Edward I receives very mixed opinions from historians. He was a brutal, almost heartless ruler who beat the Welsh and for the most part the Scottish into submission, earning him the epitaph "the Hammer of the Scots". But he was an effective ruler, until his later years. I may do a separate post about him later but it will involve quite a bit of research because I don't know that much about him. Instead, today, I'm going to write about his easily forgotten wife, Eleanor of Castile.
Leonor, as is her Castilian name, was born in Spain (at that time a part of the Kingdom of Castile) in probably 1241 to King Ferdinand III of Castile and his wife, Joan, Countess of Ponthieu in her own right.
If we look up the ancestry tree, first on her father's side, Ferdinand III was the son of Alfonso IX of Leon and Berenguela of Castile, and during his lifetime secured the union of the crowns of Leon and Castile. He was a great grandson, on his maternal side, of Henry II of England and Alienor of Aquitaine from their daughter, Eleanor of England who had married Alfonso VIII of Castile in 1177. This means Edward I and Leonor of Castile were related (no surprise there then, I'm beginning to think that being related was actually a pre-requisite for royal marriages, the popes must have been sick of giving out papal bulls to waive the degrees of consanguinity, why not just abolish it because hardly any medieval European royal dynasty observed it).
Looking to her mother's side, Joan, Countess of Ponthieu, was the eventual heiress of Simon of Dammartin, Count of Ponthieu, and his wife, Marie of Ponthieu, and if we trace her paternal line we get back to the kings of France.
Leonor of Castile was quite a pedigree; related to Edward I through her paternal line and Countess of Ponthieu in her own right when her mother and brother both died, so a desirable heiress for any King.
Her father's court encouraged the extensive education of royal children, girls and boys alike, so Leonor was educated to a much higher standard than was expected in the day.
After a possible betrothal to the heir of the Kingdom of Navarre, she was eventually given in marriage to the son and heir of Henry III of England, Edward Longshanks. In 1254, when she was about 13, the couple were married in Burgos. Afterwards they remained in Gascony with her husband ruling Aquitaine. It was here that she gave birth to her first daughter, who didn't live for very long. I disapprove of this greatly, as most people of the 21st Century do when they look back. I do realise that heiresses and royal women married young, I do accept that it happened without blanching at the thought, but what I don't understand in this case is why she was sleeping with her husband at 13. The church said girls were of marriageable age at 12, but usually frowned upon them actually completing their wifely duties until a little bit older, probably 15 or 16. Why did Edward sleep with the 13 year old Leonor? It makes me shudder.
The couple were summoned to England by Henry III and I think I remember reading somewhere that it was because she had been pregnant so young that the king was trying to prevent any mishaps happening to her during childbirth; I'm happy she actually survived at 13 years old.
Some sparse information on her father-in-law; one of the semi-incompetent kings of the middle ages, King Henry III of England. He was the successor of the infamous King John "Lackland" of England who had been forced to sign the Magna Carta in around 1215. Unfortunately it seems his son was not a better king. In the 1260s a Baron's revolt broke out supported and lead by Simon de Montfort, Earl of Leicester, who was actually the brother-in-law of the King. During the 1260s, save from a short time when de Montfort became de facto ruler of England, Eleanor had a great part in supporting her father-in-law and her husband. She summoned archers from her county of Ponthieu in France and kept hostages and prisoners for Edward at Windsor until she was forced to surrender it by de Montfort who imprisoned her at Westminster Palace.
How must she have felt at this time? The impression I have of Eleanor is a devoted wife and mother, perhaps not the best defender of castles but you can hardly blame her for that. I admire her staunch loyalty to Edward, and his for her also, and their mutual trust made the foundations for one of the best marriages between medieval monarchs I have ever read about.
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| Obviously she wasn't as scary as one of these things. |
In the 13th Century crusades were still the popular thing of medieval monarchs and Edward I, being young and enthusiastic, agreed to go to the Holy Land and fight alongside the French King Louis IX. Unfortunately for Louis he died in Carthage which left Edward as de facto leader of the crusade. Eleanor, in what would become the norm for her life with her husband, followed him to Palestine. She gave birth to a daughter, called Joan or Joanna of Acre for her birthplace.
There is an interesting and famous story of what happened to the future King of England whilst he was in the Holy Land. Being so successful there an attempt was made on his life; an assassin stabbed him with a dagger laced with poison. I have read half an article about the causes and backstory of this attempt but I won't go into it here. The stories differ, and by far the mot amazing one is Eleanor sucking the poison out of the wound with her teeth. The other, and probably the more true of the two, is that she was weeping and wailing when the doctor told her to leave because she was making too much noise.
After an unsuccessful campaign in the Holy Land (the beginning of a pattern, by the way) they left in 1272. When they were in Sicily they learned of the death of Henry III and upon their return to England were crowned in a joint ceremony in 1274. They really didn't hurry back to England but this may have been because they found out she was pregnant again; a son, Alfonso, was born in Gascony and became heir presumptive.
That's all for Eleanor's story for this week but the second and final part will follow in the next History Sunday segment.
