n.
or Margaret of Navarra French Marguerite d'Angoulême
born April 11, 1492, Angoulême, France
died Dec. 21, 1549, Odos-Bigorre
Queen consort of Henry II of Navarra and an outstanding figure of the French Renaissance.
She was the daughter of the count d'Angoulême. When her brother Francis I acceded to the crown in 1515, she became highly influential in his court. After her first husband died, she married Henry in 1525. She was noted as a patron of humanists and reformers and of such writers as François Rabelais . She was a writer and poet herself; her most important work was the Heptaméron , 72 tales modeled on Boccaccio 's Decameron and published posthumously in 155859.