#vermandois | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

anotherhumaninthisworld · 4 months

Note

Can you tell me the story of the relationship between saint-just and desmoulins? . ..

Because I couldn't understand it properly so yeah ...

The first connection between Desmoulins and Saint-Just is from 2 January 1790, when the former publishes an annonce for the latter’s recently published Organt in number 6 of Révolutions de France et de Brabant:

Organt, poem in twenty verses, with this epigraph: Vous, jeune homme, au bon sens avez-vous dit adieu ? And this preface: J’ai vingt ans, j’ai mal fait, he pourrai faire mieux.

A few months later, we find the following letter from Saint-Just to Desmoulins. It is undated, but can be traced to May 1790. The letter makes Desmoulins, alongside Robespierre, who he wrote a letter to the following year, the only revolutionaries Saint-Just is confirmed to have contacted prior to heading to Paris in 1792. Unlike in the case of Robespierre however, the letter to Desmoulins implies a correspondence was actually picked up between the two:

Monsieur, If you were not so busy I would tell you some more details about the Chauni assembly where one can find men of considerable calibre and quality. I was received in spite of my youth. Sieur Gelli, your compatriot from Vermandois had denounced me. He was thrown out bodily. We saw your compatriots, M. Saulce, M. Violette and others, by whom I was received with great courtesy. There is no point telling you (because you are not fond of foolish praise) that your region is proud of you. You will have known before I did that the department is fixed at Laon. Is that good or is that bad for one or other of the towns? It seems to me that it is no more than a point of honour between the two towns and points of honour are of little importance. I took the tribune; I worked with the intention of carrying the day on the question of the chief place but I did not follow on, I left, weighed down with compliments like a donkey burdened with relics, having, however, the assurance that at the next legislature I could be with you in the national assembly. You had promised to write to me, but I see clearly that you will not have the time. I am free as of now. Should I return to you or remain amongst the foolish aristocrats in this part of the world. At the time of my return from Chauni the peasants from my region came to look for me at Manicamp. The Comte de Lauraguais was greatly astonished by this rustic-patriotic ceremony. I led them all to his house for a visit. They said that he was out in the fields, however, like Tarquin, I had a rod with which I cut off the head of a nearby fern beneath the window of the castle and without a word we made a volte face. Farewell my dear Desmoulins. Write to me if you have need of me. Your latest issues are full of excellent things. Apollo and Minerva are still with you and are not displeased. If you have anything to say to your people in Guise I will be seeing them again in eight days’ time from Laon where I will be going on specific business. Goodbye again: glory, peace and patriotic rage. Saint-Just I will read you this evening since I have only spoken to you of your recent issues by saying yes.

Different feelings can however be found a year later, in a letter Saint-Just adressed to Villain Daubigny on July 20 1791 (it is dated 1792 in Oeuvres complètes de Saint-Just, but Saint-Just’s biographer Bernard Vinot points out that this is most likely an error, since all the events it makes allusions to took place the previous year):

…Go and see Desmoulins, embrace him for me, and tell him that he will never see me again, that I esteem his patriotism, but that I despise him, because I have penetrated his soul, and because he fears that I will betray him. Tell him to not abandon the good cause, and recommend it to him, because he does not yet possess the audacity of magnanimous virtue.

What exactly had happened between the two for Saint-Just to write this about Desmoulins is unknown. The same can be said about the question regarding where and when the meeting between them he alludes to here played out, since neither of them are confirmed to have left their respective cities in 1791.

Yet another year later, in September 1792, both Saint-Just and Desmoulins were elected deputies for the National Convention, meaning the former came to settle in Paris on Rue de Gaillon 7, around 2,5 km from the latter’s home on Rue du Théâtre 1 (today Rue de l’Odeon 28). Aside from the fact both were fervent montagnards, I have not been able to find any connection between them until the second half of the following year, with the release of Desmoulins’ Lettre de Camille Desmoulins, député de Paris à la Convention, August général Dillon en prison aux Madelonettes. In it, Saint-Just, who had accused Dillon of having been asked to lead an uprising to put the dauphin on the throne and declare Marie-Antoinette regent on June 2 1793, got described the following way in a footnote:

After Legendre, the member of the Convention who has the highest opinion of himself is Saint-Just. One can see by his gait and bearing that he looks upon his own head as the corner-stone of the Revolution, for he carries it upon his shoulders with as much respect and as if it was the Sacred Host. But what makes his vanity killing is, that some years ago he published an epic poem in twenty-four cantos entitled Argant [sic]. Rivarol and Champcenetz, from whose microscope, used in the interests of the Almanach des grands hommes, not a single verse, not a single hemistich in France has ever escaped, have in vain gone searching for this; they who have hunted up even the least little scrap of literature have not seen Saint-Just’s epic poem in twenty-four cantos. After such a misadventure, how can he show himself?

According to some sources, the ”he carries his head like the Sacret Host” comment was a reply to something Saint-Just had himself said about Desmoulins. Marcellin Matton published in 1834 an anecdote (which it is presumed he obtained from Desmoulins’ mother- or sister-in-law) in which Guillaume Brune has a meeting with the Desmoulins couple at the time of the numbers of the Vieux Cordelier being released. The following conversation would then have played out:

”…You [Brune said] are also read by Barère who recognizes himself; by Saint-Just, who promised to make you carry your head like Saint Denis.” ”That’s true,” [Desmoulins] replied, ”I remember it: it was a very bad joke, and my answer was much better. Have you seen my letter to Dillon? In the approach and posture of Saint-Just, we see that he regards his head as the cornerstone of the republic, and that he carries it on his shoulders with respect like a holy sacrament. Was I wrong, and do you think that for such a good joke he would want to kill me? I only ask him for one favor, and that is to wait until he has given a valid response.”

In 1851, the historian Nicolas Villiaume similarly claimed to have had the same story told to him multiple times by Desmoulins’ mother-in-law. Interestingly though, the ”I will make him carry his head like Saint Denis” comment already appeared in works dated 1816 and 1825 (in both cases without any source cited). There, it is instead portrayed as a response to Desmoulins having written ”Saint-Just carries his head like the Sacred Host” and not as the cause of it. In light of this, I think the idea of Saint-Just having actually said it is something that must be taken with a huge grain of salt.

The things more reliable sources can tell us about Saint-Just’s attitude towards Desmoulins at the time are less overwhelming. He was away from Paris during much of the period where Desmoulins released and got in trouble for the Vieux Cordelier (from October 17 to December 4, December 10 to December 30, and finally January 22 to February 13), and when he was there during said period, I cannot find him recorded to have spoken about Desmoulins or his journal a single time. Saint-Just also went unmentioned in all of the six numbers of the Vieux Cordelier that were released during the time they were both alive.

When the Committee of Public Safety decided to strike down Desmoulins and the other ”dantonists,” it was however Saint-Just who, like in the previous case with the hébertists, got tasked with writing a report against them. Here he obtained the help of Robespierre, who prepared around 65 notes for him to use as material against them. In said notes, Robespierre presented Desmoulins as less guilty than Danton and Fabre, having instead been more of their minion, a version of the story Saint-Just then stuck to when finishing his Rapport sur la conjuration ourdie pour obtenir un changement de dynastie; et contre Fabre d’Églantine, Danton, Philippeaux, Lacroix et Camille Desmoulins:

Bad citizen (speaking of Danton), you have conspired, you said, two days ago, bad things about Desmoulins, an instrument that you have lost, and you attributed to him shameful vices. […] For six months, a plan of palpitation and anxiety has been hatched within the government. Every day we were sent a report on Paris; we were flexibly insinuated, sometimes imprudent advice, sometimes misplaced fears; the tables were calculated on the feelings that it was important to arouse in us, so that the government would move in the direction that suited criminal plots; Danton was praised there, Hébert and Camille Desmoulins were accredited, and all their projects were assumed to be sanctioned by public opinion, to discourage us. […] What shall I say of those who claimed to be exclusively the old Cordeliers? They were precisely Danton, Fabre, Camille Desmoulins, and the ministry, author of the reports on Paris, where Danton, Fabre, Camille and Philippeanx are praised, where everything is directed in their direction and in the direction of Hébert. Danton had directed the last writings of Desmoulins and Philippeaux. […] Camille Desmoulins, who was initially duped and ended up being an accomplice, was, like Philippeaux, an instrument of Fabre and Danton. It was said, as proof of Fabre's good nature, that when he was at Desmoulins' house at the time when he read to someone a writing in which he requested a committee of clemency for the aristocracy and called the Convention the court of Tiberius, Fabre started to cry. The crocodile cries too. As Camille Desmoulins lacked character, his pride was used. As a rhetorician, he attacked the revolutionary government in all its forms; he spoke brazenly in favor of the enemies of the Revolution, proposed a committee of clemency for them; showed himself to be very inclement towards the popular party; attacked, like Hébert and Vincent, the representatives of the people in the armies; like Hébert, Vincent and Buzot, he himself treated them as proconsuls. He had been the defender of the infamous Dillon, with the same audacity that Dillon himself showed, when at Maubeuge he ordered his army to march on Paris, and take an oath of loyalty to the king. He fought the law against the English; he received thanks in England, in the newspapers of that time. Have you noticed that all those who were praised in England have betrayed their fatherland here?

According to an anecdote published in the pamphlet À Maximilien Robespierre aux enfers (1795), released a few months after thermidor by Taschereau de Fargues and Paul-Auguste-Jacques, Saint-Just and Robespierre had wanted to denounce Desmoulins and the other dantonists before arresting them, but been downvoted by their colleagues:

Why should I not say that [the dantonist purge] was a meditated assassination, prepared for a long time, when two days after this session where the crime was taking place, the representative Vadier told me that Saint-Just, through his stubbornness, had almost caused the downfall of the members of the two committees, because he had wanted that the accused to be present when he read the report at the National Convention; and such was his obstinacy that, seeing our formal opposition, he threw his hat into the fire in rage, and left us there. Robespierre was also of this opinion; he believed that by having these deputies arrested beforehand, this approach would sooner or later be reprehensible; but, as fear was an irresistible argument with him, I used this weapon to fight him: You can take the chance of being guillotined, if that is what you want; For my part, I want to avoid this danger by having them arrested immediately, because we must not have any illusions about the course we must take; everything is reduced to these bits: If we do not have them guillotined, we will be that ourselves.

Regardless of whether this be true or not, on March 30, Saint-Just was one of eighteen men to sign the by Amar drafted arrest warrant for Danton, Delacroix, Philippeaux and Desmoulins, who were all arrested in the night. The next day at the Convention, Robespierre shut down Legendre when he suggested the accused be allowed to come and defend themselves before the Convention, after which Saint-Just entered the hall, mounted the rostrum and read out the act of accusation the two of them had worked out.

Receiving a copy of Saint-Just’s report in his cell at the Luxembourg prison, Desmoulins got around to preparing a defence. In it, he claimed the author of the report had personal reasons for wanting him dead. He also referred to him as ”Monsieur le Chevalier de Saint-Just,” a nicknamed previously used by the girondin Salle:

If I had gotten the chance to print in turn, if one hadn’t put me in isolation, if one had lifted the seals and if I had the paper neccesary to establish my defense, if one gave me only two days to make a number seven, imagine how I would confront M. the chevalier Saint-Just! Imagiene how I would convince him of the most atrocious slander ! But Saint-Just writes leisurely in his bath, in his bathtub, he plots my murder during fifteen days, while I have no place to put my writing desk and only a few hours to defend my life. What is this if not the the duel of the Emperor Commodus, who, armed with an excellent blade, forced his enemy to fight with a simple foil garnished with cork? […] I arrive at the part of the report which concerns me. In living memory, there is no example of such atrocious slander as this piece. And yet there is not a single person in the Convention that doesn’t know that Monsieur the former chevalier Saint-Just holds for me an implacable hatred for a slight joke that I allowed myself five months ago in one of my numbers. Bourdaloue said: Molière puts me in his comedy, I will put him in my sermon. I put Saint-Just in a giggly number, and he puts me in a guillotine report where there isn’t a single true word in my regard. When Saint-Just accuses me of being an accomplice of Orléans and Dumouriez, he shows well that he is a patriot of yesterday. Who denounced Dumouriez first of all, and before Marat and more vigorously than anyone else? Certainly one cannot deny that it was me? My Tribune des Patriotes exists, let Saint-Just read the portrait I there painted of Dumouriez six months before his treason in Belgium, he will see that I have never since added anything to this portrait. And Orléans who he makes me the accomplice of, who doesn’t know that I was the first to denounce him? That the only writings on this faction that the Jacobins have printed and distributed were written by me? Does Saint-Just no longer remember my Histoire des Brissotins? […] There are witnesses to the fact that the great republican Saint-Just, at the beginning of the Convention, said: Oh! They want a republic, she shall cost them dearly! There are witnesses to the fact the ambitious Saint-Just said: I know where I go.

In an unfinished and unsent letter written to Robespierre around the same time, Lucile Desmoulins too held Saint-Just as the main culprit behind her husband’s fate, arguing that he had misled their friend:

…As far from the insensibility of your Saint-Just as from his base jealousies, [Camille] recoiled in front if the idea of accusing a college comrade, a companion in arms. […] Robespierre, can you really complete the fatal projects which the vile souls that surround you no doubt have inspired you to? […] Had I been Saint-Just’s wife I would tell him this: the sake of Camille is yours, it’s the sake of all the friends of Robespierre!

A rumor claiming that Lucile had been sent money from the imprisoned Arthur Dillon conveniently arrived around the same time the trial against the indulgents started getting off the rails. In the afternoon of April 4, after the proceedings had been closed for the day, Saint-Just again mounted the rostrum at the Convention and revealed the discovery of this new conspiracy:

The public prosecutor of the revolutionary tribunal reported that the revolt of the guilty had caused the court proceedings to be suspended until the Convention had taken measures. You have escaped the greatest danger that ever threatened freedom: now all the accomplices are discovered, and the revolt of the criminals at the foot of justice itself. Intimidated by the law, the secret of their conscience; their despair, their fury, everything announces that the good nature they presented was the most hypocritical trap that had been set for the revolution. What innocent person has ever rebelled before the law? There is no need for any other proof of their attacks than their audacity. What! those whom we accused of having been the accomplices of Dumouriez and Orléans, those who only made a revolution in favor of a new dynasty, those who conspired for the misfortune and slavery of the people are at the height of their infamy! If there are men here who are truly friends of liberty, if the energy that suits those who have undertaken to liberate their country is in their hearts, you will see that there are no longer any conspirators on the front line, who, counting on the aristocracy with whom they have marched for several years, call upon the people the vengeance of the crime. No, liberty shall not recoil in front of her enemies; their coalition has been revealed. Dillon, who ordered his army to march upon Paris, has declared that the wife of Desmoulins had received money in order to promote a movement to assassinate the patriots and the Revolutionary Tribunal. We thank you for placing us in the position of honor; like you, we will cover the fatherland with our bodies. Dying is nothing, provided that the revolution triumphs; here is the day of glory; this is the day when the Roman senate fought against Catiline; This is the day to consolidate public liberty forever. Your committees respond to you with heroic surveillance. Who can refuse you his veneration in this terrible moment when you fight for the last time against the faction which was lenient towards your enemies, and which today finds fury to fight liberty?

After having heard Saint-Just’s report, the Convention used this new discovery to order ”that the Revolutionary Tribunal shall proceed with the instruction relating to the conspiracy of Lacroix, Danton, Chabot and others. The President shall make use of every means which the law permits to cause his authority and that of the Revolutionary Tribunal to be respected, and to repress every attempt on the part of the accused to trouble public tranquillity and to hinder the course of justice. It is decreed that all persons accused of conspiracy who shall resist or insult the national justice shall be outlawed and receive judgment on the spot.” This order became essential for getting the dantonists condemned to death the following day.

Saint-Just had however nothing to do with the actual arrest warrant for Lucile, signed the same day by Robespierre, Billaud-Varennes, C-A Prieur, Carnot, Couthon, Barère, Du Barran and Voulland, which would lead to her ending up on the scaffold as well nine days later.

I’m currently blanking when it comes to contemporaries who had anything to say regarding the relationship between Saint-Just and Desmoulins.

#saint-just #desmoulins #camille desmoulins #louis antoine saint just #frev #frev friendships #ask

84 notes · View notes

palecleverdoll · 9 months

Text

Ages of French Queens at First Marriage

I have only included women whose birth dates and dates of marriage are known within at least 1-2 years, therefore, this is not a comprehensive list.

This list is composed of Queens of France until the end of the House of Bourbon; it does not include Bourbon claimants or descendants after 1792.

The average age at first marriage among these women was 20.

Ermentrude of Orléans, first wife of Charles the Bald: age 19 when she married Charles in 842 CE

Richilde of Provence, second wife of Charles the Bald: age 25 when she married Charles in 870 CE

Richardis of Swabia, wife of Charles the Fat: age 22 when she married Charles in 862 CE

Théodrate of Troyes, wife of Odo: age 14 or 15 when she married Odo in 882 or 883 CE

Frederuna, wife of Charles III: age 20 when she married Charles in 907 CE

Beatrice of Vermandois, second wife of Robert I: age 10 when she married Robert in 990 CE

Emma of France, wife of Rudolph: age 27 when she married Rudolph in 921 CE

Gerberga of Saxony, wife of Gilbert, Duke of Lorraine, and later of Louis IV: age 16 when she married Gilbert in 929 CE

Emma of Italy, wife of Lothair: age 17 when she married Lothair in 965 CE

Adelaide-Blanche of Anjou, wife of Stephen, Viscount of Gévaudan, Raymond III, Count of Toulouse, and later Louis V: age 15 when she married Stephen in 955 CE

Bertha of Burgundy, wife of Odo I, Count of Blois, and later Robert II: age 19 when she married Odo in 984 CE

Constance of Arles, third wife of Robert II: age 17 when she married Robert in 1003 CE

Anne of Kiev, wife of Henry I: age 21 when she married Henry in 1051 CE

Bertha of Holland, first wife of Philip I: age 17 when she married Philip in 1072 CE

Bertrade of Montfort, wife of Fulk IV, Count of Anjou, and second wife of Philip I: age 19 when she married Fulk in 1089 CE

Adelaide of Maurienne, second wife of Louis VI: age 23 when she married Louis in 1115 CE

Eleanor of Aquitaine, first wife of Louis VII and later Henry II of England: age 15 when she married Louis in 1137 CE

Adela of Champagne, third wife of Louis VII: age 20 when she married Louis in `1160 CE

Isabella of Hainault, first wife of Philip II: age 10 when she married Philip in 1180 CE

Ingeborg of Denmark, second wife of Philip II: age 19 when she married Philip in 1193 CE

Agnes of Merania, third wife of Philip II: age 21 when she married Philip in 1195 CE

Blanche of Castile, wife of Louis VIII: age 12 when she married Louis in 1200 CE

Margaret of Provence, wife of Louis IX: age 13 when she married Louis in 1234 CE

Isabella of Aragon, first wife of Philip III: age 14 when she married Philip in 1262 CE

Marie of Brabant, second wife of Philip III: age 20 when she married Philip in 1274 CE

Joan I of Navarre, wife of Philip IV: age 11 when she married Philip in 1284 CE

Margaret of Burgundy, wife of Louis X; age 15 when she married Louis in 1305 CE

Clementia of Hungary, second wife of Louis X: age 22 when she married Louis in 1315 CE

Joan II, Countess of Burgundy, wife of Philip V: age 15 when she married Philip in 1307 CE

Blanche of Burgundy, first wife of Charles IV: age 12 when she married Charles in 1308 CE

Marie of Luxembourg, second wife of Charles IV: age 18 when she married Charles in 1322 CE

Joan of Évreux, third wife of Charles IV: age 14 when she married Charles in 1324 CE

Bonne of Luxembourg, first wife of John II: age 17 when she married John in 1332 CE

Joan I, Countess of Auvergne, wife of Philip of Burgundy, and later John II: age 12 when she married Philip in 1338 CE

Joanna of Bourbon, wife of Charles V: age 12 when she married Charles in 1350 CE

Isabeau of Bavaria, wife of Charles VI: age 15 when she married Charles in 1385 CE

Marie of Anjou, wife of Charles VII: age 18 when she married Charles in 1422 CE

Charlotte of Savoy, second wife of Louis XI: age 9 when she married Louis in 1451 CE

Anne of Brittany, wife of Maximilian I, HRE, Charles VIII and later Louis XII: age 13 when she married Maximilian in 1490 CE

Joan of France, first wife of Louis XII: age 12 when she married Louis in 1476 CE

Mary Tudor, third wife of Louis XII: age 18 when she married Louis in 1514 CE

Claude of France, first wife of Francis I: age 15 when she married Francis in 1514 CE

Eleanor of Austria, wife of Manuel I of Portugal and later second wife of Francis I: age 20 when she married Manuel in 1518 CE

Catherine de' Medici, wife of Henry II: age 14 when she married Henry in 1533 CE

Mary, Queen of Scots, wife of Francis II: age 16 when she married Francis in 1558 CE

Elisabeth of Austria, wife of Charles IX: age 16 when she married Charles in 1570 CE

Louise of Lorraine, wife of Henry III: age 22 when she married Henry in 1575 CE

Margaret of Valois, first wife of Henry IV: age 19 when she married Henry in 1572 CE

Marie de' Medici, second wife of Henry IV: age 25 when she married Henry in 1600 CE

Anne of Austria, wife of Louis XIII: age 14 when she married Louis in 1615 CE

Maria Theresa of Spain, wife of Louis XIV: age 22 when she married Louis in 1660 CE

Marie Leszczyńska, wife of Louis XV: age 22 when she married Louis in 1725 CE

Marie Antoinette, wife of Louis XVI: age 15 when she married Louis in 1770 CE

#history #french #medieval

38 notes · View notes

scotianostra · 2 months

Text

On March 20th 1141 King Malcolm IV born.

This is another of those dates that can only be guessed at a lot of sources merely say circa 1141 but we have to place him somewhere in our history to remember him by so March 20th is as good a date as any., Wikipeadia has his birth later but is not precise either they say between April and 24 May 1141 by the way.

Malcom was the eldest son of Henry of Scotland, Earl of Huntingdon and Ada de Warenne, daughter of William de Warenne, Earl of Surrey and Elizabeth de Vermandois so even back in the 12th century there were ties between Scottish and English nobility.

Although he was nicknamed Virgo – Malcolm the Maiden – he was far from weak and effeminate. Rather, he was noted for his religious zeal and interest in knighthood and warfare. His coronation took place of 27th May 1153 at Scone when he was only 12 years old.

His reign was relatively brief and filled with revolts, rebellions and battles if the ancient chronicles are to be believed. He died aged only 24. I will probably put a more detailed account of his reign in May on the anniversary of his crowning.

#scotland #scottish #history #royalty #monarch

8 notes · View notes

best-bourbon-monarch · 5 months

Text

Marie-Anne:

First one in the long tradition of Louis XIV to marry his legitimated kids off to minor branches of the royal family to disgrace them and prevent them from rising against him again. She's the heroine of a pair or more of child books.

Louis:

Legitimated son of Louis XIV and the duchess of La Vallière, he dies pretty young, but also he is one of the people suspected of being the Iron Mask (le masque de fer).

#best bourbon bracket #tournament poll #bourbons

5 notes · View notes

ltalaynareor · 7 days

Text

Petites Histoires du Monde

Listes des personnes et des OC pour l'instant :

- Baudouin IV de Jérusalem (5 histoires). (Plus à venir. )

Il est souvent associé à Alix de Tripoli, personnage fictif qui est la fille unique de Raymond III de Tripoli et qui a grandi à Jérusalem. Alix est douce, gentille, mais aussi intrépide et courageuse. Baudouin et Alix s'aiment infiniment, mais ils savent tous les deux que leur amour est impossible.

Mini-série : Guérison. Baudouin est guéri de la lèpre et décide quoi faire de sa vie. (À venir)

- Édouard Ier d'Angleterre (3 histoires) (Plus à venir. )

Il est souvent associé à sa femme Éléonore de Castille. Leur amour est inspirant et unique. Un OC peut apparaître également sous la forme d'Aliénor de Mercoeur, qui est la dame de compagnie et meilleure amie de la reine d'Angleterre.

Mini-série : Seconde Guerre des Barons avec le point de vue d'Henry III, Éléonore de Provence, Éléonore de Castille, Richard de Cornouailles et lord Édouard sur la bataille de Lewes de 1264. (Publié)

- Bohémond de Tarente (3 histoires) (Plus à venir. )

Bohémond est souvent associé à Alix de Sicile, une OC fictive qui est son épouse. Ils mettent du temps à se cerner l'un l'autre, mais après avoir découvert que sa femme n'est pas qu'une jolie chose à son bras, il est son plus fervent admirateur.

Mini-série : Chefs de la première croisade avec Godefroy de Bouillon, Baudouin de Boulogne, Hugues de Vermandois, Raymond de Saint-Gilles, Etienne de Blois, Robert de Flandres, Robert de Normandie, Adhémar de Monteil, Tancrède de Hauteville et bien sûr Bohémond. (En cours)

Personnages sans lien avec Bohémond de Tarente, Édouard Ier et Baudouin IV ou une mini-série.

- Louis IX de France, Saint-Louis (1 histoire)

- Édouard II d'Angleterre (À venir)

- Alphonse de Poitiers et sa femme Jeanne de Toulouse (À venir)

- Sybille de Jerusalem et Guy de Lusignan (À venir)

- Agnès de Courtenay (À venir)

- Amaury II de Jérusalem ( À venir)

- Aliénor d'Aquitaine ( À venir)

- Henry II d'Angleterre ( À venir)

- Richard cœur de Lion (À venir)

- Jean Sans Terre ( À venir)

Et bien d'autres....

Si vous voulez en voir plus n'hésitez pas à proposer des personnes ou des événements.

#fanfic #history medieval #medieval history #bohemond i of antioch #king baldwin #baldwin iv #edward ii #Edward I #booklr #france #england #eleonor of castile #eleanor of aquitaine #plantagenet #plantagenets

6 notes · View notes

nanshe-of-nina · 2 years

Photo

Favorite History Books || Marie of France: Countess of Champagne, 1145–1198 by Theodore Evergates ★★★★☆

Countess Marie of Champagne is known today primarily as a literary patron, notably of Chrétien de Troyes, who famously announced in his prologue to Lancelot, that since she “wished” him to tell the tale, he complied with her “command.” From that and several other mentions by contemporary writers, Marie has been cast as the animator of a “court of Champagne.” It is indeed ironic that, with few explicit references to her patronage, Marie is now cited more frequently than her husband, Count Henri the Liberal (1152−81), a commanding figure in his time who made the county of Champagne one of the premier principalities of northern France and whose intellectual interests are amply attested. Marie in fact was more than a cultural patron. She was ruling countess of Champagne for almost two decades in the 1180s and 1190s, initially during Count Henry’s absence overseas, then as regent for her son Henri II and as co-lord with him during the Third Crusade and his subsequent residence in Acre. From the age of thirty-four until her death at fifty-three she ruled almost continuously, presiding at the High Court of Champagne and attending to the many practical matters arising in a vibrant principality of the late twelfth century. She acted with the advice of her court officers but without limitation by either the king or a regency council. If Henri the Liberal’s crowning achievement was to create the county of Champagne as a dynamic, prosperous state, Marie’s was to preserve it in the face of several existential threats.

Historians of Capetian France have yet to appreciate the frequency and significance of wives acting in the absence of their husbands and during the minority of inheriting sons. That was a common family practice; only in a wife’s absence was a guardian or regency council appointed. During Countess Marie’s lifetime two royal regencies were necessitated by the absence of a resident queen while the king traveled overseas: when her mother, Eleanor of Aquitaine, accompanied Louis VII on the Second Crusade, and when Queen Isabelle died in childbirth shortly before Philippe II left on the Third Crusade. In each case the king designated regents as guardians of the realm. Louis appointed Abbot Suger of St-Denis and the seneschal Raoul of Vermandois “for the custody of the realm” (de regni custodia), said Eudes of Deuil, while Philippe enacted an ordinance (ordinationem) granting his uncle Guillaume, archbishop of Reims, and his mother, Adèle, the dowager queen, limited authority during his absence.³ Countess Marie, however, like most wives of princes, barons, and knights, was not burdened by a regency council. Her decisions at court and her letters patent carried the same authority as those of her husband and son, without mention of any provisional standing. Although she often associated her underage son with her in letters patent, she alone exercised the full plenitude of the comital office, even during Count Henri II’s extended stay in Palestine, and she sealed in her own name as countess of Troyes (her only title).

Marie’s life beyond her role as literary patron and ruling countess encompassed an extensive network of family relationships, for she was connected by birth and marriage to two of the most prominent royal families of twelfth-century Europe. As the daughter of Louis VII and Eleanor of Aquitaine, Marie acquired through their second marriages numerous royal half-siblings whom she regarded as brothers and sisters: Louis’s children Marguerite of France and King Philippe II, and Eleanor’s sons Henry, Geoffroy, and Richard. Even more directly important in providing a nexus of personal support for her rule in Champagne were Henry the Liberal’s well-placed siblings: the royal seneschal Count Thibaut V of Blois (1152–91), Archbishop Guillaume of Sens and Reims (1168–1202), and Queen Adèle (1160–79, d. 1206). Marie’s seal inscribed her dual identity: “Daughter of the King of the Franks, Countess of Troyes.”

#historyedit #litedit #marie of france #house of capet #house of blois #medieval #french history #european history #women's history #history #nanshe's graphics #history books

49 notes · View notes

willbashor · 9 months

Text

September 6th!

#will bashor #historical fiction #gay prince #lgbtq books #gay versailles #louis xiv #vermandois #gay books #gay royalty #bastard prince #bastard prince of versailles #lgbtq novel #gay novel #gay historical novel #gay boys #gay man #minions

1 note · View note

ainews · 11 months

Text

In 962 AD, near the town of Laon in Picardy, France, a small incident with a donkey played a major role in advancing the power of the kings of France. In the region, there was an extremely powerful lord, Count Heribert II of Vermandois.

He had recently been on a campaign within France and amassed an impressive level of power and influence. As he was traveling to Laon he decided to rest inside the city and, at the same time, test the loyalty of the citizens of Laon. To do this, he ordered that horses and donkeys from all around should be brought to him and presented at the city’s gates. A small peasant happened to own a donkey made of diabase, a very strong and uniquely formed alloy of minerals with a rare color and superior strength.

The diabase donkey presented itself to Count Heribert as a perfect symbol of strength and loyalty, and he was so impressed that he made this donkey his new symbol of power and adopted it as the emblem of Laon. Count Heribert was so pleased with this gift, that he even stopped his campaign and allowed Laon to prosper as a city of his rule. After this incident, the diabase donkey became a symbol of strength, loyalty, and prosperity in the region.

The diabase donkey is an important reminder of how loyalty can be rewarded and how a single event can significantly increase the power and influence of a ruler. This story of the donkey made of diabase has been remembered in the Picardy region and is still cherished by many.

#ai generated #fake news

8 notes · View notes

claud-e-monet · 6 months

Text

Jeufosse - 8 miles from Giverny

In the 9th century, the islands of the Seine in front of Jeufosse became a lair for Vikings who carried out raids on the river upstream, notably the Île de la Flotte 9. In 965, a new Scandinavian expedition landed at Jeufosse and ravaged the county of Chartres, following the widowhood of the mother of Richard I of Normandy, Liutgarde de Vermandois, and her remarriage to Thibaud the Cheater, Count of Chartres. The couple wanted to recover the Duchy of Normandy and had allied themselves with the king of the Franks, Lothair and Arnould of Flanders 10.

The land was attached to the lordship of Blaru until the Revolution .

Jeufosse, France

#claude monet #france vacation #vacation post #jeufosse

3 notes · View notes

homomenhommes · 8 months

Text

THIS DAY IN GAY HISTORY

based on: The White Crane Institute's 'Gay Wisdom', Gay Birthdays, Gay For Today, Famous GLBT, glbt-Gay Encylopedia, Today in Gay History, Wikipedia, and more

1644 – The Abbé de Choisy, also known as François Timoléon (d.1724), born in Paris, among the notable Frenchmen of the seventeenth century, has left for posterity a vivid firsthand description of a strong cross-gender wish. During his infancy and early youth, his mother had attired him completely as a girl. At eighteen this practice continued and his waist was then "encircled with tight-fitting corsets which made his loins, hips, and bust more prominent." As an adult, for five months he played comedy as a girl and reported: "Everybody was deceived; I had [male] lovers to whom I granted small favors."

de Choisy as a woman

In 1676, he attended the Papal inaugural ball in a female attire. In 1687, he was received into the Académie de France. In 1696 he became the Ambassador of Louis XIV to Siam.

Regarding his gender identity he wrote,

I thought myself really and truly a woman. I have tried to find out how such a strange pleasure came to me, and I take it to be in this way. It is an attribute of God to be loved and adored, and man - so far as his weak nature will permit - has the same ambition, and it is beauty which creates love, and beauty is generally woman's portion … . I have heard someone near me whisper, "There is a pretty woman," I have felt a pleasure so great that it is beyond all comparison. Ambition, riches, even love cannot equal it …

In 1676, he attended the Papal inaugural ball in a female attire. In 1687, he was received into the Académie de France. In 1696 he became the Ambassador of Louis XIV to Siam.

Regarding his gender identity he wrote,

1667 – Louis de Bourbon, Légitimé de France, Count of Vermandois (d.1683) was the eldest surviving son of Louis XIV of France and his mistress Louise de La Vallière. He was sometimes known as Louis de Vermandois after his title. He died unmarried and without issue.

Louis de Bourbon was born at the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye. He was named after his father. Like his elder sister, Marie Anne de Bourbon, who was known at court as Mademoiselle de Blois, he was given the surname of de Bourbon not de France as a result of his illegitimacy. As a child, he called his mother Belle Maman because of her beauty. Louis was legitimised in 1669, at the age of two, and was given the title of comte de Vermandois and was made an Admiral of France.

In 1674, his mother entered a Carmelite convent in Paris, and took the name Sœur Louise de la Miséricorde. Afterwards, they saw very little of each other. From his mother and his father, Louis had five full siblings, many of whom died before his birth.

After his mother left, Louis lived at the Palais Royal in Paris with his uncle, Philippe of France, duc d'Orléans, and his wife Elizabeth Charlotte of the Palatinate. At the Palais-Royal, he became very close to his aunt despite her well-known dislike of Louis XIV's bastards. The affection the aunt and nephew had for each other never diminished.

While he was at the court of his libertine and homosexual uncle, he met the Chevalier de Lorraine, his uncle's most famous lover. It is said that the young count was seduced by the older chevalier and his set (including the Prince of Conti) and began practicing le vice italien (the contemporary appellation for homosexuality).

Louis XIV decided to exile his son and the Chevalier de Lorraine.

In order to cover up the scandal, it was suggested that the boy be married off as soon as possible; a bride suggested was Anne Louise Bénédicte de Bourbon; Louis was exiled before anything could materialise.

In June 1682, Louis was exiled to Normandy. In order to smooth things over between father and son, his aunt Elizabeth Charlotte of the Palatinate suggested to the king that Louis be sent as a soldier to Flanders, which was then under French occupation. The king agreed with the suggestion and his son was sent to the Siege of Courtray. It was there that Louis fell ill.

Despite his illness, Louis was desperate to regain his father's love and continued to fight in battle regardless of advice given by the royal doctor and the marquis de Montchevreuil that he return to Lille in order to recuperate.

Louis died on 18 November 1683, at the age of sixteen. He was buried at the cathedral at Arras. His loving sister and aunt were greatly impacted by his death. His father, however, did not even shed a tear. His mother, still obsessed with the sin of her previous affair with the king, said upon hearing of her son's death: I ought to weep for his birth far more than his death.

Louis was later suspected of being the Man in the Iron Mask.

Gandhi and Kallenbach

1869 – Mohandras Mahatma Gandhi was an Indian lawyer, anti-colonial nationalist, and political ethicist, who employed nonviolent resistance (satyagraha) to lead the successful campaign for India's independence from British rule, and in turn inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. The honorific Mahatma ("great-souled", "venerable"), first applied to him in 1914 in South Africa, is now used throughout the world.

Born and raised in a Hindu family in coastal Gujarat, western India, Gandhi trained in law at the Inner Temple, London, and was called to the bar at age 22 in June 1891. After two uncertain years in India, where he was unable to start a successful law practice, he moved to South Africa in 1893 to represent an Indian merchant in a lawsuit. He went on to stay for 21 years.

It was in South Africa that Gandhi raised a family, and first employed nonviolent resistance in a campaign for civil rights. In 1915, aged 45, he returned to India. He set about organising peasants, farmers, and urban laborers to protest against excessive land-tax and discrimination. Assuming leadership of the Indian National Congress in 1921, Gandhi led nationwide campaigns for easing poverty, expanding women's rights, building religious and ethnic amity, ending untouchability, and above all for achieving Swaraj or self-rule.

Was Mahatma Gandhi gay? A Pulitzer-Prize winning author Joseph Lelyveld claims the god-like Indian figure not only left his wife for a man, but also harbored racist attitudes.

According to Lelyveld, his lover was Hermann Kallenbach, a German-Jewish architect and bodybuilder. The couple built their love nest during Gandhi's time in South Africa where he arrived as a 23-year-old law clerk in 1893 and lived for 21 years.

At the age of 13 Gandhi had been married to 14-year-old Kasturbai Makhanji, but after four children together they broke up so he could be with Kallenbach. As late as 1933 Gandhi wrote a letter telling of his unending desire and branding his ex-wife "the most venomous woman I have met." Kallenabach emigrated from East Prussia to South Africa where he first met Gandhi. The author describes Gandhi's relationship with the man as, "the most intimate, also ambiguous relationship of [Gandhi's] lifetime."

Much of the intimacy between the two is revealed in Kallenbach's letters to his Indian friend after Gandhi left his wifen 'Ba' — an arranged marriage — in 1908 for Kallenbach, a lifelong bachelor, according to the book.

The source of much of the detail of their affair was found in the "loving and charming love notes" that Gandhi wrote to Kallenbach, whose family saved them after the architect's death. They eventually landed in the National Archives of India. Gandhi had destroyed all those from Kallenbach.

It was known that Gandhi was preoccupied with physiology, and even though he had a "taut torso," weighing 106 to 118 pounds throughout his life, the author says Gandhi was attracted to Kallenbach's strongman build.

In letters, Gandhi wrote to Kallenbach, "How completely you have taken possession of my body. This is slavery with a vengeance."

"Your portrait (the only one) stands on my mantelpiece in the bedroom," he writes. "The mantelpiece is opposite the bed."

The pair lived together for two years in a house Kallenbach built in South Africa and pledged to give one another "more love, and yet more love."

Gandhi implored Kallenbach not to "look lustfully upon any woman" and cautioned, "I cannot imagine a thing as ugly as the intercourse of men and women."

By the time Gandhi left South Africa in 1914, Kallenbach was not allowed to accompany him because of World War I. But Gandhi told him, "You will always be you and you alone to me…I have told you you will have to desert me and not I you."

Kallenbach died in 1945 and Gandhi was assassinated in 1948

1985 - Rock Hudson, American actor died (b.1925); Hudson's death from HIV/AIDS changed the face of AIDS in the United States.

1997 – "Variety" objected to the Motion Picture Association of America's decision to give the movie "Bent" an NC-17 rating, pointing out that the sex scenes were far less graphic than heterosexual sex scenes in movies which receive R ratings.

2 notes · View notes

cincinnatusvirtue · 2 years

Text

Isabel de Clare 4th Countess of Pembroke (1172-1220 AD). Anglo-Irish women of the nobility in profile...

Isabel de Clare’s life is largely known in detail for her proximity to people in her life during the late 12th & early 13th centuries of Medieval England. Her parents and ancestors were of noble & royal extraction. Her husband rose through the ranks from son of a relatively minor noble to being the man regarded as the best knight and most trustworthy nobleman in all of the Angevin Empire and a powerful statesman who ruled in England in all but name for a brief period. In death he was lionized as the “greatest knight who had lived” and their children would either become nobles & warriors in 13th century England themselves or marry into other noble families of note.

All of this overlooks just how important, strong and capable Isabel was of her own merit. Something her husband and indeed Anglo-Norman law at the time recognized. Despite its male dominance, there were women capable of being major power players in the ranks of nobility & royalty and Isabel played a contribution to that. Her life offers us a unique glimpse into a noble woman’s life during the High Middle Ages in Western Europe.

Royal Roots, Birth & Early Life:

-Isabel de Clare was born circa 1172 AD, somewhere in Leinster (southeastern), Ireland. From the start she was a symbolic & physical bridge between two cultures. She was the result of a political but dutiful marriage, and her physical being would be of crucial importance in later years.

-Her father was Richard FitzGilbert, also known as Richard de Clare, 2nd Earl of Pembroke (1130-1176). Richard would be best known to history by his nickname Strongbow. He was an Anglo-Norman nobleman of the De Clare family. The De Clare or Clare family originated in Normandy and came to England where they accompanied William the Conqueror, Duke of Normandy who would become the first Norman King of England.

-The first Richard FitzGilbert (1035-1090) was a companion of Duke William and distant kinsman. They both shared a common ancestor in Richard I of Normandy (932-996), Count of Rouen & Duke of Normandy. The name De Clare was from the Norman French for a place name, to be from or “of” said location. As a reward for being companion to Duke William in the Norman Conquest of England. Richard FitzGilbert like other Norman nobles was granted landholdings in England, becoming the new English nobility which replaced the Anglo-Saxons of old. Richard’s particular land holding was in centered in the town of Clare in Suffolk England which made him the first Lord of Clare. He also gained territory in Tonbridge in Kent, England.

-Over the generations the family expanded its holdings in England and in the Welsh Marches, Anglo-Norman controlled portions of southern Wales. Strongbow’s father Gilbert de Clare (1100-1148) became 1st Earl of Pembroke under King Stephen of England, gaining control of important parts of the Welsh Marches, including the Pembroke peninsula in southwest Wales. He also held Striguil in southeastern Wales on the River Wye, forming the strategic border between England & Wales.

-Gilbert de Clare was married to Isabel Beaumont, a former mistress of King Henry I of England & daughter of Robert de Beaumont, 1st Earl of Leicester & his wife Elizabeth de Vermandois. Elizabeth was a French noblewoman was the paternal granddaughter of French King Henry I (1008-1060) of the House of Capet. While her maternal grandfather Herbert IV, Count of Vermandois (1028-1080) was a descendant of Charlemagne and the Carolingian dynasty of Franks. Also, by virtue of Henry I’ of France’s marriage to Princess Anne of Kiev, Strongbow and subsequently Isabel de Clare were direct descendants of the Kievan Rus’s royal ruling House of Rurik which ruled Medieval Ukraine & Russia. Also confirmed among their ancestors from this line were Swedish royalty, Polish tribal royalty & possibly Byzantine Greek royalty, if the debated connections regarding Anne of Kiev’s purported paternal grandmother (Anna Porphyrogenita) are indeed true.

-Isabel de Clare’s mother and the wife of Strongbow was Aoife MacMurrough of Eva of Leinster (1145-1188) an Irish princess who was daughter of Dermot MacMurrough, King of Leinster. Ireland at the time was not ruled by one king but was instead made up of several feudal petty kingdoms, Leinster being one of them located in the southeast of the country, a land of rivers, hills and the famed Wicklow Mountains. Aoife’s and subsequently Isabel’s ancestry in Ireland went back to various Irish petty kings & even the vaunted High Kings of Ireland, who ruled as a somewhat symbolic overlord of the other petty kings. This included her paternal ancestor through Brian Boru, High King of Ireland & King of Munster and founder of the O’Brien dynasty who defeated the Vikings at their settlement in Dublin in 1014, taking the area back for the Gaelic natives of Ireland after years of Viking rule. Though Brian Boru died in the process.

-Isabel de Clare’s parents came together in the 1170′s following a power struggle in Ireland between her maternal grandfather Dermot MacMurrough & then High King of Ireland, Rory O’Connor who worried that Dermot would become too powerful as King of Leinster, so he launched an invasion of Leinster, this forced Dermot off his throne and into exile in 1166.

-Dermot’s exile took him to the court of Henry II, King of England & Duke of Normandy who was in France at the time, trying to hold together his many French possessions (Normandy, Brittany, Aquitaine, Anjou etc.) which made up his Angevin Empire. Henry would not personally partake in restoring Dermot to the throne in Ireland, but he did authorize Dermot to negotiate and make mercenary use of some of his Anglo-Norman nobility and their knightly retinues. Strongbow would be one of these Norman nobles Dermot would negotiate with.

-Strongbow promised to assist Dermot in the recapture of his throne, in exchange for Aoife’s hand in marriage and kingship of Leinster upon Dermot’s death, co-ruling with Aoife to give it air of legitimacy among the native Irish. The Norman invasion of Ireland commenced in small waves as early as 1169 with Strongbow himself arriving in 1170 where his Anglo-Norman forces, some 200 mounted knights and 1,000-foot soldiers teamed with earlier Norman war parties from the prior year, they took the port city of Waterford, once a Viking a stronghold. Here Aoife & Strongbow were married, uniting the Irish royalty with Anglo-Norman nobility in a political manner.

-Children would of course cement this marriage with the birth of Isabel probably in 1172 and her brother Gilbert.

-Dermot’s gamble paid off, his Norman mercenaries overwhelmed the forces loyal to High King Rory O’Connor. The Gaelic Irish military in terms of arms & armor were no match for the Anglo-Normans who sported the most high-quality weapons and armor of their day in Western Europe. Dermot was once again agreed to be King of Leinster in agreement with O’Connor. However, his deals with his new son-in-law Strongbow & the other Anglo-Normans unintentionally and unbeknown to them opened the door to the start of England’s several centuries of involvement in Ireland...

-Dermot would die in 1171 shortly after the retaking of the kingdom, leaving his son and son-in-law (Strongbow) to claim kingship of Leinster. His son and Aoife’s brother claimed it under traditional Brehon law while his deal with Strongbow left it as part of the dowry for marriage.

-Meanwhile. Henry II of England was concerned about his Anglo-Norman nobles over in Ireland. Strongbow in particular had through marriage and acquisition of lands, begun a private colonization of Ireland. Other nobles who took part in Dermot’s operation did so too. This resulted in Henry and Strongbow making a deal, in exchange for keeping Leinster and the restoration of Strongbow’s English, Welsh & French landholdings, he would surrender the ports of Wexford, Waterford & Dublin to royal authority directly. He’d also be required to assist Henry on campaign in France against rebels. He was made in title by Henry II, Lord of Leinster & Justiciar of Ireland (chief justice). Henry II arrived in Ireland in late 1172 for a six month stay where royal troops directly loyal to him took over the key cities of Wexford, Waterford & Dublin from the earlier Anglo-Norman mercenaries. All the Anglo-Norman nobles who gained land in Ireland during the initial invasion were forced to pledge fealty to Henry II as Lord of Ireland in exchange for their right to keep their newly colonized lands. Likewise, the native Gaelic kings were to pledge fealty to Henry II as their feudal overlord, essentially ending the now meaningless institution of High King of Ireland. Waves of Anglo-Norman, Welsh, & Flemish colonists began to settle and establish new English towns in Ireland. Some established relations with the Gaelic Irish, intermarrying, becoming a new cultural group which would expand, ebb and flow over the centuries, the Anglo-Irish. Thus began a fusion of Anglo-Norman architecture, warfare, language and with a gradual cultural assimilation of Gaelic customs that began to blur the differences overtime until the early Anglo-Normans became just accepted as Irish. Nevertheless, politically the longer lasting implications of England’s occupation of Ireland had begun.

-Isabel de Clare was born into this new political realty, her maternal ancestral homeland permanently transformed within a few years due to her maternal grandfather’s personal struggle to regain power in his homebase. None of the the participants, including her parents & grandfather had the slightest notion of the longer-term implications of their decisions. Isabel & her brother were, nevertheless, the flesh and blood realty of this new political & cultural fusion. Meant in part as political bridges between two worlds.

-Strongbow intended for his son Gilbert to inherit Leinster and the various holdings in Wales, England and Normandy. His own death came about in 1176 following an infection of the leg. He was buried in Dublin, with his tomb & effigy still found Christ Church Dublin. Aoife took charge of her children’s upbringing hoping to ensure their inheritance. She was by many accounts fierce in this regard, she was also seemingly well-educated for anybody in that time period but especially a woman, a trait she passed on to Isabel. She is also said to have led Anglo-Norman & Irish loyalist troops into battle against those who tried to take Leinster from her, she earned the nickname Red Eva.

-Gilbert de Clare, died as a teenager around 1185. Thus, all the inheritance remained with his mother Aoife and would by right of Anglo-Norman law pass on to his nearest relative, his sister Isabel and any man she would marry.

-Aoife died in 1188 by some accounts, this left the teenage Isabel orphaned without and without her brother. She was, nevertheless, rightful heir to Leinster, the castles in Wales & England that had belonged to her father and paternal grandfather (Gilbert, 1st Earl of Pembroke). She was the 4th Countess of Pembroke in this line after her brother’s brief tenure. Isabel, became a royal ward of Henry II personally. Meaning he would ensure the safekeeping of her legal inheritance and person. He entrusted this to Ranulf of Glanville, Justiciar of England. She was therefore kept in London for her safekeeping.

-In practical terms this royal wardship was essentially a foster home for orphaned nobility until the king could marry them off to some other noble. Sometimes, other nobles would be entrusted as their personal guardian and be tasked with arranging the marriage of the ward to another noble, sometimes to their guardian’s child or even the guardian themself for personal gain. This would of course require the king’s blessing.

-Isabel was described as beautiful, kind & intelligent “the good, the wise and courteous lady of high degree.” She was among the wealthiest heiresses in the Angevin Empire (Henry II’s personal empire which through conquest, inheritance and diplomacy included all of England, parts of Wales, Ireland and most of Northern & Western France). She was well educated like her mother and could speak her father’s language of French, the courtly language of the English royalty and the Anglo-Norman nobility at the time. She could also speak her mother’s native Irish (Gaelic) & Latin, the language of clergy, diplomacy and government bureaucracy. This coupled with her bloodlines would be of tremendous political import, meaning she could navigate the Irish and Anglo-Norman cultures she was born of. Rather than her education in language, courtly manners, warfare, diplomacy and politics being perceived as a threat to any husband, it would have likely been seen as a great asset.

-Her hand in marriage was promised by Henry II, to one William Marshal in 1189. Marshal was himself an Anglo-Norman noble born and raised in England around 1147. He was the son of a relatively minor noble in England’s West Country with his mother coming from a more distinct Norman family. He came of age through training as a knight with his mother’s relative in Normandy, enduring a six-year apprenticeship in knightly warfare, court etiquette & the arts. He saw some combat but was assigned to the personal service of England’s Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine and then the service of her and Henry II’s son, Henry the Younger. They bonded especially in the late 1170′s by becoming famous knights on the European knightly tournament circuit that was just blossoming at the time. Marshal became perhaps the most renowned tournament knight of all, capturing or unhorsing some 500 knights. Henry the Younger would eventually die after Marshal served him for over a decade loyally.

-Marshal then found himself in Henry II’s personal service and during a war against the King of France who was briefly joined by Henry II’s son and heir Richard where he personally unhorsed Richard with a lance, killing the horse but sparing the prince. Supposedly, the only man to do so. After Henry II’s death, Richard rose to the throne of England & Normandy. He was preparing to go on Crusade to the Middle East and liberate Jerusalem from Muslim rule. He would in time be known as Richard the Lionheart.

-Despite Marshal’s recent opposition with King Richard, the new monarch kept Marshal in his service. He also fulfilled his father’s promise to wed Isabel de Clare to William Marshal. This would make Marshal not only a wealthy and increasingly influential knight but by right of marriage make him now one of the wealthiest landowners & nobles in the Angevin Empire.

Marriage, until death do you part;

-William Marshal & Isabel de Clare were married in August 1189 in London. There was an age difference, she was not quite 18 and he was in is early 40′s. Despite the political nature of the marriage, it appears to have been a genuinely happy one by all accounts. Neither party appears to have been unfaithful to one another. The written records show a great mutual appreciation for one another and produced 10 children, 5 sons and 5 daughters over the next several decades.

-Marshal was technically by right of marriage, Earl of Pembroke but he would not officially acquire the title in his own name until 1199, a decade after his marriage. Nevertheless, he was overlord of Leinster and Striguil and set about making improvements to the castles both he had acquired in England & France for loyal service to the monarchs but his marital gains in Wales & Ireland.

-For the first decade of marriage, William was in service to Richard the Lionheart, particularly when he was gone on Crusade, he stayed behind as a member of the ruling council. This kept him in England, Wales & France mostly, with little attention to affairs in Ireland. Isabel for her part focused on raising a family and supporting her husband as he navigated politics. Though his wartime commitments to defending England from rebels & the French throne often kept them separated. Isabel, appears to have been like her mother before devoted to ensuring the cultured learning of her children.

-Affairs in her native Ireland wouldn’t be pressing for the Marshal family until around the year 1200, during the reign of Henry II’s youngest son with Eleanor of Aquitaine, John. John became king after the death of his eldest brother Richard who had returned from years in the Crusades and then a captive in Germany from a rival monarch, found himself campaigning against Philip II of France (his father’s rival) to regain territory that had been lost under John’s regency of throne. John was eventually back in Richard’s good graces when the Lionheart died of infection from a crossbow wound fired by a rebel soldier in southern France where Richard was campaigning to suppress a revolt.

-John was now King of England and had a reputation for being paranoid, highly emotional and making rash decisions, making him more unpredictable than his older brothers and father.

-Marshal found himself both in John’s good graces and bad graces at various times over the years. He and Isabel were turning to press their rightful rule in Leinster in the early 1200′s despite John’s warnings he not to do so. John like his father Henry II had been concerned about Strongbow now worried Marshal and Isabel would be too powerful and independent in Ireland. Indeed, in the two decades since the Norman invasion of Ireland, the Anglo-Norman nobility who settled there had become accustomed to their own relative autonomy. Loyalty to the king was in name but in practice, so long as they didn’t rebel against the king, they were basically free to do as they please. John’s predecessors did little to enforce this and initially John was more concerned about England & France.

-Marshal & Isabel helped develop the town of New Ross in Leinster, an English town separate from the Gaelic towns nearby, it was peopled with English & Welsh colonists, many of whom were part of the Marshal family retinue and to whom they owed their feudal allegiance. The castles of Kilkenny, Trim & others were developed and expanded by Marshal & Isabel.

-Meanwhile, Marshal earned John’s ire for having paid homage to Philip II of France in exchange for retention of Norman lands after the French kicked John’s English armies out of Normandy, forever losing his ancestral duchy of Normandy to France.

-Concerned of Marshal’s power in Ireland and anger over his dueling homages to John in England and Philip in France. John organized for Marshal to come pay homage in England where he was duly placed under house arrest at the royal court. Meanwhile his own Justiciar in Ireland, Meiler Fitzhenry who had his own ambitions on Leinster invaded using his own Irish & Anglo-Norman forces with John’s blessing. John sought to teach Marshal a lesson and increase personal control over Ireland by having a Norman noble with more loyalty. It also worked in Fitzhenry’s favor.

-Marshal himself was considered fair if not especially popular among the Anglo-Normans already settled in Leinster under his rule. While the native Gaels were less than enthused by him or any other Anglo-Norman lord. Isabel, however, appears to have been the critical element & saving grace for Marshal. Given her ancestry including the native Irish rulers of Leinster and the Anglo-Norman new elite, her command of language & diplomacy appears to have held things together while this Anglo-Norman civil war with the king’s blessing raged in Ireland.

-in 1208 Fitzhenry’s men besieged Isabel (who was pregnant) and the Anglo-Normans who were loyal to Marshal all while Marshal himself and his sons remained personal hostages of King John. Only thanks to an alliance between Marshal’s & Isabel Anglo-Norman loyalists with another rival of Fitzhenry, Hugh de Lacy (1176-1242) Anglo-Norman noble who was first Earl of Ulster did the war come to an end in Marshal & Isabel’s favor. Isabel is said to have helped direct the defense of her castles under siege while de Lacy’s men came to their relief, defeating and capturing the men John had sent to assist Fitzhenry.

-Fitzhenry remained a noble in Ireland but he was removed as Justiciar. Marshal was released by John, and he was allowed to reunite with Isabel.

-Isabel’s day to day to involvement in the civil war is hard to gauge but almost certainly if not the military matters, the diplomatic ones she learned from her Irish princess mother, along with her symbolic blood ties to the Irish & Anglo-Norman nobility of Leinster still held important sway. As Marshal had said prior to his departure to his custody in England, all he had emanates from her. This was mostly true in a political and legal sense, but he appears to have meant it in a romantic sense since she was his faithful wife & mother of his children, the vessel to his dynastic future.

-In the coming years, Isabel & Marshal looked to marrying off their children to important Anglo-Norman nobility. Though successful in this regard and Marshal & Isabel have thousands if not millions of descendants today, none of their sons would bring about descendants meaning, their holdings in Ireland, Wales and England would transfer to other families since their daughters were married off into other noble families and hence the Marshal dynasty was short lived-in terms of male direct descendants. All five daughters Maud, Isabel, Joan, Eva & Sibyl all had children that lived and went onto have descendants that live into the modern era, including members of the British royal family today as well as numerous people in America and elsewhere due to colonial descendants from English nobility.

-Marshal found himself back in John’s good favor and counselled him during the rough times of the First Baron’s Rebellion (1215-1217). He also helped guide John to signing the famed Magna Carta, meant as a peace treaty to ensure certain royal guarantees for the rebellious nobility. Making Marshal one of the Magna Carta “signers”, though the peace was broken shortly thereafter, and John died of illness during rebellion. To make matters worse England’s civil war between nobles revolting against John’s excesses and those loyal to him, including Marshal now attracted the attention of the French king Philip II and his son Louis. The rebel barons now swore fealty to Louis and asked he take over as King of England. Marshal had been made guardian of John’s son 9-year son who was crowned Henry III, making him the 4th crowned King of England that Marshal would serve. Marshal was styled as “Guardian of the Realm” and swore to defending England and its rightful king from the predations of the rebel barons and the French pretender.

-As regent he was now the head of the country in practical matters, yet he was also 70 years old. Marshal would help Henry III and England’s royalist forces when the war when at age 70 and donning knight’s armor one last time he would lead a royalist force to defeat a combined Anglo (rebel)-French force in the Battle of Lincoln in May 1217. This along with the English naval victory over France at Sandwich ended the war in the royalist favor. Henry III was recognized by France at the rightful King of England and the rebels would be forgiven in exchange.

-Marshal won the war for England but his old age was catching up with him. He now set about as Regent of England on behalf of Henry III to try and restore the treasury which was drained under John. He also reissued updated versions of Magna Carta, later cited by historians as a cornerstone moment in the gradual expanding of human rights and democracy, though the original document was narrow in scope and intended for the nobility and the preservation of their rights against royal abuse. It would influence English common law and American Constitutional law in centuries to come.

-From 1217-1219 Marshal was the de-facto the ruler of England, he wasn’t always successful, but he did ensure some measure of peace and lay a foundation that Henry III’s other regents and the king himself could later build upon.

-Isabel remained faithful to the very when Marshal died at home near Reading England in May 1219. She was said to have wept uncontrollably at his passing and could not walk during his funeral procession to London where he was buried in Temple Church.

-Nevertheless, evidence shows that despite her husband’s passing she immediately set about ensuring inheritance was due. Writing the other regents that her lands in Ireland, Wales (minus Pembroke which went to their eldest son) and England were duly granted in her name. She also negotiated with the French king to ensure inheritance of her Norman lands. She even got William Marshal II, their eldest son the hand in marriage to Henry III’s younger sister Princess Eleanor, though this marriage would produce no heirs.

-Isabel’s son William Marshal II was effective as agent managing her various estates, but illness caught up with her in March 1220 and she died in Wales ten months after her husband’s death. She was buried Tintern Abbey near Striguil Castle, now Chepstow Castle which had belonged her father Strongbow and his father before him. Her grave is there to this day alongside her mother Aoife of Leinster. Though the abbey which the De Clare & Marshal families patroned is now in ruin, the grave markers are located on the ground.

-So passed a woman of high birth within the High Middle Ages of Western Europe. She was born of two different cultures and served as a living bridge immersed in the customs of both. As a result, she was given a unique and rich in-depth education unusual for anybody for the times but especially someone of her sex. Her life is mostly known for a seemingly peripheral role in relation to her family and acquaintances of great political importance but the evidence we have suggests she was regarded by especially her family and husband in particular as an absolutely vital and strong character in the events of the time. She played a part in shaping the history of nations, by dint of her birth and by her cultured and determined character.

12 notes · View notes