Isabel, Infanta of Portugal and Duchess of Burgundy

Isabel of Portugal, Duchess of Burgundy (died 17 December 1471)

Isabel of Portugal was the only daughter of João of Aziz, the illegitimate son of Pedro I, king of Portugal. When Pedro died in 1367, he was succeeded by his eldest (legitimate) son, Fernando, who became king of Portugal as Fernando I. But when Fernando died in 1383 without a male heir, his half brother, João of Aziz, claimed the throne for himself.* After a two-year period of conflict, he was ultimately successful--by the time Isabel was born on 22 February 1397, her father had been king of Portugal for a dozen years.

Isabel of Portugal, duchess of Burgundy,
c. 1450, workshop of Rogier van der Weyden

Isabel's mother was Philippa of Lancaster, the daughter of John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster (third son of King Edward III), and his first wife, Blanche of Lancaster. In the war to secure the Portuguese succession, the English had proven to be a useful ally of Portugal, and the marriage of John of Gaunt's daughter and the new king of Portugal in 1387 secured the political alliance.

At the time João and Philippa were married, the Portuguese king already had three children with his mistress, Inês Pere--but the children to whom Queen Philippa gave birth were a remarkable group. In his epic history of Portugal, Luís Vaz de Camões would call them the Ínclita geração, the "Illustrious Generation."**

The only daughter in this "illustrious" group of Portugese royal children, Isabel was raised in a manner similar to her brothers. Along with them, she studied science, mathematics, and languages. Proficient in Latin, she also learned English, French, and Italian, languages that would prove very useful in her later career. Like her brothers, she learned to ride and to hunt, aristocratic pursuits. And along with her brothers, she was also introduced to affairs of state by her father.

But, unlike most royal daughters, Isabel was not used by her father as a political pawn, married off as soon as she was old enough. A marriage with the English king Henry V (grandson of John of Gaunt) was considered in 1415, when Isabel was eighteen, but the negotiations did not result in a marriage.

It wasn't until 1428, when Isabel was thirty-one, that a second marriage alliance was considered, this time with Philip of Burgundy. The duke had been widowed two times, but had no children. (Or, rather, he had no legitimate children--he seems to have had at least eighteen illegitimate children [and perhaps as many as fifty!!], several of whom were born during his first two marriages.)

And so Isabel of Portugal became the third wife of Philip "the Good," duke of Burgundy, the two married by proxy in 1429 and then married on 7 January 1430 when the Portuguese infanta finally arrived in Bruges.

Just weeks short of her thirty-third birthday at the time of her marriage, Isabel must have arrived at the ducal court with her considerable political and administrative skills already well developed. Isabel would prove to be a critical aide to her husband in managing his extensive territories: he was not only duke of Burgundy, but duke of Brabant and Limburg; count of Flanders, Artrois, Franche Compte, Hainault, Holland, Zeeland, Namur, and Charolais; marquess of the Holy Roman Empire; and lord of Friesland. He was also, as Aline Taylor notes, "wealthier than any other European monarch."

Following their marriage ceremony, the duke and his new duchess went on progress throughout his territories. Isabel quickly proved that, in addition to the assistance she would provide to her husband in governing his vast holdings, she could also fulfill another crucial role: she became pregnant almost immediately.

She gave birth to her first child, a boy, on 30 December 1430, and a second son in April of 1432, although both would die in infancy. Particularly touching--Isabel's eldest child died in February, just weeks before the birth of her second child, who lived just a few months. A third son, Charles, was born on 10 November 1433--he would survive, succeeding his father as duke of Burgundy in 1467.

Throughout her marriage, at least until their estrangement in the late 1450s, Isabel of Portugal carried out her husband's economic and political policies, though there was a persistent tension, with Isabel recommending closer ties to the English and Philip frequently siding with the French. As duchess of Burgundy, Isabel raised money and troops for her husband when he needed them, and in her role as her husband's representative, she restored peace in rebellious towns and negotiated settlements between merchants and trade guilds. 

After her husband's betrayal of his alliance with England in 1435, for example, Isabel negotiated a deal in order to resume the lucrative cloth trade with the English. Perhaps her most significant diplomatic accomplishment was the conference she arranged between the French, English, and Burgundians in Gravelines in 1439. Although no final agreements were reached, she did manage to broker a trade agreement with the English and, in 1443, a treaty of peace with England.

In her role as duchess of Burgundy, Isabel arranged marriages to the end of making and maintaining political relationships. Most notably, it was she who persuaded her son to marry Margaret of York, sister of Edward IV, king of England. (Richard III was also her brother.)

Although tensions between Philip and Isabel led to her retreat from court, when the duke suffered a stroke in 1458, she nursed him through his various illnesses until his death. In the mean time, she played an influential role for her son, Charles, her granddaughter, Mary of Burgundy (daughter of her son's second wife, Isabelle of Bourbon), and her daughter-in-law, Margaret of York, her son's third (and final) wife. 

Surviving portal of monastery of Chartreuse de Champmol,
Dijon, France, showing kneeling Philip, duke of Burgundy,
and Isabel of Portugal, duchess of Burgundy
(photo by Christophe.Finot)

Isabel of Portugal, duchess of Burgundy, died on 17 December 1471. Her son built a tomb for his parents in a chapel at the monastery of Chartreuse de Champmol in Dijon, then the capital of Burgundy. 

The monastery was dissolved in 1791 during the French Revolution, the tombs vandalized and destroyed by 1793. (Some effigies were reconstructed in the nineteenth century and are now in Dijon Cathedral.)

The most complete account of Isabel of Portugal's life in English is Aline S.Taylor's Isabel of Burgundy: The Duchess Who Played Politics in the Age of Joan of Arc, 1397-1471. If you can read French, I recommend Monique Somme's 1998 biography, Isabelle de Portugal, duchesse de Bourgogne: Une femme au pouvoir au XVe siècle.

Also extremely engaging is Manuela Santo Silva's "Princess Isabel of Portugal: First Lady in a Kingdom Without a Queen," in Elena Woodacre, ed., Queenship in the Mediterranean: Negotiating the Role of the Queen in the Medieval and Early Modern Eras (hugely expensive, so perhaps inter-library loan?).

*Fernando I's daughter, Beatriz of Portugal, attempted to claim the throne of Portugal, but she was ultimately not successful.

**One of João's illegitimate children, a daughter, died shortly after birth, but the surviving two, Afonso of Braganza and Beatrice of Portugal, both of whom were raised and educated by Philippa of Lancaster, were pretty illustrious too.

Isabel Clara Eugenia, Regent of the Netherlands

Isabel Clara Eugenia of Spain, archduchess of Austria and regent of the Netherlands (born 12 September 1566)

The daughter of Philip II, king of Spain, and his third wife, Elisabeth of Valois, Isabel Clara Eugenia is yet another of the remarkable Habsburg women who served as regents for their fathers, nephews, and brothers.

Isabel Clara Eugenia,
archduchess of Austria

Born in Segovia on 12 September 1566, Isabel Clara Eugenia is related to a number of women we have already met or whom we will soon meet--her paternal grandmother was Isabel of Portugal (1503-39), who had acted as regent of Spain for her husband, the Habsburg emperor Charles V, and her maternal grandmother was Catherine de' Medici, queen and regent of France. 

Although Isabel Clara Eugenia had been betrothed at the age of two to Rudolph II, who would ultimately become the Holy Roman Emperor, she remained in Spain with her father. As Philip grew older, he had come increasingly to rely on his daughter to assist him.

In March of 1588, the ministers of Henry III of France, his contemporary, announced that King Philip was "mad": "The grand chancellor assured his awed dinner guests in Paris that while Philip's councillors debated state affairs, his eldest daughter, Isabel, was signing documents and in control of government." 

This "scandalous" announcement derived from reports made by Philip's ambassador in Paris, who had told the French king's mother, Catherine de' Medici, about the significance of Isabel's role in her father's government. Rumors were also spreading in Spain that, if Philip were "incapacitated," it would be Isabel who would "take control of the government" of her father's kingdom, and not her half-brother Philip III.

Her potential to function for her father as a "regent" had been noted as early as 1574, when an eight-year-old Isabel was suggested as regent of the Netherlands. She obviously would have been a figurehead then, but from an early age she had been extremely close to her father, who had played a "direct role" in raising her and her sister Catherine Michelle. 

Isabel, in particular, had emulated her father, and he had allowed her "to take part in his office work." By 1586, she was able to be a significant help and adviser to her father; she "read him the letters and despatches he had to deal with, adding her suggestions on how they should be answered." He "even gave her access to the most important papers of state."

In 1592, Philip proposed Isabel for the throne of France, not as a bride for a ruling king but as queen regnant--the last Valois king of France had died, and Isabel, through her mother Elisabeth of Valois, had a claim to the throne.

As a Catholic, she was preferable to the closest male claimant, Henry of Navarre, a Protestant, but as a woman she had a distinct disadvantage. A challenge to French Salic law, which excluded women from inheriting the throne, never had to be made, however, since Henry converted to Catholicism and assumed the French crown as Henry IV.

As his death neared, Philip might have been well advised to name his daughter Isabel as his successor in Spain, for his son Philip (the child of Philip II and his fourth wife, Anne of Austria) had no preparation for or experience with the responsibilities of government. The king "had made no previous attempt to bring him into the process of government, an attitude which contrasts with the confidence he had place in . . . Isabel when she was even younger." 

Despite the fact that Philip was, by all reports, "very childish," in poor health, knew nothing "of matters of state," and "appeared to have little intellectual capacity," his sex seemed to determine his father's choice of Philip as his successor. But, while she would not take her father's place in Spain, Isabel would have a role in government nonetheless. 

In 1598, Philip II arranged for his daughter's marriage to her cousin Albert of Austria, and "the two would become joint rulers" of the Netherlands. On 11 September 1598, as Philip lay dying, he told his daughter that he was sorry he would not live to see her marriage, but he asked that she "govern the Netherlands well" with her husband's help. Philip II died two days later. 

Isabel Clara Eugenia, 1625,
garbed as a Franciscan tertiary
but still acting as governor of the Netherlands

On 18 April 1599, when Isabel Clara Eugenia was thirty-three years old, she married the archduke of Austria, as her father had arranged, and after the ceremony, the two took up their positions in the Netherlands.

By then, the seven northern provinces (the United Provinces) of the Low Countries had become independent; from April 1599 until Albert's death in 1621, the two governed the ten southern provinces of the Netherlands as regents for Isabel's brother Philip III.

When Albert died in 1621, Isabel joined the Third Order of St Francis, but she retained her role as governor of the Netherlands, which she continued administer on her brother's behalf until her death on 1 December 1633.

*This post has been adapted from The Monstrous Regiment of Women: Female Rulers in Early Modern Europe.

Joanna of Castile, Regent of Spain

Joanna of Castile, queen of Portugal and regent of Spain (died 7 September 1573)

Born in Madrid on 24 June 1535, Joanna of Castile, archduchess of Austria, was the daughter of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, and his wife, Isabel of Portugal. Joanna was named in honor of her paternal grandmother, Juana of Castile, a woman whom we have met before on numerous occasions, and about whom I will post later in the year. (In order to distinguish between the elder and younger women, I've referred to this Juana, the younger woman born in 1535, as "Joanna.")

Joanna of Castile,
painted by Sofonisba Anguissola

After the death of their mother, Isabel, in 1539, Joanna and her siblings were placed under the guardianship of one of their mother's principal attendants, the Portuguese noblewoman Leonor de Mascarenhas.

Although there were many tutors for their brother Philip, Joanna and her sister Maria were educated by Leonor, who made sure to teach them Portuguese, which would prove to be very important for Joanna. (Leonor was so capable she would later be entrusted by Philip with his own children's care and instruction.) 

On 11 June 1552, a seventeen-year-old Joanna was married to her fifteen-year-old first cousin, João Manuel, prince of Portugal (we have already encountered his mother, Catherine of Spain, who was the sister of Joanna's father, Charles, both children of Juana of Castile--got that?).

The marriage was short-lived, however, because João died on 2 January 1554. Joanna was pregnant at the time, and three weeks later, on 20 January she gave birth to João's son, Sebastian, who would one day before King Sebastian I of Portugal. 

But Joanna would not remain in Portugal. Soon after her son's birth, Joanna's brother Philip, then acting as regent of Spain for his father, the Emperor Charles V, needed Joanna in Spain--Philip had just married Mary Tudor, queen of England. He turned to his sister to act as regent of Spain in his place. And so the widowed Joanna, "discreet" and "religious," left behind her infant son to be raised by his grandmother Catherine, regent of Portugal. On her way home from Portugal, before assuming her role as regent, she visited her grandmother Juana of Castile--the actual queen of Spain--in Tordesillas.

As Joanna traveled to Spain and Philip prepared to leave, their father wrote to Philip about Joanna's role as regent. The emperor agreed with his son about his proposals for the government of Spain in his absence, calling them "very prudent": 

I also agree with your choice of the Princess [Joanna], my daughter, so I am sending you the powers signed and suppose you will already have sent for her to come from Portugal. Above all, let me urge you to see to it that the counsellors who are to surround her be dispassionate men of character and authority. Lay down rules for their guidance in case of conflicts, and try to limit the sphere of each one as far as it is possible without hindering them in the exercise of their offices.

As regent, the widowed Joanna would need "some woman of position and exemplary character to be near her," Charles advised, but he cautioned that his son should "specify the number of ladies she may have, so that they [presumably courtiers or advisers] may not always be importuning her to accept more." Charles thought that Joanna had lived lavishly in Portugal and he emphasized that that Philip should make sure her household was "of reasonable size," for the money needed to keep her in the state she enjoyed in Portugal would be "altogether too much."

Joanna of Castile, regent of Spain

As Philip's recent biographer, Henry Kamen, notes, Joanna of Castile "chose to spend the rest of her life in the service of the crown." Although there is no biography of Joanna, a few details of her regency can be gleaned from those of Queen Juana of Castile and of Philip II.

In 1555, for example, when Juana of Castile had become gravely ill, Joanna wrote of her "great sorrow" at hearing the news and wrote to ask Philip for permission to leave Madrid so that she could go to Tordesillas "to cure and to serve" her grandmother. 

After Juana of Castile's death, Joanna oversaw the dispersal of the queen's household, but she kept many of Juana's possessions for herself. Although her brother regarded them as "trinkets and things of little value," Joanna clearly regarded Juana's rosaries, devotional books, religious images, and portraits of Isabella of Castile (Juana's mother) and Catherine of Aragon (Juana's sister), as important items worth cherishing for their family connections. She also arranged for memorials to her grandmother, to be held throughout Spain.

In 1558, Joanna of Castile received advice from her father, Charles, shortly before his death. Although he had abdicated his title of Holy Roman Emperor in 1556 and retired to a monastery in Spain, his retirement did not keep him from writing to Joanna and warning her to "take a hard line against the Lutheran cells" in Castile. 

In 1559, "in letter after letter," her brother Philip pleaded with her for more money for his on-going wars: "The lack of money is so great that I don't know what to say," he wrote, continuing, "I am in worse straits tha[n] you could possibly imagine."

 "You need to find money from there," she replied to him at one point, "because here all is consumed and spent." Later in that year Joanna and her council "sanctioned an ill-fated military expedition into North Africa."

In the same year she was again faced with "alarming" news about Lutherans in Valladolid. Philip urged her to monitor the situation with "all care and diligence," while her father urged her to take measures against the "heretics."

Joanna issued a strict censorship order, had a new Index prepared, increased the activity of the Inquisition, and, at a series of autos da fé, several heretics were executed.

In December of 1559 Philip returned to Spain, preparing for his third marriage, this one to Elizabeth of Valois. Joanna was called upon to arrange for the new queen's reception. She was also entrusted with the guardianship of Don Juan, her father Charles V's illegitimate son, who had been born in 1547. After Philip's return to Spain, Juana's regency ended.

A plaque on the Convent of Our Lady of Consolation
noting its foundation by Joanna

Aside from her role as regent of Spain, Joanna was deeply involved in religion and with a number of religious foundations.

Like her guardian Leonor de Mascarenhas, Joanna founded a convent for the Franciscan order of Poor Clares in 1559, the Convent of Our Lady of Consolation (Nuestra Señora de la Consolación). 

And, again like Leonor de Mascarenhas, Joanna of Castile was a supporter of the newly established Jesuit order. Joanna repeatedly intervened on behalf of the Jesuits, and she was a friend of its founder, Ignatius of Loyola.

She conducted a correspondence with her confessor, Francisco de Borja and Ignatius using the pseudonym Mateo Sánchez, perhaps even requesting that she be admitted into the order under this name. 

The Convent of Our Lady of Consolation, Madrid
now known as the
as the Convent of Las Descalzas Reales

After her regency ended in 1559, Joanna retired to the convent she had founded. In 1569, Joanna and Leonor de Mascarenhas welcomed the mystic, writer, and theologian Teresa of Ávila when she visited Madrid.

Juana died in the Convent of Our Lady of Consolation, now known as the Convent of Las Descalzas Reales, on 7 September 1573; she was just thirty-eight years old. In 1582, when Joanna's sister, Maria, the Holy Roman Empress, returned to Spain (where she had also been a regent, from 1548 to 1551), she and her daughter, Margaret, would take up residence in this convent. 

About Joanna of Castile, Kamen concludes:

The princess [Joanna], always relegated to the background by historians because she abstained from any political role after her short regency in 1554-9, was the effective centre of Philip's family circle. When Philip returned to Spain in 1559 she bought a group of houses in the middle of Madrid . . . [which] became her home and retreat. All her energies were dedicated to helping her brother. Philip in his turn lavished affection on her. She was the inseparable companion of queens Elizabeth [of Valois] and Anne [of Austria, Philip's fourth wife]. In 1572 she fell seriously ill, and never recovered. Her early death, in September 1573 at the age of thirty-eight, was a severe blow to the king, who had leaned on her for advice and affection. Philip was at her bedside when she died.

There is, unfortunately, no biography of Joanna of Castile. Her story can be put together only in bits and pieces. I have used Andrew Wheatcroft's The Habsburgs,  Henry Kamen's Phillip of Spain, and Bethany Aram's Juana the Mad: Sovereignty & Dynasty in Renaissance Europe.

Update, 7 September 2025: I just discovered a 2021 publication focusing on our Joanna, a collection of essays edited by art historian Noelia García Pérez, The Making of Juana of Austria: Gender, Art, and Patronage in Early Modern Iberia (click here).

Margaret of York and the "Marriage of the Century"

Margaret of York (duchess of Burgundy, from 9 July 1468)

Born on 3 May 1446, Margaret of York was the daughter of Cecily Neville, whom we have met before, and Richard, duke of York--Margaret was the sister of both Edward IV and Richard III of England.*  In 1468, in what her recent biographer, Margaret Weightman, has called "the marriage of the century," Margaret of York became the third wife of Charles the Bold, whose lands included, besides Burgundy, a "vast agglomeration" of French fiefs, imperial territories, and several imperial cities and states in the "Pays d' Embas," or Low Countries. 

Margaret of York, c. 1477

The extent and complexity of Burgundy are indicated by the titles Margaret acquired after her marriage: she became duchess of Burgundy, of Lotharingia, of Brabant, of Limbourg, of Luxembourg, and of Guelders; countess of Flanders, of Artois, of Hainault, of Holland, of Zeeland, of Namur, of Zutphen, and of Burgundy (Franche Comté); and the lady of Friesland, of Salins, and of Malines [Mechelen], among others.

Although she failed to provide a male heir for Charles, as duchess of Burgundy Margaret of York functioned superlatively as a political adviser and diplomat for the duke and as a mother for his daughter and heir Mary.

After her marriage to the duke, Margaret of York also developed a strong relationship with her husband's mother. The dowager duchess, Isabel of Portugal, was the daughter of Philippa of Lancaster and João of Portugal, the granddaughter John of Gaunt.

Although Philippa's direct family members were Lancastrian, she was also an English relative of the Yorkist Margaret. Like Margaret, Isabel of Portugal was descended from Edward III of England. Although she was nearly seventy years old when Margaret arrived in Burgundy, the dowager duchess was still politically active, "well able," as Weightman notes, "to take charge of the marriage negotiations and to receive important diplomatic embassies on behalf of her son."

In Burgundy, Margaret of York played an important role not only in court life but also in politics and government. Just as Charles's mother, for example, had acted as regent of Burgundy, had functioned in the administration of the duchy, had negotiated treaties, and had helped to formulate policy, by 1472 Margaret herself was involved in the administration of Burgundy.

Among Margaret's responsibilities as duchess were regular progresses around the Low Countries; while her husband visited his possessions and campaigned to extend his territory, Margaret also traveled, her progresses an important means of representation of Charles's ducal position. During the first seven years of her marriage, she spent, by Weightman's calculations, only about a year with her husband; between 1475 and Charles's death in 1477, they did not meet at all.

Margaret of Burgundy and her stepdaughter traveled and lived together. Mary of Burgundy's early education had been supervised by her father's half-sister Anne, but after 1468 it became Margaret of York's task to guide, support, and educate Charles's heir. 

Charles of Burgundy died in battle in 1477, and Margaret of York was forced to move quickly and forcefully to protect Mary. In the crisis that followed the duke's death, the thirty-one-year-old Margaret, experienced in government, advised her twenty-year-old stepdaughter and negotiated on her behalf. To guard against further French encroachment--Louis XI claimed a woman could not inherit the duchy of Burgundy--Margaret of York and Mary of Burgundy turned to Maximilian, then archduke of Austria and eventually Holy Roman Emperor, offering him, as the dowager duchess wrote, "the word of a princess" in support of a marital alliance with Mary of Burgundy.

The original marriage contract, as Weightman reports, "cut Maximilian out of the succession, leaving all the Burgundian lands to the children of the marriage and specifying that all Burgundian possessions must be under Burgundian rule."

Margaret of York before the risen Christ,
from a book commissioned by
the duchess of Burgundy,
shortly after her marriage in 1468

Later, in an act signed by Margaret, her stepdaughter Mary, and Maximilian--and only one Burgundian official--this provision was eliminated, and Mary's inheritance was left to Maximilian in the event of her death. This decision proved to be critical. After five short years--and the births of two children--the young duchess of Burgundy, pregnant with her third child, died in a hunting accident.

When Mary died in 1482, Margaret of York was to have assumed the role of guardian of her stepdaughter's heirs, Philip, then four years old and Margaret, age two. But the Estates General of Flanders refused to turn the children over to Maximilian and the dowager duchess.

While Margaret prepared troops to gain possession of them, the Estates signed a treaty with Louis XI, sending the infant Margaret of Austria to the French court, while still refusing to relinquish the heir to the dowager duchess or to his father. Maximilian eventually regained control of Philip in 1484; he then entrusted Margaret of York with the boy's guardianship and education. Margaret established her court in the city of Mechelen, in Brabant, one of her dower possessions; during her stepgrandson's minority, her court there became the de facto ducal palace.

The relationship between Maximilian and the dowager duchess was complementary: Margaret of York needed the support of Maximilian in order to retain control of her dower properties, but Maximilian needed Margaret of York's experience and administrative capabilities. Throughout Philip's minority, Margaret remained Charles's "most loyal subject": "her support and advice were an invaluable asset to Maximilian in his government of the Low Countries."

Margaret was forty-eight years old when her stepgrandson Philip of Austria came of age in 1494, inheriting his mother's titles and possessions. Upon his accession, he confirmed the dowager duchess's possessions, in recognition, as he proclaimed, 

[of her] good and honest conduct towards our late lord and grandfather, and the great love that she clearly bore towards our late sovereign lady mother and to all her lands and lordships both before and after her marriage, and equally towards our lord and father, and towards us in our minority, how after the death of our late lady mother, she behaved towards us as if she was our real mother . . . and moreover because she has suffered inestimable damange rather than abandon us . . . and because of many other great reasons and considerations.

Although Margaret of York never gave birth to a child of her own, she staunchly and faithfully defended the inheritance of her stepdaughter and her stepdaughter's children. She was to serve the next generation as well, for Madame la Grande, as she was known, retained her considerable influence during her stepgrandson's rule, welcoming foreign visitors to his court (including his bride, Juana of Castile), selecting administrators and counselors for him, and presiding over many ceremonies, including the christening of Philip and Juana's first two children, Eleanor and Charles. 

Margaret of York's spectacular crown,
now in the Aachen Cathedral Treasury

Margaret of York played an important role in the life of Margaret of Austria, her step granddaughter, though the younger Margaret spent relatively little of her childhood with the older Margaret. Nevertheless, as Weightman notes, the younger Margaret "inherited much from her step-grandmother, acquiring both her personal treasures and her public servants"; but "the young woman seems to have inherited much more than material goods and servants from her namesake."

Under the influence of her female role models--Margaret of York, as well as Anne of France and Isabella of Castile, about whom I'll post later this year--Margaret of Austria was to become one of the most accomplished rulers of the early modern period. She was to serve as regent of the Netherlands for twenty years, at the same time shaping another generation of women whom she trained at her court and for whom she herself was to provide an influential model of female sovereignty.

Christine Weightman's Margaret of York: Duchess of Burgundy, 1446-1503, originally published in 1989, was republished in 2009 with a horrible title, Margaret of York: The Diabolical Duchess. Why? Not why the republication, but why the obviously tabloidization of the title?

*This post has been adapted from The Monstrous Regiment of Women: Female Rulers in Early Modern Europe (Palgrave Macmillan).