Mary, Queen of Scots

Mary Stuart was Queen of Scotland from six days of age and briefly Queen consort of France through her marriage to Francis II. Tall, exceptionally beautiful, and accomplished in languages, poetry, and music at the glittering Renaissance Valois court, Mary returned to Scotland in 1561 following Francis's death to govern a turbulent realm divided by the Protestant Reformation.

As a devout Catholic with a strong hereditary claim to the English crown as Henry VII's great-granddaughter, Mary was viewed with deep suspicion by her cousin, Queen Elizabeth I. Following the suspicious murder of her second husband Lord Darnley and her disastrous marriage to the Earl of Bothwell, Scottish Protestant lords rebelled, forcing Mary to abdicate in favor of her infant son, James VI. Fleeing south to England seeking Elizabeth's protection, Mary was instead imprisoned in damp English castles for nineteen years. Implicated in the Catholic Babington Plot to assassinate Elizabeth, Mary was convicted of high treason and beheaded at Fotheringhay Castle in 1587. Her son James VI would subsequently inherit the English throne as James I, uniting the crowns of England and Scotland.