Catherine was the daughter of Lorenzo II. de Medici, nephew of Leo X., and invested by his uncle in 1516 with the duchy of Urbino. Lorenzo, who had made himself hateful by his despotism, died the very year of his daughter's birth (1519). The duchy reverted to Leo X., and subsequently to its former masters the Della Rovera, and Catherine was left a portionless orphan. A marriage with this girl, descended from the rich merchants of Florence, was a strange alliance for the son of a king, and it was this that made Francis hesitate; but the desire of winning the pope's favour from his rival helped him at last to overcome his haughty disgust. Clement, who held (says Du Bellay) his family 'in singular esteem,' was transported with delight at the offer. A Medici on the throne of France!... He could not contain himself for joy. At the same time Francis intended to make a good bargain. He asked through the Duke of Albany, whose wife was Catherine's maternal aunt, that the pope should secure to his son Henry a fine Italian state composed of Parma, Florence, Pisa, Leghorn, Modena, Urbino, and Reggio; besides (said the secret articles) the duchy of Milan and the lordship of Genoa, which, added the French diplomatists, 'already belong to the future husband.' In order to fulfil these engagements the pope was to employ his influence, his negotiations, his money, and his soldiers. Clement said that the conditions were very reasonable.[360] He knew perfectly well that he could not give these countries to his niece; but that was the least of his cares. The preceding year, when he was speaking to Charles's ambassador of the claims of Francis upon Italy, the Austrian diplomatist had said abruptly: 'The emperor will never _yield_ either Milan or Genoa to the King of France.'—'Impossible, no doubt!' answered the pope, 'but could not they be _promised_ to him?'[361]... The scion of the Medici brought to France neither Genoa nor Milan, nor Parma, nor Piacenza, nor Pisa, but in their stead she gave it the imbecile Francis II., the sanguinary Charles IX., the abominable Henry III., the infamous Duke of Anjou, and also that woman, at once so witty and dissolute, who became the wife of Henry IV., and in comparison with whom Messalina appears almost chaste. Four children of the Medici are among the monsters recorded in history, and they have been the disgrace and the misery of France. [Sidenote: PROPOSALS OF MARRIAGE.]