Betwixt The Sheets: The History of Sex, Scandal & Society - Eleanor Aquitaine: The Life of a Medieval Badass

Episode Date: August 4, 2023

You would think that a woman who was queen several times, commanded armies and was possibly the most powerful woman in medieval Europe would need no introduction…yet here we are.On today’s show we’re joined by author and new co-host of the History Hit podcast Gone Medieval, Eleanor Janega, to learn more about this most badass medieval woman: Eleanor Aquitaine.Did she really have an affair with her own uncle? What was her relationship with her cousin? And how did medieval society take to such a powerful and influential woman?This episode was edited by Siobhan Dale. The Senior Producer was Charlotte Long.If you're enjoying Betwixt please vote for us at the British Podcast Awards here. It would mean the world to us!Get 50% off your first 3 months with code BETWIXT. Download the app on your smart TV or in the app store or sign up at historyhit.com/subscribe.You can take part in our listener survey here. Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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Sign up to join me in locations around the world and explore the past. Just visit historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. Hello, my lovely betwixters. It's me, Kate Lister. I am here to help you look after yourselves once more. Here it is. It is your obligatory, fair do's warning. This is an adult podcast spoken by adults to other adults

in an adulty way about a range of adult subjects, and you should be an adult too. So if you persist in listening to us, don't be writing us angry emails saying how offended you got, Because fair do's, we did warn you. Bad-ass bitches go, Eleanor of Aquitaine has got to be right up there. She was a queen, several times, and perhaps the most powerful and wealthy woman in medieval Europe. She had 11 children and outlived all but two of them, and she lived well into her 80s.

She was rumoured to have supported a revolt against her second husband. I mean, who hasn't? But the revolt failed. And that resulted in her being imprisoned for almost 16 years until her son succeeded the throne. After being released by a son, she continued to have a massive influence on political affairs until her death. She managed to avoid kidnappings.

She commanded armies and she joined Crusades. That's not quite as cool, but she was on Crusades. And she was doing all of this in the 12th century, by the way. Dear more about this medieval badass. Debunk some myths and have a lot of. look at her love affairs, including one that was rumoured to be with her own uncle. Here it is, Eleanor of Aquitaine. What do you look for a man?

Oh, money, of course. You're supposed to rise when an adult speaks to you. I make perfect copies of whatever my boss needs by just turning a knob and pushing the fire. Yes, social courtesy does make a difference. Goodness, for beautiful time. Goodness had nothing to do with it, dearie. And welcome back to Betwixt the Sheets, the History of Sex Scandal. Society with me, Kate Lister.

After you've heard something of the life of Eleanor of Aquitaine, it's impossible to look at the Middle Ages in the same way again. And who have we got on to talk about this absolute tour de force? Well, it's another Eleanor, who is equally as awesome. Eleanor Janega, who has been on this podcast more than any other guest and is now the host of our sister podcast Gone Medieval. So go and have a listen to her over there. She is fabulous.

But before we get into this episode, of course I have the little favour to ask of you. If you are enjoying Betwixt, we would just love it if you take a couple of seconds out of your busy day to vote for us for the Listeners Choice Award at the British Podcast Awards. If you follow the link in the show notes, it would mean the world to us. We just missed out last year and I think with your help this year, we could cinch it. Right, back to the Eleanors. Enjoy. And welcome to Betwixt the Sheets.

It's only Eleanor. Janega, how are you doing? I'm great. I'm here to laugh at a reasonable volume. And once again, you know, bring the sexiest parts of medieval history to light. Thank you very much. Eleanor is laughing because we've been told by our producer that we laugh too much and it makes the microphone pop. And now she can't stop laughing. The betwixters absolutely love you.

Some of our most popular shows is where you're here talking medieval smut. They love it. You know, like the people just know when the girlies are having a good time. And that's what the people want. They want to see the girlies chatting sex and having fun. And I hear congratulations are in order, not just for you, but mostly for the history hit team, because they have been lucky enough, lucky enough to get you to co-host Gone Medieval with the gorgeous medieval Matt.

I know. Isn't Matt just such a wonderful guy? So, yeah. Dream team, absolutely chuff to be over at Gone Medieval. because it's such a brilliant podcast and it's really wonderful for me to be able to go a little bit more in depth in my nerdery.

So yeah, we're having a great time over at Gone Medieval. You know, God bless the good ship Gone Medieval and all her sail in her, say I. Absolutely. And it means I've been lucky enough to snag you back to talk about one medieval heroine icon and your namesake, Eleanor of Aquitaine. Yeah, that's right.

My parents forced me into becoming, a medieval historian by naming me jointly after Eleanor of Aquitaine and Eleanor of Castile. So I never had a chance. This is just all nominative determinism. Are your parents proper medievalists as well? No, they're just cool. I love that. Okay, all right, so we're going to talk about Eleanor of Aquitaine, but obviously there might be people here just going, I don't know who that is.

So we'll just start absolute basics. Page 1. Who was Eleanor of Aquitaine? Cast her mind back to the 12th century. So she was born around about the year 1122. And she was, first of all, as the name indicates, the Duchess of Aquitaine, which is a really, really rich and incredibly important part of Southeast France. So she is one of the first women to be a direct vassal of the French king. What does that mean, vassal, that she was a direct vassal?

What's that? Good question. So, you know, when people talk about the concept of feudalism, feudalism is sort of not real. It's kind of like a thing that doesn't really exist, but there's the idea of this pyramid where there's a king at the top. and then there are nobles underneath them, and then underneath them there's peasants.

Well, there is certainly a thing in France where you are a lord or lady, a duchess or possibly in Eleanor's case, and you rule your little section of land. Like, think about it like a county here. Right? And so you're in control of that, and you have like, I don't know, peasants and serfs and things that pay you taxes. And then you are a vassal of the French king. So that means that when you take over your land,

And what happens is Eleanor Vauquitaine went and knelt at the feet of the King of France and put her hands over her head in her prayer thing. Bulb in there. Mm-hmm. And then the king puts his hands over yours and then says, okay, you are my vassal. And so that means that, like, you know, you have to pay tax to him. If he decides to have a war, you're supposed to show up and bring, you know, five of your besties with horses and, you know, things of this nature. And it was really kind of unusual for a woman to take on this role. But by all accounts, Eleanor was just this phenom of a woman.

incredibly, incredibly smart, a babe. Oh, was she a fox? Absolutely fox, apparently. Wow. Like, people would talk about it all the time. And she is so good at kind of, like, ruling her own duchy, and she's so wealthy and everything that she ends up marrying the King of France. Strong.

Then that doesn't go so well, because she's much smarter than him. Oh. They, stop me if you heard this one before, but, you know, they go on crusade to the Holy Land. It's like a really bad kind of holiday, and they get divorced as a result of it. If I had a penny for every time that's happened to me. Yeah. And so she comes back from holiday. It is like, that is it we are getting divorced.

Holiday. I love that you call it a holiday. It is a holiday when you're, like, this is how rich people enjoy themselves in the Middle Ages. They're like, I'm going to go over to the Holy Land for Jesus and, you know, get my butt kicked. Get some crusading on. Yeah. So they divorced. They divorced.

They divorced, yeah. So she wrote to the Pope. She's like, dear Pope, this guy's my cousin. Like anybody isn't cousins when you're royalty or whatever in the Middle Age. Did she not know that when they got married? I mean, she extremely knew it. She extremely knew it. Yes.

But the Pope is like, yeah, okay, because whatever, nobody's into this anymore. And like, she was just not really having boys for Louis anyway. So it was a whole thing. So anyway, she divorces him eight weeks later. She marries Henry II, the King of England. Fuck, man. She is busy. Who she's more closely related to.

She's more closely related to Henry than Louis, which is very funny. So she was the Queen of France and the Queen of England. England. And she is Richard the Lionheart's mum, who people have probably heard of. She's the mother of King John I, one of our worst kings. He gets a bad rap, doesn't he, John? He does. Yeah, actually. There'll be some historians out there that'll be hardcore John defenders, weren't there? And I actually kind of agree with them, because it was sort of like a terrible state to come in. And basically, you know, one of the problems that all these guys have, Henry the second, a lot of times people go, he's a bad guy. A lot of these problems are it's like if you're putting these dudes up against Eleanor. Eleanor is so like on top of things and she's so clever and really, really strong that she just makes everyone kind of like bad around her in comparison.

And you know, partially because sometimes she'll be like saying to her sons, you ever think about like revolting against your dad, you know, and things like that. So she inspires revolts against her husband. She marries two kings and gives birth to lots of other kings. Wow, okay. I'm going to have to take this down a bit here because I'm getting confused now with exactly how many kings are in and out of this woman's vagina is quite impressive. We've got like two kings, but there was like one of them in between was also like a prince, but he dies. Wow. Raise your game, ladies. Raise your game. Yeah, just an absolute phenom of a woman, right? But when you are this clever and, you know, this gairless one could say, you know, by the time you're like, hey boy,

who feels like revolting against their dad, you know, and things of this nature. So she's really cool, like, obviously, but why are we talking about her on the sex show? And the answer is because when you're this strong and you're this clever and you don't let men do whatever it is they want. Everyone was like, uh, she's a slut. Which, I mean, brackets, reclaimed word. Like, shout out to sluts everywhere. What a great thing to be. Keep it up, ladies and gentlemen.

Absolutely. And all those in between. Slut. Flop pride, man. Yeah, there is a long tradition of that, isn't there? Is that whenever a woman gets any kind of power is the thing that is always attacked. If there's nothing else that you can go after, it's just, well, she's a slag. And it's quite interesting because, like, the stories about her being a slag,

a lot of time kind of revolve around this time that she went on Crusade, right? So she's on, more specifically, the second Crusade. Is this like what happens on Crusade stays on Crusade? Yeah, kind of. And it's like, she rallied a bunch of her own troops from Aquitaine to go. There are like some stories that should say she actually led the troops like as her own general, but we're not sure if that's necessarily true. Basically because the crusade was such a disaster, we think that maybe people were like,

yeah, and Eleanor was leading her troops and that's why everything sucked, right? You know, it's a way of saying she was ineffectual, but actually, Louis, the King of France was just a really terrible general. But one of the things that was happening is that, like, things had just gone bad in the Holy Land. Let's just say that, okay? You know, like basically, it turns out, stop me if you've heard this one before, but if you come from very far away and you want to take over a piece of land in the Middle East, it's really hard to hold it because it's very far away.

I don't know if there's any lessons to be learned from that. Surely not. Surely people would have tried that once, realized that it doesn't work and would never have tried to do such a silly thing ever again. No, absolutely not. So they go over to try to kind of like retake bits that had fallen, you know, fallen. quote unquote, and we're like no longer sufficiently French. And she's like, okay, well, what we are going to do is meet up with my uncle, who is the prince of Raymond of Poitier.

And she's like, we will get over there. We'll see the lay of the land. He's the local and he's going to figure out what it is we want to do. And Louis, the King of France, is like, no, I'm going to march to Jerusalem and I'm going to retake it. Guess how that works out? Not well. It doesn't. Yeah.

Right. So when they get back, this rumor springs up. It's like, oh, Eleanor wanted to see her uncle. It's kind of bit Game of Thrones in. Yeah, and so the rumor is that she was having sex with her uncle. Is that a stretch? I mean, you know, it's a bit Targary-esque. I mean, it probably is because the thing about it is basically Eleanor is too smart to do something that's stupid.

Like, she knows everybody's looking at her. And also, it's your uncle. And it's your uncle. Like, calm down, you know? And it's like, why would she do something that risky, right? But these rumors kind of start swirling almost right away. And it's something that kind of comes up over and over and over. again throughout her life. And then later, you know, she gets such a bad rap that historians and things

later on, and I'm talking kind of like a 13th century, 14th century, when people write about Eleanor Vauquitaine, they go one step further than this. And they say, mm, Eleanor wasn't having an affair with her uncle. Don't worry about that. She was having an affair with Saladin. Oh, which is really funny because absolutely not. For anyone who isn't familiar with who Saladin is, just... Yeah, so he's the founder of the Ayubid dynasty. And he is the one that kind of like retakes the Holy Land from all of the Normans and is like, I think you'll find your French, please go home.

And ironically, people really in the Middle Ages really liked Saladin. They thought he was cool. Like he's homies later on with Eleanor's son, Richard Lionheart. They get on really well. Wow. Weirdly. But, you know, this is a really great way of, like, insulting a woman. So, like, it's okay for her son to be friends with him, right?

Yeah. But it's definitely not okay for you as a woman to be having sex with a foreigner who is also a Muslim. The leader of the enemy, quote-unquote, enemy. Yeah. And so, like, think about what an incredibly strong accusation. That's a hell of an accusation. That is. And it's really, really interesting because it isn't people in Eleanor's own time who are saying that,

but it's other people in the medieval period. And this is a really popular thing to say into the point that, like, Victorian historians are like, yeah, yeah. I mean, we all remember the time Eleanor Vakritaine had sex with Solidon. Is there any evidence for this at all? None. We don't even think they met. Wow. We have almost nothing on this at all whatsoever.

But it's just kind of like, yep, well, if you think a woman is kind of annoying and a little bit overbearing, then just throw this out there, see what sticks. Right. And this especially kind of comes from like the French side of things where it's like these things still kind of get knocked around a little bit like by the English, for example. So when Eleanor marries King Henry the second, he's like 18 and she's 30. Hmm. Well played, Eleanor. But for him, he's kind of like, Lilf. Yeah, like I've married a pinup girl, whatever, like time of my life over here. But people are kind of like, wouldn't she have an affair with her uncle? And then there's like another rumor from the English side that she had had an affair. with Henry's father. As if she'd have had the time. I mean, apparently all this girl did was just like meet powerful men and have sex with them.

These are all these rumors that kind of get brought up and people are just, you know, going, yeah, absolutely. So, you know, that's one thing. And we go, okay, sexism, everybody likes to, people hate to see a girl boss winning. They do. As has been noted. I'll be back with Eleanor and Eleanor after this short break. I'm Professor Susanna Lipskin and are not just the Tudors from History Hit. My guests and I run through the four.

gamut of human emotion and experience. From the heartbreak of the Virgin Queen, Elizabeth, not being able to marry, arguably the only man in the world she ever really wanted to marry, may have, for that reason, not married anyone else. To a prenatal battle of the sexes. A male and a female seed meet in the womb at conception, and whichever one is stronger determines the sex of the unborn child. From Lady Jane Gray facing her executioner. You can't help but fail just the utmost sympathy for this young girl. To why the laughing cavalier is, well, laughing. He strikes me as someone who goes off on a sort of swaggering booze up.

Subscribe now to not just the Tudors from History Hit, wherever you get your podcasts. I take you right back to her first marriage to Louis, because I feel that like we're kind of, we've sort of glossed over him and he's not come out of it particularly well. He's such a trash man. I was going to give you the opportunity there to maybe give him a more rounder. you know, a fairer hearing.

Who was he? What happened? No. It's just a complete douche from start to finish. I just don't like him. So in this particular one, there's, I mean, there's so many Louies. We're particularly talking about Louis the seventh. Why don't you like him, Eleanor?

What did Louis the seventh do? I don't like, for example, when you do things like blame your wife for not being a very good general. Okay, yeah, that's a dick move. It's a dick move. Well, I think it's a dick move to go on crusade. It's very popular at the time. Yeah, but like against all advice, you know, it's the equivalent of being like, you know, a celebrity at the time. So you've been told you're right your whole life.

So if people say, oh, actually, I don't think you can retake Jerusalem on your own with five of your best friends. And he's like, no, sorry. Wrong. Okay. So dick there as well. Yeah. And that's really stupid and, you know, kind of blows the whole thing. And I guess that, you know, I just kind of think he's a little bit overbearing.

He ends up working with Eleanor kind of once in a while. Like, their kids marry their kids and things like this. They did have kids, didn't they? Yeah, they have a couple of daughters. In particular, Maria of Champagne, who A, gets to have a really cool name. And she's like a big supporter of poetry and, like, courtly love genre stuff. So shout out to Marie of Champaign because a lot of the stuff that I work with is stuff she paid for. So thanks, girl.

Appreciate that. But I don't know. He's just kind of weak and selfish, which I think is sort of like the worst thing. that a king can be. So it wasn't a happy marriage then for your money? Not at all. Not at all. And like,

you know, he's kind of got that Henry the 8th vibe where it's like one of the big reasons he wanted to divorce her is they kept not having sons. Like that was her fault. He wanted to divorce her as well. It wasn't just. Yeah.

It was pretty mutual. By the time they got back from the Holy Land, it was just kind of like, this is over. We are done here. We cannot get along at all whatsoever. Yeah. He's just kind of like,

And nothing guy. Like, if you go read about him, he's not one of those French kings that does, like, a bunch of cool stuff. And then, like, he ends up marrying, you know, someone else. And they're like, it's a great love affair or something like that. So he gets to live happily ever after or what have you. Love him for that. Well done. Happy for you.

And Eleanor kind of, she has this very complex life. So it was easy enough for them to get not divorced somebody. It was annulled. Was it annulled? Yeah, it's an old. Yeah. So it's annulled due to the official term is consanguinity. So if you're too closely related to somebody, it's one of the only.

reasons that you can get your marriage broken up. So basically, if you ever see any divorces or slash annulments in the middle ages, it's almost always consanguinity. You can't get it up or you're too closely related. Those are the two reasons why you're allowed to get divorced. There's a lot of people going, I think it's the not being too closely related thing here. It's definitely, it's not the dick thing at all. But it's quite funny because after she gets divorced from Louis and Mary's Henry,

like they immediately have a son. Boom. Like immediately. So it's like, mm-hmm. Speaking of dicks that are broken. How did she meet him? She met him as the Queen of France, like a few years before they got married or something. You know, like, because technically at the time, it's so complex at this period in the Middle Ages

because the Kings of England are also vassals of the French king because they control Normandy, right? Because they're all Norman. Like, they're not really English. They're Norman, right? And so they're like, I'm the King of England and the Duke of Normandy and this, that, and the other. So she would kind of see him on business. Do you think that, like, they were maybe hooking up?

People have said that they think that Henry had the hearts for Eleanor, like, early on and had been like, hey, girl, hey. Wait, wait, wait. Didn't you say that, like, Eleanor was 30 and he was 18? So he's like five years old walking around. No. He's like 16 and he's like, hello. Has like a tapestry other upon his bedroom wall. Hello, 28-year-olds. Completely.

This is the interesting thing because, so basically, as soon as Eleanor gets divorced, immediately there are these attempts to kidnap her because all the other French dukes are like, I'm trying to marry her and I want to be the Duke of Aquitaine because it's so rich and so important. So she manages to avoid two kidnapping attempts because it's just like a free-for-all.

It's like, oh yeah, if you can get hold of her and force her to marry you, then that's great. And so she's the one who kind of goes to Henry and is like, hey, you want to get married? What's up? Very, very quickly. because, you know, in the first place, she kind of like doesn't want the come down, I think,

of no longer being queen. But she has to come up with a plan because dudes are out for her, right? And so, you know, on the one hand, you have all this, oh, yeah, she's a slut. She's having sex with all these men back in the Holy Land. But at the same time, it's like, well, when you see that there's something in it for you,

none of that matters, right? Who was trying to kidnap her? Did he catch who it was? Yeah, there's a couple of dukes, like, give it a go. And she does get kidnapped a few times in her life, but later on when she's kind of like a grandma and things like that. Yeah, so it's the Duke William of Bordeaux tries to kidnap Eleanor. And a few others besides, like this was rather the done thing to kidnap the richest woman in France

and try to force her to marry you, which is scary, right? And to us, obviously, it's incredibly weird to marry an 18-year-old when you're 30. But if your option is being forced to marry someone against your will otherwise, then this makes real sense. So, you know, think about a world like this, a world where when you're quite powerful and you're just sort of like, I don't think this is good enough. Everyone says, oh, yeah, I think you're having sex with your uncle. But then meanwhile, men can try to kidnap you and force you to marry them. And, like, indeed, it's the same kind of double standards on show later on because when she is married to Henry II, eventually after they have their last child, John, Henry gets a girlfriend's Rosamund Clifton.

and he's like, hey everyone, check out my new girlfriend. And it's just like straight up having her at court being like, everyone say hi to Rosamond. And Eleanor is like, yeah, I'm going back to Aquitaine, bye. And like, she just straight up leaves England. And it's like, yeah, you have fun with your little girlfriend. Strong move. That's nice for you.

And people think it's like maybe Henry was trying to insult her enough that she would divorce him and he could marry Rosamund. Were they not happy? I know it's like very rare for medieval royalty to be happily married. But, you know, sometimes they can at least stand each other. They had a bunch of kids, right? Yeah, I mean, I would say that it's kind of like ups and downs, right? Because they had a ton of kids.

And so, you know, it was going well enough, I guess. They really kind of have, let's see, I'm counting one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight. They have eight kids. And she's like well into her 30s by this point. Well played. Yeah, so she really, she's cranking them out. Like, it's just a clown car type of situation in terms of kids. So, you know, they're doing something right enough, right?

And it's fracturous. You know, as I say, at a point in time, the sons revolt against Henry. And Eleanor is like, get his ass. See, that's a very uncomfortable family Christmas there, isn't it? Yeah. What happened? I'm just trying to get the timeline straight in my head. So they have all of these kids.

How old was she when Henry went, oh, have you met my girlfriend, Rosamond? So Eleanor's 46 when things start to kind of, unravel between her and Henry. So, you know, if you think about it, that's a kid every two years. That is a tired royal vagina right there. Uh-huh. And royal marriage isn't about love. No.

Like, it's not. Like, it's a business deal and that's what this is about. And by all accounts, Eleanor doesn't particularly care that Henry's in love with someone else. She's like, sounds great, buddy. This is a wonderful chance for me to go to France and have a nice time. See ya. You get to be royal and not have sex with your husband.

That sounds fucking amazing. I mean, that's ideal. But that's living the dream. Like, incredibly, incredible don't threaten me with a good time hours, right? Oh, no. I'll just sit over here at my gold throne.

And, but meanwhile, here's the problem, is that Henry the Young King, who would have been Henry the 3rd, he decides that he's sort of like the equivalent of like a rugby buffhead. He's like really into jousting. He's like a very well-known sports celebrity. I have an image in my mind.

Right. You know the guy. But he decides that his dad isn't giving him enough power and that he's going to revolt against him. And Eleanor is like, ha ha, have fun, kids. And so he goes out in revolt. Richard Lionheart goes out in revolt and they're like, we're going to beat up our dad or whatever. Why did they do this? What was the reason?

They just kind of feel like, so Henry the Young King had been crowned king but had no actual power. And he still had to like go to his dad every time he wanted money. Yeah, that is weird. Why had he been crowned? It's really unusual. It's because basically Henry the second was kind of worried that there might be people coming for the throne. And that seems strange. But the thing is we'd just come out of the period known as the anarchy when Henry's mother, the Empress Matilda,

had been fighting his uncle, the king Stephen, for control of the throne. So basically he was like, I want to make it clear. It's going to be one of my sons. I'm with you. No matter what. So if you do the ceremony, then it's like we know who the next king is going to be. But he's like, and now why don't you go have fun at the joust? But the young Henry doesn't want to come and ask for money every time he wants to go jousting again, right?

And then Eleanor is like, yeah, fight your dad or whatever. So anyway, the boys revolt and Henry wins. Which Henry? Big Henry or little Henry. Yeah, big Henry, the ex-husband wins. And we think now that here kind of Eleanor steps in. Historians are divided about this because one or the other things happen. either Henry arrests Eleanor. Henry the second arrests Eleanor and is all like,

this is all your fault, woman. You go to jail now. And he brings her back to England and imprisons her in a series of castles. That's one way of looking at it. Another way of looking at it is Eleanor might have gone to Henry and been like, ah, don't be mad at the boys. Boys will be boys.

And maybe Eleanor went and was like, dude, just blame me, right? I'll go hang out in castles for a number of years. I'm quite tired. I would like to retire. and if you could send me to Sarum my favorite castle, that'd be great, thanks. How old does she hear? When the castle plan gets put into place.

Yeah, she's in her 50s at this point. I think this is a good plan. When I'm in my 50s, then I'll just stay in this massive castle. That doesn't sound that bad to me. You know, they did have family Christmases. Like, they'd kind of like bring her out at Christmas. And then occasionally later, when there would be trouble in France or something, Henry would be like, Eleanor, can you go deal with that?

And she'd be like, yeah, sure things. So it really kind of depends on who you ask, because we're not exactly sure. Either they absolutely hated each other, and this is like a hostage situation, or Eleanor is like, yeah, I'm retired. And, you know, I get on with my ex, and we share goals and we work towards those things.

Right. Plendenting. Yeah, exactly. Think about like the ex-wives in succession. Oh, got you. You're kind of like that, right? Yeah, and so it's this really interesting thing because it's difficult for us to tell,

because obviously nobody writes down, oh, and actually they get on pretty well or whatever. You have full-on wars. You have accusations of infidelity on one side, actual infidelity on the other side. But weirdly, for years, it's kind of like the way that people talk about Eleanor over and over and over is that she's just this terrible monster woman, right? And it's only kind of in, you know, the 20th century that we've started coming around to the fact that, like, actually she's cool as hell and incredibly powerful.

You know, she ends up buried next to her husband. She's buried next to, you know, Hedery the second. They can't have been that strongly disliked. I mean, to have ended up there. Like, she had no say in that. They could have just chucked her out, you know, in the wheelie bin, but they didn't. So presumably.

Yeah, but they did it. And, you know, so it's like, life is long. And relationships are complex, especially medieval ones between kings and queens, right? What happened to the sons? They go, oh, we're going to have a big revolt and a big fight with our dad. And then he kicks her.

And then is it just like, oh, right, go and stand in the corner and think about what you have done. And then they're like, oh, I'm really sorry. He basically, like, buys them. off. It's kind of like, I'm the cool divorce dad. Like, come hang out with me and your stepmom. And he like increases the young Henry's allowance. He goes to Richard the Lionheart. You know, you can take care of Aquitaine because like your mom's under arrest now or whatever. So that's for you. Everyone gets a little bit more money. The little King John, he gets some more lands,

although the little King John was like with Henry the whole time. We think we know who the favorites are. King John is Henry the second's favorite. And Richard Leinhart was Eleanor's favorite. So, you know, basically just buys them all off. And they're like, new toys, cool. You know, and they're just like, see ya, Christmas mom. You know, like, off they go. It's really interesting, too, because it's like provided you can come up with a scapegoat. And, oh, a woman as the scapegoat as well, that's incredibly powerful because everybody

knows that women are bad and idiots. The history has just blamed Eleanor for this whole insane family bust up. Mm-hmm. Yeah. And we're only kind of now realizing that probably she's. She wants us to think of it that way because she's like, well, we can't get the boys in trouble, right? Because then, like, who's going to take over all this stuff? When we die, like, someone has to get on the throne and how are we going to accomplish that?

What's our evidence for that, like, this kind of, like, much overdue reappraisal of who Eleanor of Akhton was? What is the evidence that you as historians are working with that kind of makes you go? Actually, actually, maybe she was, you know, kind of protecting her boys here. Well, the things that we really kind of think about it is, again, like the fact that Henry is trotting her out for business purposes. Yeah, that's quite compelling. And so if she was really that much of a problem, you wouldn't be like, hey, can you pop over to Norman Dio? Really quickly for me. So there's that.

And then when Richard the Lionheart becomes king, the first thing that he does is he's like, let my mom out of jail. And like, you know, the guys go over there to like free Eleanor or whatever. And she's already like walking around like, hey. So, like, it wasn't that serious of a situation. And, you know, then there's kind of like mixed reviews because, you know, Richard Lennhart basically never does anything in England. Like, he'd only ever been to England like three or four times. And then Eleanor is essentially ruling England while he goes on Crusade and gets himself killed.

And then John kind of takes over after that. And Eleanor is still kind of keeping an eye on that entire situation. So it's also quite interesting, like, when you think about, for example, Robin Hood legends. right, which all kind of revolve around. Oh, and then, you know, the country was lawless while Richard the Lionheart was weighing. King John was so bad, da-da-da-da-da-da-da. That also kind of is eliding the fact that Eleanor Vakotain,

one of like the most together rulers of the Middle Ages, was actually the one looking after the country. Thank you very much. Right. And interestingly, that just doesn't enter the legend at all whatsoever. And sure, there's like a lot of problems between like the nobles and kings and taxation is a minefield in the Middle Ages. But when we buy into that, oh, yeah, yeah, like evil King John thing,

it's like, well, what about the fact that he wasn't king at the time? I did hear another rumor about Eleanor of Aquitaine. And this might just be a bullshitty rumor. But I heard that she bumped off Henry's mistress. Yeah, that is like one of the big ones. And so, okay, this came up a lot, especially in the Middle Ages. And you know who else loved this? The Victorians.

Oh, they just fuck everything up. I love them. But what they've done to medieval history. is wow, yeah. Yeah, so the rumors about Eleanor bumping off Rosamond. They vary from she had like someone poison her, which is kind of like the standard, what you would expect someone to say

about a medieval woman killing someone. Two, she had someone hold her down in a bathtub and then Eleanor went in there and like slit her wrists and like held her under the water. It's like. Yeah, she wouldn't do that. She's got the money. She'd pay someone to do it.

Like, are you joking? Eleanor has better things to do with her time. And it's a really interesting one because it's like predicated on the, idea that Eleanor cared at all. Yeah. Right. And he's like jealous of her husband where it's kind of like, well, no.

And sure, she was probably frustrated with it. It's probably, it's embarrassing, right, to have your husband flaunt his mistress, which is supposed to be like illegal and the church isn't supposed to let you do that. But, you know, she wasn't going to ask for a divorce because, you know, why should she? She can just go back to France and be like, all right, have fun. Bye. Yeah. I'll see you.

You know, I'm about to go like inspire several balladies. to write songs for me. So have fun with your little mistress or whatever. It's not like medieval queens wouldn't have been perfectly aware that their husbands would have had bits on the side. I mean, parading them at court is a different matter. That's the thing. That's where Henry kind of has gone one step up.

And really interestingly, the Victorians were so into Roseman. There's like all this poetry like, oh, the most beautiful rose of the world. Like medieval people are a little bit more like, whoa, that's uncalled for. And they all slut shame her. But Victorians are like, what a great chick she must have been. Wow. Wow. Seduced the king.

And she was just so pretty. And it's like as opposed to Eleanor who was like also a babe, right? Was she a babe? What's been written about what she looked like? Any time they would mention her, they'd be like, and she's very hot. And now this can be confusing from a medieval standpoint, right? Because you have to understand that when we're talking about women, one of the things that makes it kind of okay that you're a powerful woman is being beautiful. Right?

because the medieval conception of being beautiful is that like you're aligned with God. So if someone is really beautiful, they are aligned with nature, which is to be aligned with God. And so you kind of see that as having a sort of divine right. So like being a really beautiful queen means, oh yeah, you definitely deserve to be queen because look how hot you are. God loves you. That's my Tinder profile. Yeah, exactly. God must love me.

See how hot I am. Please form an orderly cue. and that's kind of like one thing that's going on there is where people are reaffirming she definitively has a right to rule, right? Because she's an absolute babe. So like why wouldn't you want her to be the queen? Now, we do know a little bit more about it

where like basically she's described at an ugly age. An ugly age. No. She's an ugly. She's discarded at a young age as being a perpulchra, which is more than beautiful. The troubadour Bernan de Ventador says that she was gracious, lovely, and the embodiment of charm is what they say about her. We don't really know, though, anything about what she looked like, looked like. Because medieval people don't really write down.

Oh, someone had this color of hair. someone had this color of skin, really it kind of starts happening right when Eleanor was alive. And it's more common in poetry and things like that. Writing down descriptions of what people looked like is a much later medieval invention. So we don't know what color hair she had. We don't know what color of her eyes are. We know what the effigy on her tomb looks like. And that's about all we've got.

So whether or not that's kind of like poetic or not, we don't know. But everyone talks about how hot she is. And medieval people are just weird. that. They're just like, yeah, she's beautiful. And describing it would be useless. I can say that they're in the mind of a medieval person, there's one way to be beautiful, which is like, blonde, receding hairline, gray eyes, white skin. Bit of a belly. A bit of a belly, small tits, big ass. See, I missed my era. I'd have been such a medieval name. I know. Absolutely. You know, like, take me back. We must return. We still do that, though, to a certain amount.

I was just thinking I would recorded an episode a couple of days ago with Lenore, about the history of Barbie, and she made it a really strong case that Barbie is actually an incredible powerful female figure. She had over 200 jobs. She's been an astronaut, and this is that, but it's all softened by the fact that she's incredibly beautiful, that it creates, it's sort of like the soft launch of the really powerful woman. It's less threatening if it's like, but she does have nice tits too. For some, like, we still do that. Oh, yeah, absolutely. So, you know, we have this, right? They're like, oh, it's okay. If she's hot.

Like, it's not okay. Like, a woman, I would argue that it'd be really, really difficult for Eleanor to attain the level of power that she had if she hadn't been beautiful. Because just being like a really, really smart and precocious woman who's considered ugly, sorry, but you're not going to get to marry the King of France and then the King of England. And then, you know, be kind of like allowed to do whatever it is you want and wander around. Like, that's just not how it's going to be. You have to have that beauty to justify why it is you're there. and also to give the men something that their little brains can handle, I suppose.

So how do things end up for Eleanor then? She was under castle arrest, which doesn't sound that horrendous, with occasional trips to France to sort out an insurgency, and some weird family Christmases. How do things end for Eleanor? So when the boys take over the throne, she still stays pretty involved in the lives of her family. She, you know, rules England, as I say, while Richard Linehart's away.

after he dies and John takes the throne, she's still really involved in family matters. So, for example, when her daughter, Eleanor of England, the Queen of Castile, one of her daughters gets sent to marry into the throne of France, and Eleanor is the one who goes down there, picks which daughter it's going to be,

and then, like, escorts her across the Pyrenees up into France. And then eventually she takes the very common kind of form of ultimate retirement for Queens, which is that she joins a nunnery and dies there. And that's very common. I didn't know that. Very common when you're like, okay, I am sick of this. Like, I cannot get kidnapped one more time because, like, Eleanor 100% gets, like, kidnapped to try to get her granddaughter up to France.

And she's just like, I am done. I'm no more kidnappings. That is it. I join a nunnery too. A bit of quiet, like a nice little garden for you to tend. Although, it probably wasn't like that for Eleanor, there was it? Eleanor and a nunnery was probably not like I'm envisioning a nunnery to be. Yeah, the thing is, there are pretty posh nunneries, right?

So you can go and like basically what will happen then is that you are allowed to kind of like say your prayers, read a lot, sing. There's all of your dinners, you're not going to get kidnapped by anyone. And it's kind of in many ways, it's sort of like a retirement home for older women. It's incredibly common if you have any money at all whatsoever to be like, I'm out. I guess that makes sense. Yeah. And that's where she ends up dying at the right old age of 82. Wow, she hung in there.

She hung in there. Imagine that you were 78 and you just got kidnapped again. Like, you'd be like, you know what? It's the nunnery. Thank you. I mean, it depends who's doing the kidnapping, right? But yeah. Oh, I guess that's true.

I think I'd still opt for the nunnery, just a bit of a quiet life. I can't be doing with being kidnapped at that age, no. My final question, she about this, rather a spectacular woman who I didn't know all this stuff about her. I really didn't. So I'm so glad that you're here. Was she well liked at the time? Because historians have done all kinds of things with her reputation.

but at the time, if you're a medieval person, did people like her? Interestingly, her subjects in France really like her. Quite popular in Aquitaine for quite some time. Definitely seen as a steady hand on the tiller when Richard is away on Crusade. Everyone is like, yep, great, let's get her in. And definitely well-liked within her family, certainly,

because, you know, this is the reason why, you know, she's shepherding granddaughters various places. So she's got a pretty good relationship with most of her kids and she's got, you know, like her subjects kind of on side of her. It's more like, well, yeah, you know, you divorce the king of France and then, you know, his friends are like, she's like, how it sucks with her uncle. I never liked her anyway. Yeah, I didn't like her anyway, you know, and the king has his new mistress and she's

moved off to France. You can be like, yeah, your ex-wife, what a bitch or something. And he'll be like, I know, right, high five, you know, and this kind of thing, until you need a favor, right? So it's kind of a mixed bag is the answer. But one of the things that everybody says about her is that she was really, really fun at parties. She was like a really great company. And so she's actually pretty well liked by other nobles and things because, you know, she's the life of the party. And very well read, speaks a lot of languages, knows all these things.

So, yeah, it all really depends on who you ask. But if you can find someone impartial, they're generally pro Eleanor. Oh, and Eleanor, you have just been amazing to talk to. I've so much fun talking to you. Speaking about being pro-Eleanor. Hey. Hey. If people want to know more about you and your work,

tell us some of the places that they can find you. Yeah, absolutely. Clearly check me out over on Gone Medieval, where I'm chatting about, I'm often chatting about Queens, let's be honest. That's definitely going over. You can check out my blog going hyphen medieval.com. and if you want to hear more about my musings on medieval women,

please check out my book, The Once in Future Sex, Going Medieval on Women's Roles in Society. Eleanor, thank you so much. You have been an absolute treat. I just am always excited to come and see you, Kate. Thank you. Thank you for listening. Thank you so much to Eleanor for joining me. And if you enjoyed Eleanor, why not scroll back and listen to the other episodes on medieval sex, medieval beauty standards, and ghosts in the Middle Ages. Honestly, she's always so much fun when we have her on. And you can also listen to her now on Gone Medieval.

And if you like what you heard, please don't forget to like with you and subscribe wherever it is that you get your podcasts. If you'd like us to explore a subject or if you just wanted to say hello, you can now email us at betwixt at history hit.com. Join me again Betwix the Sheets, the History of Sex, Scandal in Society, a podcast by History Hit. This podcast contains music from Epidemic Sound. This podcast was edited by Chavonne Dale and produced by Charlotte Long.