As women and as rulers, medieval queens often found that their greatest power and weakness lay in their ability to have children.
[Note: Many apologies for the lateness of this week's blog and article due to limited access to the Internet recently. This has since been corrected and things will be back on schedule as of tomorrow's film and book reviews and next Thursday's article and blog will appear as usual. Many thanks for your patience.]
This week, we look at how our four queens dealt with the issue of succession. As women, Eleanor, Urraca, Matilda (this week's article subject) and Sibylla all had to maintain their positions by producing heirs. While a barren queen was not as easy to put away as popular histories imply (putting too much stock in the unusual and post-medieval example of Henry VIII of England and his six wives), she would see her position with her husband and in court greatly weakened. Guinevere, legendary wife of King Arthur, was always held up as an example of a barren queen who also ruled in her husband's absence-and we all know how she turned out.
But as rulers in their own rights, these queens also had their own succession to consider. The fact that three out of four of them were able to make their children their successors and heirs even over their husbands' gave them a huge measure of power. Eleanor humiliated her first husband Louis by producing five sons with her second husband Henry. Then, she turned those five sons against Henry. Urraca used her living son by her first marriage to discredit her barren second husband, Alfonso, as a rival for her throne. Neither Alfonso's gender nor his military prowess prevailed against his wife's fertility, cunning and superior diplomacy.
Similarly, Matilda was finally able to win England by presenting Stephen's barons with an adult son who could rule with a strong hand. Though a good military leader, Stephen was a weak and ineffectual ruler. Though he, too, had heirs, his poor leadership eventually made his barons choose Matilda's line of succession over his, even if they could not quite bring themselves to choose Matilda herself.
Finally, Sibylla produced daughters for heirs, both of whom died shortly before her. One might consider this a handicap, but Sibylla's husband, Guy, was so unpopular that succession went to her half-sister after her death rather than passing through him. Beginning with Sibylla, the line of succession for the Crown of Jerusalem was passed down through the female line. Sibylla secured the succession among the women in her family rather than the men.
