Stephen II (Blois)

Seal of Stephen II

Stephan Heinrich von Blois ( Etienne Henri ; * around 1045; † May 19, 1102 after the Battle of Ramla ) was a Count of Blois , Chartres , Châteaudun , Sancerre and Meaux since 1089 . He was the eldest son of Count Theobald III./I. from Blois-Champagne and his second wife Gundrade (Gondrée).

Mostly he is called Stephan II in dynastic continuity , in contrast to his uncle Count Stephan I of Champagne .

Life

Stephan is mentioned for the first time in 1061 in battles against the Count of Anjou , in 1074 his father let him rule in Blois and Chartres . Stephan married Adela of Normandy in Chartres in 1081 , a daughter of Wilhelm the Conqueror with whom the House of Blois shared an enmity with King Philip I of France . In 1088 Stephan fell into jail after a failed revolt against the king. After his release he was a loyal vassal of King Philip and successfully fought the uprising of Count Burchard II of Corbeil for him .

Crusades

Count Stephan took the cross in 1096 and became one of the leaders of the First Crusade in the contingent of his brother-in-law Robert Kurzhose . He wrote enthusiastic letters to his wife about the company's progress. During the protracted siege of Antioch , full of privation , he left the Crusader army on June 2, 1098, two days before the fall of the city, and returned home. There he was confronted with accusations and rejection because he had not fulfilled the vow he had made to liberate Jerusalem .

His wife, Adela, urged him to make a second armed pilgrimage to fulfill his vow. So he joined the crusade of 1101 - along with others who were subjected to the same pressure after their premature return home. In the battle of Mersivan he saved the life of Raymond of Toulouse , whom he then helped with the conquest of Tartus . At Easter 1102, Stephan finally reached Jerusalem.

On May 17, 1102 he took part in the battle of Ramla and fell the following day at the tower of Ramla at the age of 57 in the fight against the Egyptian Fatimids .

Marriage and offspring

Stephen's marriage to Adela of Normandy († March 8, 1138) was to be momentous. After the heir son of her brother Heinrich Beauclerc drowned in the sinking of the white ship in 1120, he decided his only legitimate daughter Matilda to be the heir to England and Normandy . Since she was married to the Count of Anjou, a hereditary enemy of the Normans as well as the Blois, the barons rejected the regulation of succession and preferred the sons of Stephen and Adele to succeed them (see: English Civil War from 1135 to 1154 ).

The couple's children were:

• Wilhelm (* 1090/1093; † around 1150), Count of Chartres, presumably excluded from the inheritance due to mental disabilities, ancestor of the Lords of Sully
• Theobald IV the Great (1090/1095 - 10 January 1152), Count of Blois and of Champagne since 1125
• Odo († after 1107)
• Mathilde († November 25, 1120 before Barfleur ), drowned with her husband on the "white ship"
  • ∞ since 1115 with Richard d'Avranches, 2nd Earl of Chester (* 1094 - † November 25, 1120)
• Eleonore († after 1148)
  • ∞ since around 1120 with Count Rudolf I of Vermandois , the marriage was divorced in 1142
• Stephen (* 1096/1097; † October 25, 1154 in Dover ), Count of Mortain in 1112, King of England since 1135
• Henry († August 8, 1171), Bishop of Winchester since 1126

In addition, three other daughters are added to the couple without any reliable tradition:

• Agnes
  • ∞ with Hugo III. by Le Puiset († 1132 in Palestine ) ( Le Puiset house )
• Adelaide; Adela or Lithuise
  • ∞ around 1112 with Milon II of Montlhéry († 1118), the marriage was divorced in 1113
• Alice
  • ∞ with Count Renaud III. by Joigny († 1150)

literature

• Steven Runciman : History of the Crusades. Beck, Munich 1957–1960.

Web links

Commons : Stephan II.  - Collection of pictures, videos and audio files

• Stephen II Henry, Comte de Blois, on thepeerage.com , accessed September 10, 2016.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Alison Weir: Britain's Royal Families. The complete genealogy. Vintage books, London 2008, ISBN 978-0-099-53973-5 , p. 51.

predecessor	Office	successor
Theobald III. (Theobald I of Champagne)	Earl of Blois Earl of Chartres 1089–1102	Wilhelm
Theobald III. (Theobald I of Champagne)	Count of Châteaudun, Count of Sancerre, Count of Meaux 1089–1102	Theobald IV (Theobald II of Champagne)