ST. URBAIN, Ferdinand de: Lorraine, ca.1730, Bronze, 47 mm
Obv: Bust of Charles IV (r) CAROLVS. IIII. D.G. DVX. LOTH. MAR. D.C.B.G.
Rev: Bust of Nicola of Lorraine (l) NICOLAA. A. LOTH. DVCISSA. LOTH. C.B.G.
Signed: SV
From the Series of the Dukes and Duchesses of Lorraine
Ref: Forrer p.310 #51

Charles IV (1604-1675) (sometimes numbered as Charles III of Lorraine) was the son of Francis II of Vaudémont, Duke of Lorraine. Charles acceded to duchy in 1624, succeeding his father, but was to lose it because of his anti-French policy. In 1633, French troops invaded Lorraine in retaliation for Charles’s support of Gaston d’Orléans, and in 1634 the Duchy of Bar was lost to France. Forced to make humiliating concessions to France, in 1634 he abdicated in favor of his younger brother, Nicholas II, and entered the imperial service in the Thirty Years War. He briefly recovered his lands in 1641 and 1644, but he was excluded from the Peace of Westphalia (1648) at the war’s conclusion. Although he joined the Spanish during the Fronde, he communicated with the French government and as a result was imprisoned by the Spanish (1654–59). In 1661, at the price of heavy concessions to King Louis XIV, Charles recovered Lorraine and the duchy of Bar, once again becoming Duke of Lorraine. Expelled once more by the French in 1670, Charles later helped to instigate the alliance of Spain and the Holy Roman emperor with the Dutch in the third of the Dutch Wars. In 1675 he defeated François de Créquy at Konzer Bruck. Charles IV retained the title of Duke of Lorraine until his death in 1675, at which time he was succeeded by his nephew Charles Leopold, later Charles V, Duke of Lorraine.

Nicola, the daughter of Henry II, Duke of Lorraine, acceded to the position of Duchess of Lorraine in 1624. She married her cousin Charles IV, Duke of Lorraine and died in 1657.