Duchess of Finland
On 4 October 1562, Catherine was married in the Lower Castle of Vilnius, Lithuania, to Duke John of Finland, later King John III of Sweden, the second son of King Gustav I of Sweden and half-brother of the then-reigning King Eric XIV. John had not received his brother's permission for the marriage and there were already tensions between them, since John pursued an independent foreign policy. The newlyweds set up house in Turku Castle in Turku, Finland. Duke John's dealings in Livonia caused King Eric XIV to declare war on his brother. Eric sent 10,000 men to besiege the castle. On 12 August 1563 the castle capitulated; Catherine and her husband were taken to Sweden and imprisoned in Gripsholm Castle.
Catherine's unsuccessful suitor Tsar Ivan was in negotiations with Eric in hopes of separating her from John and sending her to marry him in Russia. This caused alarm with Catherine and her relations. In popular opinion, this discussion was one of the reasons for the Swedish people's growing dissatisfaction with the increasingly insane Eric. King Eric agreed to hand over Catherine to Ivan, but the Swedish king was deposed before Catherine could be sent away. As his brother John succeeded him, the problem disappeared. During her incarceration, Catherine gave birth first to her eldest daughter Isabella of Finland in 1564 (died 1566), then to her son Sigismund in 1566, and finally her youngest child Anna Vasa of Sweden on 17 May 1568.
Read more about this topic: Catherine Jagellon
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