Eleanor of Aquitaine: A Biography (WOMEN IN HISTORY)

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Matthew Paris, a well-regarded historian writing in the 13th century, gives three reasons for the divorce: consanguinity, the queen’s alleged adultery and the astonishing charge that ‘she was of the devil’s race.’ He meant it literally: Eleanor was like the folkloric figure of Mélusine, woman above and fish or serpent from the waist down, though she normally managed to conceal that trait. None of the Mélusine romances explicitly mention Eleanor, but they make suggestive links: she was either descended from such a creature or had inherited her lands. Caesarius of Heisterbach, a monk writing around 1230, observed that the English king (at that time Henry III, Eleanor’s grandson) was ‘said to be descended from a phantom mother’. Eleanor’s magical character might explain both Louis’s initial, passionate devotion to his queen and his later repugnance. One poet makes her tell her barons that the king had called her ‘something misshapen and unworthy of his bed’. Ball, Margaret (2006). Duchess of Aquitaine: A Novel of Eleanor. St. Martin's Press. ISBN 978-1-4299-0139-0. Henry and Eleanor are the main characters in James Goldman's 1966 play The Lion in Winter, which was made into a film in 1968 starring Peter O'Toole as Henry and Katharine Hepburn in the role of Eleanor, for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress and the BAFTA Award for Best Actress in a Leading Role and was nominated for the Golden Globe Award for Best Actress – Motion Picture Drama.

Louis became involved in a war with Count Theobald by permitting Raoul I, Count of Vermandois and seneschal of France, to repudiate his wife Eleanor of Champagne, Theobald's sister, and to marry Petronilla of Aquitaine, the Queen's sister. Eleanor urged Louis to support her sister's marriage to Count Raoul. Theobald had also offended Louis by siding with the Pope in the dispute over Bourges. The war lasted two years (1142–44) and ended with the occupation of Champagne by the royal army. Louis was personally involved in the assault and burning of the town of Vitry. More than a thousand people sought refuge in the town church, but the church caught fire and everyone inside was burned alive. Horrified, and desiring an end to the war, Louis attempted to make peace with Theobald in exchange for his support in lifting the interdict on Raoul and Petronilla. This was duly lifted for long enough to allow Theobald's lands to be restored; it was then lowered once more when Raoul refused to repudiate Petronilla, prompting Louis to return to Champagne and ravage it once more.Although the Church didn’t allow divorce, there was a loophole for the rich and powerful. This was consanguinity: a degree of kinship, not necessarily close, that rendered a marriage quasi-incestuous and thus displeasing to God. Disgruntled spouses might discover – even after having a daughter together – that they were third cousins. They could then try to persuade the pope to annul the marriage, which he might or might not do. Eugene III did agree to divorce Eleanor and Louis, but only after long resistance. He first required the couple to try to conceive again, resulting in the birth of a second daughter. (A son could have rendered the marriage permanent.) Just eight weeks after the annulment, Eleanor married Henry II of England, a fourth cousin. On 21 March, the four archbishops, with the approval of Pope Eugene, granted an annulment on grounds of consanguinity within the fourth degree; Eleanor was Louis' third cousin once removed, and shared common ancestry with Robert II of France. Their two daughters were, however, declared legitimate. Children born to a marriage that was later annulled were not at risk of being "bastardised," because "[w]here parties married in good faith, without knowledge of an impediment,... children of the marriage were legitimate." [Berman 228.] [ why?]) Custody of the daughters was awarded to King Louis. Archbishop Samson received assurances from Louis that Eleanor's lands would be restored to her. She had two children with Louis VII: Marie and Alix, both daughters. She had eight children with Henry II: three daughters: Matilda, Eleanor, and Joan; and five sons: William, Henry, Richard (later Richard I “the Lionheart” of England), Geoffrey, and John (later John I of England). She outlived all but three of her children, including her favorite son, Richard. I know that wasn’t uncommon for the time, but it still gives me the sads.

This book strips away much of the myth. It reads like a medieval legend. This is readable history at its best, and a fascinating insight into the medieval mind." ( Northern Echo and various other local papers)

Truth and Tales about the Medieval Queen

Siberry, Elizabeth (2016). The New Crusaders: Images of the Crusades in the 19th and Early 20th Centuries. Routledge. ISBN 9781351885195. Within two months of her annulment, after fighting off attempts to marry her off to various other high-ranking French noblemen, Eleanor married Henry, Count of Anjou and Duke of Normandy. She had been rumored to have had an affair with her new husband’s father, and was more closely related to her new husband than she had been to Louis, but the marriage went ahead and within two years Henry and Eleanor were crowned king and queen of England after Henry’s accession to the English throne upon the death of King Stephen.

Kelly, Amy (1978) [1950]. Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Four Kings. Harvard University Press. ; Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Four Kings (1978 edition) at Google BooksCrawford, Katherine (2012). "Revisiting Monarchy: Women and the Prospects for Power". Journal of Women's History. 24 (1): 160–171. doi: 10.1353/jowh.2012.0006. S2CID 144074176.