Women and Economic Power in Premodern Royal Courts 9781641892735

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WOMEN AND ECONOMIC POWER IN PREMODERN ROYAL COURTS

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GENDER AND POWER IN THE PREMODERN WORLD Gender and Power in the Premodern World showcases cutting-​edge research into issues of gender and power across a broad temporal and geographic spectrum. It fills key lacunae in the field, broadening conversations about gender and power by addressing constructions and performances of masculinity as well as engaging with women’s roles, expanding beyond a European framework of analysis, and breaking down conventional barriers between premodern periods. It examines not only rulers and elites in positions of political or religious authority but also others who exerted power in economic, cultural, and symbolic forms.

Editorial Board

Elena Woodacre, University of Winchester Carole Levin, University of Nebraska Simon Doubleday, Hofstra University Susan Broomhall, University of Western Australia

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WOMEN AND ECONOMIC POWER IN PREMODERN ROYAL COURTS Edited by CATHLEEN SARTI

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British Library Cataloguing in Publication Data A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library © 2020, Arc Humanities Press, Leeds

The authors assert their moral right to be identified as the authors of their part of this work.

Permission to use brief excerpts from this work in scholarly and educational works is hereby granted provided that the source is acknowledged. Any use of material in this work that is an exception or limitation covered by Article 5 of the European Union’s Copyright Directive (2001/​ 29/​ EC) or would be determined to be “fair use” under Section 107 of the U.S. Copyright Act September 2010 page 2 or that satisfies the conditions specified in Section 108 of the U.S. Copyright Act (17 USC §108, as revised by P.L. 94–​553) does not require the Publisher’s permission.

ISBN: 9781641892728 e-​ISBN: 9781641892735

www.arc-​humanities.org Printed and bound in the UK (by Lightning Source), USA (by Bookmasters), and elsewhere using printon-demand technology.

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CONTENTS

Acknowledgements . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . vii Introduction: Women and Economic Power in Premodern Royal Courts CATHLEEN SARTI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 1.

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The Medieval English Queen as Landholder: Some Reflections on Sources and Methodology MICHELE SEAH and KATIA WRIGHT . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9

Financial Power of Empresses and Princess Consorts of the Holy Roman Empire CHARLOTTE BACKERRA and CATHÉRINE LUDWIG-​OCKENFELS. . . . . . . 35 “Edward III’s Gold-Digging Mistress”: Alice Perrers, Gender, and Financial Power at the English Royal Court, 1360–​1377 LAURA TOMPKINS. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 59 Counselling the Danish King: Sigbrit Villoms as Financial Mastermind for Christian II, 1513–​1523 CATHLEEN SARTI. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 73

Afterword: “Power Is Money”? Reflections on Money, Power, Sex, and Gender in Premodern Royal Courts ELENA WOODACRE. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87

Bibliography. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 93 Index of Persons and Topics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 99

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Conferences, coffee breaks, shared meals, and social media are essential to creating scholarship. I  firmly believe that academic creativity needs exchanges of ideas. Such exchanges can be quite solitary—​just you and a book. Or they can happen in a smaller circle of two to five people sharing a meal, talking between presentations, or taking the same bus after a talk or a long day at the university. This book in particular was created during both. It is also based on exchanging ideas in much bigger academic settings: at conferences and in the Royal Studies Network. I would like to express my gratitude first and foremost to the authors of this volume, who contributed to this book not only with their own chapters and research, but also through their engagement in academic discussions, be it at a coffee break at the IMC Leeds (thank you, Laura), during various calls and meetings of our friendship (thank you, Charlotte), over after-​conference wine and tapas in Madrid (much thanks to Katia and Ellie), or while driving to and from conferences (thank you both, Michele and Cathérine). Furthermore, all authors contributed to the shared recommended biblio­ graphy at the end of this book as well as discussed each other’s ideas and contributions. It has been a pleasure to work with you all on this book, and I am curious to see which further discussions and ideas will be inspired by our work. The inclusion of this volume in the Gender and Power in the Premodern World book series at Arc Humanities Press worked out well in several aspects: presenting our ideas in a fitting context, being able to use a shorter format which encourages further research, and bringing us together with an amazing team at Arc Humanities Press. I would like to thank the book series editors, Carole Levin, Simon Doubleday, Susan Broomhall, and Ellie Woodacre, for their support and acceptance of this book. I would like also to thank Erika Gaffney and Danna Messer, who did great work as editors. Moreover, I am grateful to Kristen Geaman and Eva-​Maria Roelevink, who both read and commented on parts of, or even the whole book. Thank you also to two anonymous reviewers who engaged with our ideas and made them better with their comments and suggestions. Last, but not least, I thank you for reading and engaging with our ideas, and I hope you’ll find them inspiring! Cathleen Sarti

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INTRODUCTION WOMEN AND ECONOMIC POWER IN PREMODERN ROYAL COURTS CATHLEEN SARTI*

Thinking about power means thinking about resources. Not only knowledge is power; money and material resources are power as well, and often in much more obvious ways.1 This is all the more important as recent research in the cultural history of politics has emphasized the impact and significance of representing power to a wider audience.2 Obviously, a ruler who wants to show off needs resources.3 Where did premodern rulers receive their resources from, how were these resources managed, and how were control over resources and political influence interrelated and dependent upon one another? The hypothesis presented in this book suggests that women were often key figures in acquiring resources and managing them, for themselves as well as for their (royal) families and their courts. Moreover, the contributions in this volume put forward the idea that women at royal courts could use resources and skills to wield political influence, even though this influence was often challenged. Trying to reconstruct and understand the influence of women challenges the modern historian in turn due to the long tradition of excluding women from sources and research, as this volume’s chapters likewise show. This edited volume discusses the political power that women at premodern royal courts held through economic influence, resources, and skills. The nexus between economic and financial resources and skills on one hand and power and influence on the other is hardly new, and has already been studied for premodern times as well as for premodern women.4 Nevertheless, research hitherto has neglected to analyze this nexus specifically for the royal court—​the space of political, social, religious, and cultural power in premodern societies.5 In addition to its explicit analysis of royal courts, * Dr. Cathleen Sarti is a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Oxford where she focusses on political and military history in Northern Europe.

1 Michael Stolleis, Pecunia nervus rerum: Zur Staatsfinanzierung in der frühen Neuzeit (Frankfurt am Main: Klostermann, 1983), 63–​68, reflects on several proverbs used in premodern Germany, all stating the overwhelming importance of money.

2 See Barbara Stollberg-​Rilinger, ed., Was heißt Kulturgeschichte des Politischen?, Zeitschrift für historische Forschung Beiheft 35 (Berlin: Duncker & Humblot, 2005). 3 See also Stolleis, Pecunia nervus rerum, 70–​71.

4 David Swartz, Culture & Power: The Sociology of Pierre Bourdieu (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997); Theresa Earenfight, ed., Women and Wealth in Late Medieval Europe, The New Middle Ages (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2010). 5 Werner Sombart, Liebe, Luxus und Kapitalismus. Über die Entstehung der modernen Welt aus dem Geist der Verschwendung, new ed. (Berlin: Wagenbach, 1992) is one of the few studies that explicitly takes into account the relationship between royalty and economics, in this case consumer culture. A critical discussion of Sombart’s ideas regarding court women as the impetus for modern capitalism

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this book offers a specific gender perspective, focusing on women and their agency, their reliance on marriages and families, and the difficulties involved in overcoming the biased source and research material.6 By adopting this perspective, the authors of this volume aim to continue a current conversation about women’s economic resources and skills and about how women used these resources to gain political power; in so doing, we challenge hitherto dominant narratives of women’s dependence on their spouses.7 Furthermore, we critically assess how much political influence their economic and financial resources yielded, and how any potential premodern “glass ceilings” worked. Finally, we understand this book as a contribution to the ongoing debate on the economics of monarchies, courts, and dynasties.8 The idea for this book originated over a period of discussions at several conferences, the first being at IMC Leeds in 2017. Questions of economic power of women at royal courts continued over tapas and Spanish wine at the 2017 Kings and Queens conference in Madrid. After these intense conversations, the idea for a book was born, and first drafts of these chapters were presented at the next Kings and Queens conference in Winchester in 2018, and at the 2018 conference of the Arbeitskreis Geschlechtergeschichte der Frühen Neuzeit. However, all these discussions would have not occurred were it not for the Royal Studies Network bringing scholars interested in questions of royal power is given in Claudia Opitz-​Belakhal, “Zwischen Luxus und Armut:  Frauen und ihr Verhältnis zum Geld in der Frühen Neuzeit,” in Frauen und Geld: Wider die ökonomische Unsichtbarkeit von Frauen, edited by R. J. Regnath and Christine Rudolf (Königstein im Taunus: Helmer, 2008), 25–​42 at 25–​27 and 41–​42. The impact of gender on consumption and capitalism is still under discussion, however, as Opitz-​Belakhal indicates (at 31).

6 Merry E.  Wiesner, Gender in History:  Global Perspectives, 2nd ed. (Malden:  Wiley-​Blackwell, 2011); see also Judith M. Bennett and Ruth M. Karras, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Women and Gender in Medieval Europe (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), especially the introduction. One of the very few books with a special focus on women and finances from an academic point of view is R. J. Regnath and Christine Rudolf, eds., Frauen und Geld: Wider die ökonomische Unsichtbarkeit von Frauen (Königstein im Taunus: Helmer, 2008).

7 In the past few years, books on royal women have included economic aspects of their power, although it usually was not the main focus. Examples of this tentative foray into combining royal studies with economic history include Lucy K.  Pick, Her Father’s Daughter:  Gender, Power, and Religion in the Early Spanish Kingdoms (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2017), especially ­chapter 3, Melanie Greinert, Zwischen Unterordnung und Selbstbehauptung. Handlungsspielräume Gottorfer Fürstinnen (1564–​1721) (Kiel: Wachholtz, 2018), as well as Therese Martin, Queen as King: Politics and Architectural Propaganda in Twelfth-​Century Spain (Leiden: Brill, 2006).

8 Books on economic aspects of monarchy include Volker Bauer, Hofökonomie: Der Diskurs über den Fürstenhof in Zeremonialwissenschaft, Hausväterliteratur und Kameralismus, Frühneuzeitstudien Neue Folge 1 (Vienna: Böhlau, 1997); Gerhard Fouquet, Jan Hirschbiegel, and Werner Paravicini, eds., Hofwirtschaft:  Ein ökonomischer Blick auf Hof und Residenz in Spätmittelalter und Früher Neuzeit, Residenzenforschung 21 (Ostfildern:  Thorbecke, 2008); or Jürgen R.  Wolf, ed., Die Kabinettskassenrechnungen der Kurfürstin Anna Maria Luisa von der Pfalz (1667–​1743): Finanzwirtschaft einer Landesmutter im Zeitalter des Absolutismus, Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte des Niederrheins 12 (Essen:  Klartext, 2015). The latter focuses specifically on the court of a princess consort and her accounts, making it one of the few extensive studies on female economic power.

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together. Therefore, our interest in this topic originates in our research into women at royal courts, meaning that we adapt economic and financial perspectives to our existing research on royal courts and not the other way around. Whereas a general economic historical approach might focus more on the role of courts in the development of realms, or in the context of broader trends in the global economic system, our perspective is more microhistorical.9 This means viewing royal courts as economic units and people at court as economic agents, and inquiring into the actors’ scale and scope, their interests, their opportunities, and their approaches to economy and finances. In short, courts are understood as businesses, but without losing sight of their political, social, religious, and cultural role in premodern society. Economy is all about decisions and choices: who makes them, what informs them, and their impact on future developments.10 Thus, studying economic and financial aspects means to focus on actors, their behaviour and means, always in regard to their social and cultural contexts, and considering short-​term psychological, emotional, and cognitive factors as well as their interests. On the next higher level—​that is, several individuals viewed as a group and/​or institution—​courts are points of intersection between economic, social, and cultural capital leading up to symbolic capital, as explored by Pierre Bourdieu. Using the definition of “capital(s) as a collection of goods and skills, of knowledge and acknowledgments, belonging to an individual or a group that he or she can mobilize to develop influence, gain power, or bargain other elements of this collection” (emphasis in the original) already highlights how having goods or skills in one sector might influence an actor’s rank or power in another.11 Pierre Bourdieu analyzed how economic capital was transformed 9 For a general understanding of premodern economies, several handbooks and overviews can be recommended; these include Peter W. Musgrave, The Early Modern European Economy, European History in Perspective (Basingstoke:  Macmillan, 1999); Hermann Kellenbenz, ed., Europäische Wirtschafts-​ und Sozialgeschichte vom ausgehenden Mittelalter bis zur Mitte des 17. Jahrhunderts, Handbuch der europäischen Wirtschafts-​und Sozialgeschichte 3 (Stuttgart: Klett-​Cotta, 1986); Karl Gunnar Persson and Paul Sharp, An Economic History of Europe: Knowledge, Institutions and Growth, 600 to the Present, 2nd ed., New Approaches to Economic and Social History (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015); or E. E. Rich and C. H. Wilson, eds., The Economy of Expanding Europe in the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, Cambridge Economic History 4 (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 1967).

10  See Matthias Blum and Christopher L. Colvin, eds., An Economist’s Guide to Economic History, Palgrave Studies in Economic History (Cham: Palgrave, 2018) in general for a very helpful introduction to economics and economic history, and in particular ­chapter 4 by Robert P. Gilles, “Economic Theory and Economic History,” 31–​39:  “Economics Studies the Human Condition” (31). Or, even more precise, “[economics] explicitly pursues understanding how human involvement converts objective physical substance into human ‘use value’ ” (32). See also Paul Heyne, Peter J. Boettke, and David L.  Prychitko, The Economic Way of Thinking, 12th ed. (London:  Pearson Education, 2010), 6: “All social phenomena emerge from the actions and interactions of individuals, who are choosing in response to expected additional benefits and costs to themselves.”

11  Erik Neveu, “Bourdieu’s Capital(s): Sociologizing an Economic Concept,” in The Oxford Handbook of Pierre Bourdieu, ed. Thomas Medvetz and Jeffrey J. Sallaz (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 347–​74 at 347.

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into cultural, social, and symbolic capital, which also translates to transforming economic power into political power. He identified court societies as a “topical illustration of the investments needed to transform wealth and status into social and symbolic capital.”12 To further discuss the notion of transformation of economic to social, cultural, and symbolic capital, this volume understands royal courts as households.13 However, we do appreciate that the royal court was on one hand a premodern household that had to be managed with the same restraints and considerations as any other household, such as balancing income and expenditure. On the other hand, the royal court was not only responsible for providing for its members (family, political elites, servants and staff, ambassadors, etc.), but was also the space of high politics. The royal court was the foremost household of the realm. This does not necessarily mean that it was the biggest household, or the most expensive (although it often was), but it was the space where domestic and foreign political actors met. Here, monarchs and their families interacted with the political elites of their realm, with elites from other realms as representatives of different courts and dynasties, and also with a broader group of people involved in the daily management of court. The court was also the space where decisions were made for the whole realm. Analyzing the economic and financial resources and skills of courtly actors therefore also has implications for the development of the whole realm as well as for the international reputation of a court and monarchy. Furthermore, the royal household often could be more than one household: the curia domini (household of the king) and the curia domine (household of the queen) could be two different spaces, both with the potential to be political spaces as well.14 We ask not only how these courts were managed, but also how family funds were handled, and whether the royal couple shared coffers or the king and queen each had their own resources. The answers to these questions shed light on influence—​from seemingly simple decisions of how expensive a diplomatic gift to another court could be, to complex policies on economic growth and investments in the realm. The study of premodern courts as economic units and especially of premodern women at those courts is supported and inspired by several economic theories and ideas as well as insights from gender studies. The foundation of our study, however, is firstly an understanding of politics as a process of negotiation in which several actors can influence decisions (be they economic, political, religious, or cultural), and secondly a focus 12 Neveu, “Bourdieu’s Capital(s),” 359, here referring to an analysis in Pierre Bourdieu, Sociologie générale. volume 1. Cours au Collège de France (1981–​1983) (Paris: Raisons d’agir, 2015), 527.

13  An English translation for the Greek word oikonomos would be “one who manages a household,” highlighting the importance of households as economic units and basis for economies of bigger communities.

14  See on the household of the queen, or the specific areas of a queen at court, Jan Hirschbiegel and Werner Paravicini, eds., Das Frauenzimmer: Die Frau bei Hofe in Spätmittelalter und früher Neuzeit, Residenzenforschung 11 (Stuttgart: Thorbecke, 2000), in particular the discussion of these courts during times of itinerant kingship by Brigitte Streich, “Frauenhof und Frauenzimmer,” 247–​62.

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on understanding these actors and their behaviour.15 This of course also touches upon economic theory, and raises questions concerning the relevance of actors’ social and cultural backgrounds (for example, to which extent their gender influenced their options, or which institutional limitations were in place), and places more emphasis on the (economic) ideas, interests, and impact of actors—​that is, their individual decisions.16 This book is also a study on the economic and financial influence of premodern royal courts. Material resources and economic means therefore signify far more than monetary possessions. First and foremost, landownership, often including the right to taxes or dues, was (and often still is) one of the most important assets.17 But luxury goods such as exotic furs, tapestries, jewellery, expensive fabrics and dresses, treasury objects, horses, buildings, paintings, and so on could also easily be turned into money and have to be accounted for as economic capital. The chapter by Michele Seah and Katia Wright in this book focuses on the former; the chapter by Laura Tompkins concentrates slightly more on the latter. Seah and Wright analyze the land possessions of two late medieval English queen consorts, Margaret of France and Margaret of Anjou, answering questions concerning the separation of the possessions of king and queen consort as well as the hitherto open question of how far royal women could be—​and were—​involved in managing their possessions. Tompkins on the other hand focuses on one woman at the royal court of Edward III who was certainly not born with a silver spoon in her mouth. Alice Perrers was Edward’s mistress and used her incredible economic skills to amass treasures. At times, she was considered one of the wealthiest individuals, male or female, in all England. In particular, she knew how to use luxury goods to her advantage, and thus she exercised not only economic but also political power. The question of whether she also managed to convert economic and political capital into social capital has to be answered in the negative, however, as Tompkins points out. 15 Stollberg-​Rilinger, Was heißt Kulturgeschichte des Politischen?; see also Michael J. Braddick and John Walter, eds., Negotiating Power in Early Modern Society: Order, Hierarchy and Subordination in Britain and Ireland (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001), especially the introduction.

16  Karl Marx’s critique of political economy was one of the most influential studies on these questions. In it, Marx prioritized the influence of social background which—​in his opinion—​formed all decisions: “It is not the consciousness of men that determines their existence, but their social existence that determines their consciousness.” Karl Marx, A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy (Moscow: Progress, 1859), preface.

17  See also Amalie Fößel, “The Political Traditions of Female Rulership in Medieval Europe,” in The Oxford Handbook of Women and Gender in Medieval Europe, ed. Judith M. Bennett and Ruth M. Karras (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013), 68–​83 at 80, who points out the great landholdings and lordly domains bestowed upon queens according to the Domesday Book. However, the extent of queenly landholdings varied greatly between different kingdoms and different reigns. See also Anne Foerster, Die Witwe des Königs: Zu Vorstellung, Anspruch und Performanz im englischen und deutschen Hochmittelalter, Mittelalter-​Forschungen 57 (Ostfildern:  Thorbecke, 2018), 217–​34, for a discussion on this in the European High Middle Ages, referring among others to Emma of Normandy, the richest woman of her time, whose son Edward the Confessor dispossessed her of some of her treasures and income. Pick, Her Father’s Daughter, discusses the ownership of monasteries as a political and economic resource.

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The emphasis on women and their economic resources in this volume means analyzing the ways in which women wielded influence, and whether—​as Anne Foerster writes—​“economic capital was one pillar of queenship.”18 The chapters by Charlotte Backerra with Cathérine Ludwig-​Ockenfels and by Cathleen Sarti highlight the agency women at court could have in terms of economic and financial resources and skills. The specific context of the Holy Roman Empire with its complicated and versatile political structure forms the basis for Backerra’s and Ludwig-​Ockenfels’s analysis of consorts and their potential incomes and expenditures as well as their realized economic influence. Together with Seah’s and Wright’s analysis of the landownership of English queens, the relevance of different legal contexts in the various realms becomes obvious. Sarti’s case study of a non-​elite counsellor for the Danish king Christian II discusses the influence a woman with particular economic knowledge and skill could achieve, but also the fall of a woman without an independent power basis. As such, this case study connects back to Tompkins’s case. The afterword by Elena Woodacre not only highlights the connections between the diverse case studies but also looks ahead to as yet unresolved questions in this new field of study. All chapters of this volume face head on the challenges regarding biased source material as well as biased (older and newer) research material which rendered women, their decisions, and their actions nearly invisible. The authors thus not only present several case studies of influential women who held economic power but also discuss how sources can reveal female influence, or which sources can be used to gain insights into these aspects. The women at the premodern royal courts analyzed here have often been neglected in historical research, and their economic power in particular has hitherto failed to attract attention. Existing research on the two lower-​class women presented here, Alice Perrers and Sigbrit Villoms, focused on the black legend of their undue influence upon Edward III and Christian II, respectively. Unsurprisingly, this black legend was hardly conducive to analyzing these women in their own right, and especially to uncovering their entrepreneurship despite challenging circumstances. Research on the empresses, queens, and princess consorts instead often focused on their political role, and more importantly on their dynastic role as wife, mother, patron, or guardian of dynastic memory, as in the case of Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici, the last of her family. The guiding question of the financial and economic influence of women at royal courts is closely connected to several research fields that have attracted increased and much-​needed interest in the past few years.19 In Germany, the research group Residenzenkommission of the Akademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen has worked on administrative aspects of the court and court organization.20 These research efforts were 18 Foerster, Die Witwe des Königs, 217. All translations, unless stated otherwise, are the authors’.

19  See also Katrin Keller, “Frauen—​Hof—​Diplomatie: Die höfische Gesellschaft als Handlungsraum von Frauen in Außenbeziehungen,” in Das Geschlecht der Diplomatie:  Geschlechterrollen in den Außenbeziehungen vom Spätmittelalter bis zum 20. Jahrhundert, ed. Corina Bastian, Externa 5 (Berlin: De Gruyter, 2014), 33–​50 at 33.

20 This group has published its results in the series Residenzenforschung (Thorbecke), including Werner Paravicini, ed., Alltag bei Hofe, Symposium der Residenz-​Kommission der Akademie

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also related to attempts to reconstruct the earnings of courtiers and the expenditures and incomes of specific courts.21 Gender studies on the other hand discusses female rule and queenship. In this field, the number of case studies and surveys has increased significantly.22 Some case studies that include an analysis of the resources available to queens and women at royal courts exist, even though economic and financial aspects have still not been researched nearly enough.23 Recent studies on premodern households allow a broader perspective on courts as economic units, sometimes including a specific gender perspective.24 Court studies and studies on premodern monarchies have der Wissenschaften in Göttingen 3 (Sigmaringen:  Thorbecke, 1995). Studies on court organization are usually case studies, such as Karl-​Heinz Ahrens, Residenz und Herrschaft:  Studien zu Herrschaftsorganisation, Herrschaftspraxis und Residenzbildung der Markgrafen von Brandenburg im späten Mittelalter... Europäische Hochschulschriften. Reihe 3 427 (Frankfurt am Main:  Lang, 1990)  on the Brandenburg court; or Volker Hirsch, Der Hof des Basler Bischofs Johannes von Venningen (1458–​1478):  Verwaltung und Kommunikation, Wirtschaftsführung und Konsum, Residenzenforschung 16 (Ostfildern: Thorbecke, 2004) on the court of the bishop of Basel, Johannes von Venningen. 21  See Mark Hengerer, “Zahlen und Zeremoniell:  Eine skalentheoretische Annäherung an räumliche und monetäre Formen der Ordnung/​Unordnung des Hofes,” in Informelle Strukturen bei Hof: Dresdener Gespräche III zur Theorie des Hofes, ed. Reinhardt Butz and Jan Hirschbiegel, Vita curialis. Form und Wandel höfischer Herrschaft 2 (Berlin: Lit, 2009), 68–​87.

22  Katrin Keller, “Mit den Mitteln einer Frau:  Handlungsspielräume adliger Frauen in Politik und Diplomatie,” in Akteure der Außenbeziehungen:  Netzwerke und Interkulturalität im historischen Wandel, ed. Hillard von Thiessen and Christian Windler, Externa. Geschichte der Außenbeziehungen in neuen Perspektiven 1 (Cologne:  Böhlau, 2010), 219–​44; see esp. footnote 3 for an overview of studies of women and politics, ca. 1990–​2010. The study of queens and queenship has expanded considerably in the past few years; recommended books include Charles Beem, The Lioness Roared: The Problems of Female Rule in English History, Queenship and Power (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006); Bettina Braun, Katrin Keller, and Matthias Schnettger, eds., Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit, Veröffentlichungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung 64 (Vienna:  Böhlau, 2016); Anne Duggan, ed., Queens and Queenship in Medieval Europe: Proceedings of a Conference Held at King’s College London April 1995 (Woodbridge: Boydell, 1997); or Theresa Earenfight, Queenship in Medieval Europe, Queenship and Power (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan, 2013); and Amalie Fößel, Die Königin im mittelalterlichen Reich:  Herrschaftsausübung, Herrschaftsrechte, Handlungsspielräume, Mittelalter-​Forschungen 4 (Stuttgart: Thorbecke, 2000).

23  Christine Juliane Henzler, Die Frauen Karls VII. und Ludwigs XI.: Rolle und Position der Königinnen und Mätressen am französischen Hof (1422–​1483), Beihefte zum Archiv für Kulturgeschichte 71 (Cologne: Böhlau, 2012); Dries Raeymaekers, One Foot in the Palace: The Habsburg Court of Brussels and the Politics of Access in the Reign of Albert and Isabella, 1598–​1621 (Leuven: Leuven University Press, 2013); Retha M. Warnicke, Elizabeth of York and Her Six Daughters-​in-​Law: Fashioning Tudor Queenship, 1485–​1547, Queenship and Power (Cham:  Palgrave Macmillan, 2017); or Wolf, Die Kabinettskassenrechnungen. 24  Theresa Earenfight, ed., Royal and Elite Households in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: More Than Just a Castle (Leiden: Brill, 2018); Nadine Akkerman and Birgit Houben, eds., The Politics of Female Households: Ladies-​in-​Waiting across Early Modern Europe, Rulers & Elites 4 (Leiden: Brill, 2014); or Hirschbiegel and Paravicini, Das Frauenzimmer.

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long focused upon the analysis of royal and noble marriages and the exchange of resources.25 The four chapters of this book combine a specific gender perspective with royal studies and new political history, and focus on economic and financial history to show the impact women made on premodern royal courts via their economic capital. It is, moreover, our intention to encourage further studies and to introduce possible approaches, sources, and challenges. Since this study marks the beginning of a broader discussion on the economic and financial aspects of courts, bibliography on these topics is included at the end of this book. This selection is obviously missing important courts like those of the Iberian Peninsula, France, and Burgundy (among many others), which is due to our own research focus, but we hope to inspire further studies into European, Asian, and African courts. In the long term, we hope this future research will someday enable comparative studies on the economic power of women in premodern royal courts from a global perspective.

25 Anna Bellavitis and Beatrice Zucca Micheletto, Gender, Law and Economic Well-​Being in Europe from the Fifteenth to the Nineteenth Century, Gender and Well-​Being (New York: Routledge, 2018); Almut Bues, ed., Frictions and Failures: Cultural Encounters in Crisis, Deutsches Historisches Institut Warschau. Quellen und Studien 34 (Wiesbaden: Harrassowitz, 2017); Anne-​Simone Knöfel, Dynastie und Prestige:  Die Heiratspolitik der Wettiner, Dresdner Historische Studien 9 (Cologne:  Böhlau, 2009); Pamela Sharpe, Women, Dowries and Agency (Manchester:  Manchester University Press, 2016); Heide Wunder, “Er ist die Sonn, sie ist der Mond”: Frauen in der frühen Neuzeit (Munich: Beck, 1992). See also the discussion on marriage from a financial aspect in Opitz-​Belakhal, “Zwischen Luxus und Armut,” 35–​39.

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Chapter 1

THE MEDIEVAL ENGLISH QUEEN AS LANDHOLDER SOME REFLECTIONS ON SOURCES AND METHODOLOGY MICHELE SEAH AND KATIA WRIGHT* of queenship developed from feminist scholars’ interest in women of power and a growing movement of political history discussing the expansion of power to speci ic elite groups. Queenship research changed both subject and theoretical frameworks by describing “practices of queenship in Western Europe […] in terms of marriage, motherhood, court ceremonial, sexuality, religion, literature, art history, and […] political authority.”1 Key works in the scholarship of royal women note that although a queen’s power originated from the king, a queen still represented and exercised her own authority.2 These studies have observed that a queen’s power came not only from her role as mediator and in luencer but also from familial connections, the education or guardianship of children, and the control of money.3 What is clear is that this agency was dependent, in some way, on the king or the institution of the crown.4 A fundamental element of a queen’s power came in the form of her economic revenue. As with any great magnate or king, a medieval queen’s income was important to supporting her political power. However, this aspect of a queen’s agency has remained understudied, with John Carmi Parsons noting that a dislike for administrative and institutional history has impeded deeper investigation of the resources of queenship.5 In * Michele Seah completed her PhD at the University of Newcastle, Australia and her research focused on the material foundations of ifteenth-century English queenship. Katia Wright is a PhD student at the University of Winchester whose research focuses on the lands of Five English queens across the fourteenth century, and is also the Assistant Curator (Archives) at the AGC Museum, Winchester. We wish to thank Cathleen Sarti for inviting us to be a part of this edited collection and the anonymous reviewers for their comments and feedback. 1 Theresa Earen ight, “Without the Persona of the Prince: Kings, Queens and the Idea of Monarchy in Late Medieval Europe,” Gender and History 19 (2007): 1–21 at 1.

2 Anne J. Duggan, “Introduction,” in Queens and Queenship in Medieval Europe (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2002), xv–xxii at xx–xxii. 3 Earen ight, “Without the Persona of the Prince,” 1–21 at 5.

4 Lisa Benz, “In the Best Interest of the Queen: Isabella of France, Edward II and the Image of a Functional Relationship,” in Fourteenth Century England VIII, ed. Jeffrey S. Hamilton (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2014), 21–42 at 28. 5 John Carmi Parsons, “Introduction: Family, Sex and Power: The Rhythms of Medieval Queenship,” in Medieval Queenship, ed. John Carmi Parsons (Stroud: Sutton, 1998), 1–13 at 1.

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recent years, many more works have analyzed different elements of a queen’s income, including her holdings, her queens’ gold, and her household and exchequer.6 The work of Hilda Johnstone was some of the earliest to consider the importance of a queen’s income and administration, analyzing the connections between a king and a queen’s administrative offices and power.7 Amalie Fößel’s work on a queen’s wealth in the Middle Ages seconds this, and questions whether a queen’s vast income indicated her position as an “officeholder,” and whether there was a direct link between a queen’s finances and her authority.8 This is continued in the work of Attila Bárány, who states that “income is clearly linked to power” and observes that many questions regarding the income of royal women, and indeed queens, have yet to be analyzed and answered.9 With this in mind, it is important to consider the sources of a queen’s income and how power was granted to and exercised by a queen through these revenues. As this work discusses, medieval English queens received income through a number of different sources, the most prominent of which was their landholdings. Several studies of England’s late medieval queens discuss the holdings and expected incomes.10 From these

6 Ana Maria A.  S. Rodrigues and Manuela Santos Silva, “Private Properties, Seigniorial Tributes and Jurisdictional Rents: The Income of the Queens of Portugal in the Late Middle Ages,” in Women and Wealth in Late Medieval Europe, ed. Theresa Earenfight (New York: Palgrave, 2010), 209–​28; Steinar Imsen, “Late Medieval Scandinavian Queenship,” in Queens and Queenship in Medieval Europe, ed. Anne J. Duggan (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2002), 53–​74; Kristen Geaman, “Queen’s Gold and Intercession: The Case of Eleanor of Aquitaine,” Medieval Feminist Forum: A Journal of Gender and Sexuality 46 (2010): 10–​33; Hilda Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in Chapters in the Administrative History of Medieval England, vol. 5, ed. Thomas F.  Tout (Manchester:  University of Manchester Press, 1930), 231–​89; Hilda Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in The English Government at Work, 1327–​1336, vol. 1, ed. James F.  Willard, et  al. (Cambridge, MA:  Medieval Academy of America, 1940), 250–​99; A. R. Myers, “The Captivity of a Royal Witch: The Household Accounts of Queen Joan of Navarre, 1419–​21,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 24 (1940): 262–​84; 26 (1941): 82–​100; A.  R. Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou, 1452–​3,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 40 (1957): 79–​113; 391–​431; A. R. Myers, “The Household of Queen Elizabeth Woodville, 1466–​7,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 50 (1967–​68): 207–​35; 443–​81; Derek Neal, “The Queen’s Grace:  English Queenship, 1464–​1503” (MA thesis, McMaster University, 1996). 7 Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in Chapters in the Administrative History of Medieval England; Hilda Johnstone, “The Queen’s Exchequer under the Three Edwards,” in Historical Essays in Honour of James Tait, ed. James G. Edwards, et al. (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1933), 143–​53; Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in The English Government at Work. 8 Amalie Fößel, “The Queen’s Wealth in the Middle Ages,” Majestas 13 (2005): 23–​45 at 25.

9 Attila Bárány, “Medieval Queens and Queenship:  A Retrospective on Income and Power,” in Annual of Medieval Studies at CEU, vol. 19, ed. J. Rasson et al. (Budapest: Archaeolingua Foundation and Publishing House, 2013), 149–​201 at 149.

10  For example, Margaret Howell, Eleanor of Provence:  Queenship in Thirteenth Century England (Oxford:  Wiley Blackwell, 1998); Sara Cockerill, Eleanor of Castile:  The Shadow Queen (Stroud:  Amberley, 2014); Lisa Benz St. John, Three Medieval Queens:  Queenship and the Crown in Fourteenth Century England (New  York:  Palgrave, 2012); Neal, “The Queen’s Grace.” Elena Woodacre’s work on Joan of Navarre includes detailed study of queens’ lands: “Mapping the Lands of an Acquisitive Queen:  Joan of Navarre,” presented at the Kings and Queens 5 Conference at Clemson University, April 2016.

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studies a queen’s agency from her landholdings has been implied; however, few studies have analyzed a queen’s lands and their administration as a form of a queen’s economic agency and precisely what that looked like.11 This chapter provides an overview of how we can closely study a queen’s economic resources and what sources we have at our disposal for such an examination. A comparative exploration of the relevant sources for the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries is presented in order to highlight what can be achieved for studies of queens in these different centuries. Two case studies from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in England illustrate, firstly, a specific way of using the evidence to illuminate queens’ positions as landholders and administrators, and, secondly, how a broader understanding of these roles may be arrived at by a more conceptual analysis of the data available on and relevant to queens’ lands and other economic resources.

Studying Medieval Queens as Landowners

The idea of queens as landowners is not one that sits comfortably within the ideological and legal frameworks that shaped the lives of married women in medieval England, especially during the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries.12 Married women during this period did not have any legal rights to own, purchase, or dispose of by selling or gifting any property such as land.13 This stark theoretical state of affairs was in reality moderated by such things as marriage settlements that saw women typically being granted property in jointure or living with the expectation of receiving dower for their maintenance if they were widowed. Scholars such as Jennifer Ward, Rowena Archer, and Barbara Harris have demonstrated that the realities of life for the nobility at least could and often did see 11 Carmi Parsons begins this work with his study of Eleanor of Castile; see John Carmi Parsons, Eleanor of Castile: Queen and Society in Thirteenth Century England (New York: St. Martin’s, 1995). He discusses her collection of lands during her tenure as queen, their general administration, and how this impacted her image as queen throughout history to the modern day. However, the analysis of the lands themselves and of Eleanor’s economic agency from them is limited. Neal’s thesis examines the lands of Elizabeth Woodville and Elizabeth of York, briefly discussing the patterns in landholdings and the relationship between lands and queenly power.

12  Many other studies focus on medieval women, including royal women, who were recognized as autonomous landowners and acted as such. In the case of royal women, an example of such a study is Lucy K. Pick, Her Father’s Daughter: Gender, Power, and Religion in the Early Spanish Kingdoms (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2017). This research focused on royal daughters in the twelfth-​ century kingdom of León who were consecrated virgins and lords of certain secular and ecclesiastical lands and properties. These women were the legal owners and used their lands and properties to create and maintain networks of power, which underscored their roles within the ruling system of the kingdom.

13  Marjorie McIntosh, “The Benefits and Drawbacks of Femme Sole Status in England, 1300–​1630,” Journal of British Studies 44 (July 2005): 410–​38 at 412. In the early fourteenth century, a trend emerged whereby women could assume the status of a femme sole, that is, a status that bestowed on a married woman a legal and economic identity that allowed her to operate independently from her husband. This meant, among other things, that she could legally own and administer lands and property. However, this trend was not prevalent among the nobility.

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married noblewomen become practically, if not legally, responsible for the maintenance and administration of the family’s lands and property.14 English queens of this period did not easily fit into this situation. As discussed further later in this chapter, the lands of the queens were predominantly dower lands granted to them for their immediate use, but an air of ambiguity exists concerning the technicalities of their ownership. Whilst the status of the queens appears to have been synonymous with the status of femme sole—​that is, a married woman with an independent legal and economic identity—​the language of the grants was occasionally unclear. In practice, however, it appears that the queens were in possession of lands for their use and benefit despite being married women. A number of questions spring to mind in relation to this situation, partly because of this ambiguity but also because of the queen’s gender. To what degree was the queen entitled to all the rights that typically accompany ownership of an estate and with how much certainty could she act to protect and enforce her rights as the “lord of the manor”? For that matter, how much responsibility did she bear towards the tenants and dependants of the estate if her position as the landowner was uncertain?15 Notwithstanding the possibility that the queen’s role as landowner was exactly comparable to that of the king’s or any other male landowner’s, these questions must still be considered within a gendered framework. Queenship research has demonstrated that the expectations and contemporary social constructs surrounding the position of queens were influenced by gender considerations. As Helen Maurer observes, theoretical gender roles during the late medieval period placed all women, even queens, in an unequal and often subservient position in relation to men and circumscribed their behaviour and attributes accordingly.16 Queenly landownership, therefore, was a situation that jarred against these theoretical foundations. How are we to make sense of a married female noble landowner who was legally and practically entitled to own and administer her lands herself (which, in essence, is what the queen might be perceived as) during a period when such an entity rarely existed?17 14 Rowena E. Archer, “ ‘How ladies […] who love on their manors ought to manage their households and estates’: Women as Landowners and Administrators in the Later Middle Ages,” in Woman Is a Worthy Wight: Women in English Society, c.1200–​1500, ed. P. J. P. Goldberg (Stroud: Sutton, 1992), 149–​81; Barbara J. Harris, English Aristocratic Women, 1450–​1550: Marriage and Family, Property and Careers (New York: Oxford University Press, 2002); Jennifer C. Ward, English Noblewomen in the Later Middle Ages (New York: Routledge, 2014). 15  The question of the certainty of landownership for queens is not as clear-​cut as might be assumed. However, it requires more discussion than can be allowed for within the scope of this chapter; it suffices to say that any uncertainty was not necessarily related to gender considerations but rather to the political, economic, and legal fluctuations of the period. 16  Helen Maurer, Margaret of Anjou:  Queenship and Power in Late Medieval England (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2003), 8.

17  Michael Hicks, “Crossing Generations: Dower, Jointure and Courtesy,” in The Fifteenth-​Century Inquisitions ‘Post mortem’: A Companion, ed. Michael Hicks (Woodbridge: Boydell, 2012), 25–​46 at 38. Heiresses were a particular case, in that married heiresses held their inherited lands in their own right but were considered femme couvertes and, therefore, control of their lands was exercised by their husbands.

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In practice, no matter the legal technicalities, queens should have had the same levels of power, authority, and agency with respect to the lands they owned as all others, kings and nobles alike. Yet we should still ask what it meant to be the only married legal female landowner of the period. Did the queens exercise their rights and treat their responsibilities as landowners in the same way as kings and other male nobles? Did they have the same expectations as any other landowner of their tenants and estate officials? How were the queens themselves viewed when it came to owning and administering lands? Did their tenants hold different perceptions and expectations of their lord or landlord when that individual turned out to be the queen? These questions, and more besides, form part of the gendered framework within which we must conduct research into queens’ lands. Then too there is the issue of the precise definitions of concepts with which we often engage in royal studies. Queenship scholars have enthusiastically embraced the growing study of women and power, often marrying such research with gendered perspectives. Much of this work has extended and continues to extend our comprehension of these concepts, and research into the economic resources and lands of queens is no less subject to such requirements. We also need to be cognisant of the variable meanings of “power.” As Max Weber originally explained, power exists in many forms but at its most basic, it may be defined as “the ability to get people to do things or make things happen.”18 This ability to act effectively may be backed up by other elements such as coercion, stress, threat, or force, but it is in effect the ability to gain compliance.19 Different terms such as “authority,” “influence,” and “agency” have been used to describe the different variants of power, each conveying subtle differences in meaning. Yet there is no hard and fast rule about the boundaries, if any exist, between these different kinds of power. Important for research into queens’ lands, such variability of meaning for this concept suggests that we might seek manifestations of queens’ economic power in a variety of different avenues, including those that are indirect and less explicit. What, then, is the relationship between lands and power? Lands and economic resources provided queens with material forms of what Pierre Bourdieu called capital, in this case economic capital.20 Their status as landowners and landholders gave them the wherewithal to use this capital as they saw fit, notwithstanding that the primary focus of these assets was the support of the queens’ households. Consideration of the meanings of power and some of its variants in relation to lands, therefore, steers us towards asking exactly how queens’ economic capital assisted in the exercise of power in its different forms. Such investigations have the potential to shed light on queens’ application of agency in many different aspects, including economic, social, and political. Queens had the ability to effect change or response, and their use of their economic capital underwrote their actions. They transformed their economic capital into many other 18 Benz St. John, Three Medieval Queens, 17. 19  Maurer, Margaret of Anjou, 5.

20  Pierre Bourdieu, “The Forms of Capital,” in Handbook of Theory and Research for the Sociology of Education, ed. J. G. Richardson (New York: Greenwood, 1986), 241–​58 at 243.

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forms of capital, such as social, political, and symbolic, and in doing so demonstrated the relationship between their economic resources and their levels of power. The surviving evidence for fourteenth-​ and fifteenth-​century England includes vast numbers of records in the chancery and the exchequer. The chancery was the largest writing office producing the king’s official letters and documents throughout this period. Its importance was equal to that of the exchequer, the oldest of the writing offices and one that focused solely on the king’s revenue. For the fifteenth century, the records of the Duchy of Lancaster are another potential source of relevant information and evidence. Robert Somerville attests to the duchy’s importance in the administrative records as “a heritage of lands and jurisdiction in England and Wales vested since 1399 in the sovereign but entirely separate from the other crown possessions.”21 Whilst the duchy records have by no means survived in wholly complete or continuous series, the fact that the monarchs of England from Henry IV (r. 1399–​1413) onwards also have been dukes of Lancaster meant that they have a relevance for research on queens’ economic resources that other noble estate archives are unlikely to have. During the fifteenth century, parts of the duchy were held by various queens in dower or were used to provide dower income. This last observation points to a key issue where the central and duchy records are concerned. Queens appeared in these records only when their interests overlapped with those of the crown or the king himself. Johnstone’s work on queens’ exchequers and households in the fourteenth century have highlighted how the administration of a queen was essentially a smaller version of the king’s, with her own treasurer and exchequer, and a strong administrative body in her household.22 Yet many of the lands queens held were granted in dower from the royal estates and on their deaths reverted to the crown.23 Even during the queens’ tenures, many of their household and estate officials continued to be involved in the kings’ administrations, a situation that points to an ambiguity surrounding the question of how separate kings’ and queens’ households and administrations really were.24 This may well have been a contributor to the fact that even within these records, evidence relating to queens’ lands and economic resources survived only when connected to the crown in some way. For both the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, key chancery and exchequer records have proven useful—​namely, the Patent, Close, and Fine Rolls. Other important government records include the Inquisitions Post-​mortem, ancient deeds, and the Parliament Rolls. The dowers of the queens were often recorded in one or other of these types of government records. For example, the details pertaining to the lands granted to Anne of 21 Robert Somerville, “The Duchy of Lancaster Records,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 29 (1947): 1–​17 at 2.

22  Johnstone, “The Queen’s Exchequer”; Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in The English Government at Work. 23  B. P. Wolffe, The Royal Demesne in English History: The Crown Estate in the Governance of the Realm from the Conquest to 1509 (London: Allen & Unwin, 1971), 54–​56. 24  Lisa Benz St. John considers this question in Three Medieval Queens, chap. 4.

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Bohemia (1366–​1394; r. 1382–​1394) in dower were recorded in the Patent Rolls, as were the dower grants to Philippa of Hainault (ca. 1310/​15–​1369; r. 1328–​1369).25 Margaret of Anjou (1430–​1482; r.  1445–​1461, 1470–​1471), the consort of Henry VI in the fifteenth century, was granted a substantial dower, the details of which were recorded on the Parliamentary Roll in 1444. Similarly, the dower for Margaret’s successor, Elizabeth Woodville (ca. 1437–​1492; r.  1464–​1483), was granted to her in the form of lands, estates, and fee farms, each recorded in the Patent or Parliamentary Rolls.26 In addition, records relevant to the queens have been found within the archive of the Duchy of Lancaster, such as the single household account extant for Margaret of Anjou.27 Another vital group of records is the estate archives of the queens—​that is, the written records produced by their household and estate officials. Different levels of officials were employed for household and estate administration—​namely, those in the local and regional areas and those at the central level. By this period, a variety of records were regularly produced during the course of administering an estate. At the local level, manorial documents, including financial accounts and court rolls, were produced by officials such as bailiffs and reeves. Central records were compiled by officials, such as receivers and auditors, who produced a variety of records, including financial accounts, land valors, accounts of arrears, and registers of estate letters. The survival rate of the estate archives of our centuries’ queens appears at first sight to be abysmal, in keeping with the general state of English medieval manorial records as a whole. These records could have a sparse and inconsistent survival rate with the added issue of being inconveniently located in many different regional archives. Nevertheless, it is not necessarily true that records relating to estates and lands belonging to the queens have not survived in great numbers. What is required are organized and detailed searches of the archives as part of systematic studies of individual estates owned by the queens. The possible yields of such searches may be illustrated by a single example as follows. Among the Duchy of Lancaster records for the south parts of England are an essentially complete series of receivers’ accounts for the lands and estates granted to and owned by Elizabeth Woodville, consort to Edward IV (r. 1461–​1470, 1471–​1483), during her tenure as queen. These records are not labelled in the catalogue as being related to queens’ lands and were discovered only when examined individually.28 Other peripheral evidence remains that may be related to our research. For instance, where the fifteenth-​century queens are concerned, extant correspondence by and related to the queens is another incidental source of relevant evidence. The letters of 25 Calendar of Patent Rolls (hereafter CPR), 1381–​85, 125–​26; CPR, 1330–​34, 55–​56.

26  CPR, 1461–​67, 430, 433, 445, 480–​82; “Edward IV: June 1467,” in The Parliament Rolls of Medieval England (hereafter PROME), ed. and trans. Paul Brand, Anne Curry, Chris Given-​Wilson, Rosemary E. Horrox, Geoffrey Martin, W. Mark Ormrod, and J. R. S. Phillips, 16 vols. (Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer: 2005), 5:571–​635 at 625–​28. 27  The National Archives (hereafter TNA) DL28/​5/​8. This account was prepared by William Cotton, the queen’s receiver-​general, who was simultaneously the receiver-​general of the Duchy of Lancaster. 28  TNA DL29/​711/​11460–​11475.

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Margaret of Anjou, in particular, form a sizeable category of evidence, with nearly 100 extant letters.29 Unhappily, correspondence for the other fourteenth-​ and fifteenth-​ century queens does not appear to have survived in any great amount despite the fact that it is highly likely that correspondence in abundance once existed for each individual. Notwithstanding the inconsistent survival rate of relevant sources, what remains is enough to build a picture of queens’ economic resources. Many details may be extracted and used in fruitful ways, such as the types of landholdings and information on estate administrative matters. The sources tell us what lands were owned by which queen. They help build a picture of the extent and spread of the lands and holdings of the queens in both the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, with the possibility that changes in patterns of holding by the queens that occurred from one century to the other may be better highlighted. The sources frequently also shed light on the types of holdings granted to each individual queen, with the attendant implications for the types of revenue that the queen as landholder could expect to garner.30 As many a social or economic historian has discovered in the past, manorial records, such as accounts and court rolls, are a particularly valuable source of information on estate issues related to repairs, crops, complaints, and disputes, among others.31 In relation to queens, for instance, the Close Rolls reveal that both Margaret of France (ca. 1279–​1318; r. 1299–​1307) and Isabella of France (ca. 1295–​1358; r. 1308–​1327) were granted timber for repairs to be carried out on their properties.32 Such information may also be used to increase our understanding of our queens’ capabilities in the area of estate administration, with implications for economic power and agency, bearing in mind that the levels of attention and interaction from each of the queens would have varied.33

Sources of a Queen’s Income

Through these chancery records and other types of evidence, it is possible to identify the different types of a queen’s income. These included but were not limited to queen’s gold, a 10 percent payment from any voluntary fine paid to the king that eventually became notoriously difficult to collect, and customs and grants gifted to her by the king.34 Port 29 Helen Maurer and B.  M. Cron, eds., The Letters of Margaret of Anjou (Woodbridge:  Boydell, 2019).

30  The types of holdings queens owned included manors, castles, lordships, parks, forests, bailiwicks, and hundreds. 31  Many estate studies are based on such records, such as J. M. W. Bean, The Estates of the Percy Family 1416–​1537 (London: Oxford University Press, 1958).

32  Calendar of Close Rolls (hereafter CCR), 1302–​7, 175—​timber granted to Margaret of France to repair her properties of the Castle of Marlborough and the Manor of Sevenhampton; CCR, 1313–​18, 542—​Isabella of France granted timber for the repair of the Castle of Pevensey. 33  CPR, 1348–​50, 530. As an example of the queen’s attention to estate matters, Philippa of Hainault ordered building work to be undertaken in her park at Brigstock.

34 Geaman, “Queen’s Gold and Intercession,” 10–​33. Queen’s gold can be seen throughout the surviving entries of the Close Rolls. An example of this is CCR, 1288–​96, 158, in which Eleanor of Castile

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customs were often added to bolster other sources of revenue and could be granted for a limited period until other income was provided or simply continued for the queen’s lifetime.35 Grants, on the other hand, could consist of anything, from wine to lump sums of money to wardships.36 These were rarely more than one-​off grants to aid in relieving household costs or to support the payment of debts. In addition to this, queens were also granted large amounts of landed property so as to maintain a steady stream of income to which the queen’s gold, customs, and grants were supplementary. The main purpose of this income was to fund the queen’s household; however, as a landholder she also reaped other benefits and, indeed, financial power. Lands were a significant source of income for the queens of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries. Traditionally, queens were granted dower lands upon their marriage, to be held after the king’s death as queen dowagers. The annual revenue for these lands was normally set at £4,000 to £4,500 per annum. This continued throughout the discussed period, though some discrepancies occurred, with both Joan of Navarre and Margaret of Anjou receiving a much larger amount of 10,000 marks (£6,666 13s 4d).37 Although the discrepancies may have been due to political negotiations, the income highlights the expected expenditure of England’s fourteenth-​and fifteenth-​century queens. is seeking to receive her queen’s gold payment from Bogo de Clare, who has just paid a voluntary fine to the king.

35  Evidence of these port customs can be seen throughout the chancery records, but mostly in the Close Rolls. Philippa of Hainault, for instance, received several ongoing customs, including one from the Port of London to aid in the expenses of the household of the royal children, from September 26, 1345, to May 2, 1358 (CCR, 1343–​46, 617; CCR, 1354–​60, 447). Philippa also received income from the customs of the Port of London in recompense for the income lost when she surrendered the castle, town, and honour of Pontefract, from June 12, 1349, to May 2, 1358 (CCR, 1349–​54, 37; CCR, 1354–​60, 447).

36  Evidence of these grants can also be seen throughout the governmental records, predominantly the Close Rolls. Examples include Philippa of Hainault receiving a further grant of lands to hold in dower (CCR, 1354–​60, 597). Isabella of France was granted a payment of £470 by the king from the Chamberlain of South Wales and the goods of Roger Mortimer to fund the expenses of her household (CCR, 1330–​33, 212). Further examples of wardships can be found across the Inquisitions Post-​ mortem, Close Rolls, and Patent Rolls, with evidence of Philippa of Hainault holding the wardship of the heir of William Latimer found in all three sources: Inquisitions Post-​mortem, vol. 7, File 689; CCR, 1333–​37, 547–​48; CPR, 1334–​38, 180–​81. Similarly, the Parliamentary Rolls record that in 1482, Elizabeth Woodville was granted “the wardships and the marriages of the heirs of her tenants of so much of the Duchy of Lancaster as she [held] to her own use” (“Edward IV: June 1467 to January 1483,” in PROME, 6:196–​225 at 207). Royal mistresses could also receive similar forms of income, the impact of which is discussed in Chapter 3. 37  Catherine de Valois received instead 40,000 ecus as stated in the Treaty of Troyes, which has been printed and translated in Anne Curry, “Two Kingdoms, One King: The Treaty of Troyes (1420) and the Creation of the Double Monarchy of England and France,” in “The Contending Kingdoms”:  France and England 1420–​1700, ed. Glenn Richardson (Aldershot:  Routledge, 2008), 35–​41. Myers implies that this is equal to 10,000 marks, similar to Joan and Margaret of France. However, this is not entirely clear and the fact that succeeding queens returned to the earlier amount of £4,500 suggests that this was not a permanent change in income allowance. Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 80.

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Johnstone’s research on the queen’s household indicates that the dower lands of queens of the mid-​thirteenth century and onwards were held during the king’s lifetime although dower was stipulated as income for the dowager.38 This has been echoed by other historians of the period.39 However, source analysis reveals more complexity to this issue, with queens holding lands either “in dower” or “for the queen’s lifetime,” and sometimes both.40 Indeed, Johnstone’s argument that queens held their dower lands during their husbands’ lifetimes is disputed in Margaret Howell’s study of Eleanor of Provence’s financial resources. Howell asserts that there is absolutely no evidence to confirm that Eleanor of Provence ever held or received income from her dower lands during her husband’s lifetime.41 Moreover, she clarifies that the income from the dower lands was in fact received by Henry III (r. 1216–​1272), and, instead, Eleanor’s household was funded by other means.42 More confusion over dower lands is added by the clear evidence that fifteenth-​century queens held their dower as consorts, during their husbands’ lifetimes, as a source of income for their households, even though this was not the use to which dower lands were typically put.43 Although queens received other forms of income, as in the case of the fourteenth-​century queens, the lands they controlled were clearly stipulated as dower. This is clear in the case of Margaret of Anjou. Nonetheless, what is evident from this is that the fourteenth century was a pivotal moment in queenly landholding and it is where the answer to the question of the holding of a queen’s dower lands lies.44 From this alone, it is certain that queens held lands and were expected to hold lands for their lifetime as a key source of income to fund their households. The income 38 Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in Chapters in the Administrative History of Medieval England.

39  Benz St. John, Three Medieval Queens, 65; Benz, “In the Best Interest of the Queen,” 21–​42 at 31–​32:  “In fact, Margaret was the first queen to hold her dower during her husband’s lifetime”; Parsons, Eleanor of Castile, 71; Cockerill, Eleanor of Castile, 146; Anne Crawford, “The King’s Burden? The Consequences of Royal Marriage in Fifteenth-​Century England,” in Patronage, the Crown and the Provinces in Later Medieval England, ed. Ralph A.  Griffiths (Gloucester:  Sutton, 1981), 33–​56 at 33–​34; Anne Crawford, “The Queen’s Council in the Middle Ages,” English Historical Review 116 (2001): 1193–​1211 at 1194; Fößel, “The Queen’s Wealth,” 23–​45 at 40; Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in The English Government at Work, 250–​99 at 253; and Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 82.

40  In the Patent Rolls dating from the reign of Edward III for his consort, Philippa of Hainault, Philippa is noted as holding land “in dower” (CPR, 1348–​50, 323), “during her lifetime” (CPR, 1334–​38, 123), and “in dower and for life” (CPR, 1330–​34, 420) across her tenure as queen consort. 41  Margaret Howell, “The Resources of Eleanor of Provence as Queen Consort,” English Historical Review 102 (1987): 372–​93 at 380–​83. 42  Howell, “The Resources of Eleanor of Provence,” 372–​93 at 383.

43  Fifteenth-​century queens generally held and controlled their dower lands during the king’s lifetime, though this was not meant to be the practice. Due to the unusual political situation, many of the queens lost their dower lands as dowagers.

44  Further research is needed to analyze the dower of medieval queens, noting the different forms of income and the struggles of widows to gain their promised dower.

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from these lands came in several ways, from the rents of tenants on the held property, to the income from manor courts, fines, and tolls. During this period, landownership itself changed, with many turning to leasing holdings, removing the issues of managing and farming property whilst still receiving an income.45 These lands also gave the rights to certain appurtenances, which the holder could sell off to the highest bidder, alongside wardships and the chattels of felons. Interesting enough, certain lands did not bring rents specifically in money; Philippa of Hainault is found in the Close Rolls receiving rent through a pair of hare-skin gloves once a year, and a list of properties pertaining to Anne of Bohemia, in the Inquisitions Post-​mortem, lists rents of a pair of gilt spurs, a barbed arrow, one pound of pepper, one pound of cumin, and a pair of gloves.46 Nonetheless, this income, across the varied spectrum, ensured a steady stream of revenue across the year to provide what was expected to fund a queen’s expenses. These lands also provided a source of queenly power both inside and outside of the main political arena. As with a male magnate, the queen’s financial position and political power were interdependent, and thus “through her lands and revenues, the queen had the opportunity to gain significant economic and political weight.”47 Indeed this by-​product of landownership enabled queens to “exercise authority in their own right, to dispense patronage directly, and to attract a retinue.”48 Evidence of this is scattered throughout the chancery rolls, showing queens granting income to specific members of their households and retinues, rewarding good service with grants of offices and even lands to be held for life without rent.49 Even though the king confirmed these grants, thus explaining their existence in the chancery rolls, they show the queen’s willingness to dispense her patronage and encourage her retinue, not just in her role as queen 45 Numerous studies have analyzed this change in landholding, known as demesne leasing, with historians arguing that the impact of the agrarian crises in the early fourteenth century and the Black Death altered the course of landholding. Though demesne leasing is seen in earlier periods, its popularity drastically increased in the years after the Black Death. Ian Kershaw, “The Great Famine and the Agrarian Crisis in England in the Later Middle Ages 1315–​1322,” Past and Present 59 (1973): 3–​50; and W. Mark Ormrod, “The Politics of Pestilence. Government in England after the Black Death,” in The Black Death in England, ed. W. Mark Ormrod et al. (Donnington: Watkins, 2003), 147–​82. 46  CCR, 1360–​64, 331; Calendar of Inquisitions Post-​mortem (hereafter CIPM), vol. 17, Entry 253. 47  Bárány, “Medieval Queens and Queenship,” 149–​201 at 173.

48  Lisa Benz, “Conspiracy and Alienation: Queen Margaret of France and Piers Gaveston, the King’s Favourite,” in Queenship, Gender, and Reputation in the Medieval and Early Modern West, 1060–​1600, ed. Zita E. Rohr et al. (London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2016), 119–​43 at 126.

49  Many examples can be found throughout the chancery rolls, but instances from the Close Rolls include:  Anne of Bohemia granted a member of staff the office and income of the janitor at the Castle and Manor of Moorend, one of her properties, for his good service (CCR, 1392–​96, 299); Elizabeth Woodville rewarded Robert Iseham for his service by appointing him steward of her manor at Geddington, and she also appointed her brother Anthony, Earl Rivers, to offices including master of the horse and justice of the peace in Hertfordshire (TNA DL37/​38, ms. 4–​5).

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but equally in her role as landowner.50 While it is unclear from the existing evidence whether all fourteenth-​and fifteenth-​century queens were equally inclined to do so, it is clear that the lands of late medieval English queens granted them the ability to act in a similar manner to a male magnate. Moreover, these two strands of income and authority brought by landownership indicate the importance of landholding for queens and the power it granted them. This is highlighted further in the following case studies.

Landownership in Dispute: Margaret of France

Between 1311 and 1313, Margaret of France, widow of Edward I, and at this time dowager queen of England, came into dispute with the four heiresses of one of her tenants. The dispute itself was over a messuage, some land, and several tenements within one of the queen’s dower properties, the manor of Gillingham, in the county of Dorset.51 The evidence of this dispute shows that Margaret and/​or her steward tried to prevent the daughters of John Goce from inheriting their father’s properties, claiming instead that they were held directly by the queen herself. Thanks to the detailed nature of the chancery rolls, it is possible to follow the case across several different types of records. These are the Close Rolls, enrolled copies of private royal letters and commands; the Inquisitions Post-​mortem, a specific series of inquisitions held at the death of a tenant in chief of the king to establish the landholdings of the dead tenant and the crown’s rights in them; and the Fine Rolls, enrolled copies of instruments issued as letters patent or close under the great seal and relating to matters in which the crown had a direct or indirect financial interest. Due to the different roles of each type of record, they offer differing categories of information, providing their own strengths and weakness as sources of this dispute. The Close Rolls present the most detailed information, revealing the crown’s role within the dispute and the actions of both the king and the queen dowager. The Inquisitions Post-​ mortem give detailed information regarding the lands involved, highlighting what precisely was held by John Goce, and thus in dispute. Though the inquisitions were to list the lands pertaining to the crown, they sometimes offer further information regarding the landownership, and in this case they record additional information not found in the other surviving records. Because of the focus surrounding the financial interests of the crown, it could seem surprising that disputes appeared in the Fine Rolls; however, this was quite common due to the potential interest the crown may have in the financial outcome. With this in mind, it is necessary to utilize all three sources to fully comprehend the events of this dispute. 50 The queen made many of the originals of these grants in her own letters patent, usually for her life. The king then confirmed these grants, either in his letters close or patent, and often increased them for the life of the grantee. Unfortunately, the Patent Rolls of the queens of England do not survive, and the only evidence we see of them, and the queen’s actions with them, are when they are confirmed by the king within the chancery rolls. 51  The manor of Gillingham, in Dorset, was held by at least four queens across this period: Eleanor of Castile, Margaret of France, Isabella of France, and Philippa of Hainault.

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Chronologically, the case first appears in the Close Rolls on July 20, 1311, in which the entry notes that the property within the manor of Gillingham, which Margaret claimed pertained to her as part of the demesne of the manor, was also claimed as the inheritance of the four daughters of John Goce, “by sergeanty of fee of being forester of Gillingham Forest and keeper of the park of the manor of Gillingham.”52 A second entry, dated September 14, 1311, notes an order by the daughters employing two attorneys to work in chancery on their case.53 The case then appears in an entry in the Inquisitions Post-​mortem, dated December 5, 1311, giving the full scope of the lands held by John Goce.54 As mentioned earlier, this entry also includes further details of the property dispute that do not appear elsewhere in the surviving chancery records. The initial memorandum notes that Margaret’s bailiff, who is not named, seized certain tenements within Goce’s property, stating that they were “to be of the demesne of the manor of Gillingham, which was assigned to [Margaret] in dower, and of the ancient demesne of the crown.”55 A further three memorandums call Margaret to chancery to explain her actions, note her appointment of an attorney to act on her behalf, and order the treasurer to assess the rolls to find out to whom the properties pertain.56 The entry closes with the statement that Walter Goce, John’s father, was a “forester of fee” and therefore held a virgate within the bailiwick in which the tenements and other lands were situated, and which John then held as well.57 Another entry appears in the Close Rolls, on December 19, 1311, in which the dispute continues, with the local escheator, Roger de Wellesworth, ordered to hold the lands in tenencia, whilst Margaret continues her claims that the property in question remains to her according to the custom of the manor.58 In May 1312, five months after the previous entry, the case features in the Fine Rolls, which give much the same information.59 However, the entry also notes that an investigation into the dispute was held in the king’s court, resulting in the king summoning the parties to Parliament, but then revoking the summons. The reasoning behind the revoked summons is not included and is not made clear in any later entries. 52 CCR, 1307–​13, 366–​67. 53  CCR, 1307–​13, 433.

54  CIPM, Volume 5, Entry 297. 55  CIPM, Volume 5, Entry 297.

56  CIPM, Volume 5, Entry 297. The attorney appointed was either Roger de Luda or Hugh de Horsigton. The entry does not say specifically. 57  CIPM, Volume 5, Entry 297. It also notes an issue with certain tenants within the property not paying rents to Margaret, which needs to be rectified.

58  CCR, 1307–​13, 391. In this entry Margaret, rather than her bailiff, is directly addressed, which is different from all the other entries at this point. It would be interesting to see whether this was a formality for an official order, or perhaps due to her specific involvement. However, it is not possible to know from the study of one source alone, and this may require further digging into the case in other records. 59  Calendar of Fine Rolls (hereafter CFR), 1307–​19, 132.

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The decision concerning the case is recorded in the Close Rolls in an entry dated September 28, 1312, more than a year after the original dispute began.60 In this entry it is noted that the decision was determined in Parliament, as implied by the Fine Roll entry four months earlier, with the king ordering Margaret to take fealty from the heirs for the property and to certify the king of the proceedings. This would certainly imply that the details of this decision and perhaps its reasoning could be found in the Parliament Rolls; however, a search for this information in the surviving rolls of 1311 through to 1313 was unsuccessful.61 This may have been due to the documents being too damaged for the information to survive, or the dispute was simply not recorded in the Parliament Rolls at all. This lack of evidence surrounding the parliamentary details produced a search through the records of the Court of Common Pleas. An examination of the Midsummer and Michaelmas terms for 1312, both fronts and dorses, was to no avail.62 This, like with the Parliament Rolls, may well have been due to the poor survival rate of both CP40 194 and 195B, but nonetheless this results in reliance purely on the chancery rolls for further information. Although it would appear that the case had been concluded, Margaret, or at least her steward, fought the official decision. In the Close Rolls again, an entry dated December 23, 1312, notes that Margaret (or her steward) refuses to carry out the king’s order, “alleging a reason for not doing so that the king deems insufficient.”63 Unfortunately the reason is not given, and as such the order is repeated, to be carried out by the king’s escheator instead. The final entry to appear in the chancery records concerning the dispute features in the Close Rolls dated April 1313, nearly two years from the start of the case, where the lands are finally partitioned between the four daughters.64 The entry itself gives vast details concerning the division of the lands, including the tenements originally noted as the full inheritance of the heiresses. This dispute highlights several aspects of queens’ lands and their administration. At first glance this case in its most basic form indicates the location of properties held by the queen. In this instance, the case shows that Margaret held lands in Dorset; moreover, the entries clearly state the land to be part of her dower, and not an additional grant of land made by either Edward I or her stepson, Edward II. Even without further analysis of Margaret’s landholdings as a whole, and considering that vast estates could be spread over the whole country, as with nobles and previous queens, it is possible to begin to consider the composition of Margaret’s lands were predominantly located in the south of England. 60 CCR, 1307–​13, 480–​81.

61  This included the Parliament Rolls of August 1311, February 1312, August 1312, March 1313, and July 1313. 62  TNA CP40 194, 195A, and 195B.

63  CCR, 1307–​13, 503–​444. Margaret is directly blamed for this. “The queen would not execute this order,” though it could have been her steward acting in her stead. 64  CCR, 1307–​13, 575–​76.

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Beyond this, these sources and the dispute itself illustrate the clear importance of landownership to England’s medieval queens. By 1311, Margaret of France was the dowager-​queen of England and was in direct competition with her niece and step-​ daughter-​in-​law, Isabella of France, for income. Though queens consort drew income from several different avenues, of which property was one of the most prominent, a dowager-​queen’s only secure income came from her dower, which in this period was often in the form of lands. Several of the entries note that Margaret held the manor of Gillingham in dower.65 The lengths to which she or her administration went to keep this property clearly indicate that she was not willing to let this source of revenue go lightly. This is furthered by the size of the property in dispute. The manor of Gillingham itself would not have been a small property, with a forest and a park attached. In some of the entries, the manor is noted to be of ancient demesne, implying its long ownership by the crown, and the possibility of its previous importance before becoming a queenly holding. Though it is possible the manor was not the largest, the inclusion of at least one bailiwick, which could hold up to two or three manors within its boundaries, certainly gives an indication of its size.66 Additionally, certain entries note that three towns were located within the manor’s borders, thus furthering the size and income of the property.67 That Margaret or her administration was willing to openly go against the ruling of the king over a messuage, a few acres of land, and several tenements within a much larger manorial property, highlights just how important this holding was. This may well have been due to certain rights she held as the lord of the manor or could equally have been due to her need to retain as much income as possible, for in March 1308 the king seized a number of her larger properties. Lisa Benz analyzes this loss of land, arguing that it was due to her involvement in a potential coup against Edward II’s favourite, Piers Gaveston.68 Her analysis highlights the importance of queenly landownership and shows that this seizure of land was quite uncommon. She argues that though queens’ lands were often reabsorbed into the crown’s lands, there was often a recompense granted in return so as to make up for the loss of income. That Margaret did not receive one, thus cutting off a source not only of her income but of her economic agency, suggests Edward was punishing Margaret for her actions.69 Though the lost lands were returned to her by the end of the year, and her dower was confirmed in 1310, it is more than possible that the memory of this sudden loss of income remained with Margaret and influenced her later actions.70 65 CIPM, Volume 5, Entry 297; CCR, 1307–​13, 366–​67, 391; and CFR, 1307–​19, 132.

66  N. Denholm-​Young, Seignorial Administration in England (London:  Oxford University Press, 1937), 32. 67  Three towns—​Gillingham, Motcombe, and Bourton—​are listed as part of the manor of Gillingham in CIPM, Volume 5, Entry 297. 68  Benz, “Conspiracy and Alienation,” 119–​43.

69  Benz, “Conspiracy and Alienation,” 119–​143 at 127–​30.

70  This dower assignment can be found in the Patent Rolls, spanning several entries on March 19, 1310 (CPR, 1307–​13, 217–​19).

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In addition to this, it is possible to further analyze the entries of this dispute to understand the role a queen played within her administration. Although the details of this would normally be found in the more specific accounts of the manorial rolls, where they survive, and although chancery records only show evidence of queens and their lands when they come into direct contact with the crown, snippets of information surrounding a queen’s administration can be gleaned from them. In this detailed dispute Margaret and her administration directly acted against the crown and the orders of the king. In several of the entries Margaret is specifically named as taking the necessary actions and is even directly addressed. Whilst this could be merely a formality as it concerns her property and is intended for her steward instead, it could possibly represent her own direct involvement in the case. That this case continued for two years and resulted in the king’s direct involvement in Parliament furthers this argument. Could Margaret have remained oblivious to such a dispute involving her own lands? Indeed, that the steward in question remains unnamed raises further questions regarding who was making the decisions to act in this way. Using only the surviving chancery records to answer these questions is impossible, and it would be necessary to look further into any surviving manorial records for the property surrounding this period. However, what should still be considered is the likelihood of a queen becoming involved in her administration and, moreover, acting as equal to a male landowner. As discussed earlier, queens as landowners did not fully fit within the female mould of the medieval period. Yet married noblewomen were often heavily involved in the administration of their husbands’ estates when they were absent. As such, would it be so surprising if queens were equally involved in the administration of their own lands? Although a queen fulfilled the role of the married woman, she was also a landowner in her own right. Indeed, queens had their own administrative offices, including households and exchequers, and their administration was headed by the queens’ own councils. The evidence of this is scattered throughout the chancery records, naming stewards of lands and households, as well as councillors to the queen, and the works of Johnstone and Crawford analyze this in detail.71 Moreover, this evidence also shows queens exercising their authority as landowners, granting offices, distributing patronage, and seeking retribution for trespass. Though the evidence of this is found due to the king confirming the grants or supporting the order, they were originally completed by the queen, in her name. This highlights not only the possibility of a queen actively engaging in her administration but also the ways in which she enacted her economic agency. Indeed, elements of this can be seen in this case study of Margaret of France. Although she inevitably lost the case, the entries show Margaret or her steward wielding her name as queen and as landowner in order to retain the lands in question. The weight behind this was not purely because of her royal status, but because she was the lord 71 Crawford, “The Queen’s Council”; Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in The English Government at Work; Johnstone, “The Queen’s Household,” in Chapters in the Administrative History of Medieval England; Johnstone, “The Queen’s Exchequer.”

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of the manor, attempting to ascertain rights to lands believed to belong solely to her through the local custom. Nevertheless, as landlord, Margaret retained an economic interest in the lands granted to the Goce heirs. Whilst Margaret was unable to gain her own way and keep the property among those others she held directly, she still benefited from the final decision handed down by the king. The final entries note that the heirs of John Goce were to give fealty to Margaret and acknowledge her as “lord.” Therefore, she still gained income in the form of rents from them as tenants. Furthermore, she retained the obligation of service owed to her by them as tenants and thus could still exercise economic agency in other ways than she originally sought to do. What this case highlights, beyond the workings of a medieval queen’s administration, is the importance of landholdings to queens in terms of not just financial income but also their use to further a queen’s economic agency.

Analyzing a Queen’s Lands: Margaret of Anjou

For Margaret of Anjou, the Patent and Parliamentary Rolls are where we find the records of lands and estates granted to her. With respect to central records produced by her household and highest-​ranking officials, and despite her being queen consort for fifteen years, only a single extant household record remains, compiled by her receiver-​general, William Cotton, in the years 1452–​1453.72 Of the many types of household accounts that might typically have been assembled during the course of the queen’s tenure, only five other accounts have survived as far as is known. All were compiled by the queen’s treasurer of the chamber and master of the jewels, both offices typically held by the same individual during that period.73 For each of the lands and estates Margaret owned, administrative records of various sorts should also exist, as previously outlined. The ongoing search for relevant documents has so far revealed that a significant volume of documents still exists for many different lands. For example, the Honour of Tutbury, granted to Queen Margaret as part of her dower, has several bailiff accounts surviving for the year of the queen’s tenure.74 Some court rolls have also survived for those years.75 Similarly, for estates in Essex such as the manors of Pleshey and Mashbury, we can still find land valors compiled just before and during the queen’s tenure, receivers’ accounts, and bailiffs’ or farmers’ accounts for significant numbers of years.76 Coupled with more incidental evidence, such as the queen’s letters and surviving references to her in literary sources including the Paston letters 72 TNA DL28/​5/​8, published in A. R. Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou, 1452–​3,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 40 (1957–​58): 79–​113, 391–​431. 73  TNA E101/​409/​14, E101/​409/​17, E101/​410/​2, E101/​410/​8, E101/​410/​11. The last manuscript has been published in A. R. Myers, “The Jewels of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” Bulletin of the John Rylands Library 42 (1959): 113–​31. 74  TNA DL29/​370/​6184, 6186, 6189–​92. 75  TNA DL30/​111/​1669, 1671–​73.

76  TNA SC6/​1093/​15, DL29/​43/​829–​30, DL 29/​733/​12042–​43, 12048–​49.

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and contemporary chronicles, the sources we have at hand are sufficient to enable useful research on the queen’s properties, especially on a comparative basis. What sort of information is available and what research can be conducted based on the sources we have for Margaret of Anjou? An obvious first step is that we can map out the lands she owned and from which she derived economic wealth. The essential starting point in any attempt to do so is the Parliamentary Roll that outlined the dower grant made in 1446 on the occasion of her marriage to Henry VI (r. 1422–​1462, 1470–​1471) and coronation. This is because many of the lands that the queen owned during her tenure were granted to her in dower. The relevant section details the grants of lands and estates, the types of holdings associated with each property, the rights accruing to the queen in relation to the different lands, and their values, either singly or in total, for particular regions or shires. The overall sum granted in dower was 10,000 marks (£6,666 13s 4d), a substantial amount that was allocated between landed and non-​landed sources.77 Insofar as the roll listed them, the queen would have been aware as to which landholdings she was being granted and their values. Whilst only £2,000—​that is, approximately 30 percent of the base dower income—​was sourced from estates and landed sources, these properties were important assets to the queen in more than just monetary terms.78 The original grant in 1446 endowed the queen with a large number of holdings, predominantly from the estates of the Duchy of Lancaster, which had become part of the royal patrimony on the accession of Henry Bolingbroke as Henry IV in 1399.79 These included a large number of holdings in Essex, Hertfordshire, Leicestershire, London, Middlesex, Oxfordshire, Derbyshire, and Staffordshire. Several grants in later years subsequently added a host of other holdings to her already considerably large estate, many situated in the ancient “South Parts” of the Duchy of Lancaster.80 Some of these—​namely, the holdings in Northamptonshire, Dorset, and Hampshire—​ were intended as recompense for her lands that were re-​granted to others by the king.81 Since the original grant had stipulated a monetary amount in landed income 77 Rotuli Parliamentorum (hereafter RP.), 5:118–​20 (this letter by Henry VI concerning Margaret’s dower is not included in PROME). The dower amount granted was allocated as follows: £2,000 in the form of lands, estates, and fee farm grants, £1,000 as a cash annuity from Duchy of Lancaster estates, and a total of £3,666 13s 4d from other sources—​namely, £1,000 from customs from the Port of Southampton, £1,008 15s 5d from the Duchy of Cornwall, and £1,657 17s 11d from the Royal Exchequer. 78  There could be vast differences between theoretical and actual income from the lands for Margaret of Anjou. Constraints in space do not allow for extensive treatment of this issue here, but more research using available estate records could shed light on the matter. 79  Wolffe, The Royal Demesne in English History, 76.

80  CPR, 1446–​52, 56, 559; CPR, 1452–​61, 339–​40; “Henry VI:  March 1453,” in PROME, 5.5: 227–​71 at 261. The “South Parts” of the Duchy of Lancaster comprised the counties of Southampton, Wiltshire, Somerset, Dorset, Devon, Cornwall, Berkshire, Oxford, Hereford, and Worcester. Robert Somerville, The History of the Duchy of Lancaster (London: Chancellor and Council of the Duchy of Lancaster, 1953), 99. 81  “Henry VI: March 1453,” in PROME, 5:227–​71 at 261. For example, the parcel of lands granted in recompense for the lordship of Pembroke comprised Gillingham in Dorset, Odiham in Hampshire, and Rockingham, Brigstock, and Cliffe in Northamptonshire.

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sources, later grants of fee farms and additional lands were not intended to result in an increase in the queen’s overall income. Nevertheless, they did increase the extent of her landholdings; thus, Margaret’s overall level of landownership increased during her tenure as queen. It is worth noting that no record has yet been found of her purchasing lands in her own right, although this appears to have been in keeping with the great nobility, who also rarely purchased lands outright. As Figure 1 shows, Margaret’s holdings were predominantly located in the Midlands, but she also became the owner of substantial holdings in the east and southwest of England, particularly in Essex and Northumberland

Cumberland

Durham

Westmorland North Riding

Yorkshire Lancashire

East Riding Wet Riding

Cheshire

Derbs

Lincolnshire Notts

Staffs Shropshire

X Heref

Leics

X Worcs

X Glos

Devon

Norfolk

X s ant Hunts Warks Nor th Suffolk Cambs Beds X Oxon Bucks Herts Essex

Wiltshire

Berkshire X Hamphire

Somerset

Rutland

X Middx X Surrey

XX Kent

Sussex X Dorset

Cornwall

X

Single estate Numerous holdings

Figure 1. A map displaying a composite view of where Margaret of Anjou owned lands during her tenure as queen and demonstrating how the queen’s landholdings were geographically spread.

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Wiltshire. This suggests that Margaret’s potential landed power base predominantly lay in the Midlands, particularly in Derbyshire, Staffordshire, and Leicestershire.82 Repeated visits made by the royal couple and the semipermanent move of the royal court in 1456 to the town of Coventry reinforce the impression that the Midlands were an important location for both the king’s and queen’s power bases.83 As land was such a crucial resource that it formed “one of the principal bases of all status, wealth and power,”84 it follows that possessing it was “the key to social dominance and political power in fifteenth-​century England.”85 Land equalled wealth and provided the resources not only to fund the queenly household but also to participate in undertakings of all sorts. Thus, it is useful to consider the specific benefits that Margaret of Anjou derived from owning lands and what their spread and extent might tell us about such things as her levels of power and influence. Firstly, landownership had direct financial benefits. In monetary terms, Margaret’s lands theoretically yielded a significant proportion of her income. By this chronological period, the queen’s dower lands, granted for her use during her husband’s lifetime, were primarily meant to fund her household and provide for her many expenses. Delving into the extant household account for the years 1452–​1453, it appears at first sight that Margaret’s landed sources of income were generally reliable and that the queen received what she expected to get and more besides in landed revenue. After all, the receipts of income from the lands listed in the account total more than £2,000 and a further £450 was received in fee farms. Deeper examination of the recorded details reveals that the reliability was unevenly spread. For example, the fee of the county of Essex, being approximately £40, was paid in full for the year as was the expected revenue from the manor of Kenilworth, about £15.86 The manors of Berkhamsted and Haverford, similarly, yielded approximately £21 and £125, respectively, figures that were very close to the expected amounts.87 Conversely, the Honour of Leicester was expected to produce £250 for the queen but she received only £180 for that year.88 The Honour of Tutbury and the manor of Havering-​atte-​Bower were even less reliable, producing only slightly more than half of the amounts the queen was entitled to.89 Worse still, some of the income 82 Concrete material evidence of the queen’s interactions with her Midlands affinity remains to be researched.

83  The king’s mental health at this time was fragile and the queen played a more active role in the court’s movements. Mary Dormer Harris, ed., transcr., The Coventry Leet Book, or Mayor’s Register (London: Kegan, 1907), 299, 300.

84  Chris Wickham, “Land Disputes and Their Social Framework in Lombard-​Carolingian Italy, 700–​ 900,” reproduced in Land and Power: Studies in Italian and European Social History, 400–​1200, ed. Chris Wickham (London: British School at Rome, 1994), 229–​56 at 248. 85  A. J. Pollard, North-​Eastern England during the Wars of the Roses: Lay Society, War, and Politics 1450–​1500 (Oxford: Clarendon, 1990), 81. 86  Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 101, 103. 87  Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 101, 104. 88  Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 101.

89  Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 100–​11, 105.

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received included arrears, meaning that at times the amounts received were less than the annual expected amounts.90 Nevertheless, the account goes on to reveal the many different expenses to which all this revenue was directed, a circumstance that clearly illustrates the direct financial benefits that accrued to Margaret from her ownership of lands. Further, whilst revenue would primarily have been directed towards household and personal spending, other outgoings could be applied to that revenue with a view to gaining indirect benefits. In Margaret’s case, the sources show occasions when her revenue was redirected to help shore up the king’s shaky finances.91 Income from lands also enabled the queen to take other actions demonstrating her power, authority, and influence. Margaret’s household account for 1452–​1453 records payments totalling a very substantial £800 to Edward Ellesmere, her keeper of jewels and treasurer of the chamber.92 His account for the same period shows that a large proportion of these funds was used for the provision of gifts to her household servants, officials, and many supporters.93 As Maurer has explored briefly in her work on Margaret of Anjou, patterns can be discerned from the lists of jewels gifted by the queen, and the symbolism and meaning behind each of the gifts are clearly worthwhile topics for more research.94 Additionally, there is the possibility of using the spending patterns to explore the relationship between the queen’s patterns of gift-​giving, among other things, and her affinity, particularly in relation to analyzing Margaret’s levels of power. Specific details of where exactly the money came from with respect to each and every landholding are not easily discerned from the household account, which details receipts from each of the queen’s lands. Margaret was granted a significant number of important and ostensibly lucrative castles, lordships, and manors as well as others such as bailiwicks and hundreds. Occasionally, a holding would include a forest, park, or additional mills and farms.95 Their sizes and therefore their worth to the owner varied. Each of these, as detailed in the grants, came with a wide range of rights that yielded monetary benefits to the owner. For example, the queen was granted in 1452 the castle, manor, town, and lordship of Marlborough “with all appurtenant yearly rents, farms, sums of money and other rents of or for wastes rented.”96 In general, myriad different types of revenue would have contributed to form the pool of monies collected by the queen’s bailiffs, farmers, and receivers. The most 90 Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 100–​11. For example, the revenues for the year from the Honour of Tutbury included a number of amounts in arrears. 91  For example, TNA E101/​410/​15. This is an account of William Fallen, the treasurer of the king’s household for 1454–​1456 where he records a receipt of £3,668 from the queen’s household. 92  Myers, “The Household of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 427–​28. 93  Myers, “The Jewels of Queen Margaret of Anjou,” 79–​113 at 123–​30. 94  Maurer, Margaret of Anjou, 85–​90.

95  For example, Gillingham in Dorset, Rockingham in Northamptonshire, and Feckenham in Worcestershire. 96  CPR, 1446–​52, 559.

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obvious ones were rents, fee farms, and court fees and fines. Others included the fees obtained from markets, returns from the sale of agricultural produce and stock, and fees from agistment, pannage, and herbage. The forest, for instance, provides a clear example of the variety of fees and revenue that could be sourced from different types of landholdings since the grants to Queen Margaret included a number of forests.97 In the fifteenth century, the term “forest” did not only refer to the physical aspect—​that is, a geographical space predominantly covered with trees, undergrowth, and an entire ecosystem involving flora and fauna. It also had a particular legal meaning attached to it. A royal forest often comprised much more than mere physical area. It was “land reserved for the use of the king,” and could include not just physical woodland areas but also areas devoid of trees and woods and populated with villages, farms, and even towns.98 The royal owners of forests could, therefore, expect to enjoy revenue from a variety of sources depending on the resources of the specific areas. These included not just fee farms or rents from the tenants living within the forest but also grants of royal licences to assart, sales of timber, agistment fees for the use of grassland as pasture for livestock, rents from leased pastures, pannage fees earned from tenants who roamed pigs in the woodland areas, and fees from forest courts such as wodemotes and swanimotes.99 Lands were also important to the queen in nonfinancial terms. Whilst landed income provided the wherewithal to demonstrate benevolence and dispense patronage and gifts, among other things, the lands themselves enabled the queen to build and maintain a power base. As previously stated, patronage could help the queen to build relationships and connections, thereby enabling the construction of networks. However, Margaret’s landownership had an additional element. People and places lay at the heart of any power base and certain of Margaret’s dower lands gave her a foothold in regions that were not traditionally part of the queen’s dower. For example, Margaret’s many holdings in the Midlands gave her the opportunity to build and establish networks in lands that had not before experienced the queen’s reach. Her standing as a landholder in this region may well have proved to be a supporting factor in her attempt to move the court there following a number of crises in the 1450s, including the king’s bout of insanity and the first Battle of St. Albans.100 Such action on the queen’s part suggests that she felt supported in the region and secure in the knowledge that the royal power base there was firm. 97 These included the forests of Savernake, Melksham, Pewsham, and Chippenham in Wiltshire, as well as the forest of Feckenham in Worcestershire.

98  Chris Wickham, “European Forests in the Early Middle Ages: Landscape and Land Clearance,” reproduced in Land and Power: Studies in Italian and European Social History, 400–​1200, ed. Chris Wickham (London:  British School at Rome, 1994), 155–​99 at 159; Charles R.  Young, The Royal Forests of Medieval England (Leicester: Leicester University Press, 1979), 5. 99  Jean R. Birrell, “The Honour of Tutbury in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries” (MA thesis, University of Birmingham, 1962). Birrell’s thesis is an example of research that investigates the range of revenue sources.

100  J. L.  Laynesmith, The Last Medieval Queens:  English Queenship 1445–​1503 (Oxford:  Oxford University Press, 2004), 140.

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Different types of holdings might also facilitate different mechanisms for the exercise and manifestation of the queen’s power and agency. We have previously seen how forests could contribute a wide range of revenue types to the queen’s coffers. Other nonfinancial benefits could be gained as well. Much as other lords and noble houses did, the queen very likely called on her forests and parks for regular food supplies since these could be sources for many different types of food items. These same resources also underpinned the queen’s capacity to reward supporters and servants with gifts.101 As a letter from Henry VI to his wife demonstrates, forest timber as well as the more obvious deer and other game could be utilized as rewards.102 Jewels, clearly, were not the only gifts worth receiving. The focus of this case study has been to demonstrate what is broadly possible in terms of the research that may be conducted with data and information obtained from sources relevant to the lands and economic resources of Margaret of Anjou. What we have seen is that the evidence on the queen’s lands gives us a clear idea of her level of ownership and the spread and extent of her lands. Further research into the variety, locality, and spread of the landed sources of income as well as the administration that necessarily went with it would reward a scholar with greater insight into the structure and organization of those lands. It would also enable greater understanding of how the queen operated as a landowner and administrator. Within these contexts, we need to interrogate our comprehension of the queen in these roles given the legal, social, and gender system within which the queen lived. As discussed, the legal system denied to married women the general right to own land albeit with the exception of the status of femme sole, a denial rooted in the gender system of the period. The social system, nonetheless, acknowledged the practical realities of life whereby married noblewomen in particular could and often did take on the role of administrator of the family estates. It is more than possible that, against these settings, the queen as landholder and administrator was not regarded as a particularly unusual figure for the time. Maurer regards the gender system within which Margaret of Anjou lived as one that encompassed dual aspects. On one hand it “denied that a woman could ever hold political authority”; on the other hand it also “permitted and even encouraged women to act in ways that had political consequences.”103 She is talking about the queen’s political actions, but a duality is also present with respect to the issue of queenly landownership. Married women were not legally entitled to own lands yet were permitted, even encouraged to administer them as if they did. Where, then, do queens fit in? Margaret of Anjou legally owned and administered her lands.104 What does this say about the type 101 Little direct evidence survives of Margaret’s household drawing upon the resources of her lands for household food supplies or that the queen gave frequent gifts of such ilk to her supporters. However, evidence pertaining to her successors Elizabeth Woodville and Elizabeth of York does exist and it is highly likely that Margaret and her household would have done the same. 102  Maurer and Cron, The Letters of Margaret of Anjou, 59–​60. 103  Maurer, Margaret of Anjou, 5.

104  The degree to which Margaret of Anjou personally administered her lands remains to be examined in detail.

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and levels of power and agency she exhibited and how she went about this? This is why we should focus on examining these questions against the different forms of power and agency; it is not enough to state whether economic resources such as lands enabled the queen to exercise power and agency. We need to examine their resultant forms and how economic resources impacted and facilitated the transfer and transformation of capital from one form to another.

Conclusion

Any scholar willing to embark upon research involving the landed sources of income for the queens of the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries in England must face the reality that while extensive evidence for these centuries survives in chancery and exchequer records, queens tend to appear in those records only when there is overlap between matters concerning their interests and those of the crown. English queens of this chronological period have not lacked for scholarly interest, yet the study of their economic resources, in particular their lands, has for long been insufficiently researched. This may be in part due to the limitations of the relevant sources that might ordinarily be utilized in such investigations, including their sparseness as well as their chronologically and geographically inconsistent survival rate. As a consequence, dedicated questions about this aspect of queens’ lives have until now not been posed very often by historians and other scholars. Yet, as this chapter has demonstrated, several categories of records can be used extensively for such research and a variety of information can be retrieved and analyzed from many different aspects. The two case studies featured in this chapter have shown that extensive archival research and patience can handsomely repay the researcher willing to undertake in-​depth examination into the topic at hand. While the limitations of the sources appear to suggest that there is little that may be used effectively in the study of queens’ lands, this is far from the whole truth. In comparison with kings or great noble families, perhaps, there is far less to work with. However, this is not to say that much cannot still be done with what has been uncovered. Likewise, modern-​day social science and anthropological research into concepts such as power and gender have enabled researchers of today to undertake deeper analysis, revealing the richer and fuller meanings and implications possible in interrogations of such deceptively simple questions as “what is the role of the queen as landowner?” The gendered framework cannot be ignored in any examination of queens’ lands and levels of ownership and administration since queenship is an office fundamentally defined by the individual’s gender as female. Furthermore, the fluid boundaries of terminology and definition with respect to the aforementioned concepts lend themselves to a more flexible process of arriving at an understanding of the relationship between economic resources and levels and manifestations of power and its variants. The two case studies explored in this chapter demonstrate what is achievable for research into queens’ economic resources and lands. Both studies reveal sources are available for both centuries that help us identify the lands owned by queens and establish their extent and spread. In addition, they offer insights into queens’ rights,

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responsibilities, and benefits gained from being landholders and administrators, as positioned against their gender and the frameworks of power. The first study exposes the possibilities in terms of research into specific estate matters, in this instance a property dispute. It shows that the queen in question, Margaret of France, could very likely have been actively involved in the dispute given her obvious vested interests in achieving an outcome favourable towards her. The second study shows how we can investigate broader concepts such as the relationship between landownership and power bases for English queens of the period in question. It highlights the fact that lands could be beneficial to queens in more ways than one. Lands could provide concrete economic wealth in the form of revenues to be used both directly and indirectly. Additionally, the lands themselves were valuable assets that could act as foundations on which queens could build the social and political networks so important for their power bases. These cases, therefore, serve as examples of what may be achieved using primary evidence that has long been available but arguably has been underutilized in relation to the economic resources of late medieval English queens.

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Chapter 2

FINANCIAL POWER OF EMPRESSES AND PRINCESS CONSORTS OF THE HOLY ROMAN EMPIRE CHARLOTTE BACKERRA AND CATHÉRINE LUDWIG-​OCKENFELS*

In the past decades, researchers of early modern history have considered the role

of empresses and princess consorts of the Holy Roman Empire in the context of dynastic continuation (through the provision of heirs), dynastic and diplomatic relations, and cultural transfer.1 Whilst all important aspects of their role, what has received less attention is that empresses and princess consorts of the Holy Roman Empire also wielded considerable financial and economic power. Many received their wealth as part of their dowers or as presents from their husbands, but they were also usually heiresses who owned money, lands, and titles in their own right. This chapter addresses this lacuna in the current literature by analyzing the financial and economic power of empresses and princess consorts of the Holy Roman Empire across the early modern period. For this study, we are concerned solely with the wives of emperors and princes,2 rather than women who were princesses of the Holy Roman Empire by birth.3 The findings presented * Dr.  Charlotte Backerra, Assistant Professor of Early Modern History in Göttingen, works on European dynastic history and international relations. Cathérine Ludwig-​Ockenfels is currently writing her PhD thesis in Early Modern History about the agency of Anna Maria Luisa de' Medici (1667–​1743) as a Catholic princess of the Holy Roman Empire at the Justus-​Liebig-​University, Gießen.

1 See Bettina Braun, Katrin Keller, and Matthias Schnettger, eds., Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit (Vienna: Böhlau, 2016); Caroline Dunn and Elizabeth Carney, eds., Royal Women and Dynastic Loyalty (Cham: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018); Corina Bastian, Verhandeln in Briefen. Frauen in der höfischen Diplomatie des frühen 18. Jahrhunderts (Cologne: Böhlau, 2013); Katharina Fidler, “Mäzenatentum und Politik am Wiener Hof. Das Beispiel der Kaiserin Eleonora Gonzaga-​Nevers,” Innsbrucker Historische Studien 12–​13 (1990): 41–​68; Markus Friedrich Jeitler, “Eleonora Magdalena Gonzaga von Mantua-​Nevers und ihre Spuren in der Baugeschichte Wiens,” in Fürstliche Witwen in der Frühen Neuzeit. Zur Kunst-​und Kulturgeschichte eines Standes, ed. Ulrike Ilk (Petersberg: Imhof, 2015), 123–​36.

2 In the Holy Roman Empire in the early modern period, an empress was always the emperor’s consort, as only men could be elected as emperors. For better readability, we only use “empress” in this chapter (not “empress-​consort”). Similarly, the wife of a prince-​elector was the “electress.” We use Electress of the Palatinate Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici as a case study through which to consider the wives of princes of the empire. When speaking in general about these females, who shared their husbands’ rank, we use “princess consort.”

3 Further consideration should be given to unmarried female members of high noble dynasties—​ for example, daughters or sisters—​but due to limitations in word count we touch this topic only where it concerns the empresses and princess consorts discussed in this chapter.

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here are largely based on existing research and singular case studies which have been examined with a new focus on finance and economic power. It thus gives a starting point for further original research into the role of consorts as economic agents. This chapter presents an analysis of the financial role of several empresses or princess consorts, with a special concentration on one case study, Electress of the Palatinate Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici (1667–​1743).4 Marital status was key to these women’s economic power. Empresses had, in addition to their own wealth, direct access to the emperor and to the imperial coffers, which they could use to support relatives and petitioners through gifts of money and land. The wife of an emperor was often the first point of contact for members of the natal families: the father of Empress Elisabeth Christine (1691–​1750, wife of Emperor Charles VI, r. 1711–​1740) heavily—​and successfully—​pressed his daughter for financial and feudal favours, even during times of extreme crisis for the Habsburg dynasty in the War of the Spanish Succession.5 The consorts of princes of the Holy Roman Empire were equally regarded as a financial resource by their natal dynasties, and were expected to be similarly generous using their allods (lands) and marital goods. Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici, the wife of the elector of the Palatinate, Johann Wilhelm of Palatine-​Neuburg (1658–​ 1716, r. 1690–​1716),6 acted as a link for her natal grand ducal family in Tuscany to the Palatinate-​Neuburg dynasty and the Habsburg throne.7 Her father, Grand Duke Cosimo III, together with Anna Maria Luisa and Johann Wilhelm, was, for example, able to stop his payments for the War of the Spanish Succession to the imperial court in Vienna. This shows that the dynastic connection was essential in strengthening the position of the Medici family, which by this period was under threat of extinction.8 Despite any similarities, however, there was no single financial experience for the early modern empresses and princess consorts of the Holy Roman Empire. Each individual actor must be analyzed in the context of his or her personal situation regarding dynastic laws, territorial legal tradition, contemporary circumstances, and possibilities according to the social status and the rank of the marital dynasty. All goods and money 4 This chapter was written jointly by Charlotte Backerra and Cathérine Ludwig-​Ockenfels, the former being responsible for the part on empresses, the latter for the section on Anna Maria Luisa, and both for concept, introduction, and conclusion. 5 See later in this chapter.

6 See Benedikt Maurer, ed., Barocke Herrschaft am Rhein um 1700. Kurfürst Johann Wilhelm II. und seine Zeit (Düsseldorf: Droste, 2009); Sigrid Kleinbongartz, Die Akte Jan Wellem (Düsseldorf: Droste, 2013), Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen, Johann Wilhelm. Kurfürst von der Pfalz. Herzog von Jülich-​Berg (1658–​1716) (Düsseldorf: Triltsch, 1958). 7 A recent study on the image of the Electress of the Palatinate built via her patronage of the arts is Laura Windisch, Kunst. Macht. Image. Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici (1667–​1743) im Spiegel ihrer Bildnisse und Herrschaftsräume (Vienna: Böhlau, 2019).

8 Until the extinction of the Medici dynasty in 1737, a new grand duke had to be enfeoffed in an official ceremony by the emperor of the Holy Roman Empire; see Matthias Schnettger, “Dynastische Interessen, Lehnsrecht und Machtpolitik. Der Wiener Hof und die Anwartschaft der Kurfürstin Anna Maria Luisa von der Pfalz auf die toskanische Erbfolge (1711–​14),” Mitteilungen des Instituts für Österreichische Geschichtsforschung 108 (2000): 352–​71 at 355.

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could be used to convert economic capital into symbolic capital, in terms of representation and status.9 Nevertheless, an overview of the amount of money a high noblewoman could rely on as the consort of a prince or of the emperor in the Holy Roman Empire is a valuable starting point for research on female agency in the early modern period. The financial resources of a woman created the framework in which she could spend her own money and thus gain personal autonomy at court along with room for political and social manoeuvre.10 To work on the financial and economic background can therefore help to trace the scope of female action in a patriarchal society.11 By examining a number of case studies of different female experiences, it will be possible to draw wider conclusions on the finances of women in the Holy Roman Empire across the early modern period.12

Finances of Women in the Holy Roman Empire

Historiography has not paid much attention to influence via money or other financial means for early modern female rulers and consorts, even though they had access to these resources.13 The reason for this neglect of “numbers” probably lies in the scientific community; for example, in German historiography accounts are seen as sources for economic history. A researcher interested in finances, statistics, and wealth might focus on the economic development of a territory, but will not normally consider rulership14 or female agency.15 Other reasons for the neglect of the finances of women are 9 Ulrike Wendt-​Sellin, Herzogin Luise Friedericke von Mecklenburg-​Schwerin (1722–​1791). Ein Leben zwischen Pflicht, Pläsier und Pragmatismus (Cologne:  Böhlau, 2017), 45, shows the transformation of princesses’ financial capital into symbolic capital via court ceremonies. 10  Wendt-​Sellin, Herzogin, 17.

11  The same is of course to be considered for male rulers.

12  Notable studies offering a generalization of female rule include Charles Beem, The Lioness Roared: The Problem of Female Rule in English History (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2006), and Kägler, Frauen am Münchner Hof (1651–​1756) (Kallmünz: Laßleben, 2011), which are attempts to compare female rulers over centuries of English history and female individuals over a century at a specific court in Munich.

13  Scholars have published studies on medieval Spanish queens, however; see Lucy K. Pick, Her Father’s Daughter:  Gender, Power, and Religion in the Early Spanish Kingdoms (Ithaca:  Cornell University Press, 2017) and Therese Martin, Queen as King: Politics and Architectural Propaganda in Twelfth-​Century Spain (Leiden:  Brill, 2006). The differences between the medieval and early modern periods on one hand and Spain and the Holy Roman Empire on the other call for research seeking to understand the finances of women in the early modern Empire.

14  A first attempt to disprove the stereotype of the German noble in the late Middle Ages and the early modern period, allegedly not dealing with his financial resources due to ethics of nobility, is Harm von Seggern and Gerhard Fouquet, Adel und Zahl. Studien zum adligen Rechnen und Haushalten in Spätmittelalter und früher Neuzeit (Ubstadt-​Weiher:  Verlag Regionalkultur, 2000). Finances of females at court are not mentioned.

15  Theresa Earenfight, on the contrary, has shown the potential for female agency in working with economic records concerning elite households in the Middle Ages and the early modern period; see Theresa Earenfight, “Personal Relations, Political Agency, and Economic Clout in Medieval and Early Modern Royal and Elite Households,” in Royal and Elite Households in Medieval and Early Modern Europe: More Than Just a Castle, ed. Theresa Earenfight (Leiden: Brill, 2018), 1–​14 at 11.

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the fragmented written records and the historiography of courtly society, which has accordingly barely paid attention to these source materials.16 Another contributing factor might be the monetary situation of the Holy Roman Empire, which was divers and difficult to understand. Due to its political heterogeneity, the Empire was divided into two areas using different currencies as the basis for commercial calculations. Over the seventeenth century, people in the northern regions (encompassing also the Electorate of the Palatinate) used the Reichstaler as the unified standard for payment transactions, while in the southern parts of the Empire and the Habsburg hereditary territories, the Reichsgulden, also named the “florin” (abbreviated “fl.”), was the base currency.17 According to the legal framework, the Reichsmünzrecht, the Empire’s heterogenic political landscape and its partitioning in the Middle Ages and the early modern period were mirrored by a variety of local and regional currencies and coins with similar denomination but divergent mint prices. Major princes and lords had imperial immediacy, meaning that they were subject only to the emperor as their liege and to the empire’s laws, which among other things gave them the right to set a coinage standard and to mint their own coins. In most European realms, this right was a droit de régale (or jus regale) available only to the highest sovereign of a realm, but due to the unique composition of the Holy Roman Empire, this right could be distributed.18 This complex system makes it difficult to use accounts and prices for historical research, even before the actual comparative value of the money is taken into account. Foreign currencies were also used in the Holy Roman Empire; for example, the financial record of the privy purse of Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici shows a variety of currencies handed in and converted by the secretaries according to their base currency.19 In 2014, Judith P. Aikin revealed the personal investments of a Protestant imperial countess in her analysis of Aemilia Juliana, countess of Schwarzburg-​Rudolstadt (1637–​ 1706), as a ruler’s consort. The countess, besides managing her dower and jointure lands, oversaw the dynasty’s enterprises and investments. She also invested in mining operations and bought land with her own money on which to build a mill that she leased 16 Jürgen Rainer Wolf, Die Kabinettskassenrechnungen der Kurfürstin Anna Maria Luisa von der Pfalz (1667–​1743) 6.5.1691–​​22.3.1718. Finanzwirtschaft einer Landesmutter im Zeitalter des Absolutismus 3  vols. Regesten 6.5.1691–​​22.3.1718, unter Benutzung von Vorarbeiten von Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen (Essen: Klartext, 2015), 43–​45.

17  Wolfgang Trapp and Torsten Fried, Handbuch der Münzkunde und des Geldwesens in Deutschland (Stuttgart: Reclam, 2014), 88.

18  Konrad Schneider, “Reichsmünzordnung,” Enzyklopädie der Neuzeit Online (2014), http://​ dx.doi.org/​10.1163/​2352-​0248_​edn_​a3556000 (October 18, 2018). Trapp and Fried, Handbuch der Münzkunde, offers a general introduction; for the Münzrecht, see pages 49–​50.

19  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1716/​18 R:  On September 5, 1717, Anna Maria Luisa handed in 601 pistole, a Spanish coin worth 2.929 Rtl. 70 Alb. When a reference to an order of the Kabinettskassenrechnung is given in this chapter, the fiscal year of the annual account is first mentioned (for example, 1706/​07), followed with an “R” for the income and annotated revisions, or the number of the order (for example, Nr. 1) (Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1219). Due to the continuous pagination over the three volumes of the edition, no references to the volumes are included.

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out, later adding an oil press, a brandy distillery, and a brewery.20 Likewise, Ulrike Wendt-​Sellin’s book about Duchess Friederike Luise of Mecklenburg-​Schwerin (1722–​ 1791) stresses her financial background, in what appears to be the first study to do this in German.21 Julia Frindte and Sigrid Westphal, in contrast, assume—​following a general but hitherto unproven understanding of the question—​that noblewomen’s social status would not allow them to make money in order to gain financial power, unlike women of the bourgeoisie in early modern cities.22 However, following the examples of Aemilia Juliana and Duchess Friederike Luise, there is clearly enough evidence of high-​ranking consorts working with their own money, or establishing manufacturing businesses and other enterprises to challenge this view and to merit further research.23 Most current research does not focus on the finances of female actors in the early modern period, but on the outcomes, like patronage, court life, or representation.24 Researchers analyze marriage contracts and their financial clauses as well as the expenditure of noble families in providing daughters with an amount of money befitting their social status.25 Not every bride-​to-​be—​or her mother—​had a say in such negotiations, showing the limits of female influence. Some were obviously informed about the financial arrangements only after the wedding, when they were already consorts. As Britta Kägler shows in her study about the princesses and electresses of Bavaria, they were not asked for their opinion during the disputes about the financial articles of the wedding contracts, neither in choosing the husband or the financial agreement.26 A further focus of historiography is the life after marriage as a widow,27 which frequently 20 Judith P.  Aikin, A Ruler’s Consort in Early Modern Germany:  Aemilia Juliana of Schwarzburg-​ Rudolstadt (Farnham: Ashgate, 2014), 125, 129. 21  Wendt-​Sellin, Herzogin.

22  Julia Frindte and Sigrid Westphal, “Handlungsspielräume von Frauen um 1800,” in Handlungsspielräume von Frauen um 1800, ed. Julia Frindte und Sigrid Westphal (Heidelberg: Universitätsverlag Winter, 2005), 3–​16 at 13–​15. Heide Wunder has written about the importance of economic households for early modern society; see Heide Wunder, “ ‘Jede Arbeit ist ihres Lohnes wert.’ Zur geschlechtsspezifischen Teilung und Bewertung von Arbeit in der Frühen Neuzeit,” in Heide Wunder. Der andere Blick auf die Frühe Neuzeit. Forschungen 1974–​1995, ed. Barbara Hoffmann (Königstein im Taunus: Helmer, 1999), 170–​86 at 176–​80.

23  One example is Landgravine Caroline of Hesse-​Darmstadt, who founded a manufactory of textile colouring near Darmstadt (Krappfabrik in Pfungstadt) in order to finance her daughters’ trousseau; see Eckhart G.  Franz, “Karoline Henriette Landgräfin von Hessen-​Darmstadt,” Stadtlexikon Darmstadt, www.darmstadt-​stadtlexikon.de/​de/​k/​karoline-​henriette-​landgraefin-​ von-​hessen-​darmstadt.html (November 1, 2018). 24  Wendt-​Sellin, Herzogin, 16. We use the term “female actor” to underline the agency of the women discussed—​linguistically, we all too often still think only of men when reading the word “actor.”

25  Wendt-​Sellin, Herzogin, 17, and Anke Hufschmidt, Adlige Frauen im Weserraum zwischen 1570 und 1700. Status—​Rollen-​Lebenspraxis (Münster: Aschendorff, 2001), 269–​73. 26  Kägler, Frauen am Münchner Hof, 136.

27 As one example see Martina Schattkowsky, “Witwenschaft in der Frühen Neuzeit. Fürstliche und adlige Witwen zwischen Fremd-​ und Selbstbestimmung. Einführung,” in Witwenschaft in der

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reflects the wider contemporary stereotype of a free widow.28 Anna Maria Luisa proved to be a widow eager to fight for her financial support as she, having returned to Florence in 1717 and staying there until her death in 1743, kept a direct correspondence on that topic with her brother-​in-​law and now elector of the Palatinate, Karl III Philipp of Palatinate-​Neuburg (1661–​1742).29 This emphasis on weddings and widowhood, however, overlooks the financial power that women could clearly wield as consorts. Once they became consorts, women had a share in spending and in administering the financial assets of the dynasty.30 It is also obvious that these women, in addition to any personal funds, managed the morgive (Morgengabe or morning gift), the counter-​ money (Widerlage), and the future dower (Wittum or jointure)—​the terms are explained later in this chapter—​by themselves; their economic survival depended on these funds.31 This financial semi-​autonomy is especially true for high noblewomen in the Holy Roman Empire, where women could be more active than in France or Spain in the early modern period.32 The extent of a woman’s involvement in her finances and economic needs also depended on the law, as in some regions of the Empire women had full authority over their finances, but in other regions a male relative—​often her father or husband—​had to act as guardian in all legal matters and for all financial transactions. Regardless of a woman’s autonomy, most noblewomen had, like their male relatives, secretaries and accountants to help with their correspondences and with managing their wealth. When researching the financial situation of female consorts in the Holy Roman Empire, it is important to note the heterogenic character of the source material.33 As archival politics of the nineteenth century often disregarded documents of female authorship, or sources regarding the lives and acts of women in general, such documents have often survived only partially or in unlikely places.34 Sources which can be used to gain insights into the financial properties and provisions of princesses as consorts include marriage contracts, testaments, decrees, inventories, correspondences, and accounts. As the last were most often in the hands of a secretary—​such as Anna Maria Luisa’s Frühen Neuzeit. Fürstliche und adlige Witwe zwischen Fremd-​ und Selbstbestimmung, ed. Martina Schattkowsky (Leipzig: Leipziger Universitätsverlag, 2003), 11–​32. 28  Wendt-​Sellin, Herzogin, 17.

29  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 24, 27; Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen, Anna Maria Luisa de᾿ Medici. Elettrice Palatina (Florence: Edizioni Sansoni Antiquariato, 1967), 134–​35. 30  Kägler, Frauen am Münchner Hof, 170–​76.

31  Heide Wunder, “Er ist die Sonn,” sie ist der Mond. Frauen in der Frühen Neuzeit (Munich: Beck, 1992), 212. 32  See in general Cordula Bischoff, “ ‘… Allzeit thun müssen, wass andere wollen’? Handlungsspielräume fürstlicher Frauen bei Hof,” in Frauensache. Wie Brandenburg Preußen wurde, ed. Generaldirektion der Stiftung Preußische Schlösser und Gärten Berlin-​Brandenburg, Julia Klein, et al. (Dresden: Sandstein, 2015), 146–​61. 33  In general, any analysis of female agency has to be based on a diverse range of sources, mirroring the reality of female lives in the early modern period, but also due to the archival practices of the past two centuries with their focus on political sources produced by men. 34  See Chapter 4 for similar problems in finding sources on a woman’s role.

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(see later in this chapter)—​their correspondences could also offer insights on financial resources. General court accounts cover the court as a whole, with female activity only a part of it. Monetary stock was not, however, the only possession to confer wealth and to offer financial resources.35 Lands in the form of agricultural estates were often part of the personal wealth of a princess or were given to her as a dower.36 Material resources such as jewellery, costly clothing, fabric, furniture, tableware, and cutlery provided further financial resources because it was easy to convert material goods into cash or to use them instead of money, for example as gifts. Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici especially mentioned her silver cutlery as a possible financial reserve in a letter to her uncle Francesco Maria dated June 11, 1699.37 A princess or empress had access to assets based on different legal concepts.38 She could own wealth given to her as personal gifts, by parents, godparents, spouses, children, other relatives, or friends. These personal gifts, ranging from textile works to lands and cities, were under her direct control or, depending on the time period and the legal system, sometimes under the guardianship of a male relative (father, brother, husband). With her marriage, several sources of financial means were added. In general, the bride’s family provided a dowry (jointure) or marriage portion (Mitgift), which went to the groom’s family for his future wife’s maintenance. Often, the dowry was consistent with the woman’s share in her parents’ bequest; in those cases, the woman had to renounce her right of inheritance before the marriage.39 The groom’s family added the same amount of money or wealth as counter-​money (Widerlage). Mitgift and counter-​money were not sellable; any interest was common property of the couple or the husband’s property. After the husband’s death, the interest of dowry and/​or counter-​money was used as dower (Wittum). Additionally, a palace or manor was agreed on as a dower 35 British queens, for example, are known to invest in stock; the same is also true for empresses and German princesses, but this issue needs further research. 36  For lands as part of a woman’s financial means, also see Chapter 1.

37  Stefano Casciu, “Anna Maria Luisa, Electress Palatine: Last Art Patron and Collector of the Medici Dynasty,” in Medici Women: The Making of a Dynasty in Grand Ducal Tuscany, ed. Giovanna Benadusi and Judith C. Brown (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2015), 323–​46 at 337; Archivio di Stato di Firenze (hereafter ASF), Mediceo del Principato (hereafter MdP) 5837, fol. 28r. Anna Maria Luisa mentions different objects, amongst others a piece of silver furniture. Casciu assumes that she acquired the furniture deliberately to sell it afterwards for money. In contrast, Cathérine Ludwig-​Ockenfels strongly argues that the electress was gifted the furniture and that she did not have any clear idea to sell it; see the handwritten original of the letter with the edited version in Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen, “Der Briefwechsel der Kurfürstin Anna Maria Luisa von der Pfalz,” Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch 40 (1938): 15–​256 at 207, B168.

38  Especially useful to understand a high noblewoman’s personal wealth in early modern Germany is Michaela Völkel, “Ihr gehört das Gut: Wie darf ich mich drum kümmern, was sie mit ihm thut?” perspectivia.net, July 29, 2015, www.perspectivia.net/​publikationen/​kultgep-​vortraege/​voelkel_​ gut (October 18, 2018).

39  The renunciation was not final, however. Depending on the circumstances, the princess might still inherit; see the case of Maria Theresa, who had to renounce her right of inheritance before her marriage to Francis Stephen of Lorraine in 1736, but still inherited the entire Monarchia Austriaca because of her father’s lack of male heirs.

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seat. A wife’s supply of clothing, adornments, and objects of bodily needs—​for example, gowns, lingerie, jewellery, or toiletries—​were counted as paraphernalia in her personal possession (Gerade, Nebengut). Of these, set jewels and objects of precious metal like chains, bracelets, rings, combs, gallipots (jars for lotions), etc. could amount to a fortune. Parts of the paraphernalia might change during a woman’s lifetime, as its classification always depended on personal usage. After the first night the married couple spent together, the morgive, which normally consisted of jewellery or estates, was added to the wife’s personal assets.40 The wife was to regularly receive hand money from the personal wealth of her husband. A consort, like other members of a dynasty, could additionally be entitled to an apanage paid from the dynasty’s estate. During marriage, especially in western and southern Germany and the Austrian lands, a form of community of marital acquisitions existed whereby the wealth accumulated during a couple’s lifetime was jointly managed or at least divided in cases of separation or a spouse’s death. Since medieval times, different practices regarding all of the aforementioned forms of obtaining capital and wealth developed in the diverse regions of the Holy Roman Empire. Therefore, each dynasty and each marriage could have diverging legal basis for its finances, which has to be kept in mind when analyzing a princess’s financial assets.41 In a model marriage, the wife would have, as mentioned earlier, a share in managing the couple’s and dynasty’s coffers. Most often, historians will therefore face a situation where a consort had access to overlapping financial and material resources based on public, dynastic, marital, and personal funds.

Empresses

The empresses of the early modern Holy Roman Empire have only recently attracted the interest of researchers. Most have stressed the empresses’ importance for dynastic continuity, dynastic and international relations, and cultural transfer. But empresses, like other princesses, also were heiresses, had monetary or nonmonetary resources, including lands, and were given a dower and other property through marriage. Because of their rank and status, they could also access imperial resources in various ways in order to financially support family members, courtiers, and other petitioners. The emperor’s wife was often the first point of call for any member of her natal dynasty. Empress Elisabeth Christine of Brunswick-​Wolfenbüttel (1691–​1750) married Archduke Charles, king of Spain, later Emperor Charles VI (1685–​1740, r. 1701/​11–​40) in 1707. During the preparation for their marriage, a document presented the natal dynasty’s expectations for the princess’s future actions. Beside supporting the recognition of the dynasty’s newly gained electoral princedom, Elisabeth Christine, as a married 40 The tradition of the morgive sees it as given in exchange for the virginity of a spouse, therefore it was not given in cases of a widow remarrying and had to be paid to the new husband by a widow marrying an innocent (that is, previously unmarried) man.

41  See for the legal background the older work by Rudolf Hübner, A History of Germanic Private Law, transl. Francis S.  Philbrick (Boston:  Little, Brown, 1918), 624–​26; on the marriage laws in general see 584–​656.

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member of the Habsburg dynasty, was to save her parents and her natal family from any legal harm and to support them in gaining first, a higher rank, pensions, and imperial fiefdoms in Italy for her parents, and second, good marriages for her female relatives and military or civil posts in the imperial system for her male relations.42 Most wishes were fulfilled; in 1707 the county of Blankenburg, ruled by Elisabeth Christine’s parents, was elevated to an imperial principality; in 1708 followed the recognition of the Brunswick electorate, and her younger relatives married well and gained important positions. Financially, the court of Vienna supported her father, Duke Ludwig Rudolph. Several times before the duke’s death in 1735, his substantial debts were covered by his son-​in-​ law, Emperor Charles VI. In addition, Ludwig Rudolph was paid a regular pension, which was raised several times. All in all, the money settled on him with his daughter’s support amounted to around 640,000 fl.43 The case of Elisabeth Christine, therefore, shows the important role of empresses in economic and financial matters. Research is, however, restricted because of several challenges regarding sources and historiography. One problem with the sources concerning empresses’ financial agency was revealed by Michael Pölzl in his research into the convent of the Salesian Sisters in Vienna. In 1707 Empress Amalia Wilhelmina (1673–​1742) had endowed the convent with part of her martial accrual, in total 100,000 fl. This generous bequest was well documented; however, in 1782, Amalia’s grandnephew Emperor Joseph II (1741–​1790, r.  1765–​1790) ordered the bills of her dower residence in the convent to be burned because he deemed them not necessary for any future reference. The accounts of the court of Vienna are also not helpful, as the private money of the empresses, which was also used for the convent’s funds, is not included in these records.44 For an empress’s court expenses, the chamber books are available, and for most empresses testaments, inventories, and marriage contracts exist.45 Sometimes, financial or economic matters are also mentioned in correspondences of the Habsburgs and of members of the court, or in diplomatic correspondences. Other sources, including material sources, are available, but not categorized or inventoried. A systematic analysis of the records for the financial room for manoeuvre of empresses has yet to been undertaken, however, making an overall assessment of the situation difficult at this stage.

42 Niedersächsisches Landesarchiv, Staatsarchiv Wolfenbüttel, 1 Alt 24 Nr. 257: Records Regarding the Conversion of the Princess, Later Roman Empress Elisabeth Christine, and Its Consequences 1706–​ 1707, fol. 368r/​v, not dated; also see Katrin Keller, “Wozu wird man Königin?” Kaiserin und Reich, February 10, 2018, https://​kaiserin.hypotheses.org/​376 (November 1, 2018), and also Gerlinde Körper, Studien zur Biographie Elisabeth Christines von Braunschweig-​Lüneburg-​Wolfenbüttel (Gemahlin Kaiser Karls VI. und Mutter Maria Theresias) (Vienna: manuscript copy, 1976), 377–​79. 43  Niedersächsisches Landesarchiv, Staatsarchiv Wolfenbüttel, 1 Alt 24 Nr. 271: Letters of Empress Elisabeth Christine to Her Father 1713–​1716; 1 Alt 24 Nr. 274:  Correspondence of the Duchess Christine Louise with the Imperial Court 1706–​1741; see also Körper, Studien, 331–​37.

44  Michael Pölzl, “Wie der regenbogen in der lufft. Die Stifterin Amalia Wihelmina von Braunschweig-​Lüneburg,” in Das Kloster der Kaiserin. 300 Jahre Salesianerinnen in Wien, ed. Helga Penz (Petersberg: Imhof, 2017), 18–​33 at 24. 45  See Christian Sapper, “Die Zahlamtsbücher im Hofkammerarchiv (1542–​1825),” Mitteilungen des Österreichischen Staatsarchivs (hereafter MÖStA) 35 (1982): 404–​54.

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In existing publications, the financial means of empresses are only mentioned regarding the dowry or dower, which is perhaps in part due to research on early modern empresses having just started in recent years. The first collected results were published as biographical essays in an edited volume by Bettina Braun, Katrin Keller, and Matthias Schnettger in 2016.46 The chapters focus on family politics—​ the education of children, marriage politics, and memoria—​on empresses’ role as intercessor—​for family members, members of other dynasties, and subjects—​on their networks and patronage, on representation, on religious activities, and last but not least, on empresses’ role as political advisors to emperors. These are the typical topics in research of princesses or female regents, but finances or economics are mentioned only in passing.47 A further example is the recent biography of Maria Theresa (1717–​1780) by Barbara Stollberg-​Rilinger, who does not discuss the private finances of the princess; the marriage portion and counter-​money, both amounting to 150,000 fl., are mentioned only in one single sentence.48 For Stollberg-​Rilinger, the gifts for Empress Elisabeth Christine—​and Maria Theresa—​for Maria Theresa’s birth and christening in 1717, for example “jewellery, brilliant-​studded tobacco tins, and portraits,” are merely “extravagant, symbolic presents.”49 But of course, the presents’ material value should not be underestimated, as shown later in this chapter for the empress’s jewellery. Dowry, Inheritance, and Gifts

The income of empresses consisted of the aforementioned elements of princesses’ wealth—​namely dowry (jointure) and counter-​money as well as marital accrual, inheritances, gifts, and other sources—​but were often considerably larger than for other consorts of reigning princes, especially the dowry (jointure) and counter-​ money. Isabella of Portugal (1503–​1539), the wife of Emperor Charles V since 1526, had a Mitgift of 1 million ducats;50 after her mother’s death, she had already received her maternal inheritance and the revenue of the Portuguese cities of Viseo and Torres Vedras.51 As Maria of Spain (1528–​1603) married Archduke Maximilian in 1548 before his election as Maximilian II, the amounts were smaller, consisting of a Mitgift of 60,000 fl. Rhenish, and counter-​money of 40,000 (Austrian) fl. (guilders),52 but her father considerably added to it with 200,000 ducats d’or and her maternal inheritance of 100,000 46 Braun et al., Nur die Frau des Kaisers?

47  Katrin Keller, “Frauen und dynastische Herrschaft,” in Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Bettina Braun et al. (Vienna: Böhlau, 2016), 13–​26 at 22.

48  Barbara Stollberg-​Rilinger, Maria Theresia. Die Kaiserin in ihrer Zeit. Eine Biographie (Munich: Beck, 2017), 37. 49  Stollberg-​Rilinger, Maria Theresia, 11.

50  Ferenc Majoros, Karl V.: Habsburg als Weltmacht (Graz: Styria, 2000), 86.

51  Carmen Sanz Ayán, “Isabel de Portugal,” Diccionario Biográfico Español, http://​dbe.rah.es/​ biografias/​13103/​isabel-​de-​portugal (November 1, 2018). 52  Because of different currencies, the sums amount to roughly the same.

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Burgundian crown thaler. In return, Maria, like other brides, renounced most rights to the Spanish crown.53 The wives of Ferdinand II and Ferdinand III, both women born into the Gonzaga dynasty, brought 150,000 doppie as well as jewellery, textiles, and carpets (Eleonora Gonzaga, 1598–​1655) and 100,000 doppie (Eleonora Magdalena Gonzaga of Mantua-​Nevers, 1628–​1686), respectively.54 As an archduchess and later empress, Maria Amalia of Austria (1701–​1756), who married the prince elector of Bavaria and later emperor Charles VII, was assigned a dowry (jointure) of 100,000 fl. and jewellery with a value of 1 million guilders.55 In the seventeenth century, therefore, the empresses’ yearly income could range between 30,000 fl. and 230,000 fl.56 In addition, Isabella of Portugal and Maria of Spain gained their maternal inheritance by their marriage, but others also inherited the movable possessions of their mothers, at the very least.57 Empresses received gifts, quite often jewellery or objects of high material value after childbirth, for their saint’s day, as wedding presents,58 or for their coronation.59 Indeed, the yearly gift-​giving on St. Nicholas’ Day could become very expensive. In 1639, for example, Ferdinand III gifted his wife, Maria Anna of Spain (1606–​1646), fifty pieces of tableware, and Maria Anna gave him a luxurious amber-​embroidered coat and a gold-​ decorated sword. Her mother-​in-​law also gave Empress Maria Anna a precious small writing desk in the form of an altar.60 Other presents came in the form of subsidies or 53 Peter Russow, “Karls V.  Tochter Maria als Eventual-​Erbin der spanischen Reiche,” Archiv für Reformationsgeschichte 49 (1958): 161–​68 at 161–​62.

54  Matthias Schnettger, “Die Kaiserinnen aus dem Haus Gonzaga: Eleonora die Ältere und Eleonora die Jüngere,” in Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Bettina Braun et al. (Vienna: Böhlau, 2016), 117–​40 at 121n18. 55  Peter Claus Hartmann, Karl Albrecht—​Karl VII.:  glücklicher Kurfürst, unglücklicher Kaiser (Regensburg: Pustet, 1985), 43.

56  Eleonora Gonzaga (1598–​1655) was able to draw an amount of 30,000 fl., whereas Eleonora Magdalena Gonzaga von Mantua-​Nevers (1628–​1686) had 230,000 fl. at her disposal, Schnettger, “Die Kaiserinnen aus dem Haus Gonzaga,” 133.

57  See Sanz Ayán, “Isabel de Portugal”; Russow, “Karls V. Tochter Maria.” The daughters of Amalia Wilhelmina, Maria Josepha, the wife of Frederick August II, prince elector of Saxonia, and as August III the king of Poland, and Maria Amalia, the wife of Charles Albrecht, prince elector of Bavaria, and as emperor Charles VII, inherited the mobile possessions known by the inventory of their mother’s dower residence in the Salesian convent; see Maureen Cassidy-​Geiger, “In der und ausser der Clausur. Kaiserinwitwe Wilhelmina Amalias Appartement im Kloster am Rennweg,” in Das Kloster der Kaiserin. 300 Jahre Salesianerinnen in Wien, ed. Helga Penz (Petersberg: Imhof, 2017), 42–​51, especially 43. Existing research contains no mention of paternal inheritance of an empress.

58  Eleonore Magdalene Therese of Palatinate-​Neuburg (1655–​1720), one of the wives of Emperor Leopold I, received presents from her parents after her wedding; see Katrin Keller, “Ein Gedanke zu ‘Amtsantritt: Die Kaiserin schreibt an ihren Vater,’ ” Kaiserin und Reich, July 16, 2017, https://​ kaiserin.hypotheses.org/​276 (November 1, 2018).

59  Anna of Tirol was gifted by the city council of Nuremberg with a bureau with silver applications worth 1,500 fl. and 500 fl. d’or. Elena Taddei, “Anna von Tirol: ‘Kaiserin für Gottes Gnaden?’ ” in Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Bettina Braun et al. (Vienna: Böhlau, 2016), 99–​116 at 111. 60  Katrin Keller and Alessandro Catalano, eds., Die Diarien und Tagzettel des Kardinals Ernst Adalbert von Harrach (1598–​1667), vol. 5 (Vienna: Böhlau, 2010), 646. Even six years later, during

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commissions by other princes: Maria of Spain received 50,000 ducats d’or from Pope Gregory XIII in 1578 for her help in keeping Emperor Maximilian from converting.61 In times of monetary shortage, empresses could fall back on these material possessions in order to pawn them for money or to borrow against them. Maria of Spain was known to use the Jews in Prague to borrow money.62 Elisabeth Christine also had a reputation for spending above her means; the Bank of Vienna had to cover the debts of her court several times. For her personal needs and private money, she wrote to her parents and to the head of her natal family, Duke Ferdinand Albrecht of Brunswick-​Wolfenbüttel, to take loans from a Jewish financier in Brunswick. In addition, she frequently pawned her jewellery for money or to cover debts, for example the aforementioned presents she received for the birth of Maria Theresa.63 Financial and Economic Actions

Empresses used their money for gifts, to support family members and relatives, or for alms-​giving; they spent huge amounts of money on jewellery, clothing, relics, liturgical objects and paraments, instituted foundations, and convents, and in their testaments they gave money and high-​priced objects as pensions or mementos to personnel, courtiers, friends, and relations. Maria Anna of Spain, the first wife of Ferdinand III, was known for her lavish court, which formed an important part of official representation strategies. But her expenditure on jewellery and textiles—​utilizing her large dowry (jointure)—​went beyond the norm and was criticized, possibly because of the circumstances during the Thirty Years’ War.64 Other expenses like the financial support of close relatives were common; for example, Empress Eleonora Gonzaga heavily supported her niece Maria.65 Other empresses financed music and the arts with their money and therefore supported cultural transfer. Eleonora Gonzaga used her wealth to introduce Italian musical traditions at court and to add a ballroom to the imperial palace (Hofburg) in Vienna.66 the economic crisis of the Thirty Years’ War, they exchanged expensive gifts. Oberösterreichisches Landesarchiv, Herrschaft Steyr, box 1222, Nr. 11–​198:  Correspondence of Johann Maximilian of Lamberg with Count Franz Christoph Khevenhüller 1644–​1649, s.f., 8.12.1645, Linz, writer with autographic signature, cited from Keller, “Weihnachten 1645.” 61  Alexander Koller, “Maria von Spanien, die katholische Kaiserin,” in Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Bettina Braun et al. (Vienna: Böhlau, 2016), 85–​97 at 94. 62  Koller, “Maria von Spanien,” 88.

63  Körper, Studien, 333n5. For jewellery as an important part of a woman’s wealth, see also Chapter 3.

64  Andrea Sommer-​Mathias, “María Ana de Austria: spanische Infantin—​Königin von Ungarn und Böhmen—​römisch-​deutsche Kaiserin (1606–​1646),” in Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Bettina Braun et al. (Vienna: Böhlau, 2016), 140–​56 at 149. 65  Schnettger, “Die Kaiserinnen aus dem Haus Gonzaga,” 136.

66  Schnettger, “Die Kaiserinnen aus dem Haus Gonzaga,” 127; Sommer-​Mathias, “María Ana de Austria,” 146.

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Alms-​giving was always mentioned in testaments to justify an empress’s debts, such as in Elisabeth Christine’s case.67 This was clearly a topos, but it was also expected that a consort would care for the unfortunate and poor with prayers, actions, and money for hospitals and almshouses, amongst other bequests.68 Endowments for military installations, like 10,000 fl. for the fortress of Vienna in Anna of Tirol’s (1585–​1618) last will,69 supported politics and stressed the empress’s role as guardian of her people. Another element involved expenses towards religious activities. Especially for the Habsburg consorts, explicit care for the Catholic faith was an important part of their duties, as the family’s Catholicism and religious politics—​characterized as pietas austriaca, or Austrian piety—​had been a key element of its dynastic values since the late sixteenth century.70 Many empresses funded religious orders and convents, for example the Jesuits, the Capuchins, or the Servites.71 Besides the importance of convents in dynastic religious politics, they were also part of ensuring the lasting memory of their founders and served as places of residence for dowager empresses and unmarried female members of the dynasty. The Jesuit schools for boys and the Salesian convents for girls, like the one instituted by Empress Amalia Wilhelmina in Vienna, provided education and knowledge with imperial support.72 Anna of Tirol, the wife of Emperor Matthias, spent a large amount of money on relics and sacral art. In her last will, she ordered that these “sacred objects” should be placed in her burial chapel with an altar in silver for which she allocated 12,000 fl.73 Anna’s sacral collection made up half of the objects in the inventory of the sacral treasury (Geistliche Schatzkammer) in Vienna. However, she is mentioned only as the treasury’s founder, not as its major contributor.74 This shows again how important further research into empresses’ finances is when compared to existing studies on Habsburg politics and imperial agency. 67 Michael Pölzl, “Die Kaiserinnen Amalia Wilhelmina (1673–​1742) und Elisabeth Christine (1691–​ 1750). Handlungsspielräume im Spannungsfeld dynastischer und persönlicher Interessen,” in Nur die Frau des Kaisers? Kaiserinnen in der Frühen Neuzeit, ed. Bettina Braun et al. (Vienna: Böhlau, 2016), 175–​92 at 190. 68  Taddei, “Anna von Tirol,” 113. 69  Taddei, “Anna von Tirol,” 113.

70  See Anna Coreth, Pietas Austriaca: Österreichische Frömmigkeit im Barock (Munich: Oldenbourg, 1982).

71  Koller, “Maria von Spanien,” 91. See Katrin Keller, “Von der Sichtbarkeit einer Kaiserin: Kaiserin Anna und ihr Schatz,” Kaiserin und Reich, January 28, 2017, https://​kaiserin.hypotheses.org/​184 (November 1, 2018), or Michael Pölzl, “Wie der regenbogen in der lufft.”

72  In 1736, Amalia Wilhelmina added an endowment for “imperial canon girls” covering the educational costs and Mitgift for three girls. Christine Schneider, “Der Konvent und das Pensionat des Wiener Heimsuchungsklosters,” in Das Kloster der Kaiserin. 300 Jahre Salesianerinnen in Wien, ed. Helga Penz (Petersberg: Imhof, 2017), 70–​81 at 80. 73  Österreichisches Staatsarchiv, Allgemeines Verwaltungsarchiv, Family Archiv Trauttmansdorff Nr. 118, Nr. 7, s.f.: Extracts of the Last Will and Testament of Empress Anna, copy, cited from Keller, “Von der Sichtbarkeit.” 74  Keller, “Von der Sichtbarkeit.”

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Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici: The Finances of a Princess Consort Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici provides a compelling example of the importance of understanding the finances of a princess consort of the Holy Roman Empire. Regarding their rank, consorts of prince electors followed directly after empresses, but in the Holy Roman Empire, due to the heterogeneity of dynastic and constitutional backgrounds, it is not immediately possible to compare individual princesses. Born as princesses, they cannot be seen independently, but only in relation to their natal dynasty. In marriage arrangements the future wives were granted their own money from their future husbands or their natal families.75 This was not meant to give them financial independence, but to enable a princess to have a representation worthy of the position of her natal and now married dynasty.76 Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici as electress, or Kurfürstin, was part of the Reichsfürstenstand, the princes and princesses of the Holy Roman Empire. Being part of this high rank of the Holy Roman Empire meant that she was similar to the empresses, who as wives of the emperors also were princess consorts.77 Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici was born to Grand Duke Cosimo III of Tuscany (1642–​ 1723, r.  1670–​1723) in 1667 and married Johann Wilhelm of Palatine-​Neuburg in 1691. She was electress for about twenty-​six years until her husband’s death in June 1716. Without having issue to inherit the Electorate of the Palatinate, she returned as a childless widow to Florence in September 1717, where she lived until her death in 1743. Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici is well known as the last of the grand ducal dynasty and she is valued by art historians as the saviour of the rich collections of the Medici in Florence. In German regional historiography, her life as the wife of Elector Johann Wilhelm has been thoroughly analyzed, especially the time during their residence in Düsseldorf, as the new capital of the duchy of Jülich-​Berg. The following analysis, however, concentrates on the lesser-​studied subject of her agency via personal finances as an electress in the Holy Roman Empire. After shortly reviewing the financial and material resources provided for her in the marriage contract, the focus is on her privy purse, the Kabinettskasse. As we have nearly the complete annual overview of her expenditures in an edited volume of these accounts, the Kabinettskassenrechnungen, two separate years of her time as consort in Düsseldorf are used to analyze two aspects: firstly, the document as a source for financial information is itself characterized, and secondly, her financial possibilities to exert influence are traced by comparing two annual accounts.78 75 See Wendt-​Sellin, Herzogin, 106–​30.

76  Kägler, Frauen am Münchner Hof, 12 and 171.

77  In her blog Kaiserin und Reich (Empress and Empire), Katrin Keller has pointed out that the differences in rank between the reigning empress and an electress could mainly be seen in the furniture provided. She uses sources concerning the ceremonial procedures of the visit of an electress to the imperial court in Vienna; see Katrin Keller, “Zeremonielle Hierarchien:  Audienzen bei der Kaiserin (1): Kurfürstinnen,” Kaiserin und Reich, October 10, 2016 https://​kaiserin.hypotheses.org/​ 139#footnote_​2_​139 (November 5, 2018). 78  My PhD thesis on Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici and her agency as a Catholic princess between Tuscany and the Electorate of the Palatinate (working title in German:  “Anna Maria Luisa de’

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Researchers looking at the Medici after their rise to the Tuscan throne as grand dukes in the second half of the sixteenth century have rarely considered the financial background of Medici women.79 Since the Medici family based their reputation on their economic success as bankers,80 this is surprising, and even more so because the family’s celebrated unique patronage of the arts81 needed a financial basis. While it is important to see the outcome of female patronage, it is equally important to see that without financial resources there would not have been any patronage at all. Turning specifically to Anna Maria Luisa, her bank accounts are mentioned in chapters by Stefano Casciu82 and Marcello Verga,83 but no details are given. Based on the source material, however, Anna Maria Luisa’s accounts can be used as an outstanding case study through which to work on the finances of a Medici woman and a princess consort of the Holy Roman Empire. As an electress, but also as the last member of the Medici dynasty, she was responsible for her natal family’s heritage and thus during her time as a widow in Florence she continuously engaged in material and financial activity. As already mentioned, the fact that her account books are edited and published, but no research has yet been conducted on the financial circumstances of the electorate of the Palatinate during the reign of Johann Wilhelm II, draws attention to the already acknowledged lack of research on the financial agency of women in the context of early modern female rule. Medici—​Dynastisch begründeter Wirkungsbereich einer katholischen Fürstin als Mittlerin zwischen den Herrschaftsbereichen der Pfalz-​Neuburger und der Medici während der europäischen Sukzessionskriege”) is still a work in progress; it is supervised by Prof. Dr.  Horst Carl at Gießen University, Germany. 79  Yvonne Maguire, The Women of the Medici (London: Routledge, 1927) and Natalie R. Tomas, The Medici Women: Gender and Power in Renaissance Florence (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003) work with female agency via commissions for works of art, but no topics related to the Medici women’s economic backgrounds are mentioned in the index. The anthology Medici Women:  The Making of a Dynasty in Grand Ducal Tuscany, edited by Giovanna Benadusi and Judith C. Brown (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2015), provides us with different fields of female agency, but no references on economic or financial activities are found in the index.

80  See Raymond de Roover, The Rise and Decline of the Medici Bank, 1397–​1494 (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1963); Richard A. Goldthwaite, “The Medici Bank and the World of Florentine Capitalism,” Past and Present 114 (1987): 3–​31.

81  See Ernst H. Gombrich, “The Early Medici as Patrons of the Arts,” in Norm and Form: Studies in the Art of the Renaissance, ed. Ernst H.  Gombrich (London:  Phaidon, 1971): 35–​57. The first overview of the history of the Medici women has been published in Tomas, The Medici Women. An edited volume on the Medici women during the time of the principality in the German lands concentrates on their biographies and their role as buyers and employers, but without any focus on financial resources; see Christina Strunck, ed., Die Frauen des Hauses Medici. Politik, Mäzenatentum, Rollenbilder (1512–​1743) (Petersberg: Imhof, 2011). 82  Casciu, “Anna Maria Luisa, Electress Palatine.”

83  Marcello Verga, “Between Dynastic Strategies and Civic Myth: Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici and Florence as the New Athens,” in Medici Women: The Making of a Dynasty in Grand Ducal Tuscany, ed. Giovanna Benadusi and Judith C. Brown (Toronto: Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2015), 347–​71.

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Marriage Contract

When Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici married in 1691, her civil status changed: the Grand Princess of Tuscany became the Electress Palatine of the Holy Roman Empire. As a child and unmarried princess, she had been highly dependent on her family, consisting primarily of male relatives. In matrimony, as mentioned earlier, women of high rank gained a certain level of financial independence. As consort, Anna Maria Luisa was still dependent on her husband, but the marriage contract was a juridical foundation which provided her with her own financial resources.84 Her Kabinettskasse—​or privy purse—​ was an annual allowance of money which she could use freely. The sources of this money need to be discussed. Who provided it to her, her natal family or her husband? What does the matrimony contract of Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici tell us about her financial and material resources? The marriage contract included a waiver, signed by Anna Maria Luisa on April 19, 1691, by which she renounced claims to her family’s possessions and any rights to the throne,85 including her own possible claims to the hereditary title and the allodia of the Medici family.86 As a consequence, financially, Anna Maria Luisa did not have financial resources drawn directly from the possessions of her natal family. As a wife, her economic status depended fundamentally on the sums provided to her by her family and her husband in the marriage contract.87 Her dowry was to be 300,000 scudi,88 which, according to Wolf, was not a huge amount.89 This dowry should have been paid in installments—​40,000 scudi as a kind of Mitgift and 20,000 scudi per annum.90 The money was intended to cover the running costs:  her annual allowance granted in the 84 Kägler, Kurfürstinnen, 167. 85  Kägler, Kurfürstinnen, 138–​39.

86  Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen, Die letzte Medicäerin—​eine deutsche Kurfürstin. Anna Maria Luisa von der Pfalz (1667–​1743) (Düsseldorf: Lintz, 1939), 18. Reference to ASF, Trat. int. 43; Miscellanea Medicea (hereafter MM) 9720 inf. XVII. After the reconstruction of this source as MM 594,17, there now exists the “Copia autentica del Contratto di Rinuncia [ai beni allodiali della Casa Medici] fatta dalla Ser.ma Principessa Anna Maria [Luisa de’ Medici] a favore del Ser.mo Granduca suo padre [Cosimo III de’ Medici], et suoi Ser.mi successori, rogato da Ser Tommaso Cepparelli in dì 20 Aprile 1691,” cc 1–​8; Verga, “Between Dynastic Strategies and Civic Myth,” 358. Kühn-​Steinhausen mentions a “memoria” written in the year after Anna Maria Luisa’s death (ASF, MdP 2713, Memorie, ins. 2). 87  Kägler, Kurfürstinnen, 167.

88  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 45–​46. Steingens uses Gulden (florins [fl.]) at 60 kreutzers as the basis of his calculations, whereas Schenkhart counts in Reichsthaler (imperial thaler) (Kölnischer Fuß) at 80 albus. For an overview of the most important currencies used in the Holy Roman Empire from 1484 to 1873 see Trapp and Fried, Münzkunde, 84–​86. 89  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 10. Part of her dowry comprised material goods, for example the silver bed of her grandmother Isabella della Rovere, which she brought to Düsseldorf (Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 13). See also Barbara Marx, “Politica culturale al feminile e identità medicea,” in Le donne medicee nel sistema Europeo delle corti, XVI–​XVII secolo, ed. Giulia Calvi and Riccardo Spinelli (Firenze: Edizioni Polistampa, 2008), 147–​67 at 167. 90  Kühn-​Steinhausen, Elettrice Palatina, 33; Kühn-​Steinhausen, Kurfürstin, 13–​14.

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wedding contract, but also jewellery and the purchase of the county of Megen.91 A subscription of Johann Wilhelm of Palatine-​Neuburg from June 8, 1691, as part of the obligation provided her with the following sums in matrimony: 100,000 fl. as morgive, an annual allowance (dowry jointure) as wife of 18,000 fl., and an annual purse as widow of 30,000 fl.92 The sum of the annual allowance was the basis for her Kabinettskasse. Interestingly, in the case of Anna Maria Luisa, it was not fixed, neither did it remain the same. The sums were constantly changing, as were the financial resources and the accounts of where the money came from. The general overview of her expenditures provided by Wolf clearly shows that from the fiscal year 1694/​95 until 1701/​02, her allowance increased from 19,000 fl. up to 46,875 fl. (31,250 Rtl.).93 Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici’s financial state clearly expanded constantly and, consequently, her agency via money broadened considerably. Moreover, the sums she did receive did not come only from her dowry but also from her husband via different sources. Already in the year 1694/​95, Johann Wilhelm increased her capital with the revenue of Ravenstein,94 and in 1708, after his mother’s death, he placed her dower at his wife’s disposal. These extra sums of money seemed to have been necessary to maintain Anna Maria Luisa’s economic status as an electress, as the Florentine money (her dowry of 300,000 scudi) had already been spent in 1698, to some extent for other purposes than for her privy purse or for her widowhood.95 In the same year, after long disputes between the elector and the estates of his territories, the latter guaranteed to pay back the entire sum of the dowry to Anna Maria Luisa’s natal family in order to sustain the widowed “ex-​electress” in the case of the early death of the elector without a male heir (in which case the son would have been responsible for supporting his mother).96 Johann Wilhelm thus managed to maintain Anna Maria Luisa’s financial status as his wife, independent from her natal family, and even independent from his own influence. Even on his deathbed in June 1716, Johann Wilhelm seemed to have increased the dowry to an almost incredible amount, perhaps even 200,000 to 300,000 fl. per annum, and to have added the tenancy for life of the jewellery of the house of Palatine-​Neuburg.97 Although Anna Maria Luisa’s inheritance as electress dowager would later be the subject 91 Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 47. The purchase of this county is not mentioned in her Kabinettskassenrechnungen, so this is a strong reference to the mutual benefit of the dowry for both spouses. Megen and Ravenstein are only mentioned as places where money has been disbursed for her: 1706/​07 R. 92  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 47. 93  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 50.

94  See Kühn-​Steinhausen, Johann Wilhelm.

95  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 48. Unlike the agreements in the marriage contract, parts of Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici’s dowry had been paid in erratic sums and were used to cover open accounts besides her personal requirements. 96  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 10. 97  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 24.

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of constant disputes, the augmentation and irregularities of her annual income as wife show that the sums fixed in a wedding contract could undergo several changes. A consort’s husband could adjust them so as to reflect new circumstances without the involvement of her natal family. More financial resources strengthened a princess’s agency during her time as consort. The numbers and the disputes surrounding these changes also show that a woman’s finances were a matter of general discussion at early modern courts and were constantly renegotiated. The Kabinettskassenrechnungen: The Electress’s Privy Purse Accounts

As mentioned earlier, Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici had been provided in the marriage contract with an annual amount of money to spend.98 The sources concerning her financial resources are still near complete and available in the Florentine State Archive. This allows the analysis of her income as well as her spending. To trace Anna Maria Luisa’s financial agency during her time as electress in Düsseldorf, her privy purse accounts—​ Kabinettskassenrechnungen—​are available as an edition of Regesta,99 published by Jürgen Rainer Wolf in 2015, but based on preliminary research that Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen carried out in the 1960s.100 Within the edition, more than 4,600 regesta—​short summaries of the receipts—​are published for a broader public.101 The edition covers the period from May 6, 1691, shortly after her arrival in Düsseldorf, to March 22, 1718, when she returned to Florence after the death of Johann Wilhelm in 1716. The account books analyzed here were kept by two private secretaries of the electress: Daniel Steingens,102 who was responsible for the account books from 1691 until July 1698, and afterwards 98 ASF, MdP 6321, fol. 155. The dispute about her dowry as a widow is mentioned in Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 27n1. For her court accounts during her time as a widow in Florence, see Casciu, “Anna Maria Luisa, Electress Palatine,” 336, and Casciu, “Principessa saggia,” 41n74.

99  A register—​in German Regest—​is meant as a roundup of the juridical consequences of a medieval or early modern document. The plural Regesten or regesta is used to indicate a collection of the records of one individual with similar content like the account books of Anna Maria Luisa.

100  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen. In her German publication Die letzte Medicäerin, Kühn-​ Steinhausen concentrates on Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici’s time in Düsseldorf. In the later Italian translation of this first biography, Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen places the focus on Anna Maria Luisa’s time as a widow in Florence; see Kühn-​Steinhausen, Elettrice Palatina.

101  This remark on the website of the Düsseldorfer Geschichtsverein shows the editorial aims beside research to be done with this edition (“Die Kabinettskassenrechnungen der Kurfürstin Anna Maria Luisa von der Pfalz,” in Quellen und Forschungen zur Geschichte des Niederrheins, ed. Düsseldorfer Geschichtsverein, www.duesseldorfer-​geschichtsverein.de/​quellen-​und-​forschungen-​ zur-​geschichte-​des-​niederrheins/​95-​kurfuerstin-​anna-​maria-​luisa-​von-​der-​pfalz.html [July 27, 2018]). 102  Daniel Steingens had been the secretary of Johann Wilhelm of Palatine-​Neuburg since 1675. In 1691, he became the privy secretary (Geheimsekretär) of Anna Maria Luisa, but also fulfilled the duty as chamber councillor (Kammerrat). Although there seems to have been irregularities in the management of the account books, he nevertheless was appointed resident of the Electorate of the Palatinate in London from 1704 until 1715; see Kühn-​Steinhausen, Kurfürstin, 13.

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Edmund Peregrinus Schenkhart.103 This change of secretaries seems to be related to irregularities in the accounts. With the change in secretaries, the currency in which the accounts were kept changed as well; according to Wolf, this may also be the cause for missing documents of 1698 and 1699.104 As mentioned in Anna Maria Luisa’s marriage contract, every circulation of her money needed to be controlled by accounting.105 The remark of “vidit”—​“seen”—​shows that there was no further restriction on the sums already spent.106 The vast number of entries are divided into annual accounts; every record covers twelve months beginning in June and ending in May the following year. The start and the end of every annual account changes slightly over the twenty-​five years of Anna Maria Luisa’s consortship. The wedding took place in Florence, and on June 6, 1691, she arrived in Neuburg/​Düsseldorf. From this moment onwards, she could receive money for her privy purse according to her wedding contract, therefore the account books used periods from June to May the following years instead of the more conventional fiscal year. During the daily tracking of money, the secretaries used this annual period to form one folder.107 It can generally be concluded that the annual account of a princess consort paralleled with her wedding year, which shows that these accounts were bound to her marital status.108 Every account year starts with a description of the gross income. Comparing the yearly income, several changes regarding the sums of money can be seen. For example, in the first year, the annual amount was handed in in one transaction via the “court 103 Edmund Peregrinus Schenkhart (served 1698–​1716), a cleric, was at first Anna Maria Luisa de Medici’s second secret secretary. From 1702 until 1716 he was the Hofkammerrat of Johann Wilhelm of Palatine-​Neuburg; see Friedrich Lau, “Die Regierungskollegien zu Düsseldorf und der Hofstaat zur Zeit Johann Wilhelms (1679–​1716) II.,” Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch 40 (1938): 257–​90 at 286, and Friedrich Lau, “Die Regierungskollegien zu Düsseldorf und der Hofstaat zur Zeit Johann Wilhelms (1679–​1716) I.,” Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch 39 (1937): 228–​42 at 239. 104  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 45. 105  ASF, MdP 6321, fol. 155.

106  As we can see at the end of every annual account, the correct cash management of the secretary is signed by himself, countersigned by Anna Maria Luisa herself, and then marked with “vidit” by Johann Friedrich Graf Schaesberg; see, for example, Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1704/​05 without a number (p. 613): Düsseldorf, January 23, 1706. Schaesberg began his career as the Hofkammerdirektor of Jülich-​Berg in 1694; one year later he was appointed Geheimer Rat und Präsident. In 1702, he became Präsident of the Hofkammer of Palatine with the title Obristhofkammerpräsident (cf. Lau, “Regierungskollegien I,” 233–​34). After the death of Johann Wilhelm, Schaesberg became Anna Maria Luisa’s Oberhofmeister (c.f. Kühn-​Steinhausen, “Briefwechsel,” 174, A 730).

107  For more details about the wedding see Klaus Müller, “Eine fürstliche Heirat im Zeitalter Ludwigs XIV. Johann Wilhelm von der Pfalz und Anna Maria Luisa Medici,” in Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici, Kurfürstin von der Pfalz, ed. Karl Bernd Heppe (Düsseldorf: Stadtmuseum Düsseldorf, 1988), 33–​48. 108  Only the nineteenth annual account of Schenkhart from June 1, 1716, until March 22, 1718, covered a longer period, the time of Johann Wilhelm’s death and the rearrangement of her financial situation as a widow until her return to Florence (Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1106–​1210).

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Jew,” Aaron Beer.109 Sometimes, as explained earlier, the electress benefited from a new source of money which augmented the sum of her allowance.110 But the entries in her privy purse account do not point directly to an additional supply of personal wealth. For example, in 1708, a rise of her annual payment was allotted with the added dower of her mother-​in-​law, which is not mentioned as such.111 Other irregularities emerge regarding the income:  first, the sums of money were provided at different times; second, the periods in which wages were paid were not in any way regular; and third, numerous institutions or persons handed in varying sums of money.112 In general, this exceptional source material shows the heterogeneity of currencies and their daily use in transactions and payments. Additionally, the secretaries used diverse currencies as bases for their calculations. Editor Jürgen Rainer Wolf provides an overview showing the changing figures and numbers when the currency as the numeric base is switched.113 To allow a comparison between different entries, in the following all expenditures are given as percentages of the annual income. When working with source material on financial history it is necessary to keep the above-mentioned points in mind, which make any comparison with other accounts challenging. Wolf also includes a general survey of the various items of expenditure. Without using further source material, it is therefore possible to see at a glance how Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici spent her money.114 Looking at the first two years of income, Wolf divides her account into two main parts: Personalkosten und Handgelder (costs for personnel and petty cash) and Vermischte sonstige Ausgaben (other mixed expenditures). The last one is characterized by diverse acquisitions accounting to varying amounts of the total sum per annum; the first category is paid on quite a regular basis. Besides minimal changes, the payments for her personal court did not change much during her stay in Düsseldorf.115 It seems as if she herself paid for her clothing.116 A  large amount of her privy purse was spent on jewellery and on silver. According to the quantifiable differences of those payments, she was allowed to spend as much of her annual allowance as pleased her.117 Interestingly, her petty cash was not included in the general amounts of money,118 but 109 Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 119. 110  In the income, the sums handed in coming from Ravenstein can be seen; see 1706/​07 R, I, 665. 111  Order of Johann Wilhelm, August 30, 1709; see for the inheritance Hermine Kühn-​Steinhausen, Landesarchiv Nordrhein-​Westfalen, Abteilung Rheinland HS BI Nr. 7 Vol. 2, cited from Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 48. 112  Heinrich Schnee, “Hoffaktor Aaron Beer in Frankfurt/​Main als Resident des Kurfürsten Johann Wilhelm von der Pfalz und Herzogs von Jülich und Berg,” Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch 52 (1966): 130–​35. As an example of the irregularities of a gross income see Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1106–​7. 113  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 50–​54. 114  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 50–​54. 115  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 55–​56. 116  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 55–​56. 117  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 56–​57. 118  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 49.

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was given to her by her secretary after she signed a receipt with the demanded sum of money.119 It may be possible that she held an account book of her own for these expenditures, but there is no reference to this in the Kabinettskassenrechnungen. To analyze the development of her policies through finances, two years are now compared and examined in detail: her first year as a young bride of Palatine-​Neuburg and her last year in Düsseldorf, which was also her first year as a widow after twenty-​ five years as an electress. The first annual record of Daniel Steingens from May 6, 1691, until May 5, 1692,120 begins with a short mention of the income:  she received 12,000 Rtl./​18,000 fl. from Aaron Beer, and she handed in 600 Spezies-​Dukaten worth 3 fl. and 54 kr., in sum worth 2,340 fl.121 She had therefore a total sum of 20,340 fl. at her disposal.122 The money consisted of two items. First was the money from her Mitgift, provided via a Jewish court merchant in Frankfurt, and resident of the Electorate of the Palatinate since 1692.123 Second, she herself deposited money outside of the fund of her annual allowance. It seems as if she had a resource that provided her with money besides her marriage property.124 Regarding expenditures, in her first year, she spent 36.77  percent of the entire income on her personal court, 7,487 fl. in total. She paid merely 1.94 percent or 399 fl. for masses and candles for religious services.125 A remarkable 33.48 percent or 4,116 fl. was spent on silver objects: she bought household articles,126 haberdashery, and jewellery. This percentage of silver would never again be so high within the time frame accounted for by her privy purse. The reason might have been that she wanted to install a proper household, so she invested the common money into paraphernalia, which also might be added to her own belongings. Along with a courtly household befitting her rank, she also created savings in material goods. Her last year as consort, the nineteenth annual account by her second secretary, Peregrinus Schenkhart, from June 1, 1716, until March 22, 1718, differs from the first annual account in three aspects: first, the annual allowance covers not twelve months, but twenty-​one; second, her annual allowance of 51,406 Reichsthaler increased by 160 percent compared to the annual sum provided in the marriage contract; and third, the currency as calculator basis changed from Gulden (fl.) to Reichsthaler due to the change of private secretaries. The electress paid nearly the same sum for her personal 119 Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1691/​92 Nr. 5, Neuburg, June 13. The term “receipt” for the notices of her Handgeld is introduced in Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 117. 120  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 118–​47.

121  “Kr.” is the abbreviations of kreutzer, the smallest coin used at the time. Only at two other times she herself handed in money (Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1696/​97 R and 1716/​18 R). It is not clear where this money came from—​this needs further research. 122  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1691/​92 R.

123  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1226; Schnee, “Hoffaktor Aaron Beer.”

124  From a financial point of view, she was able to receive money from different possessions belonging to the Medici family. After the death of her younger and last brother, Gian Gastone de’ Medici, in 1737, it seems as if she inherited Medici landed property (ASF, MM 600, 1). 125  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 50, 52.

126  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1691/​92, Nr. 118.

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court (8,928 Rtl.), but due to the increase of the annual allowance the percentage of personnel costs decreased to 17.47 percent. These funds remained stable for the whole period with just minor changes, so greater sums could be invested in other items such as jewellery. She spent a large sum on silver jewellery, but the percentage was 34.15 percent, nearly at the same level as in her first year. Johann Wilhelm died on June 8, 1716, and in Anna Maria Luisa’s receipts, the time of his death can be traced: according to the first six receipts, she spent money on candles, on poor relief, and on prayers for the elector’s recovery.127 From the moment of his death, she endowed requiems.128 Supposedly, she paid for her widow dress, but it is not clear if she also paid for the black dresses of her court or the festivities around the funeral. Of the immense measures of memoria she pursued to fulfill her role as a mourning widow, the funds concerning religious affairs leapt from 1.98 percent of her annual allowance up to an extraordinary 34.24 percent (17,606 Rtl.). Her official mourning as electress dowager is also displayed by the vast purchase of gold medals with pictures of the deceased elector and herself.129 She not only paid for the medals but also improved their design, and then she gave the order to distribute them, for which she also paid, for example to one Johann Selzer, for this service after her return to Florence.130 Analyzing these two years, we see the shift from a young wife installing her household to the new widow investing in gold medals and religious services for the memoria of her husband. As a young bride Anna Maria Luisa established a proper household with the aim to represent herself appropriately. She changed the financial characteristics of her funds: in buying products for her own personal needs, she converted the couple’s economical goods into her own material good. As a widow it was of course necessary by contemporary standards for her to invest in the memoria of her deceased husband. But the number of medals she bought and had distributed long after her return to Florence show an extraordinary commitment.131 The listed details of Anna Maria Luisa’s purchases and the long period covered by the receipts reveal that besides the expected courtly representation her main focus was to promote her rank as electress. It proves her own impetus in confirming her rule as the consort of an imperial prince. Accordingly, she also used the title gained through marriage to strengthen her position after her return to Florence.132 As a widow, she was still disputing with her in-​laws about her dowry (jointure), staying in contact with her 127 Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1716/​18 Nr. 1–​6.

128  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1716/​18 Nr. 9. She also bought more haberdashery and the number of black garments increased; see for example Nr. 19, 32, 53, 123, 209, 348. 129  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1716/​18, Nr. 70, 91, 232, 302, 303, 333, 353, 360, 373.

130  Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, 1716/​18 Nr. 399. She herself paid for the relocation from Düsseldorf to Florence; see Nr. 387, Nr. 388. 131  Only in the last year analyzed did she invest in gold medals.

132  In the last annual account 1716/​17/​18, she is addressed as electress and still signs the financial documents with “Anna Maria Churfürstin” (Anna Maria Electress); see Wolf, Kabinettskassenrechnungen, fig. 77, 1122, and fig. 88, 1155.

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husband’s brother and successor, Karl III Philipp of Palatine-​Neuburg, until she finally received money from the Palatine court according to the agreement between Johann Wilhelm and the estates in 1698.133 The comparison of two years of privy purse accounts is just one example of possible questions answered by researching the account books of a princess consort of the Holy Roman Empire. A source of this kind is more than simply a list of expenditures: depending on the questions, new knowledge can be gained about the agency of women, about female courtly households, and about the agency of a princess consort.

Conclusion

The financial and economic power of empresses and princess consorts of the Holy Roman Empire in the early modern period is a topic worth studying not only to analyze their financial background but also to explain their actions based on these data. Researching funds and expenditures of high noblewomen offers a way into questions of power relations, dynastic politics, economic history, and gender studies. Regarding the finances of empresses, this chapter has offered an overview of existing research. It is to be expected that further research will show more examples of empresses being used as conduits to finance their families, like Empress Elisabeth Christine managed to do for her father. The income of empresses had different sources; it could be based on money mentioned in marriage contracts and on monetary or material gifts, which in turn were sometimes pawned to support a certain lifestyle or to pay debts. An open question remains regarding the possession of lands, titles, and droits de régale in the hands of empresses. Expenditure, as far as we know from research literature, was not only based in courtly life but also showed individual passions for jewellery, music, the arts, or religious goods. Further research is needed so as to answer questions like those answered by Anna Maria Luisa de’ Medici’s accounts. The privy purse accounts, the Kabinettskassenrechnungen, of Anna Maria Luisa offer an overview of an electress’s economic agency. As an electress, she supported the ladies-​in-​waiting (Damenhof, Frauenzimmer) from her privy purse, a vital point to be considered and so far often neglected in research regarding the financial support of women. Through examining her accounts, Anna Maria Luisa’s spending habits as well as the personal network around her come to light, although the recipients of investments are seldom named. Although only her own privy purse, the Kabinettskassenrechnungen as finance records are nonetheless of general interest for court finances in Düsseldorf. Together with other sources, for example her correspondence, we can reconstruct her motivations for spending and find out why financial resources were used on any specific object in a certain context. 133 The dispute about the reimbursement of the dowry and the payment of her dower as a widow remained a long-​term topic during her entire time in Florence until her death. Discussions began in her first year as a widow in Düsseldorf; see Jürgen Rainer Wolf, “Residenz—​Witwensitz—​ein rechtes Dussel-​Dorff. Beisetzung und ‘Memorie’ des Kurfürsten Johann Wilhelm von der Pfalz und der Abzug seiner Witwe Anna Maria Luisa nach Florenz,” Düsseldorfer Jahrbuch 86 (2016): 89–​144.

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Women of high noble rank in the early modern Holy Roman Empire could be responsible for the management of their finances just as men. Account books of princesses in general are therefore extremely useful when analyzing court culture, as they help to understand what was bought for whom, for what event, and who or which institution provided the sums of money to spend under which circumstances. In addition, the craftsmen producing the goods can be traced, as well as currencies and prices of transactions. Regarding a princess and her daily life, questions of nutrition, clothing, books, gifts, and so on can be answered; sometimes even the purpose of a purchase is noted down. Bills of mailing, freight forwarding, and transportation records paint a picture of postal systems and transport infrastructure. The various currencies used at the same time, for example in the Holy Roman Empire, are a challenge for any financial research; a clear notion of exchange rates is necessary to understand accounts and for any comparison between different regions. Marriage politics at the highest level of nobility in the early modern period resulted in networks connecting dynasties from all over Europe, thereby crossing borders of languages, legal systems, and concepts of marital wealth. As a result, the financial and economic structures of the Holy Roman Empire and the finances of princesses and empresses, often from dynasties outside the Empire, are a necessary field of research for dynastic history, studies in international relations, and, of course, queenship studies.

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Chapter 3

“EDWARD III’S GOLD-DIGGING MISTRESS”: ALICE PERRERS, GENDER, AND FINANCIAL POWER AT THE ENGLISH ROYAL COURT, 1360–​1377 LAURA TOMPKINS* Where woman reign or be in authoritie, there must nedes vanitie be preferred to virtue, ambition and pride to temperacie and modestie, and finallie, that avarice the mother of all mischefe must nedes devour equitie and justice.1 John Knox

John Knox’s infamous 1558 polemic The First Blast of the Trumpet against the Monstrous Regiment of Women forms part of a familiar topos that connects women—​and especially female rule and political power—​with the sin of avarice. Deborah Valenze has highlighted that “early modern iconography inherited a host of medieval emblems relating to avarice, which depicted figures, usually female, grasping at or scooping up coins.”2 Richard Newhauser has likewise identified several female depictions of avarice from the early Middle Ages, including “Delilah,” “inhuman mistress,” “misshapen woman,” “whore,” and “woman hiding money bags.”3 These generic images were frequently associated with powerful women by their contemporary critics. In her study of the Medici women in Renaissance Florence, Natalie Tomas has discussed how the wealthy Alfonsina Orsini, who acted as regent during the absences of her son Lorenzo de Medici, was frequently and openly condemned for her avarice and ambition. Tomas notes that Alfonsina was the only member of the Medici family to be designated with this vice, and that by way of contrast “financial success and the will to acquire wealth […] was perceived as desirable and God-​given in male rulers.”4 Returning to early medieval Europe, “some vices,” * Dr. Laura Tompkins, Research Manager at Historic Royal Palaces, specialises in the political history of fourteenth-​century England, with particular focus on royal favourites.

1 John Knox, The First Blast of the Trumpet against the Monstrous Regiment of Women (Geneva, 1558), 12. The inspiration for using this quote comes from the popular short nineteenth-​century biography of Alice Perrers by Arthur Vincent in Arthur Vincent, ed., Lives of Twelve Bad Women: Illustrations and Reviews of Feminine Turpitude Set Forth by Impartial Hands (London:  Fisher Unwin, 1897), 3–​30 at 3. 2 Deborah Valenze, The Social History of Money in the English Past (Cambridge:  Cambridge University Press, 2006), 93.

3 Richard Newhauser, Early History of Greed:  The Sin of Avarice in Early Medieval Thought and Literature (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 132–​42. 4 Natalie R.  Tomas, The Medici Women:  Gender and Power in Renaissance Florence (Aldershot: Ashgate, 2003), 178–​85.

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as identified by Pauline Stafford, “are regularly attributed to queens, the most common being avarice.”5 This was certainly true later on of Isabeau of Bavaria, queen of France from 1385 to 1422, who was accused of avarice and moral corruption as part of the condemnation over her political aspirations.6 The correlation between female power, sexual wantonness, and avarice is also a prominent theme in the life of Isabeau’s near contemporary, Alice Perrers. Alice was the mistress of the chivalric hero Edward III of England during the less glorious “final” years of his reign, from approximately 1361 to his death in 1377.7 Mother to three of Edward’s children (a son and two daughters), Alice is largely portrayed by contemporaries as an unprincipled and immoral harlot who manipulated and controlled the increasingly aging and infirm king to her advantage. At an early stage of their relationship Alice had acted as a damoiselle to Edward’s queen, Philippa of Hainault,8 whose death in 1369 marked a rapid expansion of Alice’s influence and power.9 As one of the leading members of a small group of royal favourites, her behaviour in the first half of the 1370s contributed to a growing political crisis that came to a head in the Good Parliament of spring 1376.10 In the dramatic series of events that unfolded, a number of senior government officials and courtiers were impeached and sentenced to various punishments.11 Alice, meanwhile, was exiled from court and placed under an ordinance that forbade women in general—​“and especially Alice Perrers”—​from pursuing business and disputes in the king’s courts by way of maintenance (unlawfully aiding or 5 Pauline Stafford, Queens, Concubines and Dowagers:  The King’s Wife in the Early Middle Ages (London: Batsford Academic and Educational, 1983), 24–​25.

6 Rachel Gibbons, “Isabeau of Bavaria, Queen of France (1385–​1422): The Creation of a Historical Villainess:  The Alexander Prize Essay,” Transactions of the Royal Historical Society 6 (1996): 51–​73 at 55. 7 For the dating of Alice’s relationship with Edward III, see Laura Tompkins, “Alice Perrers and the Goldsmiths’ Mistery: New Evidence Concerning the Identity of the Mistress of Edward III,” English Historical Review 130 (2015): 1361–​91 at 1379–​82.

8 In October 1366 Alice was granted an annuity of two tuns of Gascon wine, ostensibly for her “long service to Queen Philippa”: Calendar of Patent Rolls [hereafter CPR], Edward III–​Richard II, 22 vols. (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1891–​1909), 1364–​1367, 321. However, her absence from two lists of the queen’s ladies who received robes for Christmas in 1366 and 1368 suggests that she had already left Philippa’s household by this time: The National Archives, Kew [hereafter TNA], E 101/​395/​10; E 101/​395/​2, no. 163. Unfortunately, no similar lists have survived for the first half of the 1360s or late 1350s. 9 Laura Tompkins, “The Uncrowned Queen:  Alice Perrers, Edward III and Political Crisis in Fourteenth-​Century England, 1360–​1377” (University of St. Andrews PhD thesis, 2013), 70–​112. 10  For this group, known as the court coveyn or “clique,” see Chris Given-​Wilson, The Royal Household and the King’s Affinity:  Service, Politics and Finance in England, 1360–​1413 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1986), 142–​54. 11  The Parliament Rolls of Medieval England [hereafter PROME], ed. and trans. Paul Brand, Anne Curry, Chris Given-​Wilson, Rosemary E. Horrox, Geoffrey Martin, W. Mark Ormrod, and J. R. S. Phillips, 16 vols. (Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2005), 5:295–​314. George Holmes, The Good Parliament (Oxford: Clarendon, 1977), remains the essential study of this assembly.

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abetting a suitor), bribery, and influencing parties.12 In the short term, the impact of the Good Parliament was limited. After the session came to a close on July 10, many of the rulings were overturned or simply ignored, and by October Alice was back at Edward III’s side and more powerful than ever.13 The wider political community was not so quick to forgive and forget, however, and following the death of Edward III on June 21, 1377, Alice was put on trial just five months later in the opening parliament of the reign of Richard II. Found guilty of breaking the terms of the ordinance made against her in the Good Parliament, Alice was sentenced to the forfeiture of all her land and goods and banished from the realm.14 Thomas Walsingham, the monastic author of the St. Albans Chronicle, was by far Alice’s harshest contemporary critic, who in his venom has (somewhat ironically) left us with the longest and most detailed account of her background and personality, her influence as Edward’s mistress, and her subsequent trial. He describes Alice as a shameless lowborn meretrix (a word variously translated as mistress, whore, or harlot), who “brought almost universal dishonour upon the king’s reputation […] and defiled virtually the whole kingdom of England with her disgraceful insolence.”15 Although Walsingham was not always accurate and, specifically in this case, clearly heavily biased against Alice, he nevertheless provides a truly contemporary account, and his importance as a source should not be underestimated.16 Likewise, the anonymous monk of St. Mary’s York recorded that in the Good Parliament the Commons (represented by their speaker, Sir Peter de la Mare) stated that it “would be of great gain to the kingdom to remove the said dame [Alice] from the presence of the king both as a matter of conscious and of the ill prosecution of the war.”17 During the same assembly, the bishop of Rochester, Thomas Brinton, preached from St. Paul’s Cross that “it is not fitting nor safe for all the keys of the 12 PROME, 5:313. 13  CPR, 1374–​1377, 364–​65.

14  PROME, 6:26–​32. For an overview of Alice’s trial, see W.  Mark Ormrod, “The Trials of Alice Perrers,” Speculum 83 (2008): 366–​96 at 375–​81.

15  Thomas Walsingham, The St. Albans Chronicle: The “Chronica Maiora” of Thomas Walsingham, I:  1376–​1394, ed. and trans. John Taylor, Wendy R.  Childs, and Leslie Watkiss (Oxford:  Oxford Medieval Texts, Clarendon, 2003), 42–​45 at 45.

16  See Walsingham, St. Albans Chronicle, lxxi–​lxxvi, for the historical value of Walsingham for the Good Parliament. Vivian Galbraith demonstrated in 1932 that Walsingham was unquestionably the author of the 1376–​79 recension, and—​through a detailed analysis of the manuscript tradition—​ that this and other sections were written contemporaneously before being compiled at a later date to form the Chronica Maiora: Vivian H. Galbraith, “Thomas Walsingham and the Saint Albans Chronicle, 1272–​1422,” English Historical Review 32 (1932): 12–​30. The work of the editors of the Oxford Medieval Texts edition supports this analysis: Walsingham, St. Albans Chronicle, xv–​lxx. For Walsingham’s homiletic moral tone, see Antonia Gransden, Historical Writing in England II: c.1307 to the Early Sixteenth Century (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982), 129–​30. 17  Vivian H.  Galbraith, ed., The Anonimalle Chronicle, 1333 to 1381 (Manchester:  Manchester University Press, 1927; repr. 1970), 87. The section of the Anonimalle Chronicle which covers the Good Parliament is translated in John Taylor, English Historical Literature in the Fourteenth Century (Oxford: Clarendon, 1987), 301–​13 at 306.

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kingdom to hang from the belt of one wife.”18 Although the word wife (uxoris) is used, it is widely accepted that this is a reference to Alice.19 Within this broader condemnation of Alice’s behaviour, a number of specific themes can be identified. These include sexual immorality, political influence, and—​significant for the discussion of financial resources—​numerous and repeated references to greed and avarice; that is (as described in the Oxford English Dictionary), the “inordinate desire of acquiring and hoarding wealth.”20 This is particularly striking in two literary representations which may have been inspired by Alice:  Chaucer’s Wife of Bath and, most compelling, William Langland’s Lady Meed in his allegorical poem Piers Plowman, a character whose name has become a byword for venality.21 Meed, like Alice, established her presence at the royal court and acted as a counsellor to the king, but was eventually banished on accusations of being a whore and undermining the workings of law and justice.22 In particular, in introducing Meed to his audience, Langland describes her hands as covered with rings of the “purest perreize,” a word meaning precious stones or jewels, which would seem to be a play on Alice’s surname, Perrers, and thus directly identifying her with Meed.23 Chaucer also notably named the wife in the Wife of Bath Alisoun, raising the possibility that she was in part based on his direct contemporary Alice Perrers. The Wife had a husband named Jankyn, similar to the name of Alice’s first husband, Janyn, and was a businesswoman with a mercantile and urban background, echoing Alice’s own early life in London.24 The Wife was notoriously prolific in her lustful desires, but invariably they had a financial motivation, fusing, in the words of Paul Strohm, “the categories of economic and sexual assertiveness into a single epitome of contemporary male dread.”25 Thomas Walsingham is particularly vocal on this subject, describing in one of the many examples from the St. Albans Chronicle how once Alice had gained a hold over 18 Sister Mary Aquinas Devlin, The Sermons of Thomas Brinton, Bishop of Rochester (1373–​1389), 2 vols. (London: Royal Historical Society, 1954), 2:321, translated in Siegfried Wenzel, Preaching in the Age of Chaucer: Selected Sermons in Translation (Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press, 2008), 235n19.

19  For a discussion of Brinton’s choice of the word wife instead of mistress or the more neutral woman, see Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” 221.

20  “Avarice, n.” OED Online. Oxford University Press, July 2018. Accessed October 22, 2018. www. oed.com/​view/​Entry/​13615

21  Helen Jewell, “Piers Plowman: A Poem of Crisis: An Analysis of Political Instability in Langland’s England,” in Politics and Crisis in Fourteenth-​Century England, ed. John Taylor and Wendy Childs (Gloucester: Sutton, 1990), 59–​80 at 67–​68.

22  Stephanie Trigg, “The Traffic of Medieval Women: Alice Perrers, Feminist Criticism and Piers Plowman,” Yearbook of Langland Studies 12 (1998): 5–​29.

23  William Langland, Piers Plowman:  A Parallel-​Text Edition of the A, B, C and Z Version, Volume I. Text, ed. A. V. C. Schmidt (London: Longman, 1995), 57. 24  Tompkins, “Alice Perrers and the Goldsmiths’ Mistery.”

25  Paul Strohm, Hochon’s Arrow:  The Social Imagination of Fourteenth-​Century Texts (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992), 139–​44 at 139.

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the king, she began “to appropriate possessions wrongfully wherever she could for her own use,” and elsewhere how the bishop of Winchester, William Wykeham, was able to appeal to Alice to use her influence with the king on his behalf in return for a “sufficiently large reward.”26 Likewise, as Edward III lay on his deathbed in June 1377, Walsingham states, Alice sat constantly at his side, because: Not content with the vast number of possessions and the great wealth which the infatuated king had heaped upon her daily […] she hoped that every possession in the realm would after the king’s death come to her, and that men would obey her alone, as much out of fear of royalty as of her wealth, in which she trusted more than she did God. Using such opportunities as this she stole from the king anything she could pluck from his grasp.

In one of his most vivid portrayals, Walsingham then famously followed this with his account of how when Alice “perceived that the king stood on the threshold of death, she contemplated flight” but not before she had “artfully removed” the rings from Edward III’s fingers, “in order to show everyone clearly that she had loved the king, not for himself, but for his possessions.”27 The depiction of Alice as little more than a greedy harlot was for many years readily accepted by antiquarians and historians of the period.28 In a short biography of Alice from 1897, Arthur Vincent remarks that “her dominant quality was avarice” and “her business was to acquire riches by means fair or foul.”29 In a similar style in a chapter from a 1910 volume on royal favourites, Francis Bickley reassures the delicate sensitivities of his Edwardian audience that “seeing that some of the ladies who have won the lawless love of monarchs have led, except of for that one frailty, the most commendable lives, and have even made good use of their unlicensed influence, it is comforting for the stern moralist to come now and again on one who may, undoubtedly, be described as a ‘bad lot.’ ” “Money was her passion,” Bickley continues, “and she had many ways of obtaining it.”30 Neither were such descriptions solely the reserve of popular histories. In his volume of The Political History of England published in 1905, for example, the great administrative historian T. F. Tout describes Alice’s “venality, greed, and shamelessness,” in a direct echo of Walsingham.31 Later during his 1965 lectures, K. B. McFarlane would evocatively describe Alice as “Edward III’s gold-​digging mistress,” providing the title for this chapter.32 26 Walsingham, St. Albans Chronicle, 44–​45, 110–​12. 27  Walsingham, St. Albans Chronicle, 118–​19.

28  James Bothwell, “The Management of Position: Alice Perrers, Edward III, and the Creation of a Landed Estates, 1362–​1377,” Journal of Medieval History 24 (1998): 31–​51 at 33n5. 29  Vincent, Twelve Bad Women, 5, 9.

30  Francis Bickley, Kings’ Favourites (London: Methuen, 1910), 41, 45.

31  T. F. Tout, The History of England from the Accession of Henry III to the Death of Edward III (1216–​ 1377) (London: Longmans, Green, 1905), 434. 32  K. B. McFarlane, The Nobility of Later Medieval England: The Ford Lectures for 1953 and Related Studies (Oxford: Clarendon, 1973), 131.

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In the past fifty years historians have provided a more balanced analysis of Alice’s behaviour, with Chris Given-​Wilson’s assessment of her as a “greedy but extremely capable business woman” in his ground-​breaking study on the royal household published in 1986 setting the current historiographical trend.33 In the first in-​depth analysis of Alice’s accumulation of property, James Bothwell argued in 1998 that “one sees a much more dynamic, and less obviously dependent, role played by this woman than even modern commentators have allowed,” and that “the size and nature of the estate which she left upon her forfeiture owed considerably more to her business sense than any direct royal generosity.”34 Writing in 2011, Christopher Fletcher, also referencing McFarlane, agreed that “Alice was no idle courtesan, no ‘gold-​digging mistress’ content to accrue valuable trinkets bestowed upon her by the king. She was a savvy businesswoman, whose material wealth came largely from the wise investment and manipulation of her influence with the king in the law courts.”35 In recent years, it is Mark Ormrod, however, who has devoted the most scholarship to Alice,36 arguing in 2008 for greater revision of her career as a whole in order “to release Alice Perrers both from the prejudice of chroniclers and from the notion that she was straightforwardly the inspiration for Lady Mede and instead to reconstruct her story on her own terms.”37 The question that naturally arises from this historiography, then, is what was the reality behind the association between Alice and avaricious behaviour? Can the picture of her relentless pursuit of wealth be entirely put down to the moral judgments of monastic writers, or was it, in fact, an accurate and justified portrayal? If so, what does Alice’s case tell us, if anything, about the nature of contemporary reactions to female financial power? The remainder of this chapter explores these issues by outlining the resources at Alice’s disposal, her methods of securing these assets, and how she disposed of her income. There can be no doubt that Alice was an extremely wealthy woman. The level of income expected from her forfeiture was so great that in the same parliament in which she was put on trial, the Commons included in a list of predicted revenues “that which is to be had from Alice Perrers.”38 The source of this wealth is not always transparent in the surviving documentation. It can, however, be roughly broken down into three categories:  property, cash, and material goods—​mainly in the form of jewels and jewellery. Of these, it is Alice’s acquisition of her landed estate that generated by far the most 33 Given-​Wilson, Royal Household, 147.

34  Bothwell, “Management of Position,” 33.

35  Christopher Fletcher, “Virtue and the Common Good:  Moral Discourse and Political Practice in the Good Parliament, 1376,” in Charisma and Religious Authority: Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Preaching, 1200–​1500, ed. Katherine L. Jansen and Miri Rubin (Turnhout: Brepols, 2011), 197–​214 at 198. 36  For example, W. Mark Ormrod, “Who Was Alice Perrers?” Chaucer Review 40 (2006): 219–​29; W. Mark Ormrod, “Alice Perrers and John Salisbury,” English Historical Review 123 (2008): 379–​93; W. Mark Ormrod, Edward III (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2011), 464–​65, 537. 37  Ormrod, “Trials of Alice Perrers,” 368. 38  PROME, 6:31.

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official records of her financial activity. Between 1365 and her forfeiture in 1377, Alice acquired no fewer than sixty-​eight manors and more than seventy other properties and rents across twenty-​eight counties and London.39 This provided her with an income of at least £1,000 per annum, and once undervaluation and missing information is taken into account the annual value was probably closer to £2,000, possibly more.40 Considering that £1,000 was regarded as the minimum yearly landed income for an earl,41 it is clear that Alice’s vast estate made her one of the richest individuals in the country.42 The problem with Alice is that the temporary nature of her power meant that this extensive portfolio was built up and lost again in less than twelve years.43 Unlike many queens and noble ladies in the later Middle Ages, therefore, no documentation survives relating to the management of her lands or the gathering of revenues.44 One of her associates, a man named Robert Broun of Warwick, is occasionally referred to as her steward, but beyond this there is little in the way of further evidence.45 How did Alice accumulate, from nothing, so sizeable an estate over such a short period of time? Unsurprisingly, a number of her properties were granted to her directly by the king. These included the manors of Wendover in Buckinghamshire,46 and “Philberts” in East Hanney, Berkshire, each worth more than £80 per annum.47 By far the largest proportion of land which Alice received from Edward III, however, was in the form of wardship. This included the lands and marriage rights of Peter, son and heir of Sir Robert Tilliol (Edward’s first major grant to Alice),48 the sizable estate of the heir of Fulk FitzWaryn, which included the manor of Wantage (Berkshire),49 and, most controversially, the wardship of the lands and marriage of the heir to the Orreby estate, Mary Percy. Mary was the half-​sister of the future first earl of Northumberland, Henry Percy, 39 Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” appendix A.I (246–​52). This survey supersedes that in Bothwell, “Management of Position,” appendix A (49–​51). 40  Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” appendix E (293–​310).

41  Chris Given-​Wilson, The English Nobility in the Middle Ages:  The Fourteenth-​Century Political Community (London: Routledge, 1987; repr. 1997), 37. 42  Bothwell, “Management of Position,” 35–​36.

43  In her chapter in this volume (Chapter 4), Cathleen Sarti also discusses the potential difficulties and temporary nature of informal influence, particularly of a non-​elite female counsellor. 44  See Michelle Seah and Katia Wright’s chapter in this volume (Chapter  1) on “The Medieval English Queen as Landholder,” which includes an extensive historiography of literature within this field of study. 45  Calendar of Inquisitions Miscellaneous, Volume 4: 1377–​1388 (London: Her Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1957), no. 8; TNA, SC 8/​135/​6714; SC 8/​96/​4751. 46  CPR, 1370–​1374, 161. For a detailed discussion of this grant, see Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” 73–​74. 47  CPR, 1370–​1374, 198.

48  CPR, 1364–​1367, 397, 418; 1367–​1370, 146, 292, 376.

49  Calendar of Fine Rolls, Volume 9:  1377–​1383 (London:  His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1926), 69, 85–​86, 88, 110, 327; Calendar of Close Rolls [hereafter CCR], Richard II, 6  vols. (London:  His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1914–​1927), 1377–​1381, 503.

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and it is clear from their later actions that her family did not approve of Alice’s wardship. In January 1377 Alice utilized her rights over Mary to marry her to John de Southeray, Alice and Edward’s illegitimate son. After the king’s death, however, Mary’s family successfully petitioned the pope for divorce on the grounds that she had been under the age of consent and that John was of “ignoble birth”—​which is to say illegitimate.50 In November 1375 the king also granted Alice the rights to the marriage of Richard, the brother and heir of Thomas Poynings.51 What is remarkable, however, is not the amount of land Alice received passively as gifts of the king, but that she actually acquired the majority of her estate through her own initiative. Of her total landholdings, she independently obtained forty-​three manors and twenty-​seven other properties compared to the twenty-​five manors and twenty-​five other properties she received directly from the king.52 In terms of cash outlay, Alice spent an impressive £3,360 purchasing just fourteen properties.53 Moreover, because a large number of the lands from the king were granted as part of wardships, the number of manors therefore represents a much smaller number of individual grants. In contrast to this, each of Alice’s own acquisitions generally encompassed only one or two manors and associated properties at a time. Many of these lands were not held or acquired by Alice directly. Instead, she employed the legal mechanism of enfeoffment-​to-​use, whereby a select group of loyal men owned and disposed of the property on Alice’s behalf, taking the profits to her use.54 This process could be extremely complex, and in theory meant that the landowner could avoid feudal incidents from the crown and loss of land through forfeiture.55 Undoubtedly aware of the vulnerable position she would find herself in following Edward III’s death, Alice used enfeoffment-​to-​use on no fewer than seventy-​eight occasions to either acquire or transfer property.56 Unfortunately for her, however, the greatest testament to Alice’s use of this device is the fact that the terms of her forfeiture were specifically expanded to cover property held in this form,57 something which set a precedent for all future parliamentary forfeiture and attainders. Although Alice undoubtedly used her position as Edward’s mistress to her advantage in these transactions—​in terms of both influence and resources—​this proactive, independent, and intelligent acquisition and 50 Laura Tompkins, “Mary Percy and John de Southeray:  Wardship, Marriage and Divorce in Fourteenth-​Century England,” in Fourteenth Century England X, ed. Gwilym Dodd (Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2018), 133–​56. 51  CPR, 1374–​1377, 187.

52  Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” appendix A.II (253–​57). 53  Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” 310.

54  Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” 90–​96.

55  For the development of the use in fourteenth-​century England, see J. M. W. Bean, The Decline of English Feudalism, 1215–​1540 (Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1968), 104–​79. 56  Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” appendix B (259–​65). 57  PROME, 6:30.

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management of her estate is, therefore, nonetheless remarkable for any individual, male or female, of her time.58 In addition to her landed estate, there is also substantial evidence for Alice’s material wealth, which provides a snapshot of how she chose to spend the financial resources at her disposal. Ironically for Alice, the primary source of documentation for this was generated at the time of her forfeiture, when the king’s sheriffs and escheators systematically seized her possessions into crown hands across the country, itemizing and valuing each object for eventual resale. Most notably, this included an inventory of goods taken from Alice’s London townhouse, the “New Inn,” a magnificent residence that she built on the bank of the Thames in the parish of All Hallows the Less, which was subsequently granted to John of Gaunt.59 These items alone were worth £83 9s 2d, a sum that rises to £119 9s when the possessions later identified as belonging to her son, John de Southeray, are taken into account. The account offers a fascinating personal insight into Alice’s life. Household goods and other objects confiscated by the sheriffs included a feather bed, two coverlets of white silk patterned with roses, a saddle of black cloth embroidered with roses and birds, a table with chessmen, and a case for a corporal60 “with the arms of the king of England and France.” Amongst her abandoned clothes was found a gown of russet silk, a red-​and-​blue cloak, and a mantle of black worsted.61 Supporting the portrayal of Alice in the chronicle and literary sources, rumours of secret hordes of jewels and jewellery also feature prominently. Most notably in 1384, an inquest was ordered by the government of Richard II into what debts had been owed to Alice on the day of her forfeiture and whether any of her possessions had been concealed from the king at that time. The resulting investigation returned that she had been in possession of an astonishing £20,000 worth of brooches, pearls, rubies, diamonds, balas rubies, and other jewels, which then found their way into the hands of her then husband, Sir William Wyndesore.62 In a variation on this accusation, in January 1385 the bishop of Winchester, William Wykeham, was ordered to keep within his custody all the jewels which he had been entrusted with by Alice after her conviction in 1377.63 What is known for certain is that on May 21, 1379, the treasurer, Thomas Brantingham, delivered to the keeper of the great wardrobe, Alan Stokes, more than 21,868 pearls “from the jewels of Alice Perrers” seized after her forfeiture, which were valued at £470 18s. 8d.64 These 58 Bothwell, “Management of Position,” 48–​49.

59  Tompkins, “Alice Perrers and the Goldsmiths’ Mistery,” 1384.

60  A cloth upon which the consecrated elements are placed during the celebration of the mass. 61  Tompkins, “Uncrowned Queen,” appendix F (318–​22). 62  TNA, E 368/​157, Recorda, Hilary, m. 21.

63  CCR, 1381–​1385, 502. For the context of this accusation and a wider discussion of the potential relationship between Alice and Wykeham, see Laura Tompkins, “ ‘Said the Mistress to the Bishop’: Alice Perrers, William Wykeham, and Court Networks in Fourteenth-​Century England,” in Ruling Fourteenth-​Century England: Essays in Honour of Christopher Given-​Wilson, ed. Rémy Ambühl, James Bothwell, and Laura Tompkins (Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer, 2019), 205–​25.

64  TNA, E 101/​334/​17; Frederick Devon, Issues of the Exchequer: Being a Collection of Payments Made Out of His Majesty’s Revenue, from King Henry III to King Henry VI Inclusive […] Extracted

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were subsequently granted to Richard II’s mother, Joan of Kent. Alice also received £397 from Edward III in April 1372, in discharge of money which he owed her for jewels and other items.65 Finally, there is evidence that Alice had substantial reserves of cash at her disposal. On July 13, 1377, less than a month after the death of Edward III, £2,626 8s. 6d. of Alice’s money was paid into the Exchequer by royal officials, having been seized in Kent on behalf of Richard II.66 This was before Alice’s trial and forfeiture later that year, and consequently supports the veracity of the account of the Anonimalle Chronicle, that in the Good Parliament of 1376 the Commons accused her of lifting £2,000 to £3,000 of silver a year directly from the king’s coffers.67 That is to say, in the eyes of Richard II’s officials Alice’s money could be seized before her conviction because it belonged to the Crown rather than to her. The inquisition taken in 1384 also provides evidence that Alice was an active moneylender. According to the report, at the time of her forfeiture in 1377 she was owed £40 by William, Lord Latimer, £100 from Joan, Lady Mohun, £100 from Richard Lyons, and more than £850 from Sir Robert Ashton for money that she gave to him to purchase land on her behalf, but which purchases were never made nor was the money returned to her.68 Further examples of Alice’s activity in this area include a loan of £1,000 which she made to Walter FitzWalter, in return for which he mortgaged the castle of Egremont in Cumberland to three feoffees nominated by Alice, who held it to her use.69 There can be no doubt that Alice was receiving some of her wealth directly from the king. For example, in addition to those lands granted to her by Edward III, there were also a number of gifts made through the great wardrobe. These include various garments of the king’s livery made and lined with white cloth for the hunting season in 1375, a bed of green wool embroidered with a garland of white roses and three curtains of green taffeta, and a gown with a hood of embroidered blood red (sanguine) cloth lined with pure miniver and trimmed with ermine.70 Most scandalously to historians in later years, in 1373 Edward also granted Alice all the jewels of Queen Philippa that Euphemia de Heselarton had held since Philippa’s death in 1369,71 and just days before his death in 1377, a lavish £36 6s. 8d. to cover the cost of a gold cup which Alice had purchased in London.72 One of the main problems, however, is that no accounts survive for the expenditure of the king’s chamber during this period. This was essentially the and Translated from the Original Rolls […] in the Custody of John Newport (London: Murray, 1837), 209–​10. 65  TNA, E 403/​446, April 15, 1372. 66  TNA, E 401/​527, July 13, 1377.

67  Galbraith, Anonimalle Chronicle, 87; Taylor, English Historical Literature, 306. 68  TNA, E 368/​157, Recorda, Hilary, m. 21. 69  TNA, SC 8/​214/​10685.

70  TNA, E 101/​397/​20, mm. 4, 11, 16. 71  CPR, 1370–​1374, 331.

72  TNA, E 403/​462, m. 15.

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king’s private cash to do with as he pleased, and, it is reasonable to surmise, the source from which he would have most likely given gifts and indulgences to his mistress.73 What survives, therefore, clearly represents only a small fraction of Edward’s generosity, especially when it came to material (as opposed to landed) wealth. Nevertheless, Alice’s commercial activity demonstrates that even in transactions where she was acting independently, she was indirectly utilizing her position as the king’s mistress, in terms of financial resources or of her political influence and power. The means by which she obtained some of her wealth is at times questionable. There is evidence that on more than one occasion Alice used her privileged and protected position to go about her business in a pretty ruthless manner. This is most explicitly demonstrated in a series of petitions submitted to Parliament at the time of her trial, when people were invited to share their grievances against Alice.74 For example, in another case that links Alice with jewels, John Swynton demanded the restitution of jewellery to the value of 250 marks, which he claimed Alice had taken from his wife while he was away serving in Brittany under the earl of Cambridge.75 In relation to Alice’s property acquisitions, Edmund and Margery de Brook complained that they were forcibly disseised of their manor of Bournehall by a large number of armed men under the command of Alice. Alice then had Edmund imprisoned and tried to make Margery divorce him. They requested that Margery’s right might be inquired into and justice done, as Alice’s power was so great with the late king that they had not dared to sue until now.76 This picture of Alice’s immunity from prosecution is a common theme across many of the petitions. Simon Abraham, a girdler of London, asserted that John English, Alice’s parker at Wendover, had taken his apprentice out of his service by force. Because of this, Abraham pursued various writs with the sheriff of Buckingham, but the sheriff “did not dare for loss of life and limb make execution of the writs because of the great menaces of Lady Alice.”77 Amongst the royal mistresses of late medieval England, Alice’s economic and financial resources and skills truly set her apart. This behaviour becomes much more understandable when placed in the context of her early life. Until relatively recently it was believed that Alice was the daughter of a lesser noble or gentry family, something which sat at odds with her business acumen. It has now been discovered, however, that Alice came from a family of London goldsmiths and that her first marriage was to a man named Janyn Perrers, who Edward III described in a document from 1359 as “our jeweller.”78 These urban mercantile origins explain her later commercial activity, her role as a financier, and her long-​term connection with jewels, as these were clearly a source of 73 Given-​Wilson, Royal Household, 85.

74  Ormrod, “Trials of Alice Perrers,” 381–​86. 75  TNA, SC 8/​139/​6910. 76  TNA, SC 8/​96/​4751. 77  TNA, SC 8/​88/​4394.

78  Tompkins, “Alice Perrers and the Goldsmiths’ Mistery,” 1361–​74, 1386–​87.

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wealth she was comfortable dealing with.79 Following Janyn’s death in 1361, it may well have been her financial resources that enabled her to find her way into the royal household and the king’s bed.80 It also goes a considerable way to explaining Alice’s material ambition and supposed “avarice,” both as a potentially wealthy London widow from a competitive trade-​based background who sought to increase her resources, and as a woman who did everything in her power to use financial resources to raise herself up from her humble beginnings. For Alice, the clothes and jewels that she wore, the luxury items she purchased, and the property that she owned would all have been part of how she displayed her social transformation. There is also some evidence that Alice counselled Edward III on financial matters and undertook transactions in the city on his behalf. Very early on in their relationship, in the earliest piece of evidence we have for their relationship, an extraordinary order was made to Alice’s later ally, Richard Lyons, “not to interfere with her going where she wished on the king’s business or her own.”81 Arguably, this document momentarily lifts the curtain on years of hidden commercial activity by Alice on behalf of the crown, and when her involvement with moneylending is considered, the idea that she was negotiating loans for the king, or acting as a royal financier should not be discounted.82 In particular, Alice may well have been involved in a controversial loan of 20,000 marks, which was made to the crown at an alleged interest rate of 50 percent in August 1374 by the London merchant financiers Richard Lyons and John Pyel in order to fund the war with France. This transaction and other large loans became a focal point of criticism during the Good Parliament, as it was believed that they were obtained on extremely favourable terms from the crown due to Lyons’s position within the court party, even though better options had been available. On the Parliament Roll, it is only recorded that this loan came about “by the counsel of the said Richard and others close to the king,”83 but significantly Alice can be directly connected with both Lyons and Pyel through other transactions, and Alice may even have had an important role in promoting London merchants, and Lyons in particular, within the royal household, something which characterized the court at this time.84 Alice Perrers was a politically active woman clearly happy to utilize her financial skills and resources in order to support her position at court, and in turn to use this influence to increase her wealth yet further. If a king was overly generous to any of his 79 In their chapter in this volume (Chapter 2), Charlotte Backerra and Cathérine Ludwig-​Ockenfels also highlight that jewels and other material objects should not be underestimated as an important financial resource. 80  Tompkins, “Alice Perrers and the Goldsmiths’ Mistery,” 1379–​81.

81  London Metropolitan Archives, CLA/​024/​01/​02/​011, December 9.  A  less detailed calendar summary is printed in the Calendar of Plea and Memoranda Rolls of the City of London: Volume 2, 1364–​81 (London: His Majesty’s Stationery Office, 1929), 11. 82  It is known, for example, that later she bought up debts of the household of Queen Philippa to the value of 100 marks (TNA, SC 8/​104/​5166). 83  PROME, 5:301.

84  Tompkins, “Alice Perrers and the Goldsmiths’ Mistery,” 1388.

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favourites, male or female, this would always be unpopular with the wider political community. In this regard, whilst the amount of wealth that Alice had was a problem, it was not a gendered one. There does, however, appear to be a specific connection between women and avarice that formed part of the established contemporary fears of female power. Ultimately, Alice’s wealth left her exposed and made her a target of Richard II’s government after Edward III’s death. Because of her low social status she had no family network to support her and her former political allies were seemingly more than happy to sacrifice her in order to save themselves. While still not protecting them entirely, male favourites were generally rewarded with titles or official positions which could be used to enhance their status independent from their connection to the king. Alice received no such reward—​although this may have had as much to do with her humble origins as her gender. Langland scholars have highlighted that Alice’s literary counterpart Lady Meed had passive as well as the more obvious active facets to her character, as a commodity and place of transaction.85 Similarly, Alice utilized her influence over Edward III to bring herself extreme levels of wealth and political power, but her choice to wield such financial power also meant that she was used and ultimately discarded by others.

85 For example, Clare A. Lees, “Gender and Exchange in Piers Plowman,” in Class and Gender in Early English Literature: Intersections, ed. Britton J. Harwood and Gillian R. Overing (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2006), 112–​30 at 115–​16.

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Chapter 4

COUNSELLING THE DANISH KING: SIGBRIT VILLOMS AS FINANCIAL MASTERMIND FOR CHRISTIAN II, 1513–​1523 CATHLEEN SARTI* Profess I, Syberich Willems, to have received from the excise-​masters of Ribe in Jutland, Andres Laszen and Torsten Smedt, to accountability of said excise 600 [fl.].1

Sigbrit Villoms, foremost counsellor to the Danish king Christian II (r. 1513–​1523), later also king of Norway and Sweden, wrote the sentence quoted above in a letter to the town of Ribe in order to confirm the receipt of excise money.2 This letter is an example of the fact that Sigbrit was hugely influential in the economic and financial governance of the realm, despite being a woman from a merchant background who lacked all the formal requirements usually needed to perform such a high position as a royal counsellor. She was neither formally trained nor was she aristocratic, and not only was she a woman, but she was also a foreigner. Sigbrit was a Dutch widow from a merchant family, and had already been part of Christian’s court during his time as co-​governor in Norway (1506–​1513), when her daughter, Dyveke, was his mistress. While it was not unusual for monarchs to establish their mistresses at court, the fact that Christian also brought the mother of his mistress with him, first to Oslo and then, after his succession to the Danish throne, to Copenhagen, was peculiar. It was even more remarkable that a foreign, non-​noble woman was responsible for Danish economics and finances. Moreover, Sigbrit Villoms certainly used her power to make some changes in Danish politics, and as could be expected, her actions provoked some opposition. This case study in all its unusualness, therefore, highlights what an (admittedly outstanding) woman could achieve if the circumstances were right. Furthermore, this case study offers the chance to consider economic and financial reforms formed by a female base-​born counsellor and a male king with a penchant for non-​elites, and the * Dr.  Cathleen Sarti is a postdoctoral research associate at the University of Oxford where she focusses on political and military history in Northern Europe.

1 C[arl] F.[e.] Allen, ed., Breve og Aktstykker til Oplysning af Christiern den Andens og Frederik den Førstes Historie:  Første Bind (Copenhagen:  C. A.  Reitzels Bo og Arvinger, 1854), document 5, 5. “Bekene ick Syberich Willems ontfanghen te hebben op myn g. h. weghen van den sysmeysters van Ribe in Juutlandt ghenoempt Andres Laszen ind Torsten Smedt op rekenscap van vorschenen exsysen vjc [fl.] dens.”

2 I use “Sigbrit Villoms” throughout this chapter as she is referred to by this name in most research literature. Variations of her first name include Syberich, Sibarch, Sigbritte, Sichbrit, and Sychbrit, and she herself used Syberich and Sibarch in different sources. Her last name indicates that she was the daughter of a Willem or Wilhelm and might also be found as Willemszoon (abbreviated to Willemsz.) or, shorter, Willems.

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immense opposition against both the reforms and the reformers. In 1523, Christian II was deposed in all three Scandinavian kingdoms and fled to the Low Countries, taking Sigbrit Villoms with him. Important reforms which Christian II introduced with Sigbrit’s help were withdrawn, although in at least one case a reform was reestablished more than thirty years later.3 Therefore, this chapter discusses not only the realized possibilities of a successful non-​elite female counsellor but also the difficulties of informal influence—​that is, being connected to a patron and taking the fall with them. As such, this chapter is also a story of failure.

Sigbrit Villoms in the Sources

Trying to find sources and reliable information on premodern women can be difficult; the situation is worse if the woman in question had a non-​elite background. Sigbrit Villoms, who—​as far as we know—​came from a Dutch merchant family, left little evidence of her life for historians to write her biography. We know she existed, and we know a bit more about her mostly from her time as counsellor in Denmark between 1513 and 1523. We also know that Sigbrit had a daughter, Dyveke, whose date of birth is estimated at about 1490, making Dyveke seventeen or nineteen years old when she met Christian (1481–​1559) in Bergen in 1507 or 1509.4 From that, we can estimate that Sigbrit must have been born around 1470, but depending on her being a particularly young or a particularly old mother (we also do not know if she had any other children apart from Dyveke), she might have been born anytime between around 1450 and 1475. She might have been closer in age to Christian (born 1481) than her daughter, his mistress, or she might have been indeed a motherly figure to him—​unfortunately, we just do not know.5 It is believed that Sigbrit died in Vilvoorde (Brabant) in 1532.6 Although the sources are not definite, her description fits a woman who was accused of and tried for witchcraft and subsequently executed. It is, furthermore, speculated that this trial was enforced by Emperor Charles V.7 3 See Mikael Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll,” in The Sound Toll at Elsinore:  Politics, Shipping and the Collection of Duties 1429–​1857, ed. Ole Degn (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press and the Danish Society for Customs and Tax History, 2017), 229–​46 at 233. 4 See Paul Douglas Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660: The Rise and Decline of a Renaissance Monarchy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2007), 13.

5 According to A. N. J. Fabius, “Sigbritte Willemsz, eene Amsterdamsche vrouw in het Norden: Met Portret van Christiaan II.” Jaarverslag van het Koninklijk oudheidkundig genootschap te Amsterdam 45 (1903): 1–​32 at 8, contemporaries described her as stout, short, and with red cheeks—​“een echte Hollandsche vrouw uit de volksklasse.” This description has been circulated also in the newer works; however, I have not been able to find these contemporary accounts—​and none of the authors who used them, including Fabius, gave a reference. Since this description is connected to her social class and origin and thus based on stereotypes, this might be more myth than truth. 6 For more on this, see Benito Scocozza, Kongen og købekonen:  Om Christian 2.  og Mor Sigbrit (Copenhagen: Gad, 1992), 114–​15; Mikael Venge, “To studier over problemer fra Christian II’s tid,” Historisk Tidsskrift (DK) 81 (1981): 27–​67 at 65–​67. 7 Scocozza, Kongen og købekonen, 115.

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Charles V was one of the many princes, and by far the most influential, who pushed for Sigbrit’s removal from Christian’s entourage.8 Other European rulers also tried to intervene in Sigbrit’s affairs, especially during her time in exile. Probably in 1523 or 1524 (the letter is undated), Prince Elector Joachim of Brandenburg, the brother-​in-​law of Christian II, wrote to Charles II, duke of Guelders, in whose territory Sigbrit Villoms might have been, ordering him to turn Sigbrit over to an envoy of the prince elector. Joachim of Brandenburg openly called Sigbrit “offensive to himself, his wife, and his friends.”9 Archduke Ferdinand of Austria described her as a “pestilen[s]‌ femina[]” in a letter to Christian II from March 1524.10 It is, however, still an unsolved puzzle why so many European princes wanted to dispose of her. The letters from European rulers either to other European rulers or to Christian II are for the most part the only information surviving that shows Sigbrit was indeed still alive after 1523, and likely living in Dutch territories. This also raises the question why she was living in Habsburg territory when she was clearly a woman wanted by Charles V. Unfortunately, apart from letters demanding her imprisonment, or recounting sightings of her, we do not have any other sources as to her whereabouts, her motivation, or her actions at that time.11 Indeed, Sigbrit Villoms, the female, non-​elite counsellor to the Danish king, remains nearly untraceable in sources outside of the brief period of the ten years between 1513 and 1523, when her patron was actively ruling.12 She is in this regard a typical case of an informal counsellor, especially when female, with a non-​elite background.13 It is, however, possible to use the surviving source material to understand her role as an active counsellor during Christian II’s reign. Letters are our main sources for Sigbrit Villoms; be they letters from her or to her, or letters mentioning her. Sigbrit was obviously educated enough to be able not only to calculate finances but also to read and write. Her network of correspondence included partners in the Low Countries and in the different Hanseatic cities, and even medical practitioners in the Holy Roman Empire. She wrote in Low German, the language commonly used around the Baltic at this time. 8 See Siegmund Herberstein, “Selbst-​Biographie:  Siegmunds Freiherrn von Herberstein, 1486–​ 1553,” in Johannes Tichtel’s Tagebuch; Sigmunds von Herberstein Selbstbiographie; Johannes Cuspinian’s Tagebuch; Georg Kirchmair’s Denkwürdigkeiten, ed. Theodor G. v. Karajan, Fontes Rerum Austriacarum 1.1 (Vienna: Aus der Kaiserl. Königl. Hof-​und Staatsdruckerei, 1855), 85–​97 at 86. 9 Allen, Breve og Aktstykker I, document 73, 133–​35 at 134: “das der churfurstl. gnaden, jr gemahel vnnd andern jrer khurfurstl. gnaden freunden widerwertig.” 10  Allen, Breve og Aktstykker I, document 101, 187–​88 at 187.

11  In May 1525, Johannes of Weeze, an important diplomat of Charles V, recounted a sighting of Sigbrit in a letter to Christian II (Allen, Breve og Aktstykker I, document 173, 343–​46). Apparently, Sigbrit wore a nun’s habit and was living in Brabant. This is also recounted by Fabius (“Sigbritte Willemsz,” 32), who places her near Oudenbosch in Brabant.

12  In the problem of sources, Sigbrit’s case resembles that of Alice Perrers, whose earlier life before she became mistress to Edward III is nearly unknown; see further the chapter by Laura Tompkins (Chapter 3) in this volume. 13  Further archival research is planned by the author but might turn out to be a search for the proverbial needle in the haystack.

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The minutes and records from meetings of the Hanseatic cities also often mention her and her actions. In particular, Sigbrit is frequently brought up in the context of conflicts between the Hanseatic League and Denmark, which are further discussed later in this chapter. Since conflict usually produces more written sources than times of peace, Sigbrit and her influence are most visible when she was involved in such disputes. However, this also means that conflicts might be overrepresented in the sources. Apart from these direct sources, we can also trace the actions of counsellors, be they female or male, aristocratic, cleric, or non-​elite, by analyzing the reforms and the changes in politics, and by taking educated guesses of the counsellors’ impact based on their closeness to these events. The exact reach of Sigbrit’s influence changes over the period 1513–​1523. Sigbrit might have already been appointed to oversee the Sound toll in 1513, but during the first years, nothing much changed in the administration of this toll. Furthermore, when—​as he did frequently—​Christian visited the house of Sigbrit and Dyveke near the castle, the combination of the daughter as mistress and the mother as counsellor makes it difficult to determine whether the visits were to his mistress or to her mother.14 Paul Douglas Lockhart highlights this period as the more harmonious time of Christian’s reign: “Mother Sigbrit advised the king, informally, on matters of trade and finance, and nurtured his fondness for the Dutch, but in general Christian worked closely with leading Danish noblemen.”15 However, after her daughter, Dyveke, died on September 21, 1517, Sigbrit’s influence becomes more obvious. Even though Christian’s affair with Dyveke was past, and therefore the more obvious reason for the connection between Christian and Sigbrit removed, Sigbrit’s influence did not decrease, and might have even increased.16 In time, she was close not only to the king as financial and political advisor but also to his queen consort, Isabella of Austria, sister of Charles (V),17 in her role as the mistress of Isabella’s, and later their son John’s, household (probably on Christian’s behalf). Johan Hvidtfeldt described Sigbrit’s role at court: “there was not one thing at court which was too small for her attention.”18 More important, Sigbrit might have been the reason the young queen survived her five pregnancies between 1517 and 1523, the first one when she was barely sixteen, and the second with twins, whereupon the relationship between the two women improved.19 These years also marked the most troubled times for Christian’s reign, and it is quite surprising that not only did the queen survive her pregnancies but also three 14 It was also common for contemporaries to mix up these two women (Scocozza, Kongen og købekonen, 114). 15  Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660, 13. Sigbrit Villoms was often called Mother Sigbrit (mor Sigbrit in Danish) both in sources and in research literature. 16  See also Fabius, “Sigbritte Willemsz,” 29, who describes her as “omnis homo.”

17  Charles was elected Holy Roman Emperor as Charles V in 1519. In this chapter, I use Charles (V) in cases when he acted before 1519.

18  Johan Hvidtfeldt, “Forvaltningspolitik under Christian den anden,” Scandia 12 (1939): 223–​41 at 238: “Der var ikke den ting ved hoffet, der var saa ringe, at hun ikke gav sig af med den.” 19  For the relationship between Sigbrit and Isabella, see Scocozza, Kongen og købekonen, 47–​49. See further Venge, “To studier over problemer fra Christian II’s tid,” 35.

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of her six children lived beyond infancy (John, the only son, died in 1532 at the age of fifteen). Sigbrit Villoms very probably had some medical knowledge, and certainly was skilled in herbary, as her contact with Theophrastus von Hohenheim, better known as Paracelsus, proves. Apparently, Paracelsus even learned new medical knowledge from her on his visit to Denmark in summer 1520.20 It is clear, then, that Sigbrit Villoms had multiple forms of influence, via political counsel with an emphasis on trade, economics, and finances as well as through her position at the court of the queen and later the heir to the throne. She was tasked with finding new ways to generate income and to provide money for the king’s various endeavours. Finally, she also provided ideas for legal reforms.21 Today, we can safely assume that Sigbrit did not gain this political and economic influence by “bewitching” Christian through dealings with the devil. However, compared to the contemporaries who believed her influence had roots in such unsavory, supernatural practices, we are left without any explanation for her rise to power. In order to try to find answers for Sigbrit’s extraordinary position at court, the following section first outlines the situation of Denmark in the early sixteenth century and explores Christian’s economic policies. It then pinpoints more specifically the influence of Sigbrit Villoms on these policies, despite the fact that sources that explicitly state her influence are extremely rare. Not only do we not know what happened when Christian visited the house of Sigbrit and Dyveke before the latter’s death, but there is also the problem of counsel requiring no minutes or other records. At such a small, intimate court as the Danish court in Copenhagen was in the early sixteenth century, politics was an oral business, and what source material there is therefore needs to be read against the grain and in combination in order to shed light on Sigbrit’s influence. Denmark under the Rule of Christian II

At the beginning of the sixteenth century, Denmark was the most powerful kingdom in Scandinavia. Under the Kalmar Union, a loose personal union of all three Scandinavian kingdoms between 1397 and 1523, the Danish monarchs also ruled over Sweden (sometimes) and over Norway (with a very short exception), with the latter’s extensive dominions reaching from Iceland and Greenland to the Faroe Islands, Shetland, and Orkney. Scania (today Sweden), as well as the duchies of Schleswig and of Holstein (today mostly in Germany), also formed part of the Danish core territory, which connected Denmark with the Holy Roman Empire. At this time, Denmark retained a strong feudal social structure, with a lack of representative political institutions other than the 20 Otto Nübel, Pompejus Occo, 1483 bis 1537:  Fuggerfaktor in Amsterdam, Studien zur Fuggergeschichte 24 (Tübingen: Mohr, 1972), 94–​95. Further discussion of Sigbrit’s medical knowledge is given in Venge, “To studier over problemer fra Christian II’s tid,” 35–​36. 21  Nübel, Pompejus Occo, 66 and 72–​73. Many of the documents regarding the royal finances were addressed to or signed by Sigbrit Villoms (Allen, Breve og Aktstykker I, xxx). See also Hvidtfeldt, “Forvaltningspolitik under Christian den anden,” 237; Venge, “To studier over problemer fra Christian II’s tid,” 54–​55.

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high-​noble state council.22 Freeholders owned only about 6 percent of the land, with the crown owning about 44 percent, and the nobility and clergy the remaining 50 percent.23 This meant that peasants—​who made up circa 85  percent of the population—​were under the direct economic and political control of the crown, the clergy, or the nobility. Denmark was much more urbanized than the other two Scandinavian realms, although it has to be said that Danish cities were rather small compared to non-​Scandinavian ones; Copenhagen, the biggest town in Scandinavia, had a population of only about 10,000 people in 1500.24 The city was described as “unbeautiful, consisting largely of timber and mud dwellings” by an English traveller in the 1590s.25 The Kalmar Union ended with the depositions of Christian II in all three kingdoms in 1523–​1524. In Sweden, Gustav Eriksson (Vasa) was elected as king, thereby forming the modern kingdom of Sweden. In Denmark, Frederik I, the paternal uncle of Christian II, was elected to the throne, and he also enforced his rule over Norway, continuing the personal union of these two realms. The end of the Kalmar Union had many structural bases alongside the more specific reasons from the reign of Christian II, but for the purpose of understanding Sigbrit’s role in these events, this chapter focuses on the economic aspects. One economic reason was the differing economic interests of Sweden and Denmark, especially in relation to the Hanseatic League. Denmark’s most important source of income from the fifteenth century until the nineteenth century was the toll raised on ships crossing the Sound, one of the three straits into the Baltic Sea.26 The other two navigable straits, the lesser belt and the great belt, were forbidden to non-​ Danish ships since the reign of Christian I (r. 1448–​1481), who decreed that this was a custom from time immemorial.27 Since Denmark controlled fortresses on all sides of the straits, they had the power to enforce the ban.28 Furthermore, both belts were harder to 22 Knud J.  V. Jespersen, “Repression and Representation:  Political Culture in Early Modern Scandinavia,” in Realities of Representation:  State Building in Early Modern Europe and European America, ed. Maija Jansson (Houndmills: Palgrave Macmillan, 2007), 133–​47 at 144–​45. The social structure in the lands surrounding the Baltic Sea is also discussed in David Kirby, Northern Europe in the Early Modern Period: The Baltic World 1492–​1772 (London: Longman, 1990), 16–​21. 23  Jespersen, “Repression and Representation,” 138.

24  Jens E. Olesen, “Dänemark, Norwegen und Island,” in Dänemark, Norwegen und Schweden im Zeitalter der Reformation und Konfessionalisierung: Nordische Königreiche und Konfession 1500 bis 1660, Katholisches Leben und Kirchenreform im Zeitalter der Glaubensspaltung 62, ed. Matthias Asche and Anton Schindling (Münster: Aschendorf, 2003), 27–​106 at 38. 25  Here quoted from Kirby, Northern Europe, 26–​27.

26  Jens E.  Olesen, “ ‘The Right Usual Waterway’:  The Sound Toll in the Fifteenth Century,” in The Sound Toll at Elsinore: Politics, Shipping and the Collection of Duties 1429–​1857, ed. Ole Degn (Copenhagen:  Museum Tusculanum Press and the Danish Society for Customs and Tax History, 2017), 29–​44 at 29. See also Mikael Venge, “The Charter of the Sound Toll,” in The Sound Toll at Elsinore: Politics, Shipping and the Collection of Duties 1429–​1857, ed. Ole Degn (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press and the Danish Society for Customs and Tax History, 2017), 45–​73. 27  Olesen, “ ‘The Right Usual Waterway,’ ” 37.

28  See also the description of the naval situation in Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660, 2–​3.

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navigate than the Sound, so bigger trading vessels in particular preferred the Sound for nautical reasons—​smuggling was, however, always a problem. The trade interests of Sweden, in contrast, were mostly realized through Hanseatic League traders who often used the isthmus in northern Germany and the Trave, Alster, and Elbe Rivers between Lübeck and Hamburg to transport goods from the Baltic Sea to the North Sea, and vice versa, bypassing the Sound and thus not paying any tolls.29 The conflicts between the Danish kings Hans (r. 1481–​1513), or later his son, Christian II, and the Swedish kingdom under the regencies of the Sture affected the trade in the Baltic Sea as well as the passage through the Sound. Several times during conflicts with Sweden, the Danish kings either blocked the Sound or controlled all ships into the Baltic Sea and seized weapons, salt, armory, and other war-​deciding commodities, interfering in trade with Sweden (and the East Baltic in general). This led to the involvement of several other (trading) powers aside from Sweden and Denmark, including the Dutch and the Hanseatic cities—​whether or not they wanted to.30 The situation was complicated even further by the changing alliances of the involved parties: Denmark with Norway, Sweden, Lübeck, other Hanseatic towns like Gdańsk or Stettin, Emperor Maximilian I, Margaret of Austria as governor of the Habsburg Netherlands, and the Dutch merchants and towns. Maximilian’s interest as Holy Roman Emperor and as formal ruler over Lübeck and other Hanseatic cities collided in these conflicts with his interests as head of the house of Habsburg and the Habsburgs’ rule over the Low Countries.31 In the conflicts in and around the Baltic the question of the Swedish throne was just one motive and one stage. Much more important in the early sixteenth century was the trading conflict between the Hanseatic League and other rising trading powers, foremost of course the Dutch, but also the intensified trading connections of the Fuggers.32 In the middle of this conflict was the passage through the Sound, with the questions of tolls and taxes, of blockades, of restrictions on goods allowed into the Baltic or seized by the Danish, and of Denmark as profiteer of the Sound toll.33 As the person responsible 29 See also Kirby, Northern Europe, 6.  Kirby offers a concise overview of the Baltic economy in ­chapter 1 of his book.

30  See on this also Hanno Brand, “The Diplomatic Resolution of the Sound Conflicts between the Habsburg Netherlands, Denmark and the German Hanse, 1510–​32,” in The Sound Toll at Elsinore: Politics, Shipping and the Collection of Duties 1429–​1857, ed. Ole Degn (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press and the Danish Society for Customs and Tax History, 2017), 193–​228. See also Jens C. Beyer, “King in Exile: Christian II and the Netherlands, 1523–​1531,” Scandinavian Journal of History 11 (1986): 205–​28 at 207. 31  See Brand, “The Diplomatic Resolution of the Sound Conflicts,” 196–​97.

32  See Nübel, Pompejus Occo, 46–​48. See Götz Freiherrn von Pölnitz, Fugger und Hanse:  Ein hundertjähriges Ringen um Ostsee und Nordsee, Studien zur Fuggergeschichte 11 (Tübingen: Mohr, 1953), appendix I, 153–​54, for the writ of protection Christian II gave to Jakob Fugger and his society on May 10, 1515. Finally, Fabius, “Sigbritte Willemsz,” 6–​8, offers some insights into the Dutch perspective on this trading rivalry. 33  See also Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll,” 229–​30.

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for the Sound toll and its collection since 1513, Sigbrit Villoms thus was front and centre for Danish foreign policies in which dynastic interests, trade, political ideas and reforms, and long-​term policies of expanding Danish territory mixed together. The economic policies of Christian II were closely connected to his broader political program. Together with Sigbrit Villoms and a few other non-​elite counsellors, he implemented several reforms so as to push back aristocratic and clerical political influence and to strengthen Danish towns and promote them as trading centres.34 Christian’s policy was explicitly aimed against Lübeck and other cities from the Hanseatic League, and partly realized by closer connections to the Dutch merchants and rulers. As landowners and the main profiteers of the Danish cattle trade, aristocrats who worked closely with the Hanseatic League would have been adversely affected by these policies.35 Finally, Christian’s claim to the Swedish throne, which he had tried to enforce since 1517, most probably was also to further foster his realm(s) as trading centres and to build pressure against Lübeck.36 Economic interests were clearly closely connected to Christian’s political policies regarding different groups inside and outside of Denmark. How far Sigbrit can be said to influence these, however, comes down to interpretation of the sources.

Economic and Political Reforms in Denmark under Christian II

The year 1519 turned into a year full of economic challenges and changes, with Christian II and his non-​elite counsellor Sigbrit Villoms at the heart of the decision-​ making process. They attempted to establish reforms in order to support Danish merchants, peasants, and burghers, while at the same time trying to curb the influence of the nobility and the church. Foreign politics intensified with a campaign against Sweden and renewed hostilities against Lübeck.37 In theory, after the death of his father, Hans, Christian ascended not only to the thrones of Denmark and Norway but also to the throne of Sweden. De facto, the Swedish council rejected this claim under the leadership of the Sture regents. It was obvious that neither the regents nor the council would just hand over the throne without resistance, even though important Swedish political elites were in favour of reestablishing the union of all three kingdoms. For his third campaign against Sweden after the failed campaigns of 1517 and 1518, Christian enlisted an unusually large army of foreign soldiers, mostly from the Netherlands, France, and northern Germany.38 Shipments of arms and gunpowder from the Netherlands to Denmark were also unusually high during this period.39 34 See also Axel Nielsen, Dänische Wirtschaftsgeschichte, with the assistance of Erik Arup, O.  H. Larsen, and Albert Olsen, Handbuch der Wirtschaftsgeschichte (Jena: Fischer, 1933), 66–​67. 35  See Kirby, Northern Europe, 20–​21.

36  See also Nübel, Pompejus Occo, 78, and Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660, 13. 37  Pölnitz, Fugger und Hanse, 37.

38  See also Nübel, Pompejus Occo, 88. 39  Nübel, Pompejus Occo, 90.

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For all of this preparation for military conflict, Christian needed resources. This is where Sigbrit came into play, with the realization of several reforms to gather more revenue.40 In the beginning of the sixteenth century, the increase of trade in the Baltic as well as new technologies for building ships (enabling much larger vessels) made the established toll for passage through the Sound ineffective. The traditional way was to demand one noble (an English gold coin, one of the most popular currencies for trade in the Baltic and North Sea) for each ship, and two or three nobles if the ships appeared [!]‌ to be unusually large. In 1519, the tariff was changed—​almost certainly under the direct charge of Sigbrit Villoms. She introduced a system based on cargo (goods and weight),41 which meant that in addition to the ship toll of one to three nobles, one Rhenish guilder was collected for every ten lasts of commodities.42 At the same time another fee was introduced, the tøndepenge (buoy fee), in order to further ensure safe passage through the Sound.43 The new system was fairer, more modern and yielded more income for the Danish crown. Its disadvantage was, however, that it needed much more bureaucracy, which led to delays in processing ships. In May 1519, a change of the location of the customhouse made it even more complicated for traders.44 Usually, the toll was collected at Elsinore opposite Helsingborg in the northern part of the strait, which marks the narrowest point of the Sound (approximately four kilometres with both coasts clearly visible). Sigbrit brought the collection of the Sound toll to Copenhagen at the south end of the strait, probably to exercise more direct control as well as to support Copenhagen as a commercial centre.45 However, it made for more difficult navigation since at Elsinore ships could anchor in the fairway and then use boats to reach Elsinore and the custom officers.46 With the changed location, vessels had to stop at the roadstead in Copenhagen’s waters. Even worse, the change was not announced early enough, so vessels travelling from the Baltic Sea into the North Sea trying to pay their dues at Elsinore were sent back to Copenhagen, resulting in greater loss of time. Ships intended for the Baltic Sea fared better since they were told at Elsinore to sail further down and pay in Copenhagen. Furthermore, it is probable that even ships who paid their tolls in Copenhagen still had to stop in Elsinore 40 Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll,” especially 230. 41  Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll,” 233–​34.

42  A last is a measuring unit which is different for each commodity—​i.e., a last of salt is different than a last of rye (weight and/​or quantity). Toll stations had their own lists of commodities, their measurements, and their fee. The Sound toll list was usually similar to the list of the Dutch.

43  See Ole Degn, “Tariff Rates, Revenues and Forms of Accounts in the Sound Toll, 1497–​1857,” in The Sound Toll at Elsinore: Politics, Shipping and the Collection of Duties 1429–​1857, ed. Ole Degn (Copenhagen:  Museum Tusculanum Press and the Danish Society for Customs and Tax History, 2017), 139–​92 at 142–​43. 44  See more on this change in Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll,” 230–​33. 45  Nübel, Pompejus Occo, 78.

46  Lars B.  Madsen, “The Sound Toll House at Elsinore,” in The Sound Toll at Elsinore:  Politics, Shipping and the Collection of Duties 1429–​1857, ed. Ole Degn (Copenhagen: Museum Tusculanum Press and the Danish Society for Customs and Tax History, 2017), 97–​138 at 98.

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in order to show proof of this payment, since the Sound near Copenhagen was much too broad to execute complete control over all ships coming and going.47 The location of the customhouse was kept in Copenhagen, despite several complaints from merchants, until Christian II and Sigbrit went into exile on April 13, 1523, and the new governors once again established the customhouse in Elsinore with the old customs officer reinstated (he had been released of his duties in May 1519).48 The additional collecting of tolls according to weight and commodities was also abolished, although it was eventually reintroduced in 1567.49 Sigbrit’s reform of the Sound toll may have brought in more revenue, but the change of location led to severe diplomatic conflicts with the influential Hanseatic League during a time when Denmark was preparing for war with Sweden and needed reliable allies, especially among the merchants. As a result of this reform, there were several complaints against Christian’s policies and especially against Sigbrit Villoms, who was described as an evil counsellor and rude negotiator at the meeting of the Wendish cities (Wendischer Städtetag) on October 24, 1519.50 Aside from the Sound toll, Sigbrit was also responsible for collecting excise taxes, as seen in the quote from the letter featured at the beginning of this chapter. Towns had to collect taxes on several commodities like wine and beer (in other regions bread or salt were also taxed). The task was performed by local tax collectors (cisemester) and contributed to the crown’s revenue. Sigbrit Villoms was the main contact and administrator for receiving these excise taxes in Copenhagen.51 She most probably was also in charge of state finances, especially after the Danish chancellor, Ove Bille, became bishop of Aarhus in 1520 and the position was not filled again under Christian II.52 More subtle was the influence of Sigbrit Villoms in the transfer of Dutch ideas and politics to Denmark and as a spokesperson for the king. As already stated, Denmark and the Netherlands had a close connection due to their common rival, Lübeck, as well as through the marriage between Christian II and Isabella of Austria, and finally via Sigbrit’s own background. She was the one keeping these connections alive, for example with Pompeius Occo in Amsterdam, a German-​Dutch merchant, humanist, Fugger representative, and banker of Christian II, as well as of the Norwegian archdiocese of 47 See Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll,” 230. 48  Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll,” 232.

49  Degn, “Tariff Rates, Revenues and Forms of Accounts in the Sound Toll,” 142.

50  See also the assessment by Dietrich Schäfer, ed., Hanserecesse von 1477–​1530: Siebenter Band, Hanserecesse Dritte Abtheilung (Leipzig:  Duncker & Humblot, 1905), ix, about the opposition formed against these policies, which brought several parties together against Christian II, and which was more severe due to Sigbrit’s rude behaviour as chief executive. The discussions and documents from the meeting are printed there, 428–​63, documents 227–​66. In document 240, 436–​37, the Lübeck burgher Cordt Koninck complains about the seizure of his ship and goods by Albert von Goch, and by “frouw Sibarch.” Sigbrit’s name and role were obviously known enough to not require further explanation. 51  Allen, Breve og Aktstykker I, document 5, 5, or document 10, 17. 52  See also Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660, 13.

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Nidaros (today’s Trondheim).53 Occo’s direct contact to Denmark was Sigbrit’s brother, Herman Villoms (or Willemszoon as he was known in Amsterdam).54 Nonetheless, Occo and Sigbrit also wrote directly to each other. According to Occo, he told her everything necessary; therefore, his letters to Christian could be cut short:  the king would learn everything important from her. “I do not know what else I can write to his majesty since I have written to Sigbrit at length and she will let his majesty know what is needed.”55 Both Christian II and his banker and contact in the Netherlands, Pompeius Occo, trusted Sigbrit Villoms enough to involve her as mediator and contact. In the summer of 1521, Christian II visited the Low Countries, where he met with several princes and influential people from the Empire, the Low Countries, and England, as well as with scholars like Erasmus of Rotterdam and the painter Albrecht Dürer. During this tour, Queen Isabella was officially regent of Denmark and the other Scandinavian kingdoms. However, in a conflict with the Hanseatic League, especially Gdańsk, about the reform of the Sound toll, and concerning Gdańsk’s support of Sweden, Isabella referred to Sigbrit, making clear that Sigbrit was the actual person in charge of economic politics, which in this case also involved the war against Sweden, and thus foreign politics. Even though the representative from Gdańsk tried several times either to contact Christian II directly or to gain access to Isabella as the regent, he was always blocked by Sigbrit, who stated that she was speaking for Christian.56 The influence of Sigbrit Villom’s counsel can be traced in legal documents too. Of special importance are two works of law which were introduced and implemented in the winter of 1521–​1522.57 In these, Christian II and his government, led by Sigbrit Villoms, broke with the Danish nobility and clergy once and for all. The nobility had already tried to extend their rights over the peasants in 1513, when Christian II had to agree to an electoral capitulation (handfæste). Against the nobility’s wishes, the Land Law of 53 See Nübel, Pompejus Occo, here especially 54–​55.

54  See a letter from Occo to Christian II already on June 18, 1515, printed in Nübel, Pompejus Occo, appendix I, 252.

55  Nübel, Pompejus Occo, appendix V, 259–​60, here 260:  “Anders weet ick v k mgt nyet sonders tho schriuen dan ick Sijbrech moer alle ding langer vnd brede schryffe wart sye v k mgt tho kennen geuen wat noet ist.” See also the letter from Occo to Sigbrit from September 10, 1521 (Nübel, Pompejus Occo, appendix IV, 258), in which he addresses her as “Dear Sigbrit Mother” (“Lieue sybrech moer”) and just signs “P occo” (instead of the more frequently used “popius occo” in his letters to other correspondents). Both address and signature are signs of a more informal and also a close (working) relationship between Sigbrit and Occo. 56  This is based on a report of the council’s secretary from Gdańsk, Ambrosius Storm; see Schäfer, Hanserecesse von 1477–​1530 VII, 755–​802. The reports from Storm are printed on pages 761–​82 and 790–​96; see especially 762 for the queen sending Storm to Sigbrit. Mikael Venge also uses these reports in his chapter on Sigbrit and the Sound toll (Venge, “Mother Sigbrit and the Sound Toll”).

57  See Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660, 17. There is some controversy over the exact wording of these two legal works (the Land Law of 1521 and the Town Law of 1522). Different transcripts and a discussion of these problems are presented in Aage Andersen, ed., Den danske Rigslovgivning 1513–​1523 (Copenhagen: Reitzel, 1991).

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1521 forbade the practice of vornedskab (a form of binding peasants to a noble’s land).58 Nobles (and all other Danes) were also forbidden to trade with foreigners, a privilege which, according to the new law, belonged to Danish towns and merchants.59 Towns, like clergy, were put under immediate control of the king. The latter were even forbidden from appealing to ecclesiastical courts outside of Denmark, including the papal court.60 In general, the new laws tried to restrict the trading options of the landowning aristocracy or clergy, limiting trade to Danish merchants. These policies were implemented so as to establish Denmark and its towns as serious trading centres and rivals to the Hanseatic League with whom the nobility and clergy of Denmark traditionally traded.61 These two works of law almost certainly were based on recommendations by Sigbrit Villoms and other non-​elite counsellors as the ideological architects on one hand, and the ideas that Christian himself brought back from his journey to the Low Countries in the summer of 1521 on the other.62

The Fall of Christian II and Sigbrit Villoms

The efforts of Christian II and his counsellor Sigbrit Villoms provoked severe opposition in Denmark as well as outside of the realm. Most prominently, the anti-​aristocratic and anticlerical legal reforms led to resistance by the Danish aristocracy and clergy, who despite Christian’s attitude remained politically powerful and influential. During the spring of 1523, noblemen argued against Sigbrit Villoms, stating that they feared her influence on Christian, and her words and acts against the Danish nobility: “We fear that the same [a massacre like the Stockholm Bloodbath of 1520] must also happen blamelessly to us due to the advice of the evil woman Sigbrit, who without shame has called us all of the nobility here in the kingdom rogues and traitors.”63 Foreign support for Christian II against rebellion in Sweden, and now also in Denmark, remained scarce. The towns of the Hanseatic League were still angered by 58 Christian’s handfæstning is printed in Andersen, Den danske Rigslovgivning, 19–​33 at 27. The Land Law is printed there as well (144–​257); the ban is at §111, 192. See further Kirby, Northern Europe, 19. 59  Nielsen, Dänische Wirtschaftsgeschichte, 67–​68. The Town Law is printed in Andersen, Den danske Rigslovgivning, 48–​144 at 74–​75.

60  Andersen, Den danske Rigslovgivning, 144–​257 at 160–​66. See further Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660, 17. 61  See also Nielsen, Dänische Wirtschaftsgeschichte, 66–​71.

62  See also Lockhart, Denmark, 1513–​1660, 17; Hvidtfeldt, “Forvaltningspolitik under Christian den anden,” 229–​31.

63  “Vi frygter, at det samme også skal ske os uden al brøde efter den onde kvinde Sigbrits råd, der skamløst uden al skel har kaldt os alle af adelen her i riget for slyngler og forræddere [sic].” “Opsigelsesbrev til Christian 2,” in Kampen om Danmark: Dansk politik på reformationstiden 1513–​ 1536, ed. Carsten E.  Knudsen (Herning:  Systime, 1984). See among others the letter of Olaf Nils Rosenkrantz in Allen, Breve og Aktstykker I, document 28, 48–​50, or the letter by Peder Ebbesen Galt in the same edition, document 34, 55–​57. The latter states that he fears Sigbrit will never stop hunting the Danish nobles, whom she calls traitors.

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the raising of the Sound toll and the change of the toll station’s location, by the conflicts in summer 1521, and by rumours about the establishment of a Scandinavian merchant society.64 Neither Charles V nor Margaret of Austria or the Dutch towns were willing to support Christian with military or financial help even though parts of Isabella’s Mitgift were still outstanding. The Habsburgs promised 250,000 gold guilders, but it was never paid in full. Pompeius Occo, the Fugger factor and Danish banker, twice received 54,000 guilders and used them to pay the Dutch bills of Christian II and the realm, including support and foreign soldiers for the war against Sweden, but this was in 1519/​20, and did not do much good for the uprisings in 1522/​23.65 The long-​term goals and policies of Christian II were to push back against aristocratic and clerical influence, to support the new Lutheran ideas, to establish Danish towns and merchants against Hanseatic trading influence, and finally to win back the Dominum Maris Baltici by uniting all Scandinavian thrones once again. In many ways, these actions, based on the counsel by Sigbrit Villoms and other non-​elites, were foiled by rash and quick behaviour in the years from 1519. In the complex situation of differing interests of several Baltic powers, Christian made too many enemies at once, and his support from non-​elite counsellors and the Danish towns and merchants was just not enough to maintain his position against the nobility and the church.66 In the end, Sigbrit’s reforms and attempts to generate more income for the wars against Sweden, and later against the uprising in Jutland (Denmark), proved to be in vain. Despite Christian’s and Sigbrit’s attempts to enhance the economic and political scope of action for burghers and peasants, these groups simply did not gain enough influence and power against the well-​established aristocracy and clergy, which were united against Christian’s government.67 Moreover, Christian’s rash actions in Sweden during the conflict with Lübeck and other trading powers made many Danish subjects critical and mistrustful against their monarch and his counsellors: be it the raising of taxes, his actions in foreign politics, or in lawmaking, where he overruled all criticism and enforced too many changes all at once.68 Christian II simply did not have enough money to fight on all these fronts, which was one of the reasons he had to go into exile in the Low Countries.69 The Low Countries, and especially the towns of Holland (which guaranteed the Mitgift), were not able to support Christian against Frederik I in Denmark due to various causes, 64 Kirby, Northern Europe, 59. See also Nielsen, Dänische Wirtschaftsgeschichte, 69–​70.

65  Pölnitz, Fugger und Hanse, 29. See also his settlement in a letter to Christian II on March 7, 1522, printed in Nübel, Pompejus Occo, appendix V, 259–​60. Nübel (92–​96) also provides a short account of Occo’s work as Christian’s banker.

66  This is also the argument from Axel Nielsen, who emphasizes the economic power of the aristocracy over the slowly increasing influence of burghers and towns (Nielsen, Dänische Wirtschaftsgeschichte, 70). 67  Hvidtfeldt, “Forvaltningspolitik under Christian den anden,” 238–​39.

68  Hvidtfeldt, “Forvaltningspolitik under Christian den anden,” 239, even calls the government a dictatorship, and refers to insecurities and fear of repression as part of the reason for Christian’s fall in 1523. 69  Beyer, “King in Exile,” 205–​6. Refer also to this article in general on the exile of Christian II.

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and since the latter opened up the Sound to Dutch trade in the Baltic, they were also satisfied with the status quo. Margaret of Austria and the Hollanders used Christian’s conversion to Lutheranism and his choice of counsellors to justify their position.70 Not only was Sigbrit’s fate bound to Christian, but Christian’s fate was therefore also dependent on Sigbrit and his relation to her.

70 Beyer, “King in Exile,” 227.

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AFTERWORD “POWER IS MONEY”? REFLECTIONS ON MONEY, POWER, SEX, AND GENDER IN PREMODERN ROYAL COURTS ELENA WOODACRE* As Cathleen Sarti noted in the introduction to this volume, it has often been said that money is power. When examining the situation of royal women or those in the orbit of the monarch, we can see that the reverse is perhaps more accurate—​their proximity to the centre of political power in the realm also gives them access to financial resources, which in turn enhances their own personal power and agency. These women are converting economic capital into other forms of capital—​namely power and influence, and vice versa. Those with money and power are subject to great scrutiny, envy, and suspicion—​ particularly when the financial resources are those which in theory belong to the crown and by extension to the realm itself. This dynamic can be further complicated by both sex and gender—​the patriarchal political framework of premodern royal courts meant that women were not always seen as the natural conduits or controllers of economic resources. In the cases highlighted in this volume, a further layer is added through the sexual aspect of these women’s relationship with the ruler adding suspicion that their (financial) power and influence were increased through their intimacy with the monarch. A final complication is that these women were perceived as “outsiders” as well, being either foreigners or from outside the royal caste—​or, in Sigbrit Villoms’s case, both. This combination of factors has led to criticism of women in premodern courts who openly demonstrated their economic political influence, particularly when it crossed beyond the expected area of their role. Yet, when they exercised financial agency within the boundaries of their position, for example in terms of the careful administration by consorts of their lands and household budgets, their prudence and effective management have often been ignored by their contemporaries and academics. This collection has offered several excellent case studies for an area which is in real need of further examination—​the economic and political influence and agency of women in royal courts. Recent decades have seen incredible activity in terms of the fields of women’s history, royal and court studies, as well as economic and political history, and yet researchers have performed little joining of the dots to draw out the connections between them. One reason for this might be an early preoccupation by those who look at female economic activity in the premodern world to focus on women * Dr. Elena (Ellie) Woodacre is a specialist in queenship and royal studies and has published extensively in this area. She is the founder of the Kings & Queens conference series and Royal Studies Network and edits the Royal Studies Journal.

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within the framework of work and industry.1 As queens do not “work” in a conventional way, nor do they engage with industry in a conventional manner, they have fallen outside this area of interest—​yet these royal women controlled significant amounts of economic resources, and financial management was a crucial aspect of their role. While an interest in work and industry appears to have excluded royal women from the focus of economic historians, queenship scholars have been more interested in other aspects of the queen’s role such as recent studies on royal women and cultural transfer, their role in diplomacy and as counsellors and comparative studies of royal women in various geographical contexts.2 While these are all worthy areas of exploration, it has resulted in the economic activities and administration of royal women being understudied. As Cathleen Sarti noted at the outset of this collection, researchers have made initial attempts to highlight and probe the financial aspects of the queen’s role—​for example Fößel and Barany—​but there is far more work to do in order to gain a deep understanding of this vital element of queenship.3 However, one of the strengths of this collection is that it not only adds to our understanding of the financial activities of queens but brings them together with other women in the royal court. By comparing the economic activity of women who are all very close to the ruler and had influence on him but held different positions (some official and some informal), some interesting observations can be made. The first two chapters offer an opportunity to examine the ways in which the consorts of rulers controlled resources through their dower and dowry and allow us to see similarities and differences across period, place, and position via their studies of late medieval English queens, Holy Roman Empresses, and the consort of an Imperial Elector. Both chapters highlight the impressive range of documentary sources available which shed light on the economic activities of consorts and how they have been underutilized in this regard in both German and English historiography, as well as in the context of queenship studies. These chapters also demonstrate that financial sources contain a 1 See van Nederveen Neerkerk’s overview of gender and economic history, particularly her comment on page 182; Elise van Nederveen Neerkerk, “Gender and Economic History: The Story of a Complicated Marriage,” Tijdschrift voor Sociale en Economische Geschiedenis 11 (2014): 175–​97. An example of recent research in this area is Meridee L. Bailey, Tania M. Colwell, and Julie Hotchin, eds., Women and Work in Premodern Europe: Experiences, Relationships and Cultural Representation, c.1100–​1800 (London: Routledge, 2018).

2 A brief selection of recent examples in these areas includes Helen Watanabe-​O’Kelly and Adam Morton, eds., Queens Consort, Cultural Transfer and European Politics, c.1500–​1800 (London: Routledge, 2016); Joan-​Lluís Palos and Magdalena S. Sanchez, eds., Early Modern Dynastic Marriages and Cultural Transfer (London:  Routledge, 2017); Elena Woodacre, ed., A Companion to Global Queenship (Leeds:  Arc Humanities, 2018). Several recent studies have analyzed the role of royal women in epistolary diplomacy, particularly with regard to Elizabeth I; for example, see Carlo M.  Bajetta, Guillaume Coatalen, and Jonathan Gibson, eds., Elizabeth I’s Foreign Correspondence: Letters, Rhetoric and Politics (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). 3 Amalie Fößel, “The Queen’s Wealth in the Middle Ages,” Maiestas 13 (2005): 23–​45, and Attila Barany, “Medieval Queens and Queenship: A Retrospective on Income and Power,” in Judith Rasson and Marianne Sághy, eds., Annual of Medieval Studies at CEU, vol. 19 (Budapest: Central European University, 2013), 149–​200.

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wealth of information on the wider functioning of the court and the realm. The authors show how these documents can be used to trace the extended networks that consorts used both within and beyond the realm and the relationship with merchants, bankers, artisans, and tenants with the consort and the court, as well as data on transport systems and currency exchange, making them useful both to economic historians and to royal studies specialists. These first two chapters also highlight regional differences in a consort’s position and financial prerogatives. Backerra and Ludwig-​Ockenfels note that the legal rights and autonomy of royal women varied considerably across the Holy Roman Empire due to the differing legal frameworks of the many political units within the Empire. They also show differences between the situation of Holy Roman Empresses, such as Empress Elisabeth Christine (wife of Charles VI) and other princess consorts, such as Anna Maria Luisa de Medici, the Electress of Palatine-​Neuburg, who was the focus of an extended case study. Another interesting aspect which links these two chapters is the issue of dower. Seah and Wright explore the sources relating to the dowers of the late medieval queens of England, noting how the queen’s dower often made her one of the great landowners of the country. This gave the queens considerable opportunity for administration in a way which was largely autonomous and separate from their role as the king’s wife or widow. Their dower also gave queens the ability to build networks or an “affinity” through the officers who stewarded their lands and through their tenants. The queen’s dower then formed the basis of her economic and political power, not only giving her the financial basis necessary to maintain her household and fund her patronage activities but also serving as a hub of networks of influence which radiated across the country. Indeed, Michelle Beer has argued that when Henry VIII was seeking an annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon and by extension seeking to remove her from the queen’s office, he began stripping her of her dower to weaken her financial situation and to break down her affinity of supporters who owed their political livelihood and position to her.4 Backerra and Ludwig-​Ockenfels’ study also notes the power and influence that consorts in the Holy Roman Empire gained through their management of financial resources. Yet their chapter highlights the differences in the mechanism of dowry and dower, which is far more complex than the equivalent institutions in England, encompassing not only the marriage portion or Mitgift from the bride’s family but also the Morgengabe, morgive or morning gift, the counter-​money (Widerlage), as well as the consort’s dowry or jointure, which would be transferred into the dower (Wittum) after the husband’s death. (Wittum). However, this chapter provides an intriguing counterpoint to the first study on the queens of England—​where Seah and Wright focus more on the composition of the queen’s dower, the variance in revenues gained from it, and her administration of her lands, the second chapter gives more emphasis to how imperial consorts used the financial resources at their disposal through their dower and annuities. 4 Michelle Beer, “A Queenly Affinity? Catherine of Aragon’s Estates and Henry VIII’s Great Matter,” Historical Research 91 (2018): 426–​55, republished in Royal Studies Journal 6 (2019) as the winner of the annual article prize for 2019.

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Backerra and Ludwig-​Ockenfels demonstrate that their expenditure encompassed far more than merely acquiring goods and accoutrements but was a vehicle for cultural, religious, and political patronage that gave them the ability to provide support to their natal families as well. They show how some consorts, like Landgravine Caroline of Hesse-​ Darmstadt, even used their financial resources to invest in industries and effectively to become businesswomen in their own right. Finally, the case study of the privy purse of Electress Anna Maria Luisa shows her use of expenditure to establish and affirm her position during key transitional points in her life by charting her spending in the initial year of her marriage and the first year of her widowhood. The final two chapters of this collection focus on two women who were not consorts but were still on extremely intimate and influential terms with the king: Alice Perrers, mistress of Edward III of England, and Sigbrit Villoms, counsellor to Christian II of Denmark. Both women were intensively criticized for the power they gained and the wealth that they managed through their royal connection. Ultimately both fell hard when the reigns of their royal partners finished—​the loss of their protectors left them exposed to the full brunt of their critics. Other interesting connections emerge between these two women. Both Alice and Sigbrit appear to have risen from the merchant class—​Laura Tompkins makes a convincing argument that this background gave Alice a deep understanding of economic matters and the financial acumen she needed to develop her portfolio of lands and assets. Tompkins notes that Alice strategically used the complex mechanism of enfeoffment to hold her properties, which gave Alice a means of protecting her vulnerable position (which as a king’s mistress could be ended at a moment’s notice with his death or the loss of his affections) while still allowing her to extract the profits. Sigbrit too may have been able to draw on her knowledge of the mechanisms of trade in her efforts to reform the collection of taxes on merchant vessels crossing the Sound. As a native of the Low Countries, long one of the most commercially active regions in Europe, she may have been able to give Christian II a richer understanding and a different perspective on trade and taxation as his adviser. Both Sigbrit and Alice shared a connection with queens, serving in the households of Isabella of Austria and Philippa of Hainault, respectively. While Alice rose out of the queen’s household to ultimately take the role of a virtual queen (along with many of the queen’s jewels) after Philippa’s death, Sigbrit joined the household of Isabella of Austria and leveraged that position to become close to both king and queen. While Sigbrit acted as a counsellor to the king and helped him develop his political and economic policies through her financial acumen, she supported the queen through several pregnancies, utilizing her knowledge of childbirth and herbal remedies to help Isabella recover and her children to thrive and survive. Finally, both women shared a sexual linkage with the king—​while Alice was the king’s mistress, Sigbrit rose to prominence as the mother of the king’s mistress, Dyveke. However, as Sarti notes, Sigbrit’s influence grew rather than ended on Dyveke’s death. Yet that sexual connection and the fact that both women were outsiders—​born into the merchant class rather than the aristocracy or royal family—​made them objects of criticism at court. Their influence was distrusted and even

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detested by the elite courtiers and by other royals, including Emperor Charles V, who sought to remove Christian from Sigbrit’s influence and even potentially to prosecute her on charges of witchcraft. Some contemporaries clearly felt that for “inappropriate” intimates like Alice and Sigbrit to gain such access to the king—​and therefore to power and the financial resources of the crown—​some kind of extraordinary power must have been at work to “bewitch” the king and turn him from those who were deemed to be more appropriate counsellors. Taken as a whole, this collection provides important insights on the financial mechanisms of the court and the economic agency of the women who inhabited it. All of these political actors demonstrate their ability to manage economic resources as well as the financial gains and influence that their proximity to and intimacy with the king offered. This collection has also examined both formal frameworks for female economic agency through the mechanism of the queen’s dowry, dower, grants, gifts, and informal channels which allowed women like Alice and Sigbrit who did not occupy the official position of the first lady of the realm to become the most influential woman at court. Yet we can also see the vulnerability of these outsiders, who were able to rise high at great speed through the favour granted by kings, but they did not have the protection of recognized status or the support of natal dynasties to fall back on after the death or removal of their royal patrons. Consorts had the economic safety net of a dower, which provided ongoing access to financial resources after the death of their spouses, but Alice Perrers’s carefully crafted “nest egg” that she built through the gifts given by her royal lover and her own business acumen was quickly wiped out when she fell victim to her many enemies after the death of Edward III. Returning to where we started, these chapters reveal that a woman’s management of financial resources, whether it is the administration of her lands and household or advising the king on economic policies, can open her up to criticism. The often misguided perception that women leveraged their sexual connection to a ruler for financial gain led to accusations of avarice or being in modern parlance a “gold digger,” manipulating the king and milking the realm’s economic resources for their own benefit. This criticism from contemporaries has left a long legacy in historiography, leading to permanently blackened reputations which have obscured the financial activity and ability of these figures, which new revisionist scholarship, such as the chapters here by Tompkins and Sarti, aims to correct. In the case of consorts, even when their management of economic resources has drawn little critique from contemporaries, the almost deafening silence of modern researchers on this vital aspect of their role has meant that their financial activities and ability have gone largely unnoticed. With so much recent focus on queenship and monarchy which has given us a greater understanding of the consort’s office and authority, this key piece of the puzzle is needed to complete the picture. It is our fervent hope that this collection, and other emerging scholarship on the economic agency of court and royal women, will highlight both the need to build up our knowledge of the financial activities of women in the royal court and the range of excellent and understudied documentary sources available to carry out this much-​ needed research.

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INDEX OF PERSONS AND TOPICS

This volume deals mostly with people who were known by their first names. As such, all persons are ordered alphabetically by their first name, including the very few who actually had a commonly used last name.  Alice Perrers, 5–6, 60–71, 75, 90–91 Amalia Wilhelmina, Holy Roman empress, 43, 45, 47 Anna Maria Luisa de Medici, electress of Palatine-Neuburg, 6, 36, 38, 40–41, 48–57, 89–90 Anna of Tirol, Holy Roman empress, 45, 47

capital (after Pierre Bourdieu), 3–6, 8, 13–14, 32, 37, 70, 87, 89 Caroline, landgravine of Hesse-Darmstadt, 39, 90 Catherine of Aragon, queen of England, 89 Charles II, duke of Guelders, 75 Charles V, Holy Roman emperor, 44, 74–76, 85, 91 Charles VI, Holy Roman emperor, 36, 42–43, 89 Charles VII, Holy Roman emperor, 45 Christian I, king of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, 78 Christian II, king of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, 6, 73–78, 80–86, 90–91 consorts (also princesses, electresses, queens, and empresses) 2, 4–6, 12–13, 15, 18, 19–20, 23–25, 35–38, 41, 42–47, 48–50, 52–53, 55–57, 76, 83, 87–91 counsel (also advice, council, counsellor), 6, 24, 44, 52, 62, 70, 73–77, 82–85, 88, 90–91 counter-money (Widerlage), 40–41, 44, 89 court as household, 1–4, 7, 17–19, 24, 28–29, 70, 87, 89–91

dower (Wittum), 11–12, 14–15, 17–18, 21–23, 26, 35, 38, 40–43, 51, 88–89, 91 dowry (jointure), 41, 44–46, 50–52, 55–57, 88–89, 91 Dyveke Villoms, 73–74, 76, 90

Edward III, king of England, 5–6, 60, 63, 68–70, 90–91 Eleanora Gonzaga, Holy Roman empress, 45–46 Eleanora Magdalena Gonzaga of MantuaNevers, Holy Roman empress, 45 Eleanor of Provence, queen of England, 18 Elisabeth Christine, Holy Roman empress, 36, 42–44, 46–47, 57, 89 Elizabeth Woodville, queen of England, 15, 19 Ferdinand I, Holy Roman emperor, 75 Ferdinand II, Holy Roman emperor, 45 Ferdinand III, Holy Roman emperor, 45–46 Frederik I, king of Denmark, 78, 85

gifts, 16, 29, 36, 41, 44–46, 65, 68–69, 91 Gustav I, king of Sweden, 78

Hans, king of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, 79–80 Henry III, king of England, 18 Henry VI, king of England, 15, 26, 31 Henry VIII, king of England, 89

income (also revenue), 4, 6–7, 9–10, 14, 16–20, 23, 28–29, 40–42, 44–47, 50–52, 55–56, 64–65, 89 inheritance, 12, 20–22, 41–42, 44–46, 51, 54–55 Isabeau of Bavaria, queen of France, 60 Isabella of Austria, queen of Denmark, 76, 82–83, 90 Isabella of France, queen of England, 16–17, 23 Isabella of Portugal, Holy Roman empress, 44–45

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Index of Persons and Topics

Joachim I, elector of Brandenburg, 75 Johann Wilhelm, elector of PalatineNeuburg, 36, 48, 51–52, 56–57 John Goce and heirs, 20–25 Joseph II, Holy Roman emperor, 43

landownership, 5, 11–13, 16–20, 23–25, 26–31, 35, 38, 41–42, 57, 61, 64–66, 87, 89 luxury Goods (also jewels, jewelry, tapestry), 5, 29, 31, 41–42, 44–46, 50– 51, 54–57, 62–64, 67–70, 90

Margaret of Anjou, queen of England, 5, 15, 25–32 Margaret of Austria, governor of the Habsburg Netherlands, 79, 85–86 Margaret of France, queen of England, 5, 16, 20–25, 33 Maria Amalia of Austria, Holy Roman empress, 45–46 Maria Anna of Spain, Holy Roman empress, 45–46 Maria of Spain, Holy Roman empress, 44–46 Maria Theresa, Holy Roman empress, 41, 44

Matthias, Holy Roman emperor, 47 Maximilian I, Holy Roman emperor, 79 Maximilian II, Holy Roman emperor, 44, 46 mistresses, 5, 17, 60–63, 66, 69, 73, 75–76, 90–91 Mitgift (also marriage portion), 41, 44, 47, 50, 55, 85, 89 morgive (also morning gift, Morgengabe), 40, 42, 51, 89

patronage (also networks, affinity), 6, 11, 19–20, 24, 29–31, 33, 36, 39, 43–44, 46, 49, 70–71, 75, 89–91 perception, 6, 13, 59–60, 62–63, 82, 87, 90–91 Philippa of Hainault, queen of England, 15, 17, 19, 60, 68, 90 Pompeius Occo, 82–83, 85 queenship, 6–7, 9, 12–13, 31–33, 58, 91

Richard II, king of England, 61, 67–68, 71

Sigbrit Villoms, 6, 73–86, 90–91 sources, 2, 6, 10–11, 14–16, 20, 24, 25–26, 38, 40–41, 43, 49, 52–54, 58, 61, 65, 74–77, 88–89