#richard i of england

This badass here was the coolest woman of the Middle Ages. She was the daughter of William X, duke of Aquitaine and Count of Poitiers. When she was fifteen, her daddy died and she inherited his lands. She married Louis VII and became queen of France. She accompanied her husband to the Holy Land on a crusade, where she is rumored to have cheated on him (possibly with her uncle Raymond of Poitiers). Her and her ladies dressed as Amazons and were badasses, but the Second Crusade was a disaster. Louis was not only a boring lover, he was also at the time an ineffectual military leader. Under the pretext of consanguinity (they were third cousins) and the wife’s supposed inability to bear sons (they had two daughters together), Eleanor was repudiated. She said kthanxbye and bounced with her lands. Some dude tried to kidnap her and force her to marry him but she was like HELL NO. She married Henry, Duke of Normandy, who was eleven years younger than her (what a cougar! and she might have had an affair with his father prior to their wedding). Two years later, Henry became king of England. Throughout their marriage, she gave him five sons and three daughters (in your face, Louis!). She supported her sons in their rebellion against their father, so Henry imprisoned her for sixteen years. When Henry died, Eleanor’s favorite son, Richard the Lionheart, became king and released his mommy at once. Aged approximatively 67 at the time of her liberation, she became queen dowager. She died at 82 years old! She is, to my knowledge, the only woman to have ever been queen of France and of England. Three of her sons ruled over England (Henry, Richard and John), and two of her daughters were also queens (Eleanor and Joan). Throughout history, people have accused her of every vice (notably to have poisoned Henry’s mistress, the Fair Rosamund) but such allegations are false and were only invented in attempt to discredit a queen who, in a time where so little opportunities were given to women, displayed great fierceness and power.