Mary, Queen of Scots | Letter signed, to M. de Rambouillet, 31 August 1578

Mary, Queen of Scots.

Letter signed, with autograph subscription (“Vottre bien bonne amye Marie”), to the Marquis de Rambouillet,

expressing “grandes et continuelles obligations que j’ay au Roy tres chretien”, thanking him his services during his mission to the English court, pleading that he intercede on her behalf with the French King Henri III (“…Je vous prie doncques affectueusement qu’avant votre partement de ce royaume, je puisse par votre bn moyen resentir quelque effet de la favourable recommendation et intercession du Roy mondict seigneur et frere…”) and complaining of the lies that have been spread by her enemies (“…que depuis un temps j’ay tres indignement receu par quelques faulses impressions de mes ennemis pres de la Royne madite bonne soeur…”), in French, in an attractive scribal hand, 1 page, folio, Chatsworth House, 31 August 1578, integral address panel and traces of seal, letter-locking slits, some browning

MARY, QUEEN OF SCOTS, REFLECTS ON HER CONFINEMENT. 

The Marquis de Rambouillet had been sent by King Henri III, the younger brother of Mary’s first husband, Francois II, to intercede with Elizabeth I on behalf of the Scottish queen, who had now been a prisoner in England for a decade. She writes this letter as Rambouillet was about to return to Paris, his mission a failure. She ruefully admits the fundamental truth of her position: it is her very closeness to Elizabeth – and therefore to the throne – that makes her such a threat (“…vers laquelle a mon advis rien ne me nuist tant que luy este si proche parente…”) It was her position as Catholic heir to the throne that made her irresistible to those dissatisfied with the Elizabethan settlement, and thus the subject of numerous plots. Mary was at thus time under the custody of one of the greatest magnates of the English Midlands, the Earl of Shrewsbury, and his wife Bess of Hardwick. She was staying at Chatsworth House, one of a number of Shrewsbury properties that were strategically located at a distance from both London and the Scottish borders. Her lodgings at Chatsworth are still known as the Queen of Scots Apartments, and tapestries embroidered together by Mary and Bess during her residency still survive.