Editing Château d'Amboise (section)

===Royal residence===
[[File:AmboiseLeChateau.JPG|thumb|upright=1.4|The château rises above its surrounding town]]
Expanded and improved over time, on 4 September 1434 it was seized by [[Charles VII of France]], after its owner, Louis d'Amboise, Viscount of Thours (1392–1469), was convicted of plotting against [[Louis XI]] and condemned to be executed in 1431. However, the King pardoned him but took his château at Amboise. Once in royal hands, the château became a favourite of French kings, from Louis&nbsp;XI to [[Francis I of France|Francis&nbsp;I]].<ref>{{harvnb|Garrett|2010|p=xx}}</ref> [[Charles VIII of France|Charles VIII]] decided to rebuild it extensively, beginning in 1492 at first in the French late Gothic Flamboyant style and then after 1495 employing two Italian mason-builders, [[Domenico da Cortona]] and [[Fra Giocondo]], who provided at Amboise some of the first [[Renaissance]] decorative motifs seen in French architecture. The names of three French builders are preserved in the documents: [[Colin Biart]], Guillaume Senault and Louis Armangeart.

Following the [[Italian War of 1494–1498|Italian War of 1494–1495]], Charles brought Italian architects and artisans to France to work on the château, and turn it into "the first [[Italianate architecture|Italianate]] palace in France".<ref name=Garrett100>{{harvnb|Garrett|2010|p=100}}</ref> Among the people Charles brought from Italy was [[Pacello da Mercogliano]] who designed the gardens at the Châteaux of Ambois and [[Château de Blois|Blois]]; his work was highly influential amongst French landscape designers.<ref>{{harvnb|Benevolo|1978|p=363}}</ref> Charles died at Château d'Amboise in 1498 after he hit his head on a door lintel.<ref name=Garrett100/> Before his death he had the upper terrace widened to hold a larger [[parterre]] and enclosed with latticework and pavilions; his successor, [[Louis XII]], built a gallery round the terrace which can  be seen in the 1576 engraving by Jacques [[Androuet du Cerceau]], in ''Les plus excellens bastimens de France''. The [[parterres]] have been recreated in the twentieth century as rectangles of lawns set in gravel and a formal [[bosquet]] of trees.

[[File:Chapel-Saint-Hubert.JPG|thumb|upright=1.25|left|The chapel of Saint Hubert (1493),<ref>{{cite web |last=Cartwright |first=Mark |title=Chapel of Saint Hubert, Amboise |url=https://www.worldhistory.org/image/10507/chapel-of-saint-hubert-amboise/ |website=[[World History Encyclopedia]] |access-date=4 May 2019 |date=29 April 2019}}</ref> where [[Leonardo da Vinci]] is believed to be buried]]
King [[Francis I of France|Francis I]] was raised at Amboise, which belonged to his mother, [[Louise of Savoy]], and during the first few years of his reign, the château reached the pinnacle of its glory. As a guest of the King, [[Leonardo da Vinci]] came to Château d'Amboise in December 1515 and lived and worked in the nearby [[Clos Lucé]], connected to the château by an underground passage. Records show that at the time of Leonardo da Vinci's death on 2 May 1519, he was buried in the Chapel of St Florentin, originally located (before it was razed at the end of 18th century) approximately {{convert|100|m}} northeast of the Chapel of St Hubert. This Chapel of St Florentin belonged to the royal castle and lay within the stone fortifications surrounding the property of the Château d'Amboise, and it should not be confused with the nearby Église Saint Florentin, also in Amboise, but not located within the property boundaries of the Château d'Amboise.

After the [[French Revolution]] (1789–1799), the Chapel of St Florentin was in such a ruinous state that the engineer appointed by [[Napoleon]] decided that it was not worth preserving and had it demolished. The remaining stonework was used to repair the Château d'Amboise. Some 60 years later (and 330 years after Leonardo's death and original burial), the foundational site of the Chapel of St Florentin was excavated: it is alleged that a complete skeleton was found, with fragments of a stone inscription containing some of the letters of his name. However, other accounts describe heaps of bones (as is customary in chapels throughout France) and even anecdotes of children kicking skulls around for fun and games. Nonetheless, based on some contemporaneous accounts, it is the collection of bones that were found to be whole and with an extraordinarily large skull that are supposed to be buried in the Chapel of Saint Hubert, where now a large floor-level marble stone bearing a metal medallion relief portrait of Leonardo da Vinci (based on the "Melzi's portrait") and the words LEONARDO DA VINCI seem indicative of his final resting place.

[[Henry II of France|Henry II]] and his wife, [[Catherine de' Medici]], raised their children in the Château d'Amboise, along with [[Mary, Queen of Scots|Mary Stuart]], the child Queen of Scotland who had been promised in marriage to the future French [[Francis II of France|Francis II]].