Marguerite de Navarre was born in 1492 to Charles d'Angoulême and Louise of Savoy. She became the Duchess of Alençon after marrying Charles in 1509. After his death, she remarried to Henri d'Albret, King of Navarre. Marguerite was influential in the French court of her brother, King Francis I of France, and played a key role in his release after being captured. She advocated for religious reforms and was involved in the Protestant movement. Marguerite wrote several religious and political works before her death in 1549, though her most famous work, Heptameron, was published posthumously.

1. MARGUERITE
DE
NAVARRE
April 11th, 1942 - December 21st, 1549

2. MARGUERITE
OF ANGOULEME
Marguerite de Navarre was born Marguerite of Angouleme
in April of 1942 to Charles d’Angoulême and Louise of Savoy
She had one sibling, Francis I, the future king of France.
Her father died shortly after her brothers birth, her mother
did not remarry. She became the head of the household and
instilled a love of knowledge in Marguerite.

3. DUCHESS OF ALENCON
Marguerite married Charles, the duke of Alencon on
October 9th, 1509
In 1515 she joined in her brother’s court after he became the
French king.
10 years later during a series of military disputes her brother
was captured by the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V. She
led the campaign to get him released.
Shortly after she won her campaign and arranged her
brother’s return, her husband, Charles, passed away.

4. MARGUERITE DE NAVARRE
After her first husbands death, Marguerite remarried in 1527 to Henri d’ Albret,
King of Navarre.
They had one child, Jeanne.
Marguerite remained an integral player in her brother’s court but instead of
focusing solely on political debates, she became very involved in religious debates.
She became a very large part of the evangelical movement to reorganize the
Catholic church, which called for a return to the focus on scriptures and to
translate the Bible to French.
Marguerite not only pushed the movement, she lived it. She involved herself in the
politics of the religion as well, she established asylum for many religious activists.

5. MARGUERITE’S WORKS
Her early works involved a series of religious poetry;
Marguerites de la Marguerites des princesses (1547)
Miroir de l'âme pecheresse (first published in 1531 then
again in 1547)

6. IN THE END
After a long career in French politics, Marguerite withdrew herself and spent the
majority of her time in her chateaux in Southern France.
She began writing a series of novellas that she envisioned would become a French
Decameron, however, she died before she could finish leaving 73 novellas to her
editor, Claude Gruget in 1949.
He entitled the serious of novellas, Heptameron, it became Marguerite de
Navarra’s most well-known work even though it was published 9 years after her
death.

7. WORKS CITED
Brown, Susan. “Public Overview Screen: Marguerite de Navarre”. The Orlando Progect 2006-2009.
Cambridge University
http://orlando.cambridge.org/public/svPeople?person_id=margna
Fabbri, Kimberly. “Marguerite, Queen of Navarre. Pavlav’s Women’s History Site. 2005.
http://departments.kings.edu/womens_history/margueritN.html
http://www.aspecambrai.org/page-10143-saint.html