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Chapter 4 - Female Sovereigns

from Part I - The Life Cycle

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 July 2020

Robert Bartlett
Affiliation:
University of St Andrews, Scotland
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Summary

This chapter discusses queens regnant and empresses regnant, women ruling in their own right. It is based on a provisional list of 27 cases. The earliest (in the frame of this book) are in Byzantium, Irene (797-802) and the sisters Zoe and Theodora in the eleventh century. The title of the latter is clearly seen as hereditary right, even though it seems that only slight efforts were made to ensure biological continuity of the dynasty. In contrast, the earliest western European case of a queen regnant, Urraca of Leon-Castile, shows how persistently her father sought to obtain a male heir, although he was willing to see her as his successor when he was left without one. The cluster of twelfth-century cases, Urraca, Melisende of Jerusalem and (ultimately unsuccessfully) Matilda. of England are analysed, and the issue of misogyny in the sources discussed. Female sovereigns are much more common in the Mediterranean and Iberian realms than further north. Though they are rarer in the thirteenth century than in the twelfth, fourteenth or fifteenth, this seems to have been purely circumstantial. The one explicit attempt to exclude women from succession, in late medieval France, is the result of one specific political crisis.

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Chapter
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Blood Royal
Dynastic Politics in Medieval Europe
, pp. 124 - 154
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2020

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  • Female Sovereigns
  • Robert Bartlett, University of St Andrews, Scotland
  • Book: Blood Royal
  • Online publication: 09 July 2020
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108854559.005
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  • Female Sovereigns
  • Robert Bartlett, University of St Andrews, Scotland
  • Book: Blood Royal
  • Online publication: 09 July 2020
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108854559.005
Available formats
×

Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • Female Sovereigns
  • Robert Bartlett, University of St Andrews, Scotland
  • Book: Blood Royal
  • Online publication: 09 July 2020
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108854559.005
Available formats
×