Queens and Power in Medieval and Early Modern England

1. "Greater by Marriage": The Matrimonial Career of the Empress Matilda

The Matrimonial Career of the Empress Matilda charles beem Here lies Henry’s daughter, wife and mother, great by birth, greater by marriage, But greatest by motherhood. The epitaph of the empress Matilda described the summit of earthly achievement to which a twelfth-century aristocratic woman could aspire, according to the dictates of a male-dominant feudal society. As the daughter of Henry I of England, the widow of Holy Roman Emperor Henry V, and the mother to the future Henry II of England, Matilda’s relationships to her male royal kinsmen were crucial and inescapable elements of her career as a female feudal lord, when she bore the title Domina Anglorum, “Lady of the English,” during the years 1141 to 1147.1 While Matilda possessed a hereditary title to the English throne, she failed to gain her inheritance following her father’s death in 1135, as her cousin, Stephen of Blois, rushed into the vacuum to claim the English crown. Four years later, as her second husband, Geoffrey, “Greater by Marriage” 1 ฀2 charles beem Count of Anjou, labored to subjugate the duchy of Normandy, Matilda set off on her own to begin a sustained effort to displace Stephen as king. Matilda, however, was not content to exercise power on behalf of either her second husband or eldest son, or to play the role of dynast, the usual method by which women in Anglo-Saxon and Norman England enjoyed the legitimate exercise of political power. Instead, for all intents and purposes, Matilda wanted to be a king, in the sense that her ultimate goal was to solely possess an estate and office that had previously been occupied only by men. Matilda’s second marriage complicated her pursuit of this goal. As she presented herself as an alternative candidate for the English throne, Matilda represented herself as a single woman, amplifying her exalted position as the daughter of a king and the widow of an emperor while downplaying her status as a married woman. During the spring and summer of 1141, the pinnacle of her career as Domina Anglorum, Matilda exercised an autonomous historical agency completely outside the conjugal jurisdiction of the marriage not mentioned in her epitaph. On the twelfth-century European aristocratic marriage market, Matilda was a catch. During this time, a woman’s designation as a royal heir was rare, but not unknown. Matilda’s contemporaries Queens Urracca of Castilla-Leon and Melinsende of Jerusalem had been designated by their fathers as successors to continue their respective dynasties through the female line.2 To do this, they needed to be married, so they could produce the next generation of male heirs. The big problem for both of these queens, however, was attempts by both husbands and sons to encroach on the political power that each also considered their birthright. Matilda’s designation as Henry I’s heir was also based primarily on her ability to force a similar dynastic link. Henry’s first consort, Edith/Matilda, was a direct descendant of the Anglo-Saxon royal 3 “greater by marriage” house of Wessex; their dynastic union represented a highly symbolic blending of Norman and Saxon royal blood.3 Seeking to stabilize the fluid Norman succession patterns, Henry I was adamant that his successor would be his own legitimate offspring. Before her death in 1118, Edith/Matilda bore Henry two children who lived to adulthood, a daughter, Matilda, and a son, William, the Ætheling. In 1114, Henry I married eleven-year-old Matilda to Holy Roman Emperor Henry V. During the course of her first marriage, Matilda gained both the experience and the status that formed the building blocks for her later career as Lady of the English.4 Following the tragic death of William the Ætheling in 1120, Henry I began to consider the possibility of designating Matilda as his heir.5 In 1125, Henry V died, leaving Matilda a still youthful but childless dowager Holy Roman empress. At her father’s bidding, Matilda returned to England, an experienced woman of the world possessed with a formidable tutelage in the wide-ranging affairs of the twelfth-century empire. At the same time, Henry I’s second marriage had produced no children, leaving Matilda his remaining legitimate heir general. Primogeniture, however, had only been an intermittent feature of late Anglo-Saxon and Norman succession patterns.6 Henry I himself had triumphed over the claims of his...