Eleanor of Aquitaine on Crusade

“I dressed my maids as Amazons and rode bare-breasted halfway to Damascus. Louis had a seizure and I damn near died of windburn, but the troops were dazzled.”

 Eleanor of Aquitaine in the 1967 film “The Lion in Winter” starring Peter O’Toole and Katherine Hepburn.

As with most good historical fiction, there is more than a grain of truth to this fictional line from The Lion in Winter. Not only did Eleanor of Aquitaine take part in the Second Crusade, her role soon became  controversial and her participation precipitated a marriage crisis. Here is a summary of what happened.

In 1144, the crusader County of Edessa was overrun by the atabeg of Mosul, Zengi.  The news shocked Western Europe and Pope Eugenius III called for a new crusade. St. Bernard of Clairvaux enthusiastically took up the call, and at the pope’s bidding preached the crusade far and wide, including on Easter Sunday in Vezelay, Burgundy.  Here King Louis VII of France knelt before the abbot and took the cross to the thunderous cheers of his vassals and subjects. When he finished, his queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, knelt beside him and likewise took the cross.

Eleanor did so as the Duchess of Aquitaine and Countess of Poitou – not as Queen of France. The importance of her gesture was to muster support among the barons and lords who owed her, but not Louis of France, homage.  However, Eleanor’s example inspired many other noblewomen to take the cross as well. 

When King Louis’ crusaders set forth on their crusade, the estimated 100,000 French included an unnamed number of ladies – or “amazons” as some liked to call them – determined to take part in the crusade themselves.  Far from being Eleanor’s “maids,” most of these women were the wives of noble crusaders, wealthy enough to afford horses and armor, since according to a Greek chronicler writing some fifty years after the event, they rode astride and wore armor.  They were also accompanied by servants and a great deal of baggage.

Depiction of Eleanor of Aquitaine in a German 12^th century Manuscript

The first stages of this crusade went remarkably well, with the army making good progress.  Although accounts differ on the extent to which Louis was able to prevent pillaging and abuse of the civilian population along the route, it is clear that the French intention was to pay for provisions and leave the Christian populations in peace. Unfortunately, they were preceded by German crusaders under the Holy Roman Emperor Conrad III that behaved so badly the French found all the cities closed to them, and the price for goods exorbitant.

Nevertheless, they reached Constantinople in comparatively good order, and while the common soldiers encamped outside the walls, the nobles, including Eleanor and her ladies, were introduced to the luxuries and splendors of the fabled Queen of Cities. They were lodged in palaces the like of which they had never seen before, feted and entertained. 

The news that the Byzantine Emperor had just concluded a 12 year truce with the Turks, however, cast serious doubts upon his reliability.  The mistrust of the Greeks only increased when the Byzantine Emperor tried to make Louis swear to turn over any territories his army conquered to the Emperor. Louis thought he had come to fight the Turks and restore Christian rule – not expand the borders of the Byzantine Empire.  Nevertheless, Louis rejected calls by some of his advisors to capture Constantinople and depose the Greek emperor.  Instead he set out for Jerusalem determined to fulfill his crusading vow – and consult with the King of Jerusalem about further action.

The French crusaders advanced along the southern, coastal route at a leisurely pace until at the end of October they encountered deserters from the German crusade, who reported that the Turks had all but annihilated the Germans and now lay in wait for the French.  A few days later, the French caught up with what was left of the Germans, including Emperor Conrad, who was suffering from a head wound. Together Louis and Conrad’s crusaders followed the Mediterranean coast, finally reaching Ephesus in time for Christmas. Here, however, Conrad decided he was too ill to continue, so he and his nobles took ship back for Constantinople, while what was left of the foot soldiers continued with Louis’s army.

No sooner had the German Emperor departed, than adversity struck the French. Torrential rains lasting four days washed away tents, supplies, and many men and horses. After this catastrophe, Louis elected to strike out inland across the mountains, despite the absence of guides, in an attempt to reach Antioch as soon as possible.  This route, however, was not only through rugged terrain and along bad roads, but took the French where they were constantly harassed by Turkish skirmishers. By now, at the latest, the “gayness and the gilt” of Eleanor and her lady-crusaders (or amazons) were “all besmirched with rainy marching in the painful field.”

Disaster, however, did not overtake them until mid-January, when two Poitevin nobles in command of the van took fatal independent action.  They had been ordered to set up camp for the main army at a specific place, and Eleanor was sent with them. (Throughout the crusade, King Louis maintained separation from Eleanor in order not to be tempted to break his vow of chastity for the duration of the crusade.) When the main army reached the designated camp, however, they found it empty. The vanguard of Poitevins with the Queen had decided to move to a more attractive-looking spot down in the valley. The exhausted troops at the rear, including the King with Eleanor’s baggage train, could not possibly catch up and as darkness fell a large gap had opened between the Christian van and main force. The Turks quickly exploited the situation. They attacked the main force, killing Louis’ horse under him and some 7,000 crusaders before darkness fell, putting an end to the slaughter. Many in the army blamed Eleanor, because it was her vassals who had left the main French army in the lurch.

After this disaster, the French returned to the coast, now determined to continue the crusade by ship. They were without supplies, however, and soon reduced to eating their horses before what was left of Louis’ force finally reached Antalia on January 20, 1148.  Here they discovered it was impossible to find sufficient ships for the whole force at prices King Louis was willing to pay. Plague broke out in the crusader camp, decimating a force already on the brink of starvation. At this junction, King Louis VII (not to be confused with his namesake and future saint, Louis IX) abandoned his troops and took ship with his wife and nobles for Antioch. Abandoned by their king, some 3000 French crusaders are said to have converted to Islam in exchange for their lives and food.

Louis and Eleanor, meanwhile, arrived in Antioch. Antioch was a magnificent, walled city, which had been one of the richest in the Roman Empire. At this time it was inhabited by a mixed population of Greek and Armenian Christians ruled by a Latin Christian elite, headed by Raymond of Poitiers, the younger brother of Eleanor’s father, William Duke of Aquitaine. The language of the court at Antioch was Eleanor’s own langue d’oc, and the customs were likewise those of the Languedoc. Within a very short time, Eleanor and her uncle developed such rapport that the king became jealous and then suspicious. The clerical chroniclers are united in condemning Eleanor of forgetting her “royal dignity” – and her marriage vows.

The situation was aggravated by the fact that Raymond of Antioch thought the crusaders had come to restore Christian control over the county of Edessa – and so secure his eastern flank, but Louis thought he had come on pilgrimage to Jerusalem and insisted on continuing to the Holy City, rather than following the Prince of Antioch’s military advice. At this junction, with Louis already jealous of Eleanor’s close relationship (sexual or not) with Prince Raymond, she announced that she – and all her vassals – would remain in Antioch, whether Louis went to Jerusalem or not. Since her vassals made up the bulk of what was left of the French forces, this was an effective veto. Louis threatened to use force to make her come with him as was his right as her husband. Eleanor retorted their marriage was invalid because they were related within the prohibited degrees and demanded an annulment. Louis responded by having her abducted in the middle of the night and carried away from Antioch by force. 

Although Eleanor then spent several months in Jerusalem while her husband’s crusade came to its final humiliating disaster outside Damascus, nothing is recorded of her activities.  Her influence on Louis and her role in the crusade was over. Furthermore, despite an attempt to patch up the marriage, after their return to France, the birth of a second daughter made a divorce a dynastic priority, paving the way for Eleanor to marry Henry of Anjou, the future King Henry II of England.

(Truly, fiction does not get better than facts like these!)

There are many biographies of Eleanor, I personally relied on Alison Weir’s Eleanor of Aquitaine: By the Wrath of God, Queen of England, (London, Pimlico, 1999), and Amy Kelly’s Eleanor of Aquitaine and the Four Kings, (Cambridge, Mass, Harvard University Press, 1950). There are innumerable novels about Eleanor. I have not read them all and the ones I did read, failed to do her justice, so I’ll refrain from a recommendation.

Eleanor’s Tomb at the Abbey of Fontevrault

Helena P. Schrader is the author of a number of books set in the Middle Ages. Her most recent series, a three-part biography of Balian d'Ibelin a contemporary of both Eleanor, has to date won 8 literary accolades. 

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Philip II of France in the Holy Land

Seal of Philip II Capet

Philip II Capet of France has gone down in French history as Philip Augustus, another way of saying Philip the Great or Philip the Magnificent. He earned this epithet primarily for wresting territory away from King John of England and restoring the control of the French monarchy over the vast lands in Continental Europe that had been controlled for half a century by John’s father (Henry II) and brother (Richard I). Philip II was able to reduce the English-controlled territories to a small enclave near Bordeaux. Having successfully subdued the most powerful of his insubordinate vassals, he proceeded to systematically re-establish the primacy of the monarchy over all the barons of France. By the end of his reign he had greatly increased the wealth, prestige and power of the central government in Paris, built the Louve, and established the University of Paris. He ruled a total of 43 years, from 1180 to 1223, and was the first king to style himself “King of France” instead of “King of the Franks.”

But most of this occurred well after Philip’s brief sojourn in the Holy Land, and the focus of this post is on Philip Capet at the time of and during the Third Crusade.

Philip had been born in August 1165, or eight years after Richard of England. He had been crowned king in late 1179 while his father yet lived, and became sole king of France at the age of 15 the following year. Almost at once he started fighting with the Count of Flanders over territory, and while this was resolved by treaty in 1185, Philip had meanwhile started making demands on Henry II for the return of his sister’s dowry. (His sister Marguerite was the widow of Henry the Young King, Henry II’s eldest son, who had died in 1183)  This war with the Plantagenets was to last the next thirty years, with periodic truces.

The war between the Capets and Plantagenets was an intimate affair. Eleanor of Aquitaine, Henry II’s queen and mother of Henry the Young King, Richard, Geoffrey and John, had been married to Philip’s father. Philip had two half-sisters, who were Eleanor’s daughters by his father ― and they, of course, were half-sisters of the young Plantagenets also, by their mother. Philip’s sister Marguerite was married to Henry the Young King, making them brothers-in-law. Philip’s other sister Alys was betrothed to Richard. Henry the Young King and his brothers represented their father at Philip’s coronation in 1179, they attended the French court at other times as well. Philip knew the Plantagenets well, and they him.

This medieval illumination is meant to depict Philip II's Coronation. The Figure on the Right Represents Henry II, who was not present. Henry II is also shown wearing three lions/leopards, a device that was not adopted by the English royal house until Richard returned from the Holy Land.

In 1186, Philip succeeded in pulling the third Plantagenet son, Geoffrey, into his net. Geoffrey was preparing to rebel against his father (again), when he was killed in a tournament. Philip allegedly tried to throw himself into the grave from grief. Two years later, Philip lured the eldest of Henry’s surviving sons, Richard into his camp by claiming (almost certainly untruthfully) that Henry did not intend to name Richard his heir. Richard publicly paid homage to Philip as his liege after confronting his father about his inheritance, and then fought at Philip’s side until his father was defeated, humiliated and dead. During this period of alliance, Philip and Richard were said to be so close that they shared a bed, a fact that has given rise to many accusations of homosexuality against Richard but, curiously, not against Philip. 

In any case, everything changed the minute Richard was King of England.  Richard and Philip might have been allies against Henry II, but they were enemies the moment Richard took up his father’s mantle. Richard Plantagenet had no more intention of playing humble vassal to Philip than his father had; he intended to retain control over all his territories. Philip and Richard were thus on a collision course from July 6, 1189 onward.

But on the surface they had a common cause. They had both taken the cross and vowed to recover Jerusalem for Christendom. Richard had been the first prominent nobleman in the West to do so, and his subsequent actions attest to his sincere commitment to restoring Christian rule to the Holy City. Philip on the other hand is widely believed to have been pressured into crusading by his nobles and clergy; his subsequent actions seem to bear this out. Nevertheless, from 1189 to 1190 Philip was engaged in preparing for what would become known as the Third Crusade. 

On July 1, 1190, Philip met up with Richard at Vezelay in Burgundy and travelled together at the head of their respective hosts as far as Lyon, before proceeding by different routes to the next rendezvous: Messina on Sicily. Philip was by now mourning the loss of his wife Isabelle, who had died giving him twin sons, who died shortly afterwards. He therefore arrived in Sicily a widower. Evidently to the disappointment of the spectators ― but very indicative of Philip’s nature ― he made no great show of his arrival. He arrived in a single ship (i.e. ahead of his fleet) and immediately disappeared inside the castle on the harbor.

In Sicily, King William II, a staunch supporter of the crusader cause and brother-in-law to Richard of England, had died unexpectedly in November 1189, shortly before the Kings of France and England arrived. Lacking any direct heirs, the Sicilian throne had been seized by his illegitimate first cousin Tancred, who made the tactical error of placing the Dowager Queen of Sicily (Richard the Lionheart’s sister Joanna Plantagenet) under arrest.

Richard of England, in contrast to Philip, arrived in Sicily with his entire fleet and a with a showy fanfare of trumpets, fluttering banners, banging shields and the like. On landing and learning that his sister had been impressed, he demanded not only her release but the restoration of her dower portion (or compensation) and the full payment of everything William II had pledged to the crusade itself. Tancred capitulated rapidly, and Joanna Plantagenet made an immediate conquest: in Philip of France.

This illustration allegedly shows Richard, Joanna and Philip in Sicily

Accounts suggest that Joanna, who like Philip was just 25 years old, was beautiful (she was Eleanor of Aquitaine’s daughter, after all), and, of course, she was a dowager queen by marriage and a princess by birth. As Richard was already betrothed to his sister Alys, Philip may have seriously considered strengthening the bonds by taking Joanna to wife. Richard absolutely refused to think about this because he had no intention of marrying Philip’s sister Alys Capet.

Meanwhile, however relations between Richard and Philip, already brittle with unspoken rivalry and latent hostility, had broken into the open when fights broke out between the local inhabitants and Richard’s troops. The English claimed they were being cheated, the locals claimed the English were disorderly and disrespectful. There were too many fighting men in a strange town, harassing the girls and probably being pick-pocketed etc. The situation is perennial and resurfaces whenever there are large armies in foreign territory. Something ignited an all-out fight, and while Richard first tried to calm tempers, he soon lost his own and came to the aid of his men. Philip of France, probably out of spite for Richard rather than sympathy for the Sicilians, took the side of the locals against his fellow crusader.  The break was so public and bitter that it took the efforts of many noblemen on both sides to get the two kings to reconcile.

The atmosphere between them deteriorated further when suddenly Eleanor of Aquitaine arrived in the company of Berengaria of Navarre.  Richard  now announced that he had chosen her as his wife instead of Alys. To an astonished and furious Philip, Richard explained that he could not possibly marry Alys because his father had known her carnally. The brilliance of this argument against a marriage that had been agreed years earlier was that this allegation stemmed from none other than Philip himself. Philip had used the accusation in his web of lies to induce Richard to turn against his father. As a result, Philip could do little more than swallow his own pride (and bile no doubt). But a marriage with Joanna was now obviously off the table. The kinship ties so elaborately devised by Philip and Richard’s fathers had all broken, and what remained was open and growing hatred.

But first there was a crusade to carry out, and the Kings of England and France publicly vowed to share all spoils in the upcoming campaign in the Holy Land. Then at the first opportunity Philip embarked his army and set sail for the Holy Land on March 30, 1191.   

Philip’s entire fleet crossed the Mediterranean without notable incident. On May 20, the King of France arrived off the city of Tyre, the last Frankish stronghold in the Kingdom of Jersualem. Tyre was controlled by a distant relative of Philip’s, Conrad de Montferrat, one of the two contenders for the throne of Jerusalem. Philip immediately threw his support behind Montferrat, bolstering his claim to the crown against those of his rival, Guy de Lusignan. He and Conrad together proceeded to the Christian siege of Acre. Here Philip brought not only new troops but new vigor to the siege, at once erecting a number of powerful siege engines.

However, he soon became ill with what the contemporary chronicles call “Arnoldia,” a debilitating illness that caused the loss of hair and nails and could be fatal. Furthermore, with the arrival of King Richard there were two commanders in the same camp and frictions between them sparked almost at once. Allegedly, Richard refused to let his troops support at least one attack ordered by Philip.  But then Richard too fell ill with “Arnoldia.”

Various assaults and above all the action of the siege engines continued as both kings gradually regained their strength. Most significantly, the arrival of the French and English fleet had enabled the sea blockade of Acre to become completely effective and no supplies, munitions or reinforcements were slipping into the city. By early July the Saracen garrison of Acre had reached the breaking point. The commanders of the Saracen garrison therefore sought a truce in which to seek instructions from Saladin. They told the French and English kings that they would surrender if Saladin did not come to their aid within a set period of time, asking to be allowed to take their arms and their moveable valuables with them and enjoy a safe-conduct to wherever they wished to go. King Philip, supported by his nobles, agreed. King Richard insisted they should not be allowed their arms and valuables. Negotiations broke down.

Medieval depiction of the Surrender of Acre -- notably to Philip. Richard is beside him.

Ten days later, with still no relief from Saladin, the garrison again sought terms and this time agreed to much harsher conditions: the return of the Christian relic known as the “True Cross” that had been captured at the battle of Hattin, the release of an unspecified number oChristian prisoners taken at or after Hattin, and the payment of 200,000 Saracen gold pieces, all to be delivered one month after the signing of the agreement. Members of the garrison (the numbers vary according to source) were to be held as hostages to ensure the release of the Christians, the remaining members of the garrison were free to go ― but without their arms or valuables. The kings of France and England accepted these terms.

On July 12, the hostages were surrendered, the remaining garrison marched out ― proudly by all accounts ― and the crusaders took possession of Acre after four years of Saracen occupation. They found the churches desecrated, but otherwise most of the city intact. It was divided equally between the French and English, with Richard’s men notably (and foolishly as it turned out) throwing down the banner of the Duke of Austria because that represented a claim to the spoils and Richard wasn’t sharing with anyone but Philip of France.

But now that Acre was in the hands of the crusaders, the issue of who was the rightful King of Jerusalem came again to the fore. As noted above, Philip backed the claims of Conrad de Montferrat (a kinsman), who was married to the sole remaining legitimate heir, Isabella of Jerusalem, and was supported by the High Court of Jerusalem. Richard, however, stubbornly backed the architect of the disaster at Hattin, King Guy, who was a vassal of the Plantagenet. After much bitter fighting, a compromise was found. Guy was recognized as king for his life-time, but Conrad was recognized as Count of Tyre (to include Sidon and Beirut, if/when these cities were ever recovered) and heir to the throne at Guy’s death. Curiously, however, Guy’s elder brother Geoffrey, who had come out from the West with the crusaders, was also awarded the title of Count of Jaffa and Ascalon, the county that traditionally belonged to the heir of the throne. To be sure Jaffa and Ascalon were at this point in still in Saracen hands, but it was an ominous hint that the Lusignans did not really accept ― and did not intend to respect ― the agreement to make Montferrat king at Guy’s death.

With that dispute at least temporarily out of the way, Philip dropped a bombshell: he announced that he was turning over his share of all the booty to Conrad de Montferrat and intended to return to France. No one, not even his own nobles, had expected or approved of this abandonment of the crusade. His official excuse was “ill-health.” (He had either never fully recovered from the Arnoldia or he had contracted dysentery subsequently.) No one accepted this as a legitimate reason to break-off a crusade. Crusaders were supposed to achieve their objective, or die in the attempt. No one, however, was able to reason with or shame Philip into changing his mind. Despite alleged curses and bitter recriminations, Philip prepared to depart. Richard, suspicious that Philip’s intentions were to attack his lands in his absence, demanded that Philip swear on holy relics that he would leave the Plantagenet territories in peace until Richard’s return.

On August 1, 1191, Philip boarded an galley loaned to him by Richard of England and sailed for Tyre. He took Conrad de Montferrat and the most valuable of the Saracen hostages from the surrender of Acre with him. The exact date of his departure from Tyre is not recorded, but he was no longer in Outremer when the deadline for the delivery of the True Cross, captives and cash payment expired in mid-August. The decision to massacre the hostages fell to Richard of England alone.

Philip was back in Paris by late 1191. He immediately began undermining Richard’s authority and drawing the last and youngest of the Plantagenet brothers, John, into his net. His vow not to attack Richard during his absence was as meaningless as the crusader vow he’d taken before leaving for the Holy Land ― and as meaningless as the marriage vows he exchanged with Ingeborg of Denmark. Philip Capet, great as his legacy was for France, lacked any sense of personal honor, integrity, and a fear of God. While his qualities served his kingdom well, he remains for me a distasteful character.

Philip II of France plays a minor role in Envoy of Jerusalem. 

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Reflections on Richard the Lionheart

The Statue of Richard the Lionheart in front of the Houses of Parliament, London

Over the years, I have provided short biographies of the historical characters who figure prominently in my Jerusalem trilogy. One character, however, I have avoided up to now: Richard the Lionheart.

Richard I Plantagenet, King of England, is -- even after more than 800  years -- somewhat intimidating. He is one of those historical figures, who is more legendary than historical. He has been rendered in art in a variety of forms and he generally comes out “larger than life.” Legends of his courage circulated even in his lifetime and after his death became more exaggerated. Richard was seen as the (at least spiritual) descendant of Alexander the Great, Charlemagne, and King Arthur.  He was remembered in medieval romances as the incarnation of chivalry, the perfect royal-knight, as Jean Flori documents extensively in his biography of Richard. (Richard the Lionheart, Jean Flori, Praeger Publishers, 2006.) Richard the Lionheart’s popularity even in popular culture goes back at least to the time of the first Robin Hood legends – whenever that was!

Hollywood's Version: Here Sean Connery as King Richard, Kevin Costner as Robin Hood

He was, however, as a historical figure, highly controversial even in his own lifetime. He was seen by the Church as excessively proud, greedy and sexual (more on this later). Contemporary clerical chroniclers saw his death as “divine justice” for his sins, and they compared his reign unfavorably with that of his father. Richard was disliked by the German Emperor and hated by the French King. He was called “the devil” by his own brother John (not the best person to be calling names, but be that as it may….) On the other hand, there can be little doubt he was adored not only by his  hard-headed, practical and highly political mother, but also by his troops. Despite the best efforts of his brother John and the King of France, he retained the loyalty of most of his vassals and subjects as well.

Early historians tended to place Richard in the “great” category, but during the Enlightenment, when the crusades were detested as “irrational,” Richard’s reputation among historians started to fade. The famous historian David Hume described Richard as violent, irrational, and excessively passionate. William Stubbs, an important 19^th century historian, considered him a “bad ruler.” Sir Stephen Runciman, the most influential historian of the crusades in the early 20^th century, called Richard “a bad son, a bad husband and a bad king”.

To this day historians and informed laymen tend to fall into “pro” or “con” camps. It seems as if people can’t be neutral about Richard.  The main sources of contemporary contention are: 1) whether Richard was a “good” or a “bad” king of England; 2) whether Richard was homosexual or not; and 3) whether Richard was a stupid, bloodthirsty brute or an intelligent and judicious nobleman and commander. 

Richard the Lionheart's Tomb at Fontevrault Abbey

In researching Richard Plantagenet for his role in Envoy of Jerusalem, I came to the following personal understanding of this complex and controversial king:

First and foremost, Richard was a product of his age, birth and upbringing. Born a prince to two of the most ambitious, politically savvy, proud and passionate people of the 12^th century, Richard had little chance of being humble, meek, dispassionate, indecisive, or easy-going. None of his brothers exhibited particular restraint, humility or benevolence toward their enemies either.  Known even in their own time as “the devil’s brood,” the Plantagenets fought their father and they fought each other as well as their liege lord Philip II and any and every rebellious vassal for what they perceived as their “rights” – their titles, their territory, their castles, their lands. 

The Tomb of Richard's Parents, Eleanor of Aquitaine and Henry II

Richard was, furthermore, only 13 when he was first invested with authority as Duke of Aquitaine. While children in the Middle Ages undoubtedly grew up faster than children do today, that is still a very young age to be raised to such high status. It is hard to imagine that the dignity, power and importance of this title did not go to his head.

Certainly, Richard identified with Aquitaine far more powerfully and emotionally than he ever did with England or Normandy. He spent almost no time in England as a child, and not until the death of his elder brother Henry the Young in 1183 did he expect to become King of England.  Even then, his father kept him guessing about whether he would be recognized as heir or not. It was literally not until his father died in 1189 that Richard had a bond with England. By then he was 32 years old and had already taken the cross. In short, his mind was focused elsewhere. So, no, he neither spent much time in nor cared particularly about England. But that does not necessarily make him a “bad” king. Indeed, it was not until the 18^th century that the English “disowned” him. Throughout the Middle Ages, Richard was revered as one of England’s greatest kings, as a king who made England proud because his glorious reputation reflected well upon his kingdom and subjects.

Another thing I learned was that Richard’s relationship with his father was far more complex than that of an impatient and rebellious son. From 1173 to 1183, Richard and his father fought almost continuously together – against the French King, against the rebellious lords of Aquitaine, against Richard’s brothers. They were allied again 1184 – 1187. I hypothesize that the bitterness of the final break (that led indeed to Richard hounding his father to his grave) was a function of the intensity of Richard’s earlier love for his father. Richard felt betrayed by a man he had come to love, and it was this sense of betrayal that turned love into hatred.

That Richard loved his mother deeply is unquestionable. He had been with her at her court in Poitiers from the ages of nine to thirteen. As Duke of Aquitaine he identified with her and her heritage. He surrendered the Aquitaine to her and her alone, trusting her not to give it to one of his brothers. His very first act as king was to order her release from detention. He sought her advice when he was with her and entrusted her with royal authority during his absence. Arguably there was no other human being that he trusted as much as he trusted his mother, and rightly so. She, more than anyone, held his kingdom together in the face of rebellions and secured his release from German captivity.

But Richard was anything but a “mama’s boy.” He was strong, athletic, and comradely. He won the affection of his troops because he could swear, fight and whore as hard as they did. Indeed, the Church was highly critical of his sexual excesses. It has become popular to impute homosexuality to Richard, but there is no evidence that he was suspected of this in his own time. Certainly, he had mistresses and at least one illegitimate son, so if he was also a practicing homosexual he was bi-sexual. We will probably never know what his sexual preferences were and, frankly, I don’t much care.

What did strike me as exceptional, however, was his willingness to do manual labor. This was anything but self-evident in a medieval nobleman, much less a king. Yet the Itinerarium Peregrinorum et Gesta Regis Ricardi claims that Richard helped rebuild the defenses of Ascalon “with his own hands,” and describes his example inspiring everyone to work together to hand the stones up to the wall (Book 5, Chapter 6). The willingness to do menial labor reveals just how sure Richard felt in his own skin. He was so sure of his own innate nobility that he had no need of royal symbols or ceremony. It was perhaps this trait that enabled him to endure captivity at the hands of the Holy Roman Emperor. 

I was also impressed with Richard’s financial savvy. His ability and willingness to invent new means of raising revenues when preparing for the crusade would not have disgraced an investment banker in the 1980s! His astute sale of the Island of Cyprus to the (rich and financially liquid) Knights Templar, thereby refilling his own coffers while securing the military objective of ensuring Latin control of this strategically vital island was a stroke of genius. His re-sale of the island to Guy de Lusignan was almost equally shrewd, again giving him resources while also easing a delicate political issue: what to do with a deposed king, who has been your client?


Almost equally impressive was his diplomatic skills and his intelligence. Richard was put in front of a kangaroo court stacked against him by Emperor Henry VI -- and talked his way into a complete acquittal! That is a remarkable achievement. He also diplomatically out-maneuvered Philip II of France, drawing one important supporter after another out of his rivals camp.  


Finally, I was won over by Richard’s leadership style. Richard was a brilliant strategist – who also led from the front. He risked his own life, but was very cautious with the lives of his soldiers. He understood logistics as well as strategy, and he won his battles with a combination of careful planning and sheer audacity. As one of my readers put it, in the end, I just had to love Richard.


Richard the Lionheart is a central figure in Envoy of Jerusalem, and I have attempted to do justice to him in my portrayal of him there. Buy now in paperback or kindle!