By his wife, Catherine of Cleves, the third duke had fourteen children: among them Charles, 4th duke of Guise (1571-1640); Claude, duke of Chevreuse (1578-1657), whose wife, Marie de Rohan, duchess of Chevreuse, became famous for her intrigues; Louis (1585-1621), 3rd cardinal of Guise, archbishop of Reims, remembered for his liaison with Charlotte des Essarts, mistress of Henry IV.
Charles, 4th duke of Guise (1571-1640), was imprisoned for three years after his father’s death. He married Henriette Catherine de Joyeuse, widow of the duke of Montpensier. His eldest son predeceased him, and he was succeeded by his second son Henry (1614-1664), who had been archbishop of Reims, but renounced the ecclesiastical estate and became 5th duke. He made an attempt (1647) on the crown of Naples, and was a prisoner in Spain from 1648 to 1652. A second expedition to Naples in 1654 was a fiasco. He was succeeded by his nephew, Louis Joseph (1650-1671), as 6th duke. With his son, Francis Joseph (1670-1675), the line failed; and the title and estates passed to his great-aunt, Marie of Lorraine, duchess of Guise (1615-1688), daughter of the 4th duke, and with her the title became extinct. The title is now vested in the family of the Bourbon-Orleans princes.
GENEALOGICAL TABLE OF THE HOUSE OF GUISE
Authorities.—A number of contemporary documents relating to the Guises are included by L. Cimber and F. Danjou in their Archives curieuses de l’histoire de France (Paris, 1834, &c.). Vol. iii. contains a soldier’s diary of the siege of Metz, first published in Italian (Lyons, 1553), accounts of the sieges of Calais (Tours, 1558). of Thionville (Paris, 1558); vol. iv. an account of the tumult of Amboise from the Mémoires of Condé, and four accounts of the affair of Vassy; vol. v. four accounts of the battle of Dreux, one dictated by Guise, and accounts of the murder of Guise; vol. xi. accounts of the Parisian revolution of 1558; and vol. xii. numerous pamphlets and pieces dealing with the murder of Henry of Guise and his brother. An account of the murder of Guise and of the subsequent measures taken by Mayenne, which was supplied by the Venetian ambassador, G. Mocenigo, to his government, is printed by H. Brown in the Eng. Hist. Rev. (April 1895). For the foreign policy of the Guises, and especially their relations with Scotland, there is abundant material in the English Calendar of State Papers of Queen Elizabeth (Foreign Series) and in the correspondence of Cardinal Granvella. The memoirs of Francis, duke of Guise, covering the years 1547 to 1563, were published by Michel and Poujoulat in series 1, vol. iv. of their Coll. de mémoires. Among contemporary memoirs see especially those of the prince of Condé, of Blaise de Monluc and of Gaspard de Saulx-Tavannes. See also La Vie de F. de Lorraine, duc de Guise (Paris, 1681), by J. B. H. du Trousset de Valincourt; A. de Ruble, L’Assassinat de F. de Lorraine, duc de Guise (1897), where there is a list of the MS. sources available for a history of the house; R. de Bouillé, Hist. des ducs de Guise (4 vols., 1849); H. Forneron, Les Guise et leur époque (2 vols., 1887).
[1] This incident supplied Alexandre Dumas père with the subject of his Henri III et sa cour (1829).
[2] Philippe-Emmanuel of Lorraine, duke of Mercœur, a cadet of Lorraine and brother of Louise de Vaudémont, Henry III.’s queen. His wife, Mary of Luxemburg, descended from the dukes of Brittany, and he was made governor of the province in 1582. He aspired to separate sovereignty, and called his son prince and duke of Brittany.