Queens of the crusades, p.22
Queens of the Crusades, page 22
Eleanor sent her to Fontevraud, then continued her progress. She attended to business, heard petitions, dispensed justice, mediated in disputes, distributed largesse, made grants of lands and castles and conferred or confirmed privileges. Throughout her reign as duchess, and thanks in part to her enlightened policy and patronage, Aquitaine and Poitou had witnessed the extraordinary growth and increased prosperity of many towns and cities. In return for the assurance that they would look to their own defenses, Eleanor granted charters conferring independence from feudal jurisdiction to La Rochelle, Saintes and the Île d’Oléron, creating communes and putting an end to the irksome disputes that overshadowed relations between the lords and an increasingly vocal bourgeoisie. In return for the right to elect a mayor, approved by Eleanor, and independently manage their own affairs, these towns were bound to supply her with feudal levies in time of conflict. The arrangement benefited both sides.
As she had foreseen, the new communes helped to impose law and order in her unruly domains. King Philip was so impressed by her far-sighted policy that he adopted it himself in France. Through these wise measures, which brought the people flocking to her, and by granting privileges to her great lords, Eleanor bought the loyalty of her vassals for John, even such troublesome lords as the Lusignans, who, with many others, now renewed their oaths of allegiance. Her long progress had borne fruit. She had secured her domains for John and tipped the scales against Arthur.
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On May 25, 1199, confident that his continental possessions were secure for the moment, John crossed to England to claim his kingdom, which had been held safely for him by Hubert Walter and William the Marshal. Two days later, on Ascension Day, he was crowned in Westminster Abbey. Wisely, he appointed Hubert Walter chancellor and named William Earl Marshal of England.
As king of England, John has received a bad press, although recent studies of the official documents of his reign have shown that he was a gifted administrator who ruled “energetically enough.”4 Unlike Richard, he showed real concern for his kingdom, and traveled more widely in it than any of his Norman and Angevin predecessors, dispensing justice, overseeing public spending and the efficiency of his officials and taking an interest in the welfare of his common subjects. He built up England’s navy and its maritime defenses. Thanks to his personal intervention, the Exchequer, Chancery and law courts began to function more effectively. The future looked promising.
Isabel of Gloucester had not been crowned queen. Before August 30, 1199, John had his childless marriage annulled in Normandy on a plea of consanguinity. Ralph of Diceto believed that he had “acted on wicked counsel and rejected his wife” because he was “seized by hope of a more elevated marriage.” Isabel did not contest the action, which was probably why Innocent III withdrew his objection. John kept her in wardship at Winchester Castle to prevent her taking a second husband who might claim her estates, of which John had retained possession. It does not seem to have been an onerous captivity, for he maintained a great household for her and continued to send her presents of wine and fabrics.
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On July 1, Berengaria was present when her sister Blanche married Theobald III, Count of Champagne, at Chartres, an alliance that had been arranged by King Richard. That same day, Eleanor arrived in Bordeaux, where she granted a charter conferring commune status on the city. Redressing complaints of unjust impositions by Richard, she made it clear that she expected from her people “the fidelity and devotion that we and our predecessors and our dearest son, John, King of England, have always had.”5 Sometime after the end of May, when she went to Fontevraud to collect Joanna, she granted the community an annuity “for the weal of her soul and of her worshipful husband of sacred memory, King Henry, of her son [the Young] King Henry, of goodly memory, and of that mighty man King Richard, and of her other sons and daughters, with the consent of her dearest son John.”6
Having completed her grand progress, during which she is estimated to have traveled over a thousand miles, Eleanor moved north to Rouen with Joanna. On her way, she may have visited Berengaria and expressed her concern about the election of Giraldus to the see of St. David’s in June, for they would join John in ruling against it.
On July 29, Eleanor met with Philip at Tours and, for the first time ever, paid homage for Poitou and Aquitaine, an extraordinary act on her part, for women rarely swore fealty for lands they held: a male relative usually did so on their behalf. But this was a politic move to ensure the legitimate succession of her heirs to her domains and to counter Arthur’s claims. It underlined the independence of her fiefs from the Angevin Empire and shrewdly preempted any schemes Philip might have had for setting up Arthur as their ruler. The chroniclers record few details of the meeting, stating chiefly that Philip gave Eleanor the kiss of peace.
The next day, she met up with John at Rouen. Thanks to her efforts, his footing on the Continent was more secure, and she now formally recognized “her very dear son John as her right heir.”7 He paid homage to her, and she commanded her vassals to render him allegiance. He acknowledged his debt to her, and his trust in her, in a decree proclaiming that she was to retain Poitou and Aquitaine for the rest of her life and “be lady not only of all those territories which are ours, but also of ourself and of all our lands and possessions.”8
Joanna was now near term and unwell. Knowing that she was dying, she begged to be veiled as a nun of Fontevraud, that she might set aside the vanities of her rank and end her life in poverty and humility. The veiling of a pregnant married woman was forbidden by canon law, but Joanna would not be dissuaded, even by her mother. Matilda of Bohemia, Abbess of Fontevraud, had the power to commute the rules and was duly sent for, but Eleanor, fearing that Joanna might not live until she arrived, asked Hubert Walter to do the veiling. He counseled her to be patient and await the coming of the Abbess, but Joanna was adamant in her resolve. Impressed by her fervor, and taking pity on her and her anguished mother, he convened the nuns and clergy, who all agreed that Joanna’s vocation must be inspired by heaven. On their advice, Hubert admitted her to the Order of Fontevraud in the presence of Eleanor, Berengaria and many witnesses. Joanna was so weak that she could not stand to make her vows and died shortly afterward, having expressed a wish to be buried with Richard at Fontevraud. Her infant was born minutes later, by Caesarean section; he survived just long enough to be baptized and named after the late King.
Late that September, Joanna was buried “among the veiled ones” at Fontevraud, Eleanor and John having followed the funeral cortège south from Rouen. When her eldest son, Raymond VII, died in 1249, he was interred next to her, and effigies were placed on both tombs.
Eleanor remained at Fontevraud. She had established her own lavish chapel, dedicated to St. Lawrence, in the abbey, where she sought solace in her grief. Yet, at seventy-five, she still remained active in the government of her domains, retaining twelve clerks to deal with her affairs. Her chaplain Roger acted as her secretary. Among the dozen or so charters she granted in her final years was one conferring new privileges on Bordeaux. She visited her lands on occasion and ordered the refurbishment of the vast “Hall of Lost Footsteps” in her palace at Poitiers; three walls still display Romanesque arcading dating from her time.
Arthur, fearing Philip’s ambitions, now abandoned him, at which point Philip concluded a five-year truce with John, in which Eleanor was influential. In return for the Vexin, Evreux and 30,000 marks (£14,700,000), Philip recognized John as Richard’s heir. The meeting ended with the two kings “rushing into each other’s arms.”9 The truce also provided for the marriage of Philip’s twelve-year-old heir, Louis, to one of John’s Castilian nieces. It was decided that Eleanor would travel to Castile to select one of them and escort her to John in Normandy, a strenuous task for an old lady. But Eleanor was “tireless in all labours, at whose ability her age might marvel.”10
Early in January 1200, she set off from Poitiers, accompanied by Archbishop Hélie of Bordeaux and the trusty Mercadier. Just south of Poitiers, she was ambushed and taken prisoner by her turbulent vassal, Hugh de Lusignan, who threatened to hold her captive until she had ceded to him the rich county of La Marche. It had long ago been sold by his forebears to Henry II, but was also claimed (through an ancestral marriage) by Count Aymer of Angoulême, a powerful, independent-spirited and untrustworthy baron who had allied himself to Philip against Richard and, in 1199, obtained Philip’s pledge that he would adjudicate favorably on Aymer’s right to La Marche.
Realizing that the Castilian marriage was of greater importance than a disputed fief, and believing that Hugh—who had been one of Richard’s friends and had distinguished himself during the crusade—was a worthier claimant to La Marche, Eleanor ceded it to him and was set free to continue her journey south toward Bordeaux.
In January 1200, John confirmed Hugh as count of La Marche. Soon afterward, Hugh was betrothed to Aymer’s heiress, Isabella, who would, in time, bring him the county of Angoulême (or the Angoumois, as it was also called). The union of two powerful and volatile vassals, and the creation of a large and powerful Lusignan fief comprising Lusignan itself, La Marche and ultimately Angoulême, posed a serious threat to the cohesion and stability of Eleanor’s domains, for these combined territories would cut a swathe through most of Poitou, cleaving her demesne virtually in half. Aymer and the Lusignans would wield control of the Roman roads between Poitiers and Bordeaux, and their lands would straddle the valley of the Charente, which flowed through Angoulême to the strategically important port of La Rochelle. John would never have let Hugh have La Marche had he known of the planned betrothal. All he could do now to counter the threat was buy the loyalty of his Poitevin barons.
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Before departing on her journey, Eleanor had informed her vassals in an open letter that she “has gone to Gascony, taking with her the original of the testament of her dearest daughter, Queen Joanna, that the Count of St. Gilles [sic] may see it.” She begged her bishops “to carry out its provisions, according to the transcript of it she sends them, as they love God and her.”11 After what must have been a frosty meeting with Raymond in Toulouse, Eleanor once more crossed the Pyrenees, braving the hazards of winter, then traveled through Navarre to Castile, where she was reunited with the daughter she had not seen for thirty years.
Of their twelve children, King Alfonso VIII and Queen Leonor had two remaining unmarried daughters, Urraca and Blanche, who were both beautiful and dignified. Eleanor rejected Urraca on the grounds that the French would never accept a queen with such an outlandish name, and chose twelve-year-old Blanche to be “the guarantee of peace.” It was a wise choice, for Blanche of Castile would prove as formidable a queen as her grandmother. Probably Eleanor perceived that she possessed extraordinary qualities; when Blanche was only sixteen, it would be said that she was “a woman in sex, but a man in counsels.”12 In choosing her, Eleanor laid the foundation for France’s greatness in the decades to come.
Marriages were not solemnized during Lent, so she lingered for nearly two months at the Castilian court, which, thanks to the influence of her daughter, had embraced the culture and architecture of the south, yet offered Moorish luxuries reminiscent of the courts of the East. Late in March, Eleanor and Blanche journeyed through the pass of Roncesvalles into Gascony, reaching Bordeaux by April 9. There, they kept Easter, after which Mercadier was to escort them north through Poitou. But, in Easter week, “he was slain in a brawl in the city.” The tragedy grieved Eleanor, who was already “fatigued with old age and the labour of the length of her journey.” She accompanied Blanche in easy stages to the Loire Valley, where, unable to continue farther, she entrusted her to the Archbishop of Bordeaux, who took her to King John. Her duty discharged, an exhausted Eleanor “betook herself to the abbey of Fontevraud and there remained.”13 But the world kept intruding upon the peace of the abbey.
1
“A Splendid Animal”
Early in 1200, King Sancho I of Portugal had sent envoys offering John one of his daughters and, in February, John sent an embassy to Portugal to open negotiations for a marriage. On May 22, John and Philip concluded the Treaty of Le Goulet, in which Philip formally recognized John as Richard’s heir, and John paid homage to him for his continental territories. The following day, Blanche and Louis were married.
In the early summer, Eleanor fell ill, and John visited her at Fontevraud. She too was concerned about the recent alliance between Angoulême and the Lusignans and advised John to visit his Poitevin domains and, for the sake of peace, form a friendly alliance with Hugh de Lusignan. He took her advice and rode south, summoning the counts of Angoulême and Limoges, who had rebelled against King Richard, to Lusignan for a ceremony of reconciliation, during which they and Hugh de Lusignan were to pay homage to John.
On, or shortly before, July 5, the King arrived at Lusignan, one of the largest strongholds ever built in France. The tenth-century fortress was strategically sited on a narrow ridge overlooking steep valleys on either side, but it had been partially dismantled during the recent wars and was not fully rebuilt until later in the thirteenth century. Here, John joined a gathering of southern lords hosted by Raoul de Lusignan, Seigneur of Exoudun, the brother of Hugh IX de Lusignan, the new Count of La Marche.
Aymer, Count of Angoulême, now nearing forty, came from a long line of rulers who had adopted the surname Taillefer (hewer of iron), in honor of an ancestor who had crushed Viking invaders in the ninth century. Being a fourth son, Aymer had not expected to become count of Angoulême, but his older brothers had all predeceased him. While paying lip service to the rulers of Aquitaine, Angoulême was a virtually independent fiefdom that lay between Poitou and Gascony. Not long ago, Aymer had been willing to offer his allegiance to the King of France. John was determined not to let that happen again.
Some chroniclers believed that Philip had urged John to ask Aymer for the hand of his daughter and heiress, Isabella, but it is hard to see why, unless it was to foment trouble in Poitou. Most likely, the marriage was John’s idea. The prospect of acquiring Angoulême and scuppering the ambitions of the Lusignans was irresistible, as was securing the friendship and loyalty of the powerful, yet fickle, Count Aymer and the wealthy fief of Angoulême on his death. John may even have envisaged seizing La Marche, and Lusignan too, with Aymer’s help.
In marrying Isabella, John would be acquiring a beautiful bride—she would be called the Helen of her age—with impressive connections. She had royal blood, for her mother, Alice de Courtenay, was a granddaughter of Louis VI of France and first cousin to King Philip. Isabella’s uncle, Pierre de Courtenay II, was the Latin Emperor of Constantinople. The Courtenays were related to many of the royal and noble houses of Europe and the aristocratic Courtenays of England. Alice had married Count Aymer, her third husband, before 1191, possibly around 1186. Isabella, their only child, had perhaps been born in 1188/9: several sources state that she was twelve in 1200, or looked about that age, although she was probably younger.
Her betrothed, Hugh IX—nicknamed “le Brun” (“the Brown”)—had been born around 1163–4 and inherited Lusignan in 1172. By his first wife, whom he had repudiated in 1189, he had a seventeen-year-old son, the future Hugh X, who might have been a more fitting husband for Isabella, given the closeness in their ages; but Hugh IX evidently fancied her himself. They had promised themselves to each other per verba de praesenti (by words in the present tense), which sufficed to establish a valid, indissoluble union. Isabella would have been deemed old enough to consent to the betrothal, being above seven years of age. Thus, she was bound to Hugh, and her union with John could not be valid without a special dispensation. “Because she had not yet reached nubile years, Hugh did not wish to espouse her in the face of the Church” and had agreed to defer the wedding until she was old enough.1 His mother being dead, it was not thought proper that Isabella reside with him at Lusignan, so it appears that she was sent to live in the household of his uncle, Raoul de Lusignan.
Aymer was eager to see his daughter married to John. Aside from the prestige and glory to be gained from her elevation to a throne, he still wanted La Marche and saw an opportunity to press his advantage. An agreement was reached on July 5, almost as soon as the King arrived at Lusignan, and a marriage contract secretly concluded.
John kept up the pretense that his Portuguese marriage was going ahead. On July 10, he sent another embassy to Sancho I, with instructions to bring him his bride. The envoys believed they were on a bona fide mission, and John appears not to have cared that his jilted bride might be publicly humiliated or that there could be reprisals from her angry father.
He must have known that marrying Isabella would make enemies of the Lusignans, who would be furious at being deprived of Angoulême. Speed and secrecy were therefore essential. He dared not risk the Lusignans getting wind of the plan and preempting it.
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John returned to Chinon on July 30. Soon afterward, Count Aymer “snatched his daughter from the custody of Hugh le Brun.”2 Some chroniclers assert that she was abducted screaming in terror. She was brought back to the fortified city of Angoulême, her father’s capital, which stood on a high plateau surrounded by ramparts. Having no idea why she had been summoned home, she was reunited with her parents in the great Châtelet in the center of the city.
