A gruesome death

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Merilyn Pedrick

A gruesome death

Legg inn av Merilyn Pedrick » 16 des 2005 02:19:01

Foulques III "Nerra", Comte 'd'Anjou 972-1040 had a wife named Elizabeth de
Vendome who died in 999 in Angers. The note I have beside her death says
boiled to death", which makes me feel rather queasy to say the least.

Can someone enlighten me about her demise, and why she may have suffered
such a fate?

Merilyn Pedrick

Aldgate, South Australia

Merilyn Pedrick

Re: A gruesome death

Legg inn av Merilyn Pedrick » 16 des 2005 02:36:01

Leo was quick off the mark and has e-mailed his Genealogics entry for these
people, which I've copied below. What a charming chap Foulques must have
been! Thanks Leo.
Merilyn
"BIOGRAPHY
Son of Geoffrey I, Count of Anjou, and Adelais de Vermandois, Foulques began
his reign by seizing Châteaudun to secure himself against his neighbours
Eudes II Count of Blois and Champagne, and Gelduin Lord of Saumur. In 992,
after winning the battle of Conquereuil against the Bretons, he pillaged and
devastated the area. In his time, castles of wood were still being built as
well as those of stone. Between 992 and 994 Fulk built the stone castle at
Langeais, which is the earliest stone castle to have survived.
In 1026 Foulques took Saumur and built many castles in Anjou for use as
offensive bases: Trèves on the Loire, Durtal also on the Loire above Angers,
and a ring of forts encircling Tours. According to Richard Erdoes, in his
_AD 1000: Living on the Brink of Apocalypse_: 'Not all founders of
monasteries were known for their kindness. Fulk of Anjou, plunderer,
murderer, robber, and swearer of false (sic) oaths, a truly terrifying
character of fiendish cruelty, founded not one but two large abbeys
(Beaulieu-des-Loches near Tours and St.Nicholas at Angers). Foulques was
filled with unbridled passion, a temper directed to extremes. Whenever he
had the slightest difference with a neighbour he would rush upon his lands,
ravaging, pillaging, raping and killing; nothing could stop him, least of
all the commandments of God. This appalling man had countless crimes upon
his conscience, but when seized with a fit of remorse, he abandoned himself
to incredible penance. Thus the very tomb of St. Martin, whose monks he had
ill-treated, saw him prostrate, with bare feet and in penitent's dress; and
during his life he went to Jerusalem several times as a devout pilgrim,
treading half-naked the sorrowful road of the passion while two of his
servants flogged him until the blood flowed, crying: 'Lord, receive thy
perjured Foulques!'.
He boiled his first wife to death for infidelity, and went on pilgrimage to
Jerusalem three times: in 1002, about 1008 and in 1039."

-------Original Message-------

From: Merilyn Pedrick
Date: 12/16/05 11:19:04
To: GEN-MEDIEVAL-L@rootsweb.com
Subject: A gruesome death

Foulques III "Nerra", Comte 'd'Anjou 972-1040 had a wife named Elizabeth de
Vendome who died in 999 in Angers. The note I have beside her death says
boiled to death", which makes me feel rather queasy to say the least.

Can someone enlighten me about her demise, and why she may have suffered
such a fate?

Merilyn Pedrick

Aldgate, South Australia

mike

Re: A gruesome death

Legg inn av mike » 16 des 2005 17:35:36

Foulques III "Nerra", Comte 'd'Anjou 972-1040 had a wife named Elizabeth de
Vendome who died in 999 in Angers. The note I have beside her death says
boiled to death", which makes me feel rather queasy to say the least.

Can someone enlighten me about her demise, and why she may have suffered
such a fate?

Merilyn Pedrick

"Merilyn Pedrick" wrote:
Leo was quick off the mark and has e-mailed his Genealogics entry for these
people, which I've copied below. What a charming chap Foulques must have
been! Thanks Leo.
Merilyn> He boiled his first wife to death for infidelity, and went on pilgrimage to
Jerusalem three times: in 1002, about 1008 and in 1039."


I didnt know she was boiled! I remember reading that Fulk came home
one day and found her inflagrante with one of his vassals. He beseiged
the tower she was hiding in, and when she saw there was no escape
she flung herself out the window. He then had her burnt at the stake in
her wedding dress. I think I read this in Bachrach's biography of Fulk
the Black. Such was the Age of Chivalry and Courtly Love.

mike

Cristopher Nash

Re: A gruesome death

Legg inn av Cristopher Nash » 17 des 2005 19:46:13

What calumny! No, at the worst, in irritation over her putative
adultery and following her fall from an 'enormous height', he simply
either stabbed her when she tried to hide and then had her burned in
the Angers church parvis or let her fry when he set fire to the
citadel there. As you might expect of a 20-year-old with rapidly
diminishing prospects, however, she may have been boiling mad.
(Christian Thevenot, _Foulque Nerra III, Comte d'Anjou_ [n .d.,
64-5]; Bernard S. Bachrach, _Fulk Nerra, the Neo-Roman Consul,
987-1040_ [1993, 76] — both drawing largely on the Chronique de St-
Florent, written some years later.)

On 16 Dec 2005, at 00:45, Merilyn Pedrick wrote:

Foulques III "Nerra", Comte 'd'Anjou 972-1040 had a wife named
Elizabeth de
Vendome who died in 999 in Angers. The note I have beside her
death says
boiled to death", which makes me feel rather queasy to say the least.

Can someone enlighten me about her demise, and why she may have
suffered
such a fate?

butlergrt

Re: A gruesome death

Legg inn av butlergrt » 18 des 2005 01:15:25

Good Evening,
I could be wrong, but I believe that this is the same Fulk who later was
forced by his now ex-father-in-law to do a pilgrimage to Jeruselem for
killing his wife in this affair.

I further remember reading that I thought it was a mere stable-hand that
he caught her with, which by killing him was no major deal and why a duel
by combat etc. would not have applied.

Being a great lord, I would imagine that catching his wife triffeling with
chattel property, and definitely below his and her station, would have
rather irritated me too.

I suppose the saying, if you play with fire you might get burned, was all
true in this case.
Best,
Emmett

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