In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

efore her death at brie-Comte-Robert on March 4, 1371, Jeanne d’Évreux spent forty-three years as a very rich widow after losing her husband, King Charles Iv of France (1294–1328) on February 1, 1328.1 The couple had been married since July 5, 1324. Jeanne had had two daughters (one of whom predeceased her father) and was pregnant with a third when Charles died. during her long widowhood, Jeanne worked to promote peace between France and navarre out of dedication to her nephew, Charles of navarre (known as “the bad”). Her chief concerns, however, were her two daughters Marie (1326–41) and blanche (1328–93), their property rights, the lands she herself held in dower, her impressive collection of relics and holy images, the elegant books and jewels she owned, and, principally, the welfare of her soul—and her husband’s. She made a cult of widowhood and philanthropy. to advance her husband’s salvation and her own, she herself created a multitude of charitable institutions. Clearly aware of the power the living exercised over the dead and of the special vulnerability of royal widows,Jeanne came to devise imaginative and extraordinary testamentary strategies to protect herself against the pitfalls of will-making. distrustful of postmortem provisions, Jeanne would eventually obtain special royal approval of her novel and extraordinary design to execute her testament herself. to be sure, many wills contained clauses specifying the fulfillment or completion of projects the testator failed to carry out while alive,2 but, as will be seen, Jeanne’s plan was far more sweeping and dramatic than any such provision. As queen and young widow, Jeanne took a traditional, conservative approach to matters testamentary, which were of considerable concern to her. She drew her first will in october 1326,five months after her coronation at the SainteChapelle , while she was awaiting the birth of her second child.3 The will does not The Testamentary Strategies of Jeanne d’Évreux: The Endowment of Saint-Denis in 1343 Elizabeth A. R. Brown b 217 survive,4 but her husband endorsed it in an act dated october 18, 1326, preserved in many exemplifications, that ordered its execution and assigned the revenues of Champagne for this purpose. After her husband’s death, as she awaited the birth of her third child, Jeanne obtained the authorization of the regent, her cousin Philip of valois, to draw a new will containing bequests up to the sum of 16,000 l.par.(20,000 l.t.).Philip granted his approval on March 28,1328,four days before Jeanne had the daughter whose birth catapulted him to the throne of France.5 Whether Jeanne actually had a will drawn up is unknown. She may not have done so, since scarcely more than a year later, on october 3, 1329, Philip (now Philip vI) renewed his act of 1328, again authorizing Jeanne to change her will.6 once more, Jeanne may or may not have availed herself of the king’s permission. not until May 1349 is she known to have issued another will7 (which, like the others, no longer exists). only her final testament and two codicils (dated, respectively, March 1366/67 and october 1370) are preserved, in imperfect copies made in the seventeenth century by Jacques Menant (d. 1699), auditor of the Chambre des comptes.8 Still, abundant traces of her testamentary activities are found in royal acts that reveal her preoccupation with death and the afterlife. Having in August 1338 obtained from Philip vI clarification and modification of the sources of revenue that would be available for executing her testament ,9 Jeanne grew more ambitious. by the beginning of 1339 she had decided to launch an endowment campaign to benefit a host of institutions and individuals. She began by securing the king’s permission to dedicate to “piteables vsages” 500 l.par. (625 l.t.) of annual revenue—roughly equivalent to assets worth 5000 l.par. on February 15,1339,granting her request,Philip vI amortized the property that would provide the revenue, so that donees would receive her gifts tax-free.10 The king also stipulated that, should Jeanne not dispose of all this property before she died, her executors might do so for her soul’s welfare. At this stage Jeanne was in all likelihood contemplating the novel project for which she secured royal authorization later in the year: to execute her testament herself, during her lifetime, without jeopardizing the 16,000 l.par...

Share