Read Eleanor of Aquitaine Online
Authors: Marion Meade
Eleanor of Aquitaine (10 page)
When she ventured out from the royal enclave, she found herself in a noisy, reeking world of crooked streets darkened by the upper stories of houses, which leaned precariously forward. Due to poor drainage the lanes ran deep with mud and the contents of chamber pots and washbasins pitched from upper windows. Almost drowning out the pealing bells and majestic tones of the Gregorian chants from the Romanesque bouquet of churches came the constant clatter of street cries: the menders of furs, the candlemakers, the vegetable and fruit merchants, the wine crieurs who walked through the streets carrying a bowl that could be sampled and shouting, “So-and-so has just opened a cask of this wine. He who wants to buy some of it will find it on the Rue _” And everywhere on the twisting, turning streets were sold things to eat: waffles, small cakes, wafers, and, carried about by the
talemeliers
in baskets covered with white cloths, the favorite pasties, turnovers filled with chopped ham, chicken, eel, soft cheese, and egg.
talemeliers
in baskets covered with white cloths, the favorite pasties, turnovers filled with chopped ham, chicken, eel, soft cheese, and egg.
The city swarmed with students from every nation in Europe: John of Salisbury; nineteen-year-old Thomas Becket, clinging to his vow of chastity; and the sons of well-born fathers who had flocked there to plunge into philosophy, theology, medicine, or feudal law and, perhaps equally important, to taste the heady delights of the flesh and the tavern. On the quays along the Seine they slogged behind the skirts of learned doctors who discoursed on Plato and Aristotle as well as writings of the church fathers. Along the Petit Pont, the upper stories of the little buildings housed brilliant teachers, such as Adam de Petit Pont, and in order to hear their lectures students eagerly crowded into the tiny rooms and if necessary sat on the rickety stairs. In this intellectual’s paradise one could dip into the central controversy of medieval thought: the importance of the universal versus the particular. Were universals—the Church, humanity, divinity—more important than the particulars—churchmen, individuals, persons of the Trinity? Must one be able to comprehend the universals before one could understand the particular? Should one incline toward the Realists, who believed in universals, or the Nominalists, who upheld the importance of the particulars? In Paris, one could believe as one pleased, unless of course one happened to stray too far in the direction of heresy.
Among the remarkable array of scholars assembled only a short walk from the palace of the Capets was one who stood head and shoulders above the others. Peter Abélard blazed with a glory that caused women to stare at him from their windows and men like John of Salisbury “to sit at his feet drinking in every word that fell from his lips.” His fame rested mainly on his illustrious mind but partly on his skill in the art of seduction, for some twenty years earlier he had been taken as tutor into the home of the lovely Héloïse. Books were opened, but more words of love than lessons were heard. After the birth of an illegitimate son and a subsequent marriage, Héloïse’s uncle had Abélard castrated, and finally the lovers separated, each taking monastic vows. Abélard’s troubles were common knowledge and in
Historia Calamitatum
he himself had written about his emasculation as well as other persecutions. By the time Eleanor arrived in Paris, the unhappy Abélard had reached his midfifties, but his sharp mind and quick tongue continued to question ideas long taken for granted. Believing that only reason and intelligence can resolve inconsistencies in matters of faith—by doubting we are led to inquire; by inquiry we perceive the truth—he presumed to understand and explain the mystery of the Trinity. To apply the hot light of reason to all things in heaven and earth was an original, if not to say dangerous, notion and one that even then was propelling him toward fresh calamities. In an open debate at Sens in May 1140, his so-called blasphemous views on the Trinity would be challenged and condemned by Bernard of Clairvaux.
Historia Calamitatum
he himself had written about his emasculation as well as other persecutions. By the time Eleanor arrived in Paris, the unhappy Abélard had reached his midfifties, but his sharp mind and quick tongue continued to question ideas long taken for granted. Believing that only reason and intelligence can resolve inconsistencies in matters of faith—by doubting we are led to inquire; by inquiry we perceive the truth—he presumed to understand and explain the mystery of the Trinity. To apply the hot light of reason to all things in heaven and earth was an original, if not to say dangerous, notion and one that even then was propelling him toward fresh calamities. In an open debate at Sens in May 1140, his so-called blasphemous views on the Trinity would be challenged and condemned by Bernard of Clairvaux.
A man like Peter Abélard. deprived of his manhood for love of a lady, would have appealed to a romantic like Eleanor, but the ideas he espoused would also have been examined with some care; at least she would not have rejected them out of hand the way her conservative husband did. It seems inconceivable that she would not have sampled the wisdom of the ages being imparted freely on bridge and street corner, especially since the intellectual life was not barred to females, and Abélard himself boasted that noble ladies thronged his lectures. If the queen believed it beneath her royal dignity to betake herself to one of the crammed rooms on the Petit Pont, she had more suitable opportunities to hear the masters. In warm weather, the royal garden threw open its gates to the schools, and there, from a front-row seat under a pear tree, she surely could have imbibed the rudiments of dialectic and the structure of the syllogism. Indeed, in later years, she would give ample demonstration that she had mastered the fine points of intellectual swordsmanship. Still, as a woman, especially as a queen, Eleanor could never truly enter into the sweetly tumultuous life of the scholar: she could only flit through its tantalizing atmosphere, alighting now and then to inhale its perfume. Nor did her temperament at that time allow for sustained interest in any subject requiring discipline.
Most people’s lives are shaped by what they remember of childhood, and Eleanor was no different. Accustomed to the extravagant green vistas of the south, those gardens full of acid sunlight and the mellow crooning of nightingales, she was not entranced by Paris. She saw only its squalor, heard only its noise. Although she had her sister for company, she was lonely and utterly bored; she missed the sound of the langue d’oc and the easygoing humor of the southerners. Even Louis was perceptive enough to notice her gloom, and since he felt solicitous of his wife’s happiness, he did not object when she spent frivolously on costly silks and jewels.
Along with the throne, Louis inherited Abbot Suger from his father. The royal counselor hoped for the best from the young king whom he had known and loved since infancy and whose education he had personally directed at Saint-Denis. He would always remain, for Suger, “a child, in the flower of his age and of great sweetness of temper, the hope of the good and the terror of the wicked.” The queen Suger liked a great deal less, although he was forced to admit that she was “
nobilissima puella,”
a most nobly born girl, which, strictly speaking, is more a statement of fact than an expression of opinion. If any man could have herded Louis and Eleanor along the narrow path of responsibility, it was the tiny prelate whom fortune had lifted from the poor rural peasantry to be chief minister of kings, head of the royal abbey of Saint-Denis, and notable author. While still a boy, Suger had met Louis the Fat at the school for novices at Saint-Denis, where they both were students. It might be thought that the son of a peasant would have little in common with the great figures of the aristocracy, but Suger, no ordinary priest, was undeniably a man of enormous culture. “He had such a great knowledge of history that no matter what prince or king of the Franks one mentioned, he immediately and without hesitation would hasten to recount his deeds.” Endowed with a prodigious memory, the abbot knew the Scriptures virtually by heart and could reply succinctly to any question put to him, and he could also recite from memory the “heathen” verses of Horatio. Ovid, Juvenal, and Terence.
nobilissima puella,”
a most nobly born girl, which, strictly speaking, is more a statement of fact than an expression of opinion. If any man could have herded Louis and Eleanor along the narrow path of responsibility, it was the tiny prelate whom fortune had lifted from the poor rural peasantry to be chief minister of kings, head of the royal abbey of Saint-Denis, and notable author. While still a boy, Suger had met Louis the Fat at the school for novices at Saint-Denis, where they both were students. It might be thought that the son of a peasant would have little in common with the great figures of the aristocracy, but Suger, no ordinary priest, was undeniably a man of enormous culture. “He had such a great knowledge of history that no matter what prince or king of the Franks one mentioned, he immediately and without hesitation would hasten to recount his deeds.” Endowed with a prodigious memory, the abbot knew the Scriptures virtually by heart and could reply succinctly to any question put to him, and he could also recite from memory the “heathen” verses of Horatio. Ovid, Juvenal, and Terence.
By temperament, he was unsuited for a life of austerity and for many years had indulged his love of luxury with soft woolen shirts, dainty coverlets, and warm furs. In recent years, however, he had been severely criticized by Bernard of Clairvaux: “From early time yours was a noble abbey of royal dignity.... Without any deception or delay it rendered to Caesar his dues, but not with equal enthusiasm what was due to God.... They say the cloister of the monastery was often crowded with soldiers, that business was done there, that it echoed to the sound of men wrangling, and that sometimes women were to be found there. In all this hubbub how could anyone have attended to heavenly, divine, and spiritual things?”
How indeed. As a result, Suger had given up his fine horses and splendid livery and exchanged his spacious home for a tiny barren cell. However, in his most current project, the restoration of Saint-Denis, he continued to indulge his love of beautiful objects by embellishing the new church with gorgeous stained glass and precious ornaments. After 1140, he devoted his entire time to Saint-Denis; this did not reflect any lessening of his interest in affairs of state but rather his fall from favor with the young king, or, more precisely, with the young queen. Eleanor rejected the notion that her husband should be closely supervised like a schoolboy instead of relying on his own judgment. And if Louis needed advice about Aquitaine, he had only to ask his wife, for, after all, who had more practical knowledge than she? After the departure of Suger and his balancing stability, the young couple were left to their own devices.
As is often the case with weak men who wish to prove their masculinity, Louis felt compelled to meet each affront to his royal authority with a display of ferocity bordering on the brutal, but much of this stemmed indirectly from a desire to impress his wife. Constantly, he looked over his shoulder to gauge her reaction, a habit that must have simultaneously pleased and annoyed her. He would never understand her, but from the first, he had adored her in the way an inexperienced boy worships a gay, confident girl; with passionate admiration he responded to her charm, to a cleverness that he himself lacked, and he indulged her extravagantly. If she was headstrong and demanding—and unquestionably she was—he excused it as perfectly normal behavior for one of her richly endowed nature. There was, of course, another side to the story: Eleanor was anxious to control everything she regarded as hers, that is, her person, about which she was hysterically vain; her life; and her lands, which she felt, quite rightly, she knew more about than Louis or any of his royal ministers. As she repeatedly pointed out to Louis, the Aquitainians, for all their splendid qualities, were a pigheaded people who would only extend their respect to a firm ruler.
Before the death of Eleanor’s father, the political situation in Aquitaine had been unsatisfactory, and by now it had grown steadily worse.
For that matter, trouble had been brewing in Louis’s own domains, and only a few days after his succession he had been obliged to put down a rebellion in the town of Orleans. Some sixty years earlier there had begun the growth of the communal movement whereby a few towns, in a reaction against feudal exploitation, tried to obtain a measure of self-government by establishing collective seigneuries that would recognize their economic and political interests. In some cases, Louis the Fat had encouraged communes, because he saw them as a device to curb the power of both his barons and the Church. When, however, the proposed commune occurred on the king’s land, as was the case with Orleans, it was a different story, and when the Orleans bourgeois bitterly complained about outrageous taxes and demanded a charter of rights, he refused. Within days of his death, the burghers suffered a convenient memory loss and proclaimed themselves a commune. The young king, fresh from his baptism of fire in the Talmont, marched against the town and promptly executed the conspirators who had sought to foster insurrection; then, evidently reluctant to be known as a tyrant, he abruptly reversed his position and granted most of the demanded reforms. In the future, this trait of indecision would mark most of his political actions.
The rebellion in Orléans proved to be anything but an isolated case, and a similar mutiny soon occurred in Eleanor’s domains—as it happened, in her own capital city of Poitiers. In late 1137, after having had a few months to digest the changes in their political fortunes as a result of William X’s death, the Poitevins exhibited reluctance to put themselves into the hands of a foreign king merely because their land happened to be part of his wife’s real estate. Accordingly, they repudiated Louis’s authority and boldly announced themselves a free city, a serious blow to the prestige of both Eleanor and her husband. Angry and humiliated, Louis hastily threw together an army, short on knights but well equipped with siege machines, and marched on the rebellious town. Since the surprised Poitevins had barely had time to organize their defense, the king was able to easily capture the city without a single casualty on either side. In victory, however, he was unable to handle the uprising in a diplomatic or even sensible manner, or rather he dealt with the rebels in a manner that he believed would meet with Eleanor’s approval.
His demands were positively ruthless: Instead of simply disbanding the commune and letting it go at that, he vindictively insisted that the sons and daughters of leading citizens be offered as hostages and sent away into exile in France. On an appointed day, the burghers were to bring their children, with baggage, to the main square before the ducal palace. The howls of the horrified Poitevins carried far beyond the boundaries of Aquitaine all the way to the Abbey of Saint-Denis, where Suger, a more impartial judge, was summoned to Poitiers to reason with his flower child. After a long talk with Louis, Suger appeared in person to the burghers and stilled their lamentations; Louis, in seclusion, had changed his mind and would allow their heirs to go free.
In Paris, Eleanor observed this incident with irritation. Mistaking brutality for strength, she longed for Louis to assert himself so that she might feel, if not love, then respect for him. His weakness overwhelmed her. Obviously, he could not be counted on to handle a simple revolt with any sense of proportion; and then, like a clumsy child, he needed to be rescued by Suger. Furthermore, resentful of Suger’s interference in a matter that she felt did not concern him, she determined that his advice would not be sought in the future.
Although Eleanor did not accompany Louis to Poitiers, she made several trips back to the south during the early years of her marriage, the first of which may have been in September 1138, when she attended the festival of Notre Dame at Puy. Generally, she was accompanied by her husband, as well as her sister, who remained her closest friend and confidante. Undoubtedly, she found her relationship with Petronilla comforting, because life in Paris was even more alien than she had ever imagined. While she had not expected marriage to bring her the lover of her dreams, presumably she had hoped to find a degree of emotional and sexual satisfaction. If she had possessed these, she might have borne the shock of her new life, but as it turned out, circumstances had not brought her loving, and therefore she determined to drink deeply of living. To her, this meant excitement and novelty. There had been, of course, special occasions, as on that first Christmas of their marriage when Louis had taken her to Bourges to be crowned queen, but these temporary diversions could not replace the pleasure she had anticipated as the wife of a great lord. She knew that her happiness had been left behind in Poitiers. Was the rest of her life to be spent permanently sealed on that dreary island, condemned to live with a submissive man who feared to look at her body and felt loath to touch her even in the dark?
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