Gabrielle d'Estrées, Duchess of Beaufort and Verneuil, Marchioness of Monceaux was a mistress, confidante and adviser of Henry IV of France. She is noted for her role in ending the religious civil wars that plagued France for more than 30 years.
Portrait, 17th century
Portrait of Gabrielle d'Estrées
César de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme
Catherine Henriette de Bourbon, Légitimée de France
Henry IV, also known by the epithets Good King Henry or Henry the Great, was King of Navarre from 1572 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first monarch of France from the House of Bourbon, a cadet branch of the Capetian dynasty. He pragmatically balanced the interests of the Catholic and Protestant parties in France as well as among the European states. He was assassinated in 1610 by a Catholic zealot, and was succeeded by his son Louis XIII.
Portrait by Frans Pourbus, 1610
Henry III of France on his deathbed designating Henry IV of Navarre as his successor (1589)
Portrait of Henry III of Navarre (future Henry IV of France), c. 1575
King Henry IV in his coronation robes, by Frans Pourbus the Younger