queens of the crusades eleanor of aquitaine and her successors

I think I might prefer QUEENS OF THE CRUSADES a little more to QUEENS OF THE CONQUEST.

Through the story of these first five Plantagenet queens, Alison Weir provides an enthralling new perspective on a dramatic period of high romance and sometimes low politics, with determined women at its heart.īlurb taken from Goodreads. The lives of Eleanor’s successors were just as remarkable: Berengaria of Navarre, queen of Richard the Lionheart, Isabella of Angoulême, queen of John, and Alienor of Provence, queen of Henry III, and finally Eleanor of Castile, the grasping but beloved wife of Edward I.

Her narrative begins with the formidable Eleanor of Aquitaine, whose marriage to Henry II establishes a dynasty which rules for over three hundred years and creates the most powerful empire in western Christendom – but also sows the seeds for some of the most destructive family conflicts in history and for the collapse, under her son King John, of England’s power in Europe. We see events such as the murder of Becket, Magna Carta and the birth of parliaments from a new perspective. Crusading queens, queens in rebellion against their king, queen seductresses, learned queens, queens in battle, queens who enlivened England with the romantic culture of southern Europe – these determined women often broke through medieval constraints to exercise power and influence, for good and sometimes for ill.Īlison Weir’s ground-breaking history of the queens of medieval England now moves into a period of even higher drama, from 1154 to 1291: years of chivalry, dynastic ambition, conflict with the church, baronial wars, and the all-pervading bonds of feudalism. The Plantagenet queens of England played a role in some of the most dramatic events in our history.

Queens of the crusades eleanor of aquitaine and her successors