Margaret of France (1282-1318)

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Margaret of France (1282-1317)

Margaret of France (* around 1282 in Paris , † February 14, 1318 in Marlborough Castle , Wiltshire ) was the daughter of the French king Philip III. and his second wife Maria von Brabant . As the second wife of King Edward I , she was Queen of England from 1299 to 1307.

Life

marriage

Despite the mourning for his first wife Eleanor of Castile , who died in 1290 , King Edward I of England decided a few years later to remarry. That his choice originally went to Blanche , the daughter of Philip III who is known for her beauty. and sister Margarethes, but this marriage was thwarted by her half-brother, the French King Philip IV, the handsome , is an unfounded story. Blanche was supposed to marry King Rudolf I of Bohemia in 1300 .

In 1294 Philip IV offered to marry the still very young Margaret to the 55-year-old Edward I. Negotiations in this regard were initially unsuccessful. The Anglo-French conflict came to a head and Philip IV advanced into Gascony , which belonged to Edward's mainland property. Pope Boniface VIII , who acted as a mediator in the war that followed, brought the marriage project back into discussion in 1298, and after negotiations in Montreuil in June 1299, a peace was made, including on the condition of Eduard's marriage to Margarethe. On September 10, 1299 , the marriage of the 17-year-old (or, according to other sources, 20-year-old) Margaret to the now 60-year-old King of England took place in Canterbury by Archbishop Robert Winchelsey . This was followed by four-day wedding celebrations.

English queen

In October 1299 Margarethe moved into London . The new ruler was never crowned in an official ceremony, making it the first uncrowned queen since the Norman conquest of England. Eduard soon returned to the theater of war in Scotland , leaving Margarethe alone in London. There she first lived in the Tower so as not to fall victim to the smallpox epidemic brought in by the crusaders . After a few months, Margarethe decided to travel to her husband, who was still active in the military.

The royal couple, who are so far apart in age, had a happy marriage. In 1303/04 Margarethe was with her husband in Scotland. According to the testimony of his letters and contemporary chronicles, Eduard loved his wife very much. When her sister Blanche died in 1305, Eduard ordered state mourning at his court just to flatter his wife. Margarethe had a close friendship with her stepdaughter Mary, a nun, and her stepson, the heir to the throne Eduard (II.) , Who were both her age. Eduard (II.) Once gave his stepmother an expensive ruby ​​and a gold ring, and Margarethe in turn mediated in 1305 in a conflict between the heir apparent and his father.

Margarethe often stood up for subjects who had fallen out of favor with her royal husband and was thus able to reduce their sentences. For example, a goldsmith who had been captured and threatened with death who had made the crown for the Scottish King Robert Bruce owed his life to her. Perhaps in this way she wanted to allay concerns about her French origins, which she apparently could not entirely dispel. She was described as beautiful and pious by contemporary English authors and called "the flower of France".

Widowhood and death

After Edward's death in 1307, Margarethe no longer married, although she was only about 25 years old. Allegedly she said: "When Edward died, all men died for me". She commissioned her chaplain John London to write a Latin eulogy for her late husband. In January 1308 she sailed to France with the new English King Edward II and accompanied him to Boulogne to his wedding with Isabella , a daughter of King Philip IV of France. She then lived at Marlborough Castle in Wiltshire until her death and devoted herself primarily to charitable work. She died in 1318, so only survived her husband by a good 10 years. She was buried in London's Greyfriar's Church , the construction of which she had helped to finance. Her battered tomb was bought by the English politician Martin Bowes around 1550 . Although she had been generously endowed by the king financially and with her own lands and had received £ 4,000 from Pope Clement V in 1306 , she left considerable debts.

ancestors

Louis VIII the lion
 
 Blanka of Castile
 
 Raimund Berengar V.
 
 Beatrix of Savoy
 
 Henry II of Brabant
 
 Maria von Staufen
 
 Hugo IV of Burgundy
 
 Jolande from Dreux
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Louis IX the Saint
 
 
 
 
 
 Margaret of Provence
 
 
 
 
 
 Henry III. from Brabant
 
 
 
 
 
 Adelheid of Burgundy
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Philip III from France
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Maria of Brabant
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 Margaret of France
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

progeny

Margarethe had three children with Eduard I.

Margaret named her firstborn son Thomas after the canonized Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Becket , whom she had called for help during her dangerous birth; She gave her daughter Eleonore, who died as a toddler, the name of Edward's first wife.

literature

Remarks

  1. ↑ Margaret's year of birth is given by some sources as 1282, the Liber de antiquis legibus as 1279; the year of death 1318 is certain (JC Parsons, ODNB, vol. 36 (2004), p. 635; MC Prestwich, Lexikon des Mittelalters , vol. 6, col. 236.)
  2. ↑ JC Parsons, ODNB, Vol. 36 (2004), p. 635.

Web links

Commons : Margaret of France  - Collection of images
predecessor Office Successor
Eleanor of Castile Queen Consort of England
1299–1307 		Isabella of France
personal data
SURNAME Margaret of France
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Queen of England
DATE OF BIRTH around 1282
PLACE OF BIRTH Paris
DATE OF DEATH February 14, 1318
Place of death Marlborough Castle , Wiltshire