The Secret Eleanor (50 page)

She looked up at de Rançun, beside her. “Do you miss her?”

“I have you,” he said. He kissed her hair. “Come along.”

She followed him to the stairs down the outside wall. At the foot of the stairs, by the gate, his black horse and the gray Barb waited, their reins in the hands of a groom. The Barb’s mane was studded with red rosettes, and he tossed his head, eager. She went down to him, and de Rançun came after her, to lift her into the saddle.

This is perhaps a novel interpretation of the scraps and pieces we know about the great Queen Eleanor of Aquitaine. Nothing herein contradicts those few known facts.

Medieval politics were family politics, and Eleanor of Aquitaine was the matriarch of the greatest family of them all. Her time could be called the Age of Eleanor. She became Queen of France at age fifteen, when her father died suddenly on pilgrimage. Her younger sister, Petronilla, her constant companion in those early days, went with her to Paris. Eleanor dominated her young husband, Louis VII; engaged in notorious flirtations under his nose; and gave him reckless political advice. When he went on Crusade, she rode side by side with him all the way to the Holy Land, where they disagreed so violently that they returned on separate ships.

The Pope engineered a brief reconciliation, but in the summer of 1151, when she was thirty, Eleanor met the young Duke of Normandy, Henry of Anjou, apparently for the first time. Over the next several months, she wrangled an annulment of her marriage out of Louis. This was announced on Palm Sunday at Beaugency on the Loire in 1152. Some ambitious young French noblemen conspired to capture her and her duchy on her way home, but she escaped back to her great city of Poitiers in Aquitaine, a rich, ancient land of poetry, song, and combustible nobles. There she sent a proposal to Henry. A few weeks later they were married, and in the next fourteen years they produced the most celebrated brood of children in the Middle Ages.

Eleanor was Queen of England from 1154 to 1189 and lived another fifteen years after that as Dowager, Regent, and Duchess. Two of her sons became kings of England, and her daughters and grandchildren ruled half the kingdoms of Christendom into the next century. She was a great patron of the arts as well as a capable ruler, holding court and dictating policy, bringing a dozen new styles and ways of thinking to work and play in the High Middle Ages. Above all, she raised the prestige of women to a new height.

Her marriage to Henry II was even more tumultuous than her marriage to Louis VII. Henry was only nineteen when they married, a hard hand and ambitious, already known for his volatile temper, unflagging energy, and impulsive amorous adventures. Shortly after they married, Henry fought, wheedled, and connived his way to the throne of England, so that between him and Eleanor they ruled a great swath of western Christendom that dwarfed the kingdom of France. Within only a few years they were battling each other for control. Henry had mistresses, and he hoarded all power to himself like a dragon on a pile of gold. They argued about their children and about their officers and their policies. Eleanor hated Thomas à Becket when he was Henry’s intimate and then hated how Henry got him killed. After the birth of John, her last child, she left the King and went to live alone at her splendid court in Poitiers. As soon as her boys were old enough, she began encouraging them to attack their father. Henry retaliated by locking her up for fifteen years.

Nonetheless, when she got out, his life was over and hers was still in high gear. While her son Richard was on Crusade, she ruled as regent, and in Aquitaine she was always lord suo jure, even if she was a woman. At age eighty she rode across the Pyrenees to collect a bride for the heir to the French throne, choosing a woman who would become almost as powerful as she was, Blanche of Castile, mother of Saint Louis.

She set a new standard for what a woman could do then and now and followed her own will all her long life, dying in 1204 at age eighty-two. She is buried at Fontevraud, the great abbey on the Loire that her family patronized, and where her effigy still lies on top of her casket, although her bones are long scattered.

Petronilla of Aquitaine, who never remarried after the caddish Count of Vermandois divorced her, faded from view soon after her sister’s annulment and possibly died the next year. She also was buried at Fontevraud. Joffre de Rançun went on to a long career as the most indefatigable of the many Poitevin rebels against Henry II and later his son Richard the Lionheart. Louis VII of France married twice more, and late in life at last produced a son, Philip Augustus, who reigned after him, wily and successful. The French Princess Marie, Eleanor’s daughter by Louis, became Countess of Champagne, presiding over a renaissance of music and literature at Troyes, patronizing Chrétien de Troyes, among others, one of a generation of women who owed their prestige and their grasp of power to Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Finally, there is an old text, now vanished, that claimed Eleanor and Henry did have a son named Philip, who disappeared in infancy. When in the steady stream of Eleanor’s children he was born, what happened to him, and how he came by the odd, un-Angevin name, no one now knows.

1. Early in the novel, Eleanor doesn’t pray at church about her complicated situation with Henry because “God was a man, anyway, and would not understand” (page 29). In the context of the book, Eleanor seemed to defy this mentality and behaved contrary to the typical male-centric way of thinking in the twelfth century. Discuss whether or not Eleanor would have spoken this same phrase by the end of the book.

2. Although Eleanor lived a life of luxury and power, she seemed to want more freedom and less complication, as when she first acted as Petronilla, riding her mare and “in her heart she laughed and danced for her freedom like a bacchant” (page 38). Do you think Eleanor did ever yearn for a simpler life, especially later on in the course of the novel?

3. Do you think most women in the twelfth century desired more opportunity and freedom to choose their own lives?

4. When Eleanor and Louis are discussing her lack of bearing a son, Eleanor states, “ ‘I know this is God’s judgment. . . . I shall never come to you again as a wife’ ” (page 91). Do you think this is simply an easy excuse to get out of her marriage, or does she really believe this?

5. Do you think Eleanor was a dishonest woman? Discuss why or why not. During this time period, would any woman of her stature have acted similarly, or was it her idiosyncratic personality?

6. Eleanor’s ladies-in-waiting are involved in every aspect of her life. Do you think this bond helped or hurt women during this time period? Do you think women of lesser stature had similar bonds with other women? Cite examples when social standing is ignored and real friendship is shown amongst the women.

7. When Henry’s father dies suddenly, the three remaining sons battle each other for his throne. Discuss the lack of loyalty among these brothers, and how it affected the shifts of power during the Middle Ages.

8. At one point, Eleanor claims Henry “had what was better than love; as he had proven again, now he had the gift of power” (page 146). Is this really what’s most important to her with regard to him? Did your opinion shift by the end of the book?

9. Claire disbelieved Petronilla after meeting Thomas the lute player for the first time, when Petronilla tells her men only care about one thing. Why do you think Claire doesn’t believe her at first? Was Claire right to resist him initially?

10. When Petronilla finally takes over as the Queen on their progress, it’s enlightening to her. Discuss how the opportunity to play Queen changed Petronilla for better or worse.

11. Petronilla grapples with the sin of lying but Eleanor seems to have no qualm in this respect. Do you think it’s because Eleanor is trying to get ahead in a man’s world? Petronilla also believes that the intention to help her sister was no sin, even if the deed itself was. Discuss whether or not you agree with her, and how this might pose a different problem in modern society.

12. After Eleanor almost loses the baby, Petronilla says, “ ‘It is a sign. God favors us.’ ” But Eleanor retorts with, “ ‘Whatever that means’ ” (page 233). Discuss the sisters’ differing viewpoints at this moment and what it might mean for their faith and the future of Aquitaine.

13. No one in a position of power is to be trusted in the book—they are all plotting one way or another. Cite examples from the book of jealousy getting the best of the characters, especially Henry, Eleanor, and Claire.

14. Do you believe that Henry’s love was for Eleanor or the crown, and vice versa?

15. After Petronilla learns of Eleanor’s plot to kill her, she feels she has “no true home” (page 283). Discuss this within the context of the book—is “home” a castle, a family, a homeland? With shifting loyalties and borders, is this concept ever really possible?