#queenship

[une-sanz-pluis]

A young queen should fulfil her representative functions, and give grace to herself, her family, the Lancastrian house, and her new kingdoms. And Philippa did. She surrounded herself with beautiful things: silver, gold, jewellery, textiles, wall hangings, carriages and horses. She had her crown, her golden belt, and her chain with a lock in the form of a white dog. This was not vanity; these were signs of a powerful queenship. She worked fundamentally as regent. Queen Philippa and King Erik even issued their own separate letters on the same matter. She was an important queen, and skilled in both warfare and economics. Was Queen Philippa influential regarding art? There are few indications that she took a special interest in art and architecture [...] Her interest was rather directed towards devotional material culture, judging from written sources. The relics to be displayed were already in the centre when she visited the abbey in 1415, and donations of relics and reliquaries were henceforth important. The spaces discussed above were narrow and close to the body; they were personal but not private. They extended the royal body in a material way, with material means, within any building where the queen occasionally resided. In Philippa’s trousseaux, the three beds, the cloth of estate, the chapel and, to some extent, the carriage and harness are examples of spatial constructions that created a personal space for the queen. Her body was, as it were, not left alone and naked in her new countries. If someone approached the queen, she or he would stop outside this personal sphere and could not get closer without permission. The constructions created rooms within rooms, so that no one should forget whom and what the Queen Philippa was, not even King Erik, as he entered her chambers or the bridal bed. The iconography of the House of Lancaster reinforced this meaning. Her space was extended through her personal canopy, the ‘cloth of estate’. Her stunning, official outfits were carefully described in England, and with no doubt she appeared with very valuable jewellery. The queen’s gowns, girdle and chain, and ring and seal demonstrated her prestige and were essential insignia, as she was to act with power. The material aspects of being a queen helped to protect and extend the private body and sphere to a personal space where Philippa acted. The creation of her own spaces, using beds and wall-hangings, her chapel, her cloth of estate and finally a funerary choir built within Vadstena Abbey church was fitting for a queen and ruler.

Mia Åkestam, "Creating Space: Queen Philippa and Art in Vadstena Abbey", Continuity and Change: Papers from the Birgitta Conference at Dartington 2015 (Kungl. Vittehets Historie oc Antikvitets Akademien 2017)

[une-sanz-pluis]

Philippa was a pious queen, with a religious focus on Vadstena and the Birgittine Order. This focus on a single monastic order distinguishes her from most contemporary royalty; the standard was to spread the interests more equally among different orders and churches. Some reasons for her singular devotion can be mentioned: Her first lady in waiting was a close relative to Birgitta; the management at Vadstena was female and aristocratic, yet with humble ideals; the cult of the Virgin Mary, Saint Anna, and Saint Birgitta (who was a lady and a mother, as well as a founder and a saint) for a young queen whose task was to give birth to the king’s heirs. Philippa’s concern for the Birgittines can also be seen in the light of politics. When she married Erik, Vadstena had a close relation to the Kalmar Union rulers and promoters. Her family, including her brother King Henry V, supported the Birgittines already in 1406 and founded Syon Abbey nine years later. Saint Birgitta had been concerned about the Hundred years’ war between France and England. In her Revelations, she had supported England’s cause and the king of England, albeit she moderated her position later. Thus, Philippa had little opportunity to support any other monastic order. Vadstena and the Birgittines were central to her from an early date, as mentors and as friends, in her religious dedication and as a politician. During her life as queen she was often present in Vadstena in person, and with her own choir and the Saint Anna foundation she created a space for her continued presence.

Mia Åkestam, "Creating Space: Queen Philippa and Art in Vadstena Abbey", Continuity and Change: Papers from the Birgitta Conference at Dartington 2015 (Kungl. Vittehets Historie oc Antikvitets Akademien 2017)

[une-sanz-pluis]

As Louise Berglund discusses, a common interpretation presupposes that the power of medieval queens was informal and private, conducted by their spouses. This hardly applies to Philippa. She was young, but as she approached her 20s, she came forward as a queen. She seems to have been skilled at and interested in politics, judging from the 67 entries found in the Swedish charters alone. She had a functioning secretariat and her own seal. Tomas Simonsson, dean of Strängnäs (appointed bishop in 1429) was her chancellor. Her estates had been shattered, but that changed in June 1420, when her properties were expanded and concentrated to central parts of Sweden. She acted as ruler, independent of the king, and had the ability to manage the affairs of the Kalmar Union, even as a defender in war.

Mia Åkestam, "Creating Space: Queen Philippa and Art in Vadstena Abbey", Continuity and Change: Papers from the Birgitta Conference at Dartington 2015 (Kungl. Vittehets Historie oc Antikvitets Akademien 2017)

[une-sanz-pluis]

In the year of our Lord 1430. During the night before twelfth night our beloved queen, mistress Philippa, died, the queen of Sweden, Denmark and Norway. She was buried here in Vadstena in the choir of Saint Anna, which she herself had founded and had built. She was the very faithful patroness of this monastery and of the whole order. From this text, it seems clear that Philippa not only founded an altar for Saint Anna, but that she also built it. The same information is given in her charter for the founding in 1425. The two sources give the impression that she had already built the choir and the altar when it came to financial matters and funds for masses, priests and church. Matter was important, as Caroline Bynum has shown, and an interpretation on an abstract level is not necessarily valid for these two written sources – a diary and a charter. Furthermore, Philippa was buried in her choir on 6 January 1430, according to her earlier plans. There are no indications of a raised and sculpted tomb in the written sources. Still, according to a source from the seventeenth century, the queen’s tomb was raised, and there is reason to believe that it also had an effigy. It is unknown if that was the case during the early 1400s. A conclusion from the quote from Diarium Vadstenense is that the queen was personally engaged in the construction of a new, extensive choir/chapel with screens made of wood or of stone, and with proper space for tombs, altars and people – a standard within church buildings in the fifteenth century.

Mia Åkestam, "Creating Space: Queen Philippa and Art in Vadstena Abbey", Continuity and Change: Papers from the Birgitta Conference at Dartington 2015 (Kungl. Vittehets Historie oc Antikvitets Akademien 2017)

[une-sanz-pluis]

Vadstena Abbey surfaced as a media platform for Queen Philippa for several reasons. It was used to propagate claims to legitimate rule, both by pointing to hereditary rights and by establishing moral rights. Through her foundation of an altar and a future burial site, she created a close and highly visible affiliation with the spatial centre of Sweden at the time. She also emphasized the importance of holy women through her commission of works depicting Saint Anne and Saint Mary. The links between England and Scandinavia were underlined even further by the prayers that were to be said every day in Vadstena for herself, her husband and her parents. Her self-chosen burial place, the altar and the masses thus constituted additional memory sites that were meant to last infinitely. More-over, these media platforms also inscribed her into the community of Christians and the community of the realm, linking her to everyone who contributed to Vadstena Abbey and the Birgittines, even after she was dead. There must certainly have been aspects of the link between Philippa and Vadstena that were observed by her contemporaries, but that are lost to us today. However, the love and devotion she showed the monastery, not only through gifts and good works but also through her many recurring visits, must have made a profound impression on everyone at the time. When she died in 1430, Philippa was in Vadstena to celebrate Christmas and the New Year. The conversations and the care she shared with the brothers can be seen as subtle and private rituals that also communicated valuable aspects of her power as a public and medially conscious Queen. And because the medieval female saints with whom she aligned herself functioned as mediators between the spiritual and secular worlds even after her death, Queen Philippa of Scandinavia can be said to have functioned as a kind of medieval medium in her own right.

Louise Berglund, "Queen Philippa and Vadstena Abbey: Royal Communication on a Medieval Media Platform", Media and Monarchy in Sweden (Nordicom 2009)

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As mentioned, Philippa [of England] had her altar dedicated to Saint Anne and therefore wanted images of the coronation of the Virgin to adorn it. But why did she choose these two saints? It she had been a man, it is probable that she would have preferred to link her foundations to masculine saints such as Saint George, who became an immensely popular figure representing victorious kings and knights in the late Middle Ages, or a royal saint such as Saint Erik of Sweden. In her case, the choice of the two female saints is equally significant. The cult of the Virgin was of course very important throughout the Middle Ages. The beautiful gold mosaics of the Virgin in Italian churches, such as Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome, testify to the splendour of her cult. The theological aspects of her own conception and that of the Christ were debated, however. Leading theologians were unsure as to the nature of the Virgin's own origins. During the fifteenth century, it was established that Mary herself had been immaculately conceived. Her parents Joachim and Anne had thus not tainted her with mortal sin. In 1481, a feast day celebrating the iminaculate conception of Mary was introduced. This establishment of the virginity of Anne was somewhat problematic, however, as it is not supported by any such claims in the Bible. Saint Birgitta, the founder of Vadstena Abbey, had had many revelations regarding very physical aspects of the birth of Christ and other such events. Her vision of the birth of Christ and the placing of the infant in a cradle became normative for the Church. She also discussed the conception of Mary at length, and concluded that her conception was without sin, because Mary's parents were exceptionally pure people who had an exceptionally chaste marriage. It seems that the revelations of Saint Birgitta helped launch the cult of the mother of Mary in Sweden, and this may explain why Queen Philippa chose to associate herself with that particular saint. The Virgin Mary, on the other hand, was the strong symbol of a heavenly queen, perceived as reigning in splendour with a crown on her head. Therefore, the mediated image of the crowning of Mary did not just underline the importance of queenship and blur the boundaries between the worldly queen and the heavenly one, it also strengthened the gender aspects of medieval royal power with the help of one of the most canonized icons. However, there may actually be yet another reason for the choice of Saint Anne and the Virgin Mary. Both were also strong symbols of motherhood and the Holy Family. Saint Birgitta may thus have wished to emphasize the importance of Anne because she, like Birgitta, was a holy woman who was not technically a virgin. The persona of Anne demonstrated that even people who had lived in a sexual relationship could be pure, if their marriage had been chaste and primarily oriented towards religion. On the other hand, Philippa may have needed to associate herself with these symbols of family and femaleness for a diametrically opposed reason: She never had any children. When the altar, and probably the sculpture of Saint Anne with Mary and the infant Jesus as well, was commissioned, Philippa had been married for nearly twenty years and had not conceived. When she died five years later, she was still childless. This was of course a problem for her, because she had failed to secure the dynasty of her husband. Although they were parents, both Anne and Mary had been constructed as symbols of virginity, and it is possible that Philippa wished to associate herself with these symbols of purity and spirituality, particularly be-cause, in the Middle Ages, virginity had strong positive connotations of being chosen, special and different from ordinary people. Furthermore, researchers have shown that in later medieval England in particular, "performance of virginity seems to have been an intrinsic part of the enactment of royalty".

Louise Berglund, "Queen Philippa and Vadstena Abbey: Royal Communication on a Medieval Media Platform", Media and Monarchy in Sweden (Nordicom 2009)

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As always, I am thinking about Catherine of Valois's having greater power and agency than is typically afforded her.

When we read the accounts of how Catherine attended parliamentary sessions in 1423 and 1425 carrying the infant Henry VI in her arms. she is playing a symbolic or ornamental role in proceedings. We have no evidence she either directly or indirectly influenced matters at these sessions or was actively involved. But then, this doesn't necessarily mean anything about the political power queens wielded.

BUT. This symbolic role places Catherine at the very centre of government. It's showing her and Henry very much in the model of the Virgin Mary with the infant Christ. And the Virgin was very, very famously an intercessor. So Catherine is at the very centre of government, replicating the most famous image of female intercession. I don't think we can reduce her presence in these sessions was down to just a symbolic or ornamental role. Even in the unlikely event that she wasn't wielding power and influence at that moment, it is telling us that when her son is grown, Catherine, like the Virgin, will be a powerful intercessor for those who seek her help.

[poorshadowspaintedqueens]

Did non princess born queens have to curtsy to their sister in laws and the kings daughters when without the king? It’s said that it’s royal protocol Camilla has to curtsy to princsss Anne because without the king being born princess royal outranks camilla’s position. But I can’t see a non- royal born queen having to curtsy in front of her ladies in waiting at her non-married sister in law or daughter in law.

I can't speak to what the current royal family does in the UK, but typically that was not the case in medieval or early modern Europe. The queen, whoever she was, outranked every other woman, even the king's relatives. Now, did this occasionally lead to social awkwardness? Oh, yes. The future Queen Mary I of England, for instance, was constantly wrangling for precedence with her father's later queens.

Now, if you move further east, things get more complicated. The Sultan's mother in the Ottoman and Mughal Empires, for instance, had the potential to wield enormous power, depending on her relationship with her son. And, depending on her relationship with her daughter(s)-in-law, they might work together or be at odds.