Anna of Kiev

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Fresco in the Kiev Cathedral of St. Sophia ; Anna is pictured second from the right.

Anna of Kiew ( French Anne de Kiev , formerly French Anne de Russie ), also Anna Jaroslawna and partly Agnes, (* 1024-1032 probably in Kiev ; † September 5, 1075-1078 / 79) was Henry I's second wife . of France from 1051 to 1060 Queen of France .

From the dynasty of Rurik coming, Anna was a prestigious bride for the French king. After his death, she and the Flemish Count Balduin V took over the reign for their still underage son Philip I. When they married Rudolf III for the second time in 1061 . , Count of Valois , came to a break with her son and the royal court. A few years later, however, there was a reconciliation between mother and son, and Anna took part in court life again from 1065, before she died between 1075 and 1079.

family

Anna was born as the daughter of Grand Duke Yaroslav the Wise of the House of the Rurikids and his wife Ingegerd of Sweden, daughter of the Swedish King Olof Skötkonung , probably in Kiev. Her father knew how to forge family ties with many powerful aristocratic dynasties in Western and Eastern Europe through a clever marriage policy. Through Maria Dobroniega , a sister of Yaroslav who had married Casimir I of Poland , Anna's family was related to the Polish royal house. Anna's brother Isjaslav had also married Kasimir's sister Gertrude in 1043. Anna's older sister Elisabeth was through her marriage to Harald III. Became Queen of Norway, while her younger sister Anastasia with the Hungarian king I. Andreas was married. In addition, Anna was through the marriage of her brother Vsevolod I with a relative of Emperor Constantine IX. Monomacos is also closely associated with the Byzantine imperial family.

Like her two sisters before her, Anna married a king from Western Europe, the Capetian Henry I of France, and became his second wife. From this marriage three sons were born. These were:

  • Philip I (* 1052; † 1108), King of France from 1060
  • Robert (* 1055; † around 1065)
  • Hugo (* 1057; † 1101), from around 1080 Count of Vermandois , ⚭ 1078 Adelheid, daughter of Count Heribert IV and heiress of the County of Vermandois

The chronicler Wilhelm von Jumièges claims in his chronicle, written before 1087, that the royal couple also had a daughter, but he is the only medieval historian in whose records this statement can be found. According to the tradition of the Roman Catholic Church , St. Edigna could have been a daughter of Henry I.

Only shortly after Heinrich's death in 1061 Anna had a second marriage to Rudolf III. from Valois and became his third wife. The connection between the two remained childless.

Life

Childhood and youth

There are no records of Anna's childhood and youth, but research assumes that, as the daughter of the Kiev Grand Duke, she received the in-depth training that was customary at the court there. Anna, for example, knew the Cyrillic alphabet and could write a little.

Representation from the Chroniques de Saint-Denis : 1) Henry I sends a bishop (left); 2) Henry's wedding with Anna of Kiev (right)

At the end of 1042/43, Jaroslaw the Wise, Anna or her sister Anastasia planned with the king and later Emperor Heinrich III. to marry and made this an offer, which Heinrich turned down. Around six years later, however, there was another applicant for Anna's hand, Henry I of France, who, as king from Western Europe, was entirely to the taste of the Grand Duke. After the death of his first wife Mathilde in 1044, the French king remained unmarried for five years, although no children had resulted from his marriage and thus the continued existence of the young Capetian dynasty was not guaranteed. One possible reason for the long waiting time could have been that there were difficulties in finding a suitable woman for him in Western culture, whose degree of consanguinity was not too high or who could meet all the requirements of a Capetian queen. Heinrich's initiative may have been initiated by Count Baldwin V of Flanders. From a dynastic point of view, Anna was a perfect bride for Heinrich I: She was educated and from a good family, which was known for his numerous offspring and thus for the fertility of his female family members. In addition, there was no blood relationship between her and the French king. From a political point of view, however, the connection with the daughter of the Kiev grand duke was not particularly desirable, because the marriage did not result in any territorial gains for the Capetian Empire. Nevertheless, Henry I's embassy arrived in Kiev by 1049 at the latest to woo Anna for the king. But it was probably only a second French delegation that finally accompanied Anna to France after the successful marriage negotiations. Among them were Roger II, Bishop of Châlons , Gauthier I ( the Wise ), Bishop of Meaux , and Gosselin de Chaunay as a representative of the French court. The claim, which was often found in the past, that he also accompanied monk Ilarion Anna to France, can, however, be almost ruled out for reasons of time. The statement that the Slavic Gospel , which is now kept in the city library of Reims, came to France with Anna from Kiev, turns out to be false. An inventory of the Reims church treasury from 1622 records the manuscript as a donation from Cardinal Charles de Lorraine-Guise from 1574.

Queen of France

Anna's wedding with Heinrich I took place on Pentecost Sunday , May 19, 1051 in the 9th century Carolingian church of Reims , a predecessor of today's cathedral . The bride was in her 20s, an advanced marriage age for that time, and yet she was around 20 years younger than her 43-year-old groom. The wedding ceremony was chaired by Bishop Gauthier I. Immediately thereafter, Anna was anointed queen by the Archbishop of Reims , Guido von Châtillon, with the assistance of Roger II of Châlons. She was the first Carolingian queen to be anointed in Reims. The wedding ceremony was followed by one-week festivities.

Only one year after the marriage, the longed-for heir to the throne was born with the couple's first son. The child was baptized - probably at Anna's request - with the name Philipp , which was unusual for the Capetian dynasty . However, none of Anna's ancestors bore this name, and it was not very common in the Byzantine Empire either. Perhaps he was referring to the apostle Philip , who played an important role in the Orthodox Church , or to the Macedonian king Philip II.

In the following eight years of marriage with Heinrich, Anna in all probability fulfilled the duties customary for French queens, such as raising children and running the royal household. Gifts and endowments to the Church were also their responsibility. She accompanied Heinrich on his travels through his kingdom and was a member of the French Privy Council. However, she does not seem to have been involved in political affairs at first, because she was not mentioned in royal documents in the first few years of marriage. This changed from July 1058 at the latest, when Anna was granted more political influence.

Regency and Second Marriage

When Heinrich I died on August 4, 1060, Anna's eldest son, Philipp, was eight years old. However, he had already been crowned co-king in May 1059 while his father was alive. In his will, Heinrich had appointed his brother-in-law Baldwin V of Flanders as the official guardian of the heir to the throne. However, Anna probably took over part of the government business in her capacity as Queen Mother and member of the Privy Council in informal co-regency. However, only the Annales Bertholdi mention this , all other contemporary chronicles cite Baldwin as regent. The fact is, however, that Anna accompanied her son on his tour of France and is mentioned by name in eleven documents from Philip's first royal years, which can be seen as an indication of her political participation.

However, when the Queen Mother married Rudolf III, Count of Valois, later of Amiens , Vexin and Crépy in 1061 , it caused a scandal at court and a break between the nine-year-old French king and his mother. According to a romantically transfigured version of the story, Rudolf III. Anna kidnapped during a ride in the royal woods of Senlis and brought them to his castle in Crépy-en-Valois , where a hastily summoned priest is said to have married them. In order to be able to marry Anna, Rudolf III. his wife Eleanor of Montdidier and Peronne cast out on the pretext of adultery. But the latter turned to Pope Alexander II for intervention , and after an official investigation, the marriage between Anna of Kiev and her second husband was declared invalid. However, since Rudolf did not separate from his wife, contrary to church orders, this resulted in his excommunication . However, there is no record of whether Anna was excommunicated from Kiev. Courtiers in Philip's immediate vicinity successfully took advantage of Anna's marriage to turn the king against his mother and her second husband. She does not seem to have stayed at the court until the beginning of 1065, at least there is no evidence of any contact between the king's widow and the royal court during this period. Then it seems to have come to a reconciliation between mother and son, because Anna reappears in a royal document of January 26, 1065. She was also there when her son married Bertha von Holland in 1071 .

Statue of Anna of Kiev in Saint-Vincent Abbey, commemorating her as the founder of the monastery

In connection with Anna's remarriage, research sees the foundation of the Augustinian canons of Saint-Vincent in Senlis, which she initiated and which most likely fell between 1062 and 1069. The founding and furnishing of the monastery were possibly a required achievement in order to help her second marriage to a better acceptance. Around 1062 Anna and the Benedictine Abbey of Saint-Rémi also founded a convent in Senlis, which moved to Villers-Cotterêts in 1630 .

Last years

After twelve years of marriage, Rudolf's death in September 1074 widowed Anna a second time. Possibly she returned to the French court. In a document from 1075 it was named one last time, after which it was no longer documented. Perhaps she withdrew to the Saint Vincent monastery that she founded. An anonymous chronicler claimed that she allegedly returned to her Russian homeland.

The exact date of Anna's death is still unknown. But it has been handed down that a mass was read for them every year on September 5th in Senlis, which suggests this date as the date of death. Philip I made a donation to Cluny Abbey in 1079 to forgive the sins of his father and mother. It can therefore be assumed that Anna died between 1075 and 1079. The burial place of the former queen is also unknown. What is certain is that she was not buried either in Saint-Denis or next to her second husband in the Saint-Arnould Abbey in Crépy-en-Valois. But there is much to suggest that her grave was in the Abbey of Saint Vincent. In 1682, the Jesuit father Claude-François Ménestrier claimed that he had found Anna's grave based on an inscription on a tombstone in the church of the Abbey of Villiers-aux-Nonnains near La Ferté-Alais , but this theory is largely classified by today's medievalists as untrustworthy. Ménestrier's statement can no longer be verified because the grave in question was destroyed during the French Revolution .

literature

  • Robert-Henri Bautier: Anne de Kiev, Reine de France, et la politique royale au XIe siècle . In: Revue des Etudes Slaves . Volume 57, 1985, ISSN  0080-2557 , pp. 539-564.
  • Vladimir V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev. An enigmatic Capetian Queen of the eleventh century. A reassessment of biographical sources . In: French History . Vol. 19, No. 3, 2005, ISSN  0269-1191 , pp. 299-323, doi : 10.1093 / fh / cri032 .
  • Christian Bouyer: Dictionnaire des Reines de France . Perrin, Paris 1992, ISBN 2-262-00789-6 , pp. 135-137.
  • Amédée de Caix de Saint-Aymour: Anne de Russie, pure de France et comtesse de Valois au XIe siècle . 2nd Edition. Honoré Champion, Paris 1896 ( online ).
  • Jacqueline Dauxois: Anne de Kiev. Pure de France. Presse de la Renaissance, Paris 2003, ISBN 2-85616-887-6 .
  • Roger Hallu: Anne de Kiev, pure de France . Editiones Universitatis catholicae Ucrainorum, Rome 1973.
  • Edward D. Sokol: Anna of Rus, Queen of France . In: The New Review. A Journal of East European History . No. 13, 1973, pp. 3-13.
  • Gerd Hit: The French queens. From Bertrada to Marie Antoinette (8th – 18th centuries). Pustet, Regensburg 1996, ISBN 3-7917-1530-5 , pp. 81-83.
  • Carsten Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 (= historical research . Volume 24). Franz Steiner, Stuttgart 2002, ISBN 3-515-08113-5 , pp. 109-116.

Web links

Commons : Anna of Kiev  - collection of pictures, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ a b c W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 302.
  2. ↑ a b C. Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 , 2002, p. 116.
  3. ↑ a b c W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 321.
  4. ^ Andrzej Poppe: A. v. Kiev . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages . Volume 1. dtv, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-423-59057-2 , Sp. 656.
  5. ↑ a b c W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 308.
  6. ↑ a b c C. Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 , 2002, p. 109.
  7. ↑ a b W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 304.
  8. ^ WV Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 303.
  9. ↑ a b c W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 305.
  10. ^ WV Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, pp. 306–307.
  11. ↑ a b W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 307.
  12. ↑ a b C. Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 , 2002, p. 111.
  13. ↑ Short biography of Anna von Kiev on Epistolæ: Medieval Women's Letters , accessed on February 2.
  14. ↑ Jean Dubabin: What's in a name? Philip, King of France . In: Speculum . Vol. 68, No. 4, 1993, ISSN  0038-7134 , pp. 949-968, doi : 10.2307 / 2865492 .
  15. ^ WV Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 310.
  16. ↑ a b W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 312.
  17. ↑ C. Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 , 2002, pp. 112-113.
  18. ↑ a b W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 313.
  19. ^ WV Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 314.
  20. ↑ C. Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 , 2002, p. 113.
  21. ↑ C. Bouyer: Dictionnaire des Reines de France , 1992, p. 137.
  22. ↑ a b C. Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 , 2002, p. 114.
  23. ^ WV Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 318.
  24. ^ Elisabeth Lalou: Senlis . In: Lexicon of the Middle Ages . Volume 7. dtv, Munich 2002, ISBN 3-423-59057-2 , Sp. 1759
  25. ↑ C. Woll: The queens of high medieval France 987-1237 / 38 , 2002, p. 115, note 46.
  26. ^ A b W. V. Bogomoletz: Anna of Kiev , 2005, p. 320.
predecessor Office Successor
Mathilde of Friesland Queen of France
1051-1060 		Bertha of Holland
personal data
SURNAME Anna of Kiev
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Anne de Kiev; Anna Yaroslavna; Anne de Russie; Anne de Ruthénie
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Russian noblewoman, Queen of France by marriage
DATE OF BIRTH between 1024 and 1035
PLACE OF BIRTH Kiev
DATE OF DEATH between 1075 and 1089