CHARLES IX, 1560-1574, came in the midst of the Reformation and the Wars of the Huguenots in France. The crimes which mar the history of his reign are not entirely the fault of this weak king, but are due mainly to his ambitious mother Catherine de' Medici (see Medici). When Charles IX came to the throne he was only ten years old, and it was under his mother that the religious wars began which devastated France for a generation. To her also must be attributed the chief blame for the massacre of St. Bartholomew's Day to which she persuaded her weak and cowardly son in order that she .might hide her part in the attempted murder of Coligny (see Coligny, Gaspard de).