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'Claude of France' (14 October 1499 – 20 July 1524), Queen consort of France and duchess of Brittany in her own right, was the eldest daughter of Louis XII, King of France and Anne, Duchess of Brittany. As the first wife of Francis I, King of France, she was the mother of King Henry II, King of France, and thus grandmother of the last three kings of the Valois line and also of Elisabeth, Queen of Spain, Claude, Duchess of Lorraine, and Marguerite, the queen of Henry IV, King of France.
Since her mother had no surviving sons, Claude was the heiress of Brittany, while the crown of France could pass only to and through male heirs, according to Salic Law. In 1504 Claude's mother Anne, eager to keep an independent Brittany out of French hands, effected the Treaty of Blois, which promised Claude's hand in marriage to the future Holy Roman Emperor Charles V with the promise of Brittany and Burgundy. The prospect of a reduced France surrounded on several sides was unacceptable to the Valois, and so the betrothal was soon cancelled. The French nobles argued against a betrothal to a foreigner, urging Louis XII to marry her to her cousin Francois, Duke of Angouleme, "who is at least all French," and in any case was the heir-presumptive. In 1506, the child was therefore betrothed to François. In 1514, when her mother died, Claude became duchesse de Bretagne (Brittany); and on 18 May 1514, at Saint-Germain-en-Laye she married François.
When Claude died, she was succeeded as ruler of Brittany by her eldest son, the minor François the Dauphin, who became Duke François IV, with Claude's widower King François I as guardian.
After Claude's death, in 1532 the personal union of France with Brittany was made definitive. The Dauphin, son of François I and Claude de France was duke of Brittany until his untimely death (1532-1536). His brother Henry succeeded him, and the last of the dukes of Brittany was Henry's eldest son Duke François V, crowned in 1544, and later also Dauphin and then briefly king.
Claude, the pawn of so much dynastic maneuvering, was short in stature and afflicted with scoliosis that gave her a small hunched back. She was eclipsed at court by her mother-in-law, Louise of Savoy, and her sister-in-law, the literary Marguerite, queen of Navarre.
When François became king in 1515, two of Claude's ladies-in-waiting were the English sisters, Mary and Anne Boleyn. Mary became the king's mistress before returning home in about 1519. Anne served as Claude's official translator whenever there were English visitors such as in 1520. Anne was also a temporary companion to Claude's younger sister, Renée de Valois. Anne Boleyn returned to England in 1521, where she eventually rose to become queen.
Claude's life was spent in an endless round of annual pregnancies. Her husband had many mistresses but was usually relatively discreet. Claude imposed a strict moral code on her household, which only a few like Mary Boleyn chose to flout.
Claude died in 1524, when she was only twenty-four. Her second son later became King Henri II. Her husband later remarried, to Eleanor of Habsburg, the sister of Emperor Charles V. The atmosphere at Court became considerably more debauched, and there were rumours that King François died of syphilis in 1547.
Claude is remembered in a classic small plum, the size of a walnut, pale green with a glaucous bloom, still called "Reine Claude" in France and known in England as a "greengage."