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moment, and so did his audience. The king prostrated himself before the saintly abbot, and the barons thronged to imitate him in their eagerness to accept the blessing. After the king came Eleanor, who offered her vassals from Poitou and Aquitaine, and after her, scores of great ladies including the half sister of the King of Jerusalem, Sybille, countess of Flanders, as well as other great ladies such as Mamille of Roucy, Florine of Bourgogne, Torqueri of Bouillon and Faydide of Toulouse.
The male chroniclers who observed these women taking the cross tut tutted the whole idea, considering that the presence of women on the crusade set a bad example for females as a whole. After all, had not the papal bull promulgating the crusade expressly forbade the attendance of concubines?
The queen appears to have been swept away, however, with the adventure of it all, bringing to the crusade a form of theatre a century before the first mystery plays were performed. Crowds of people had gathered to hear and discuss the new great journey. Suddenly, she appeared amongst the faithful, riding a white horse and dressed as an Amazon, shod with gilded sandals and her flaming hair bedecked in plumes. Surrounded by a bodyguard of similarly garbed women, she galloped around the meeting place, urging the faithful to join in the journey. Her attendant ladies distributed white distaffs to the fainthearted.
This theatrical symbolism was maintained throughout the crusade, according to Nicetas, who complained that the women dressed as men, mounted on horses and armed with lance and battle axe, keeping a martial demeanor as bold as the Amazons of legend. Eleanor in particular was richly dressed, and as with knights appearing in disguise at tournaments, she adopted a secret name - the lady of the golden boot. Eleanor was past the blush of girlish beauty for which she had become famous: now she was a magnificent warrior queen, the boldness of her manner combined with the aristocratic elegance of her bearing to make all who saw her think of her as the true Amazon queen, Penthesilea.10
Why did so many great women take the cross? Some commentators speculated that rather than choosing to go, they were forced to, especially Eleanor. Knowing her passionate character, the king feared to leave her behind. More recently, historians have theorised that her zeal was part of the new spirit of the troubadour, in which ladies and their courts were seeking relief from their gloomy castles. Journeys along the pleasant roads to the sunshine of the south were by now common. Pilgrimages had become the excuse for journeys of dalliance and pleasure.
And the ultimate pilgrimage was to the bazaars of Tripoli and the famous shrines of Jerusalem.11
This is perhaps a churlish suggestion, however, and rather demeaning to both the intellectual and spiritual state of Eleanor and her womenkind. It should be recalled that this was also the moment when Hildegard of Bingen was fervently imploring the great people of Europe to undertake a spiritual redemption - and Eleanor was one of those with whom she was corresponding.
1. Bonner, Songs of the Troubadours, p.32.
2. Ibid., p.31.
3. Runciman II, pp.27-30.
4. Ibid., p.7.
5. Ibid., p.183.
6. Ibid., p.188.
7. Kelly, Eleanor of Aquitaine, pp.40-41.
8. William of St Thierry et. al., St Bernard of Clairvaux, G. Webb and A. Walker (trans.), Mowbray, London, 1954, p.110.
9. Pernoud, In The Steps of the Crusaders, M. Case (trans.), Constable, London, 1959, plate 3.
10. Kelly, Eleanor of Aquitaine p.51 and Fraser, The Warrior Queens, pp.23-4.
11. Kelly, pp.45-6.
Chapter 23:
The Goddess of Love
The chaos of 1095 was never to be quite repeated in all its immense, dark power. Yet in 1147, it seemed that all of Western Europe was swirling in a tremendous, silver flood
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