Margaret of Anjou: Monstrous Monarch or Quintessential Queen?

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"To promote a woman to bear rule, superiority, dominion, or empire above any realm, nation or city is repugnant to nature, contumely to God, a thing most contarious to his revealed will and approved ordinance, and finally it is the subversion of good order, of all equality and justice."

Queen Margaret of Anjou(1430-1482), wife of King Henry VI of England(1421-1471)has been reveled for centuries. She was nicknamed "she-wolf of France" by Shakespeare and depicted as a ruthless, murderous, cold-hearted monster. However, this may not be an accurate representation of Margaret. She was a powerful woman; born into a life of violence, instability, and loss which shaped her personality into that of a queen who was as formidable as Elizabeth I.

Born March 23, 1430, Margaret of Anjou (Margaret d'Anjou in French)at Pont-à-Mousson, France to Rene of Anjou and Isabella, Duchess of Loreine. Margaret had been born into a great noble family, not only was she the daughter of a duke and niece of King Charles VII of France, she was also a descent of two queens of England: Matilda, wife of William the Conqueror and Eleanor of Aquitaine, wife of Henry II. Yet while Margaret grew up in a cultured court setting, the Hundred Years' War (1337-1453), a conflict over the French throne between main belligerents of France and England was raging. The constant threat of danger would have a greater affect on a young Margaret more than anyone could have imagined.

As child, Margaret was raised primarily by her mother and grandmother; her father had been taken hostage in Dijon, Burgundy when she was only a few years old. With her mother in charge of her education, Margaret was able to study with the same tutors who taught her brothers until the age of fift...

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... Louis XI to bury her in Angers Cathedral at Chateau Dampiere between her mother and father. Margaret of Anjou died August 25, 1482 at the age of fifty-two years old, Louis did follow her final request and her remains are still there today.

Works Cited

Gregory, Philippa. The Kingmaker's Daughter. New York: Simon and Schuster, 2012.

Kendall, Paul Murray. Richard the Third. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 2002.

Castor, Helen. She-Wolves: The Women who Ruled England before Elizabeth. N.p.: Harper Collins Publishers, 2011.

"Henry VI." English Monarchs. Accessed April 15, 2014. http://www.englishmonarchs.co.uk/plantagenet_11.htm.

Henry VI Part 3. Written by William Shakespeare.

Blakman, John. Henry the Sixth. London: Cambridge University Press, 1919. Accessed April 15, 2014.

http://www.gutenberg.org/files/29689/29689-h/29689-h.htm.

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