Regency
Within hours after Henry IV's assassination, Marie was confirmed as Regent by the Parliament of Paris on behalf of her son and new King, eight-year-old Louis XIII. She immediately banished her late husband's mistress, Catherine de Balzac d'Entragues, from the court. At first, she kept the closest advisers of Henry IV in the key court positions and took for herself (1611) the title of Governess of the Bastille, although she entrusted the physical custody of this important Parisian fortress to Joachim de Chateauvieux, her knight of honor, who took direct command as a lieutenant of the Queen-Regent.
From the beginning, Marie was under suspicion at court because she was perceived as a foreigner and never truly mastered French; moreover, she was heavily influenced by her Italian friends and confidants, including her foster sister Leonora "Galigai" Dori and Concino Concini, who was created Marquis d'Ancre and a Marshal of France, even though he had never fought a single battle. The Concinis had Henry IV's able minister, the Duke of Sully, dismissed, and Italian representatives of the Roman Catholic Church hoped to force the suppression of Protestantism in France by means of their influence. However, Marie maintained her late husband's policy of religious tolerance. As one of her first acts, Marie reconfirmed Henri IV's Edict of Nantes, which ordered religious tolerance for Protestants in France while asserting the supremacy of the Roman Catholic Church.
To further consolidate her authority as Regent of the Kingdom of France, Marie decided to impose the strict protocol from the court of Spain. An avid ballet performer and art collector, she deployed artistic patronage that helped develop the arts in France. Daughter of a Habsburg archduchess, the Queen-Regent abandoned the traditional anti-Habsburg French foreign policy (one of her first acts was the overturn of the Treaty of Bruzolo, an alliance signed between Henry IV's representatives and Charles Emmanuel I, Duke of Savoy), and formed an alliance with Habsburg Spain which culminated in 1615 with the double marriage of her daughter Elisabeth and her son Louis XIII with the two children of King Philip III of Spain, Philip, Prince of Asturias (future Philip IV) and Anne of Austria, respectively.
Nevertheless, the Queen-Regent's policy caused discontent. On the one hand, Protestants were worried about the rapprochement of Marie with Spain; on the other hand, Marie's attempts to strengthen her power by relying on the Concinis deeply displeased part of the French nobility. Stirring up xenophobic passion, the nobility designated the Italian immigrants favored by Marie as responsible for all the wrongs of the kingdom. Taking advantage of the clear weakness of the Regency, the princes of the blood under the leadership of Henri II, Prince of Condé, rebelled against Marie.
In application of the Treaty of Sainte-Menehould (15 May 1614), the Queen-Regent convened the Estates General in Paris. The Prince of Condé failed to structure his opposition to royal power. However, Marie undertook to cement the alliance with Spain and to ensure respect for the theses of the Council of Trent. The reforms of the paulette and the taille remained a dead letter. The clergy played the role of arbiter between the Third Estate and the nobility who did not manage to get along: Civil lieutenant Henri de Mesmes declared that "all the Estates were brothers and children of a common mother, France", while one of the representatives of the nobility replied that he refused to be the brother of a child of a shoemaker or cobbler. This antagonism benefited the court, which soon pronounced the closure of the Estates General. The Regency was officially ended following the Lit de justice of 2 October 1614, which declared that Louis XIII had attained his legal majority of age, but Marie then became head of the Conseil du Roi and retained all her control over the government.
One year after the end of the Estates General, a new rebellion of the Prince of Condé allowed his entry into the Conseil du Roi by the Treaty of Loudun (3 May 1616), which also granted him the sum of 1,500,000 livres and the government of Guyenne. During this time, the Protestants obtained a reprieve of six years to the return of their places of safety to the royal power.
In 1616, the requirements of the Prince of Condé became so important that Marie had him arrested on 1 September and imprisoned him in the Bastille. The Duke of Nevers then took the leadership of the nobility in revolt against the Queen. Nevertheless, Marie's rule was strengthened by the appointment of Armand Jean du Plessis (later Cardinal Richelieu)—who had come to prominence at the meetings of the Estates General—as Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs on 5 November 1616.
Despite being legally an adult for more than two years, Louis XIII had little power in the government; finally, he asserted his authority the next year. Feeling humiliated by the conduct of his mother, who monopolized power, the King organized (with the help of his favorite the Duc de Luynes) a coup d'état (also named Coup de majesté) on 24 April 1617: Concino Concini was assassinated by the Marquis de Vitry, and Marie exiled to the Château de Blois.
