Eleanor of Aquitaine: A LifeIn this beautifully written biography, Alison Weir paints a vibrant portrait of a truly exceptional woman and provides new insights into her intimate world. Renowned in her time for being the most beautiful woman in Europe, the wife of two kings and mother of three, Eleanor of Aquitaine was one of the great heroines of the Middle Ages. At a time when women were regarded as little more than chattel, Eleanor managed to defy convention as she exercised power in the political sphere and crucial influence over her husbands and sons. Eleanor of Aquitaine lived a long life of many contrasts, of splendor and desolation, power and peril, and in this stunning narrative, Weir captures the woman—and the queen—in all her glory. With astonishing historic detail, mesmerizing pageantry, and irresistible accounts of royal scandal and intrigue, she recreates not only a remarkable personality but a magnificent past era. |
From inside the book
Results 1-5 of 54
Page
... honour, and endurance, as well as legendary heroes such as Charlemagne, Roland, and King Arthur, while the romantic poems and lais (lays) sang of love. It was the poets of the south, the troubadours, who popularised the concept of ...
... honour, and endurance, as well as legendary heroes such as Charlemagne, Roland, and King Arthur, while the romantic poems and lais (lays) sang of love. It was the poets of the south, the troubadours, who popularised the concept of ...
Page
... honour of her love. There was an underlying eroticism to these precepts, for it was tacitly understood that the persistent lover would one day have his hoped-for reward. The ideals of courtly love were at breathtaking variance with ...
... honour of her love. There was an underlying eroticism to these precepts, for it was tacitly understood that the persistent lover would one day have his hoped-for reward. The ideals of courtly love were at breathtaking variance with ...
Page
... honour and obey their parents, and any transgressions were usually punished with severe beatings, but the evidence suggests that Eleanor was spoiled. Richard le Poitevin, writing in the 1170s, states that she was “brought up in delicacy ...
... honour and obey their parents, and any transgressions were usually punished with severe beatings, but the evidence suggests that Eleanor was spoiled. Richard le Poitevin, writing in the 1170s, states that she was “brought up in delicacy ...
Page
... honour. He was incapable of guile or procrastination, and throughout his life he retained a childlike air of simplicity. Like the obedient son he was, Louis did not question his father's choice of bride, and he dutifully helped Abbot ...
... honour. He was incapable of guile or procrastination, and throughout his life he retained a childlike air of simplicity. Like the obedient son he was, Louis did not question his father's choice of bride, and he dutifully helped Abbot ...
Page
... honour was on occasion a serious disadvantage when it came to dealing with more wily and pragmatic princes. Over the years, however, Louis came to be recognised as a man who, in many respects, fulfilled the knightly ideal, and he earned ...
... honour was on occasion a serious disadvantage when it came to dealing with more wily and pragmatic princes. Over the years, however, Louis came to be recognised as a man who, in many respects, fulfilled the knightly ideal, and he earned ...
Contents
To Jerusalem | |
A Righteous Annulment | |
A Happy Issue | |
All the Business of the Kingdom | |
Eleanor by the Grace of God Queen of England | |
Poor Prisoner | |
Shame Shame on a Conquered King | |
The Eagle Shall Rejoice in Her Third Nesting | |
The Admiration of Her Age | |
The Devil Is Loosed | |
The Staff of My Old Age | |
The Most Reverend Eleanor | |
The Brood of the Wicked Shall Not Thrive | |
The King Has Wrought a Miracle | |
Conjectures Which Grow Day by Day | |
The Holy Martyr | |
The Cubs Shall Awake | |
Beware of Your Wife and Sons | |
A Candle Goeth Out | |
Notes on the Chief Sources | |
Dedication | |
A Readers Guide | |
Other editions - View all
Common terms and phrases
abbey Abbot Alys Angevin Anjou Archbishop army Arthur barons Berengaria Bernard Bishop Blois Brittany brother castle Cathedral charter Chinon Christmas chroniclers Church Count court crown crusade daughter death domains duchy Duke Eleanor of Aquitaine Emperor English excommunicated father FitzStephen Fontevrault France French Geoffrey Geoffrey’s Gervase of Canterbury Giraldus Cambrensis Guillaume le Maréchale heir Henry and Eleanor Henry’s honour household Hugh husband Ibid Jerusalem Joanna John of Salisbury John’s King Louis King’s kingdom knights L’Histoire de Guillaume London Longchamp Louis’s Lusignan marriage married Matilda mother Norman Normandy overlord palace Paris peace Philip Pipe Rolls Poitiers Poitou Pope Queen Eleanor Ralph of Coggeshall Ralph of Diceto Raoul Raymond reign remained Richard of Devizes Robert of Torigni Roger of Hoveden Roger of Wendover Rolls Series Rosamund Rouen royal sent sons Suger Theobald took Toulouse trans troubadours twelfth century vassals Walter Map wife William of Newburgh Winchester Young King