Matilda I of England

“ MATILDA (1102-1164) , queen of England and empress, daughter of Henry I. of England, by Matilda, his first wife, was born in 1102. In 1109 she was betrothed to the emperor-elect, Henry V., and was sent to Germany, but the marriage was delayed till 1114. Her husband died after eleven years of wedlock, leaving her childless; and, since both her brothers were now dead, she was recalled to her father’s court in order that she might be recognized as his successor in England and Normandy. The Great Council of England did homage to her under considerable pressure. ”

“ Matilda of Anjou, married to William the Etheling; retires to a nunnery. Matilda of Boulogne, wife of Stephen of Blois. Matilda of Flanders, her marriage to William the Conqueror; founds the Abbaye aux Dames at Caen; her help toward the invasion of England; works the Bayeux tapestry; her coronation; character; her affection for Robert Courtheuse; her death; her husband’s tender love for. Matilda of Huntingdon, married to David I. of Scotland. Matilda, daughter of William the Conqueror, betrothed to Edwin; her touching death. Matilda, daughter of Henry I., marries Henry V., of Germany. ”

“ The kingdom was in the desperate state described in the last melancholy pages of the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, when life and property were nowhere safe from the objectless ferocity of feudal tyrants—when “every shire was full of castles and every castle filled with devils and evil men,” and the people murmured that “Christ and his saints slept.”
Such was England’s fate till 1153, when Matilda had retired from the strife in favour of her son, Henry of Anjou, and Stephen was grown an old man, and had just lost his heir, Eustace, to whom he had desired to pass on the crown. ”

“ Matilda was passionately fond of music and devoted much time and attention to this art. When she became Queen of England she was exceedingly liberal in her rewards to those monks who sang the church service well, and did everything in her power to encourage them. ”

“ Queen Matilda, "acting the part of a man," advanced with her forces to the neighbourhood of the city and brought home to the burghers the evils of civil war. They were easily moved. A sudden uprising of the city forced the Empress to "ignominious" flight, leaving her baggage behind. She retreated to Oxford, and Matilda the queen entered the recovered city. Geoffrey de Mandeville at once brought his allegiance to the new market and obtained, it is probable, another advance of price and Henry of Winchester was easily persuaded to return to his brother's side. ”

“ Though we know that Matilda did not love her husband before marriage, she became a devoted wife afterwards, and William showed his entire confidence in her by leaving her to govern his country when he went over to England to obtain a promise from Edward the Confessor that he would adopt him as successor to the throne. ”

“ But if, on the contrary, while Queen Matilda's friends are achieving the counter-revolution, the English Resident goes to the palace, avows his master's approbation of it, and adds, that every attempt to overturn [226] it, or to impede his sister's recall, will excite the resentment of his Britannic Majesty, who will support it, if necessary, by force: all ranks of men will remain in profound submission. The party is, therefore, determined to draw up a letter to the above effect, addressed to the King of England in their joint names, and to limit their requests to this single point. ”

“ Then Queen Matilda made a pathetic appeal to this haughty, arrogant woman in behalf of Stephen, who remained, heavily ironed, in prison. She assured the empress that the loss of power was of little moment; all she asked was that her husband might be set at liberty. She even proposed that if her life were spared, and her son were permitted to enjoy the Earldom of Boulogne, she would enter a convent, her husband a monastery, and promised that both would forever forego all claim to the crown of England. ”

“ As Matilda grew towards womanhood, more than one Norman chieftain had endeavoured to obtain her hand in marriage; but on preferring their request to William Rufus, that politic monarch had refused his consent. He did not wish to see an English princess, a lineal descendant of Alfred the Great, allied to any man whose power or abilities might enable him to aspire to the throne. Matilda, therefore, remained in the seclusion of the cloister until King Henry sent to her his proposals of [154] marriage. It is related that the young princess received the offer with dislike if not with disdain. ”

“ He could send for his wife; his children should be born here. It should be the native land of future generations for his family. Matilda came soon after Easter, with a distinguished train of ladies as well as lords, and with her Guy, Bishop of Amiens, who, Orderic tells us, had already written his poem on the war of William and Harold. At Whitsuntide, in Westminster, Matilda was crowned queen by Archbishop Aldred. Later in the summer Henry, the future King Henry I, was born, and the new royal family had completely identified itself with the new kingdom. ”

“ During the grand coronation banquet, a noble cavalier, named Marmion, rode into the hall on horseback, completely armed, and shouted out three times: "If anybody denies that our most gracious sovereign Lord William, and his spouse Matilda, are King and Queen of England, he is a false-hearted traitor and liar, and here I do challenge him to single combat." ”

“ But the death of her husband had rendered her succession to the English throne a matter of less difficulty, and Henry had no mind to sacrifice his own plans for the benefit of a foreign people. In September, 1126, he returned with Matilda to England, and in January following, at a great council in London, he demanded and obtained of the baronage, lay and spiritual, an oath to accept Matilda as sovereign if he should die without a male heir. ”

“ The queen from this time forth was more constantly than ever on the ramparts watching for the arrival of the British flotilla. The squadron, consisting of the Southampton, Captain McBride, the Seaford, Captain Davis, and the Cruizer, Captain Cummings, left England on May 22, and anchored off Elsinore on the 27th. In the meanwhile Caroline Matilda wrote her brother a most affecting letter, asserting her innocence of all the criminal accusations against her in the strongest manner, and declaring that the strictness of her future life should fully refute the slander of her enemies. ”

“ In the year 1093, her father was slain before Alnwick Castle, and her mother died of grief shortly after. Donald Bane usurped the throne of his nephew, and Eadgar, the ætheling, removed his nephews and nieces to England, not deeming them safe in Scotland. Matilda was educated in the Nunneries of Romsey and Wilton, under her aunt, Christina, the Abbess. She had two or three eligible offers of marriage, and it was with some reluctance, and not until a council had determined that she was under no religious vows, that she accepted the hand of the king. ”

“ In April, Queen Matilda, who was in character and abilities better fitted to rule over England than her husband, succeeded in making peace with King David of Scotland, who stood in the same relation to her as to the other Matilda, the Empress, since she was the daughter of his sister Mary. The earldom of Northumberland was at last granted to Henry, except the two strong castles of Newcastle and Barnborough, and under certain restrictions, and the Scots gave hostages for the keeping of the peace. ”

“ Princess Amelia told Lord Hertford, on the 26th, that when the King of Denmark was in England, observing how coldly he spoke of his wife, she asked him why he did not like her. He answered, 'Mais elle est si blonde!' The princess added, that Queen Matilda had a very high spirit, and that she believed the Danes would consent to let her go to Hanover. 'But she will not be let go thither,' added the princess, meaning that the queen's brother, Prince Charles of Mecklenburg, commanded there, 'or to Zell, but she will not go thither (another of the queen's brothers was there) ”

“ Not only did he crown his new mistress at Winchester, but he crowned his own baseness by a slashing speech against his own brother, winding up with a fulsome puff for the new queen, whom he hailed as "the sovereign lady of England and Normandy." Matilda was by no means successful in handling the sceptre, which required a stronger arm and more dexterity than she was mistress of. The Londoners, in particular, showed symptoms of revolt, and the Bishop of Winchester having got all he could from the queen, turned round once more in favour of his brother. ”

“ But he knew that it would be a hard matter to secure her succession, for England had never been ruled by a queen-regnant, and it was very doubtful if the Great Council would elect a woman. Moreover, the barons grudged that she should have been married to a foreign count, for they had hoped that the king would have given her hand to one of his own earls. Henry endeavoured to support Matilda's cause by constraining all the chief men of the realm, and his own kinsfolk, to take an oath to choose her as queen after his death. ”

“ In pursuance of one of those chivalrous impulses of which the records of the Middle Ages afford so many examples, the king caused Matilda to be escorted in safety to her brother Robert, and restored to Adelais the possession of her castle.
A civil war now raged throughout the country. The Norman race in England were immediately split up into two factions, and each man looked with distrust upon his neighbour, uncertain whether to regard him as a friend or an enemy. Many of the barons of the west and north declared for Matilda, and recalled the oaths they had taken to Stephen ”

“ Matilda's youngest child, the English-born William ‘of Winchester,’ died in 1213, leaving by his wife, Helen, daughter of Waldemar I of Denmark, a son named Otto, who became sole heir male of the family on the death of his uncle Henry in 1227, and from whom sprang the ducal house of Brunswick and Luneburg, and the present royal house of England. ”

“ The relationship between Matilda and William has never been made out certainly. Of the various theories on the subject that best worth consideration is that the impediment arose from the marriage contract between Richard III, William's uncle, and Matilda's mother, Adela, although the marriage was not completed (see Spicilegium, iii. 390; Palgrave, England and Normandy, iii. 264; Norman Conquest, iii. 657) . ”

“ MATILDA, MAUD, MAHALDE, MOLD (1080–1118) , first wife of Henry I, king of England [q. v.] , was a daughter of Malcolm III, king of Scots, and Margaret, grand-daughter of Eadmund Ironside [see Margaret, Saint] . She was probably born in the autumn of 1080, as her godfather was Robert, duke of Normandy, who was in Scotland then, and, so far as is known, at no other time. She was baptised Eadgyth (Edith) , but Matilda or Maud, in various forms, is the name by which she is known in history. Her education was entrusted to her mother's sister Christina, who was a nun at either Romsey or Wilton. ”

“ Matilda remained in Normandy with her father till the autumn of 1135, when a quarrel broke out between him and Geoffrey; she now sided with her husband, and went back to Angers after parting in anger from the king. On 1 Dec. Henry died. Matilda at once re-entered Normandy to claim her inheritance; the border-districts submitted to her, but England chose her cousin Stephen for its king, and Normandy soon adopted England's choice. Matilda appealed at Rome against Stephen for his breach of his oath to her ”

“ Matilda had three cousins who were such skilful needlewomen, that they were sought in marriage by the greatest princes of Europe. Their work has not been preserved, but Matilda's still remains and is called the Bayeux Tapestry. It is the most wonderful achievement in needlework ever accomplished by any woman. But we shall tell more about it, by-and-bye.
Matilda's father was Earl of Flanders, a rich, powerful prince, skilled in the arts of peace and war. He was, besides, such a popular man that all the rulers in his 016 neighborhood were anxious to win the hand of his beautiful daughter. ”

“ Matilda was spared the pain of witnessing the misfortunes of her favourite son; she died some years before. Matthew Paris, in speaking of her, says, "She was an incomparably noble and pious princess, whose generous gifts were the joy of the Church."
Although the wife of William possessed many virtues, her character was far from being perfect. It was her influence which induced her husband to put the Earl of Gloucester to death, and to confiscate his possessions to her use. She never forgave that unhappy noble for having rejected her love. ”

“ During King Stephen's absence some enormous fires occurred in different parts of England which seemed to be the work of discontented subjects; conspiracies were formed in favor of the Empress Matilda, and, what was worst of all, the King of Scotland made another invasion into Northumberland. But Queen Matilda showed herself a woman of courage and determination, for she actually went in person to fight the insurgents, and kept them at bay until her husband arrived and drove the Scottish army back into their own country. ”