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- BIOGRAPHY
Nicolas de Lorraine, duc de Mercoeur, comte de Vaudemont, born at Château de Bar-le-Duc on 16 October 1524, the son of Antoine II 'le Bon', duc de Lorraine et Bar, and Renée de Bourbon, dame de Mercoeur. He started his adult life in the Church, as bishop of Verdun from 1544 to 1547 and of Metz from 1543 to 1548. However, with the death in 1545 of his brother François I, duc de Lorraine et Bar, he took on the regency jointly with his sister-in-law Princess Christine of Denmark and Norway, in the name of her son, his nephew Charles II (born in 1543).
The Estates (Parliament) of Lorraine decided in November 1545 to leave Christine sole regent. She adopted a policy favourable to the empire, which Nicolas opposed. He gave up his bishoprics in 1548 so that he could be relieved of his religious vows, and took the title of Comte de Vaudémont. In 1550 the war recommenced between Charles V and Henri II of France, and in 1552 Henri captured Trois-Evêchés (collectively the lands covered by the bishoprics of Metz, Toul and Verdun, which belonged to the Holy Roman Empire; they were not definitively attached to France until the Treaty of Westphalia in 1648). On 15 April 1552, on his way to Nancy, Henri II relieved Christine of her regency and named Nicolas in her place. He performed the function until Charles II reached his majority in 1559. He then withdrew from public life and built his valuable collection of paintings, books and weapons.
On 1 May 1549 in Brussels, Nicolas married Margaretha van Egmond, daughter of Jan van Egmond, 2.Graaf van Egmond, and Françoise de Luxembourg, comtesse de Gavre, dame de Fiennes. They had four children, none of whom would have progeny. The most famous was Louise, who in 1575 married Henri III, king of France.
Margaretha died in 1554, and on 24 February 1555 at Fontainebleau, Nicholas then married Jeanne de Savoie, daughter of Philippe de Savoie, duc de Nemours, and Charlotte d'Orléans-Longueville. Nicholas and Jeanne had six children, of whom only their first-born, Philippe Emmanuel, would have progeny; he married Marie de Luxembourg, duchesse de Penthièvre et d'Etampes, and their daughter Françoise married César de Bourbon, duc de Vendôme et de Beaufort, son of Henri IV and his mistress Gabrielle d'Estrées. Jeanne died in 1568, and on 11 May 1569 at Reims, Nicolas married Catherine Romula de Lorraine, daughter of Claude de Lorraine, duc d'Aumale, and Louise de Brézé, dame d'Anet, younger daughter of Louis de Brézé, comte de Maulevrier, baron du Bec-Crespin, and Diane de Poitiers, duchesse de Valentinois. Nicolas and Catherine had five children, of whom only Henri, their first-born, would have progeny; he married Claude de Moy, marquise de Moy, comtesse de Cerny.
Nicolas died 23 January 1577 and was buried at the convent of the Cordeliers in Nancy. His third wife Catherine died in 1606. He was succeeded as duke of Mercoeur by his son Philippe Emmanuel.
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