From 1589 to 1599, the relation between Henri IV and the Parlement of Paris was a tumultuous one. Some parlementaires associated with the Catholic League refused at first to recognize Henri of Navarre as their king. These magistrates met in Paris until April 1594. Meanwhile, their royalist colleagues congregated in Tours where, in March 1589, Henri III had transferred his sovereign court. From there, the royalist councillors helped Henri IV reconquer his realm. This, they did in spite of his religion, although they frequently asked him to convert to Catholicism. After the reunification of the two rival courts in April 1594, the parlementaires seemed to work as one and blocked the verification of numerous edicts presented by the king. Their opposition was so strong that it has led some historians to claim that it was endangering the State's survival. It slowly faded away after the verification of the Edict of Nantes in February 1599. In a pacified France, the conflicts between a king finally in control of his realm and his parlementaires became rare. The magistrates finally had confidence in the government which seemed to take adequate measures to stabilize France after more than thirty years of civil wars. / The difficult relationship between Henri IV and the Parlement of Paris between 1589 and 1599 was not created by the egoistic nature of the magistrates or their incompetence as claimed by numerous historians. If some of the Parlementaires--we will call them the "opportunists"--put their own interests before those of the realm, a majority of their colleagues had a very high idea of their political role within France, an idea based on centuries of relation between the kings of France and the Parlement as well as on the political role of the court as defined by theorists of the time. Confronted to a king they hardly knew, these "traditionalists", on whom this work will be centered, tried to make sure that the interests of the kingdom, its king and its inhabitants were protected. They would not give Henri IV's government the leeway it sought but would scrutinize and frequently block the edicts presented to them, and this until Henri IV proved that he could be trusted as the head of the realm.

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This study explores Franco-Papal relations, and their effect on the French Church and State, from Henri IV's conversion to Roman Catholicism in 1593 until his death in 1610. Because Henri IV's primary concern, even in matters involving the Papacy or the Gallican Church, was to protect his kingdom from Habsburg encroachment, he was willing either to abandon his Protestant allies abroad, or to adopt reform measures, such as the decrees of the Council of Trent, that might weaken his own authority or disturb the peace of his kingdom. This caused repeated conflicts with the Counter-Reformation Popes Clement VIII and Paul V, to whom the primary enemy was always the infidel and the heretic. Nevertheless both sides realized that they needed each other to maintain their independence of Spain.

Les transformations qui interviennent en France à la suite des guerres de Religion modifient l’imbrication des sphères politique et religieuse. La scission entre protestants et catholiques, la triple reconstruction religieuse, nationale et étatique, les évolutions des pratiques et croyances religieuses ainsi que la nouvelle vigueur des gallicanismes induisent des mutations dans la dimension religieuse des conceptions du pouvoir royal entre le règne d’Henri IV et celui de Louis XIV, évolutions appréciables sur le plan symbolique. De 1589 à 1715, une iconographie abondante place le roi dans une situation religieuse, le met en rapport avec des personnages saints ou divins, ou souligne l’importance de son action en matière religieuse. Ces portraits du roi régnant ou de rois défunts, produits en des lieux disséminés sur le territoire métropolitain du XVIIe siècle, révèlent une autre image du pouvoir royal que l’iconographie plus amplement étudiée jusqu’ici. Elle intègre une sacralité héritée, fruit d’une longue construction médiévale dont l’importance se lit toujours au Grand Siècle, et des éléments neufs, qui passent en particulier par l’essor de cultes associant le roi et ses sujets, comme celui de saint Louis ou celui de Marie, marqué par le vœu de Louis XIII. Elle doit en outre se comprendre dans le cadre de l’évolution du droit divin, dans ses rapports avec l’autorité et le pouvoir du roi. L’image d’harmonie qui est élaborée témoigne de la place de cette iconographie dans la légitimation d’un ordre politique et social liant espace terrestre et monde céleste. La genèse de ces objets divers (peintures, sculptures, gravures, etc.), souvent éloignée de la cour, entretenant des relations parfois très ténues avec le pouvoir royal, ne peut être envisagée comme le fruit d’une propagande : elle souligne plutôt des fabrications collectives du portrait religieux du roi. Ainsi, cette thèse propose une histoire culturelle du politique, s’appuyant sur une approche iconographique intégrant les pratiques sociales et les théories politiques. / The transformations that occurred in France after the Wars of Religion altered the interweaving between the political and the religious spheres. The split between Protestants and Catholics, the rebuilding of the church, the nation and the state, the transformations of the religious beliefs and practices, and the new strength of the gallicanisms led to changes in the religious idea of the royal power between the reign of Henry IV and Louis XIV. These evolutions are assessable on a symbolic level. From 1589 to 1715, an abundant iconography places the monarch in a religious situation, puts him in touch with saints or God, or underlines the importance of his action in the religious field. These portraits of the reigning king or deceased kings, produced in dispatched places in the kingdom, reveal a different image of the royal power than the iconography that has most been studied up to now. It includes an inherited sacrality, built during the Middle Ages and still important in the 17th century, and new elements, which entail the growth of cults associating the monarch and his subjects, such as the cults of saint Louis and the Virgin Mary, marked by the vow of Louis XIII. It must furthermore be understood within the framework of the evolution of the divine right, in its links with the royal authority and power. It builds an image of harmony that shows the place of the iconography in the legitimization of a political and social order linking terrestrial and celestial spaces. The creation of these objects (paintings, sculptures, engravings, etc.), often far away from the court, often in loose relationships with the royal power, cannot be understood as propaganda: it rather emphasizes collective makings of the religious portrait of the king. Thus, this thesis offers a cultural history of the political field, leaning on an iconographic approach including social practices and political theories.