Un prélat français de la Renaissance: Le Cardinal de Lorraine entre Reims et l’Europe ed. by Jean Balsamo, Thomas Nicklas, Bruno Restif (review)

Charles de Lorraine, cardinal de Lorraine and archbishop of Reims, became one of the principal leaders of the Catholic reform in France during the mid-sixteenth century. A member of the Guise branch of the Lorraine dynasty, Charles de Lorraine (1524–1574) personified a Renaissance prince and a reforming prelate during a tumultuous period of religious change and confessional division. His religious and political engagement in the first two decades of the French Wars of Religion (1559–1629) made him a controversial and polarizing figure.

Un prélat français de la Renaissance. Le Cardinal de Lorraine entre Reims et l’Europe offers a historical portrait of the cardinal de Lorraine from various perspectives. This collective volume publishes twenty-five essays by historians, art historians, literary scholars, and other specialists on the cardinal de Lorraine and his historical context. The volume produces a nuanced view of the cardinal as a religio-political leader and a literary and artistic patron (Jean Balsamo, Bruno Restif). Several essays treat the documentary record and historiographical literature on the cardinal de Lorraine (Vladimir Chichkine, Isabelle de Conihout, Antoine Pietrobelli, Claude Langlois, Jean-Marie Le Gall).

Charles de Lorraine served as archbishop of Reims and also played numerous other clerical roles. He embodied a reforming bishop, transforming his diocese of Reims into a major center of Catholic reform (Bruno Restif). Isabelle Balsamo assesses the archbishop’s artistic patronage in the cathedral of Reims, while Patrick Demouy focuses on the devotional activities and penitential processions that he encouraged. The cardinal promoted Catholic reform throughout the kingdom by sponsoring Jesuit missions in France and supporting other religious orders (Madeleine Molin). Joseph Bergin analyzes the “ecclesiastical empire of the Guises,” focusing particularly on the cardinal de Lorraine’s role as abbot of the royal abbey of Saint-Denis, where royal family members were interred. As archbishop of Reims, Lorraine crowned three French kings and engaged in religious politics in order to promote Catholic reform in the kingdom. The cardinal and his brother—François de Lorraine, duc de Guise—advised the young François II during his short reign (1559–1560). Charles de Lorraine maintained a broad clientele in the province of Champagne and beyond through his benefices and urban associations (Mark Konnert and Mark Greengrass).

Charles de Lorraine’s attitudes toward heresy gradually shifted between the 1540s and 1570s. Theologian Claude d’Espence provided the young cardinal with spiritual guidance, but the he later fell under suspicion of heresy (Peter Walter). The cardinal promoted a religious reform program based on religious harmony and Christian unity in the mid-sixteenth century (Alain Tallon). Lorraine later organized a major theological discussion between Catholic and Calvinist theologians at the Colloquy of Poissy (1561), but the meeting utterly failed to produce any theological compromise between the increasingly divided confessions (Max Engam-mare). The cardinal de Lorraine seems to have gradually embraced strict anti-heresy policies, pressing for executions of Huguenots who had participated in the Conspiracy of Amboise and justifying massacres of Protestants. Calvinist writers such as François Hotman demonized the cardinal as a “tiger” and a “viper” for his “cruelty and avarice” toward Protestants. Hugues Daussy traces the crystallization of this negative image of the cardinal.

Lorraine engaged in European politics through relationships in Germany, Italy, Scotland, and the Netherlands (Eric Durot, Matteo Provasi, Federica Veratelli, Jules Versele, and François Pernot). The cardinal de Lorraine conducted several diplomatic missions and acted as one of the main negotiators for the peace of Cateau-Cambrésis in 1559 (Thomas Nicklas). He participated in the papal conclave for the election of Julius III, and his brother, the cardinal de Guise, took part in two additional conclaves (Alain Cullière). Yet, electoral...