In November 1575 King Henri III of France and his mother, Catherine de’ Medici, amused themselves in the streets of Paris snatching lapdogs from nuns; three years earlier during the reign of Henry’s brother and predecessor, Charles IX, the quarry had been Huguenots hunted down and killed in the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacre, allegedly again at the instigation of Catherine. As this history of the French Renaissance court demonstrates, the elaborate pursuit of game was the consuming passion of the Valois kings.

Jul 2008

Never Knowingly Understaffed

Cousins in Arms

Diamond in the Rough

Family Planning

Prince of Pleasure

Kings of Spin

Renaissance Woman

Biography of A Wardrobe

The Marrying Kind

What A Woman!

Not All Façade

From The Sidelines

Worse Than The Baglioni?

Shared Passions

My Last Duchess

Royal Mail

At Home with Mrs Brown

Bertie, Lillibet, Margaret & Me

Two Nations Under God

Sign Up to our newsletter

@Lit_Review

Last Tweets