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Description
Theresa Earenfight's Queenship in Medieval Europe documents the lives and works of queens and empresses across Europe, Byzantium, and the Mediterranean in the Middle Ages. Introducing pivotal research and sources in queenship studies, Earenfight highlights four crucial moments across the full span of the Middle Ages-ca. 300, 700, 1100, and 1350-when Christianity, education, lineage, and marriage law fundamentally altered the practice of queenship. The book makes the compelling argument that queens, linked to kings by marriage, family, and property, were vital to the institution of monarchy.
This 2nd edition foregrounds that medieval queens led richly complex lives and were highly visible women active in a man's world. It also continues to examine the theories and practices of queenship in the context of wider issues of gender, authority, and power. Using an enhanced and entirely reformulated chapter structure, this new edition includes for the first time:
· Material on sources, methods and theories that considers recent work on feminist and gender theories
· A framing of the historical study of queens in the wider history of the Middle Ages
· Stronger coverage of: gender, dynasty, and legitimacy; the royal mistress; the dynamics of the royal household; the operations of the court; the history of emotions; landholding and lordship; and material culture
· Clearer connections between the history of queens and queenship and the history of women overall
· Analysis of the movement of women across geographical boundaries, including Hungarian, Byzantine, Scandinavian, and Islamic realms
· Numerous genealogy charts, end-of-chapter source documents, 30 images and several maps
· Historiographical updates throughout
Table of Contents
Figures: Maps, Dynasties
List of Images
Introduction
· Notes on Sources
· A Note on Place Names, Translations, and Proper Names
PART I: What Does It Mean To Be a Queen or an Empress?
Introduction to Part I
Ch. 1 Definitions, Context, Geographies
· Complex Layers of Identity: Eleanor of Aquitaine
· What Is a Queen? An Empress?
· What Does It Mean to Be a Queen?
· What Does It Mean to Be a European Queen?
· What Is Distinctive About Medieval Queenship?
Ch. 2 Methods: Studying Queens
· Overshadowed and Overlooked: Blanca of Navarre
· Historiography of Queenship
· Feminists Rewrite History: Women Studies and Its Allies, Feminist, Gender and Sexuality Studies
· Working with Textual Sources
· A Woman Writing about Queens: Christine de Pizan and Medieval Political Theory
PART II: Becoming a Queen: Marriage, Sexuality, Maternity
Ch. 3 Legitimizing Marriage
· Marriage as the Foundation of Monarchy in Medieval Europe
· Marriage Law in Late Antique and Early Medieval Queenship
· Polygamy and Polyamory: Wives, Bed-Companions, and Concubines
· The Question of Divorce: Theutberga, Waldrada, and Lothar
· Keeping It in the Family: Consanguinity and Incest
· Public Legitimization of the Marriage: A Queen's Coronation
Ch. 4 New Marital Status, New Royal Identity
· Markers of a Queen's Personal Identity
· Royal Objects of Exchange
· Queens Exchange Ideas Across Borders
Ch. 5 Sexuality, Power, and Queenship
· Gender, a Precarious Balancing Act
· Gender, Sexuality, and Medieval Queenship
· The Interplay of Gender, Sexuality, Power, Authority, Influence, and Agency
· A Case in Point: Isabelle of France
Ch. 6 Maternity and Motherhood
· Queenship and Motherhood
· Medical Knowledge and the Experience of Pregnancy
· The Social and Political Practice of Queens as Mothers
· Queens Without Children
Ch. 7 Queens, Marriage, and the Formation of European Dynasties
· Capetian France, 987–1328
· Anglo-Norman and Plantagenet England: 1002–1337
· France: Valois Queens
· England: Plantagenet, Lancastrian, and York Queens
· Scotland
· Christian Iberia
PART III: Queenship in Practice
Ch. 8 Empresses, Queens, and the Power of Sanctity
· Eastern European Empresses as Models of Christian Queenship
· Queenship and Religious Conversion
· Balancing Carnal Marriage and Pious Spirituality
· Memorializing Christian Queenship and Dynasty
Ch. 9 The Queen's Household
· The Organization of the Household
· Public and Private Spaces and Places in the Royal Household
· Women (and a Few Men) in the Queen's Household
· Funding a Household: The Queen's Finances
Ch. 10 Empresses
· The Eastern Roman (Byzantine) Empire
· The Holy Roman Empire
Ch. 11 Sovereign Queens
· Anglo-Saxon Britain
· Plantagenet England
· The Crusader-States
· Iberia: Castile, León, and Portugal
· The Mediterranean: Sicily and Naples
· Eastern and Northern Europe: Hungary, Poland, and Scandinavia
Ch. 12 Queens-Consort: Official and Unofficial Co-Rulership
· Official Authority: Regents
· Official Authority: Queens-lieutenant in the Crown of Aragon
· Unofficial Shared Rulership: Diplomats, Advisors, Intercessors
Ch. 13 Queens-Dowager and the Art of Memorializing a Queen
· Queens-Dowager
· Commemorating Queens
Conclusions: Wrapping Up and Looking Ahead
Notes
Works Cited
Product details
| Published | Dec 10 2026 |
|---|---|
| Format | Paperback |
| Edition | 2nd |
| Pages | 336 |
| ISBN | 9781350497917 |
| Imprint | Bloomsbury Academic |
| Illustrations | 30 bw illus |
| Dimensions | 234 x 156 mm |
| Publisher | Bloomsbury Publishing |
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