knows, has to
be the Chateau de Chambord. It's breathtaking.
It is. And if you look at it, it doesn't look
like a defensive fortress that's meant to stop
an army. It looks like a fantasy castle pulled
from a storybook. Fantasy castle is the perfect
description. It's just... It's huge. It's spiky.
It's incredibly ornate. It is the physical manifestation
of his entire reign. I mean, it's got medieval
roots, sure. It has the towers and the moat.
Right. But the style, all the detail, is pure
Italian Renaissance splendor. And there's a da
Vinci connection here, too, isn't there? There
are theories, and they're pretty well supported
by the sources, that da Vinci himself might have
had a hand in designing it. particularly that
famous double helix staircase. Ah, the one where
two people can go up and down at the same time
but never actually cross paths? That's the one.
It just feels like a da Vinci invention, doesn't
it? So clever and so theatrical. Very much so.
But he didn't just stop in the countryside. He
turned his attention to Paris as well, to the
Louvre. Yes, and that's so significant for anyone
visiting Paris today. The Louvre, you have to
remember, was originally this grim medieval fortress.
Right. It was for defense, not for living. Exactly.
It was there to defend the city. Yeah. Francis
is the one who began the transformation from
a fortress into the grand palace we recognize.
He also poured a ton of money into the Chateau
de Fontainebleau. Which became his favorite spot.
His favorite residence, yeah. And also home to
his official mistress, the Duchess of Etan. We'll
definitely get to the personal drama later, but
it sounds like Fontainebleau was the real center
of the action. It was the center of court life.
But what's so fascinating here is that Francis
wasn't just building nice houses for himself
and his mistresses. He was consciously building
a reputation as an intellectual. Okay. The sources
make a real point to say he was a man of letters
who actually read the books he bought. Which
apparently was kind of rare for a king. Surprisingly
so. I mean, many monarchs collected books as
status symbols. You know, they'd have these fancy
bindings made to look good on a shelf. Right,
for show. For show. Francis engaged with the
material. He seriously improved the royal library.
He appointed the great humanist Guillaume Boudet
as his chief librarian. And here's where it gets
really interesting for the history of knowledge
itself. What did he do? He opened his library
to scholars. That sounds like a really modern
concept, like open access. It was revolutionary
for the time. He wanted to facilitate the diffusion
of knowledge. And then in 1537, he signs the
Ordinance de Montpellier. The Ordinance of Montpellier.
And this decreed. that his library must receive
one copy of every single book sold in his kingdom
wait that's the precursor to the legal deposit
system we have today like the library of congress
or the british library getting a copy of everything
that's published exactly it started with francis
he wanted to capture and preserve the entire
intellectual output of his kingdom that is a
visionary move it's incredible yeah and he wasn't
just a collector he was in conversation with
thinkers he corresponded with philosophers including,
and this is notable, women like the abbess Claude
de Bechtos. And what was that relationship like?
The sources say he would carry her letters around
with him to show the ladies of the court, saying,
look at this brilliance, you should all aspire
to this. It shows a man who genuinely valued
intellect, regardless of where it came from.
So we have this picture of a high -minded, book
-loving, art -collecting intellectual, a true
Renaissance prince. We do. But now we need to
pivot, and pivot hard. Because the same man was
known as the Night King. And his reign wasn't
just library visits and chatting with philosophers.
It was constant, brutal warfare. This is the
great contradiction of Francis de Sigt. You cannot
tell his story without telling the story of his
rivalry with one man. Charles V. Charles V, the
Holy Roman Emperor, the big bad of the story,
at least from the French perspective. He is the
ultimate antagonist for Francis. To understand
why Francis was so constantly at war, you just
have to look at a map from that time. What does
it show? Charles V ruled Spain, Austria, the
Netherlands, and the Holy Roman Empire. France
was quite literally encircled by the Habsburg
monarchy. He's surrounded. Completely surrounded.
Francis felt claustrophobic, and he spent his
entire reign trying to break out of that box.
And it wasn't just geopolitical. It was personal,
right? The sources mentioned Francis tried to
get himself elected Holy Roman Emperor. He did
in 1519. And he failed spectacularly. Charles
won partly because he basically threatened the
electors and partly because he just paid them
more. So Francis starts his reign with a massive
chip on his shoulder. A huge one. But, you know,
initially things went very, very well for him
on the battlefield. We have to talk about the
Battle of Marignano in 1515. This is right at
the start of his reign, Francis's first Italian
war. Right. And it was a massive victory, a stunning
victory. He just crushes the combined forces
of the Papal States and the old Swiss Confederacy,
who were considered the best mercenaries in Europe.
And the result? He captures Milan. This is the
moment that cements his reputation. He's a warrior
king. He's young. He's dashing. He's victorious.
He's captured one of the jewels of Italy. He
feels invincible. But of course, history has
a way of humbling people who feel invincible.
It does. Because 10 years later, we get the absolute
low point, the Battle of Pavia in 1525. And low
point feels like a massive understatement. This
was a catastrophe. It was a disaster that reshaped
European politics. It was during the Four Years'
War. Francis meets the imperial forces of Charles
V at Pavia near Milan. And it just goes horribly,
horribly wrong. What? happened? The French cavalry
gets bogged down in the mud. The sources are
clear that Francis was physically in the thick
of the fighting. He wasn't commanding from a
tent in the back. He was a true night king. He
was. And his horse was injured by a man named
Cesar Herculani. It goes down. And the king of
France, the son around whom the entire French
court revolved, was captured on the battlefield.
Imagine the shockwaves that sent through France.
The king is just gone. He's in enemy hands. It
was total chaos. There's actually a bit of a
historical dispute over exactly who caught him.
The sources list a few different Spanish soldiers
all vying for the credit and the reward. But
the result was the same. He was taken prisoner.
There's a little bit of trivia here that I love.
Legend says Zupa a la Pavese, it's a type of
soup with bread and a poached egg, was invented
on the spot by a peasant woman to feed the captive
king right after the battle. Wow. Because that's
all she had in her kitchen. Comfort food for
a captured monarch. And this is where we get
that incredibly famous quote, isn't it? He writes
a letter to his mother. He does. Of all things,
nothing remains to me but honor and life, which
is safe. It's often shortened, as you said, to...
All is lost save honor. It's so dramatic. It
captures that chivalric ideal he was trying so
hard to embody, even when he's sitting in a prison
cell in Madrid. Absolutely. He's a captive of
his arch rival, Charles V, and he's forced to
sign a treaty. The Treaty of Madrid in 1526.
And it was... Oh, it was humiliating. He had
to surrender all his claims to Italy, to Naples
and Milan. He had to recognize the independence
of Burgundy, which was a huge chunk of what he
considered France. And there was a personal sting
in the tail, too. The final insult. He had to
agree to marry Charles's sister, Eleanor of Austria.
Talk about an awkward wedding. I just crushed
you in battle and threw you in jail. Now marry
my sister. Exactly. But here's the twist. This
is the part of the story that really stood out
to me in the notes. He gets released, but there's
a condition. A trade. A human trade. Yes. This
is the part that is just so hard for modern listeners
to really stomach. He was released in exchange
for his two eldest sons. The Dauphin Francis
and the younger Henry being taken hostage in
his place. He traded his kids for his freedom.
He did. Two young boys, I think there were eight
and seven, sent to a Spanish prison so their
father could go home. That is ruthless. I mean,
on one hand, I guess you can argue it's pure
real politic. The king is the state. He needs
to be free to govern. Sure. But on the other
hand, as a parent. That is horrifying. It shows
you the sheer desperation. He was so obsessed
with breaking that Habsburg encirclement, he
was willing to do anything. And what happens
next is just as cynical. Oh, it's peak 16th century
politics. The moment he crosses the border back
into France, he immediately repudiates the entire
treaty. On what grounds? He claimed it was void.
He said, I signed it under duress as a prisoner,
and also my sons were taken hostage, so none
of it counts. he immediately went back to raising
an army to fight Charles again. The war just
never ends. Which brings us to probably his most
shocking diplomatic move, the one the sources
call the impious alliance. Yeah, if you thought
trading his kids was controversial. Apparently
that wasn't the only line he was willing to cross.
Not even close. Desperate, absolutely desperate
to counter Charles V, Francis reaches out to
the other great power on the European periphery,
Sultan Suleiman, the magnificent of the Ottoman
Empire. A Christian king allying with a Muslim
sultan in the 1500s. I cannot imagine that went
over well with the pope. It was beyond scandalous.
It was called the Sacrilegious Union of the Lily
and the Crescent. It was the first major non
-ideological alliance between a Christian and
a non -Christian empire in modern history. But
Francis just didn't care about the optics. Not
at all. He cared that the Ottomans were also
sworn enemies of the Habsburgs. It's the classic,
the enemy of my enemy is my friend. And it wasn't
just a paper alliance, right? They actually coordinated
militarily. The sources mention a joint naval
assault on Nice in 1543. Yes. You have Ottoman
ships wintering in French ports. The Ottoman
fleet under Barbarossa sailing alongside French
ships to attack a Habsburg city. It's an incredible
image. It just shows how far Francis was willing
to go. He was a complete pragmatist, but he was
masked as this chivalric knight. A perfect way
to put it. And we see the same kind of competitive,
pragmatic spirit in his dealings with England,
specifically with Henry VIII. Ah, the field of
the cloth of gold. 1520. This sounds like the
precursor to a G7 summit, but with, you know,
way more velvet and fountains flowing with wine.
And more wrestling. What? It was this incredibly
lavish diplomatic meeting. They built temporary
palaces out of wood and canvas covered in gold
cloth. There were literal fountains of wine.
The goal was to solidify an alliance between
France and England against Charles V. But it
didn't work. It didn't. The sources note that
Francis and Henry were just too competitive with
each other. They were two young, powerful, athletic
kings, and they were constantly trying to one
-up each other. And they actually wrestled, like
physically grappled. Yes. The story goes that
they had a friendly wrestling match, and Francis,
who was known for his strength, won. He captured
Henry in a throw. Henry VIII does not seem like
the kind of guy who would take that well. He
did not. He was famously proud. So in the end,
despite all the gold cloth and all the partying,
no real agreement was reached. Henry eventually
allied with Charles V anyway, though he flipped
back and forth later on. It just highlights that
Francis was constantly juggling these massive
personalities, Suleiman, Henry, the Pope, all
in a desperate bid to keep France from being
crushed by Charles. That was the single obsession
of his foreign policy. Okay, so speaking of the
wider world, we have to look west. Francis wasn't
just looking at his European rivals. He was looking
across the Atlantic at the New World. But he
had a problem. A big one. The Treaty of Tordesillas.
Right. The Pope had basically drawn a line down
a map and divided the entire non -Christian world
between Spain and Portugal. And Francis was,
understandably, pretty annoyed by this. He has
this fantastic quote, one of my favorites. Let's
hear it. He said, I would very much like to see
the clause of Adam's will by which I should be
denied my share of the world. Adam's will. That
is such a brilliant, witty comeback. He's basically
saying, show me the fine print in the Bible where
it says Spain gets all of America. Exactly. So
he just ignored the treaty. He started sending
his own explorers. He sent Giovanni da Verrazzano
in 1524. Where did he go? Verrazzano explored
the North American coast, and he actually sailed
into what is now New York Harbor. He named the
site of present -day New York City New Angulim
after his own ducal title. Start spreading the
news. I'm leaving today for... New Angoulême.
It doesn't have quite the same ring to it, does
it? Not at all. And then 10 years later, in 1534,
he sends Jacques Cartier to explore the St. Lawrence
River. He was looking for gold and a passage
to Asia. He didn't find either of those. No,
but what he did do was lay the claim for what
would become Quebec and French Canada, a massive
part of France's future empire. And the notes
also mention he was looking east too, right?
Something about these Dieppe maps. Yes, this
is fascinating. At the same time, French ships,
mostly from the port of Dieppe, were starting
to reach places like D in India and even Sumatra
in Indonesia. That's a long way for the 1530s.
It is. And it led to the creation of the Dieppe
maps, which were these incredibly detailed, advanced
world maps for their time. So you can see, even
while he was losing battles in Italy, he was
planting the seeds for a future global French
presence. OK, so we've covered the patron, the
warrior, the diplomat. But we also need to look
at what he did inside France, because the sources
mentioned some state building that sounds a bit
dry on paper like language reform, but is actually
huge. The Ordinance of Villers -Cotterêts in
1539. This is absolutely monumental. I know this
one. This is the one that made French the official
language, right? That's the headline. Yes. It
replaced Latin as the official language of administration,
law and government. And this is a massive cultural
shift. How so? Well, before this, if you were
a regular person dealing with the court system
or any legal document, everything was in Latin,
a language you almost certainly didn't speak
or read. It is a barrier. A huge barrier. By
mandating French, the language of the people,
Francis was, in a way, unifying the country culturally.
He was creating a shared identity. He was saying,
this is who we are. We are French, and we speak
French. The ordinance also mentions something
about vital statistics. Yes, and this is another
one of those boring -sounding things that is
actually revolutionary. It required priests in
every parish to register all births, marriages,
and deaths. That's the beginning of the modern
state, knowing who its citizens are? It's the
foundation of census data, of syllable records,
of everything. It's a huge step toward a centralized
state. And he also tried to reform the military,
establishing these national legions. He did,
inspired by the old Roman legions. He wanted
a standing professional army, not just the old
feudal system where you have to rely on your
nobles to bring their peasants to a fight. Which
would give him more direct control. Way more
control. It was expensive. The taxes to pay for
it were very heavy. But again, it was another
step away from feudalism and toward a modern
nation state. OK, let's unpack the topic of religion,
because this is where the shiny Renaissance prince
image gets a little dark. The outline describes
a pretty stark shift from tolerance to persecution.
It's a really tragic arc, actually. Initially.
Francis was quite tolerant of the new Protestant
ideas that were bubbling up. Why was that? Well,
a big influence was his beloved sister, Marguerite
de Navarre. She was very sympathetic to religious
reform. She read Martin Luther. She protected
reformers in her own court. She wrote these spiritually
complex texts like the Heptameron. And Francis
loved his sister. He adored her. So he tolerated
her circle and their ideas. Plus, there was a
political angle. Of course. The Protestant Reformation
was causing a world of trouble for his rival,
Charles V, in the German parts of the Holy Roman
Empire. So Francis kind of thought, hey, if it
annoys and weakens Charles, I can live with it.
So it was a calculated tolerance. Yeah. Then
came the affair of the placards. 1534. This is
the absolute turning point. What happened? Overnight.
Anti -Catholic posters placards appeared all
over Paris and several other cities. They didn't
just question Catholic doctrine. They viciously
denounced the mass in very harsh terms. And one
of them was put somewhere. Personal. Yes. One
was allegedly placed on the door of the king's
own bedchamber at the Chateau d 'Amboise. Wow.
That's not just a theological debate anymore.
That's a massive security breach and a direct
insult to the king. Exactly. He took it incredibly
personally. He saw it not just as a religious
disagreement, but as a seditious plot against
his authority and his person. The gloves came
off. And the crackdown was immediate. Immediate
and absolutely brutal. The sources describe a
wave of arrests. Censorship of printing was ramped
up. John Calvin, who would go on to define a
huge branch of Protestantism, was forced into
exile in Geneva. People were publicly burned
at the stake. And this policy of persecution
culminates in the massacre of Marendal in 1545.
This is the darkest stain on his entire reign.
The Waldensians were a pre -Lutheran reformist
group, and they were mostly living peacefully
in villages in the south of France. And Francis
turned on them. He signed an order for their
extirpation. It was effectively a military operation
against civilians. Whole villages were destroyed.
The sources say thousands were killed or sold
into slavery. It's... It's startling to reconcile
the man who championed the Mona Lisa and open
libraries with the man who ordered the massacre
of Marindal. It serves as a really stark reminder
that these Renaissance rulers were not modern
liberals. They were absolute monarchs. They valued
order and unity, their order and unity above
all else. And when he felt that was threatened.
Whether it was by Charles V on the battlefield
or by heretics in his own kingdom, he reacted
with extreme, overwhelming violence. Let's move
to something a bit more. Domestic. His personal
life. We've mentioned his sister Marguerite a
few times. You really can't overstate her influence.
Marguerite Navarre was a true powerhouse. She
was his intellectual equal, his political advisor,
and his closest confidant his entire life. They
were very close. Incredibly. They, along with
their mother, Louise of Savoy, called themselves
the Trinity. They were a formidable political
unit. And then there were wives and, of course,
the mistresses. His first wife, Claude, was the
Duchess of Brittany. She was vital politically.
She gave him seven children, including his heir,
and she secured the union of Brittany with France.
But she was often overshadowed by the more glamorous
women at court. And after she died. After she
died, his official mistress, Anne de Pissalieu,
who became the Duchess of Etampes, became incredibly
powerful. And the sources note he was the first
king to actually use the formal title Matissantite.
Official mistress. Yes, he basically institutionalized
the role. And Anne Pizzolo was not just a pretty
face. She was described as blonde, very cultured,
and extremely politically savvy. She wielded
real power at court, often clashing with Francis'
top military leaders. So she set a precedent.
She absolutely set a precedent for the powerful
royal mistress that would be a feature of the
French court. all the way until the French Revolution.
We also have to talk about its branding, the
salamander. If you go to Chambord or Fontainebleau,
you see salamanders carved into everything. It
was his personal emblem, the salamander, surrounded
by flames. And his motto was, I nourish and extinguish.
Exactly. It refers to the legendary belief that
salamanders could not only live in fire, but
could also put it out. So what's the message?
The message is one of power and control. I nourish
the good fire. of the arts of knowledge and i
extinguish the bad fire of my enemies of heresy
it's a statement of absolute authority and of
course we have to come back to the nose francois
de grome he was a very large man very tall for
his time and the nose was a prominent feature
he seems to have owned it It was part of his
imposing, larger -than -life physical presence.
So Francis died in 1547 at the Château de Rambouillet.
He was buried at the Basilica of Saint -Denis,
though the sources note his tomb was desecrated
during the French Revolution later on. When we
look back at this whole reign from 1515 to 1547,
how do we sum it all up? It really feels like
a mixed bag. It is absolutely a mixed bag. I
think the historian Glenn Richardson puts it
really well. He ruled as well as reigned. Meaning
he wasn't just a figurehead. Not at all. He was
actively in charge. And he left an immense, undeniable
cultural legacy. Without Francis I, the French
Renaissance simply doesn't happen the way it
did. The chateaus, the art in the Louvre, the
French language itself as a tool of the state.
That is all him. But on the flip side, the negatives.
On the flip side, he was a king who suffered
humiliating military defeats. He lost Milan,
which he'd won so brilliantly at the start. He
was captured. He left the country bankrupt from
his constant wars. And the religious persecutions.
And he initiated those brutal religious persecutions
that would tear France apart in the wars of religion
for decades after his death. It's the complexity,
I think, that makes him so interesting. He's
not a simple cartoon hero or a cartoon villain.
Precisely. He was a man of huge appetites for
art, for war, for women, for knowledge, for territory.
And he pursued all of them with the same relentless
and sometimes ruthless intensity. I want to leave
our listeners with a final thought that really
came up for me while reading about his obsession
with Charles V. Francis spent his entire life,
his entire reign, trying to beat this one guy.
They fought. They insulted each other. They made
treaties. They broke treaties. They even wrestled.
It defined him. It did. But when you look at
what Francis is actually remembered for today,
the Mona Lisa, the Chateau de Chambord, the exploration
of Canada, the ordinance of Villiers -Cotterêts
making French the official language, none of
that really had anything to do with fighting
Charles V. That is a really profound observation.
His military legacy is mixed at best, but his
cultural legacy is immortal. So it raises the
question for me, how much of history is shaped
not by some grand strategic plan, but by leaders
just trying to outdo their personal enemies?
And considering that his new Angoulême is now
New York City, the financial capital of the world,
how different would the globe look today if Francis
had focused a little less on conquering Milan
and a little more on that clause in Adam's will?
It's one of the great what -ifs of history, isn't
it? If France had turned west with its full force
suitor instead of obsessing over the south. Yeah,
we might all be speaking French in Manhattan
today. A fascinating deep dive into a king who
was truly larger than life and had the nose to
match. Thank you for listening. Thank you.