Eleanor of Aquitaine Guide, Meaning , Facts, Information and Description
Eleanor of Aquitaine (about 1122 - April 1, 1204) was one of the most powerful people of the Middle Ages and the richest and most powerful woman in Europe during her lifetime. She was married first to the French King Louis VII and then to the English King Henry II, a marriage that produced the two English kings Richard the Lionheart and John. Her father was William X, Duke of Aquitaine, and her mother was Aenor Aimery, the daughter of Aimeric I, Vicomte of Chatellerault. When Eleanor was born she was named after her mother and called "Alia Aenor", which in Latin means "other Aenor", but it became "Eleanor" in English. She was raised in one of Europe's most cultured courts, the birthplace of the courtly love poetry invented by her grandfather, William IX of Aquitaine, the Troubador.
Even before the Crusade, Eleanor and Louis were becoming estranged as vigor and piety clashed. She sided with her flamboyant, handsome uncle, Raymond of Toulouse, in his desire to re-capture the County of Edessa. Louis preferred to visit Jerusalem which eventually led to a debilitating campaign. When Eleanor declared her intention to stand with Raymond for Edessa, Louis had her brought with him by force. Eleanor's imprisonment disheartened her Aquitaine knights and Magdalene followers and the divided Crusade armies could not overcome the Muslim forces. For reasons unknown Louis and the Crusade kings targeted Damascus, an ally until the attack. Failed, they retired to Jerusalem and sailed home. When they passed through Rome on the way to Paris, the Pope himself tried to reconcile Eleanor and Louis, and Eleanor did conceive their second daughter (Alix (or Alice) Capet, the first being Marie de Champagne), but there was no saving their marriage. In 1152 the marriage to Louis was annulled on the grounds of consanguinity. Her vast estates reverted to her and were considered no longer a portion of the French royal properties.
Within a year, Eleanor married Henry Plantagenet, Duke of Anjou, who was shortly to become king of England. She was eleven years older than he and related to him in the same degree as she had been to Louis. She bore Henry five sons and three daughters — (William, Henry the Young King, Richard I "the Lionheart, Geoffrey, Duke of Brittany, John "Lackland, Matilda, Eleanor, and Joan) — over the next thirteen years. Some time between 1168 and 1173, Eleanor instigated a separation, deciding that from then on she would mostly remain in her own territory of Poitou where she developed the rumored Court of Love, while Henry concentrated on controlling his increasingly large empire elsewhere. A small fragment of her codes and practises remain written by Andreas Capellanus.
In 1173, Eleanor took part in a rebellion against Henry (see Revolt of 1173-1174), in league with three of their four surviving legitimate sons, although his other sons stood by him. Henry in 1170 had Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Beckett murdered and Europe was outraged. Eleanor was certainly incensed by Henry's numerous sexual dalliances leaving a division of family inheritance. She was annoyed with his attempts to control her patrimony of Aquitaine and the social progress of her court Poitiers. The rebellion was put down, and Eleanor was imprisoned by Henry at the age of 50 for the next fifteen years.
Upon Henry's death in 1189, her son Richard inherited the throne and released his mother from prison. She ruled England while Richard went off to Crusade. She survived him and lived long enough to see her youngest son John on the throne.
Eleanor died in 1204 and was entombed in Fontevraud Abbey near her husband Henry and her son Richard. Her tomb effigy shows her reading a Bible.
Eleanor and Henry are the main characters in the play The Lion in Winter, by James Goldman, which was made into a film starring Peter O'Toole and Katharine Hepburn. The depiction of her in the film Becket is totally inaccurate. She appears briefly in the BBC production Ivanhoe portrayed by Sian Phillips. She is also a major character in Thomas B. Costain's Below the Salt, and the subject of E. L. Konigsburg's children's book A Proud Taste for Scarlet and Miniver.
Eleanor in historical fiction
Biographies
| Preceded by: William X | Duchess of Aquitaine with Louis and Henry I | Succeeded by: Richard I |
| Raymond | Countess of Poitiers with Louis and Henry I | William |
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