The Maid and the Queen Read Online Free PDF

get an education as to what a resolute and indefatigable female could achieve in the political arena when she set her mind to it.
    M ARIE OF B LOIS was the widow of Louis I, duke of Anjou, count of Provence, and (even though he was French to his core) king of Sicily. Louis I was another of Charles V’s many siblings, which meant he was also the brother of the duchess of Bar. * In the complicated mess that was the genealogy of the French royal family, this made him the queen of Aragon’s uncle, so Marie of Blois was Yolande of Bar’s aunt.
    Until the last years of his life, the kingdom of Sicily, which in the fourteenth century encompassed most of Italy south of Rome, was little more to Louis I than a drawing on a map. But in 1381, his distant cousin Joanna I, queen of Naples, Jerusalem, and Sicily, had been threatened with invasion and, desperate for allies, had offered to make Louis her heir if he came to her aid. This proposition was too tempting to be refused, and so the following year Louis, adding the prestigious denomination “King of Sicily” to his title, had raised a tremendous army and crossed into Italy. Large armies move slowly, however, and by the time he made it down to Naples, Joanna I was dead and the kingdom held by a rival militia. Louis attempted to takehis legacy by force, but his troops had been decimated by sickness and starvation on the long march south and he was unable to secure a military victory. Refusing to surrender the inheritance he had risked everything to claim, he retreated to the eastern coast of Italy and sent to France for reinforcements. Louis’s persistence was admirable but his luck rather less felicitous, and he died soon thereafter of a chill contracted at a drafty castle, before the requested supplementary regiments had time to arrive.
    By any reasonable standard, Louis I’s dream of sovereignty should have died when he did. The French ruling family had no political experience in southern Italy, no knowledge of local customs or the serpentine nature of the various family and baronial alliances necessary to maintain power. They were hazy even on the geography of the place. But none of this stopped Louis’s widow, Marie of Blois, from relentlessly pursuing what she considered to be her family’s lawful inheritance. She was an intensely practical middle-aged woman and must have known that her chances of succeeding at so ambitious a quest were low. But she had two sons, the eldest of whom, Louis II, was just seven when his father died, and opportunities to claim large, prestigious kingdoms didn’t materialize every day. Marie had no intention of letting this one slip by without a fight.
    The first step was to get little Louis II officially recognized as count of Provence. This was itself a difficult task, as most of the towns in the county, hearing of the death of Louis I, were in revolt. To achieve her goal, Marie would have to force the rebellious Provençal barons, grown men all, to go down on one knee and do homage to her son.
    And so at the age of forty Marie pawned her valuables, everything she owned right down to the gold and silver dinner service, and bought herself an army. It wasn’t a large army—only “400 lances,” which translated into about fifteen hundred men—but Marie counted on its being just formidable enough to give the opposition pause. Then, with her son by her side, and her remaining money from this transaction conveniently stashed in silver coins in her saddlebags, she led her force into Provence.
    She stopped in village after village, introducing Louis II to the local officials and noblemen, graciously listening to their grievances and, more important, dispensing privileges and largesse. With her gifts of silver and her ever-present soldiers hovering ominously by her side, Marie proved herself a master of the art of carrot and stick. Her reputation swelled as town after town, baron after baron, came over to her side and paid homage to her son.