Adeliza of Louvain
| Adeliza of Leuven | |
|---|---|
| Queen consort of the English | |
| Consort | 2 February 1121 – 1 December 1135 |
| Consort to | Henry I William d'Aubigny, 1st Earl of Arundel |
| Issue | |
| Reynor d'Aubigny Henry d'Aubigny Alice, Countess of Eu Olivia d'Aubigny Agatha d'Aubigny William d'Aubigny, 2nd Earl of Arundel Geoffrey d'Aubigny | |
| Royal House | House of Normandy House of Leuven |
| Father | Godfrey I of Leuven |
| Mother | Countess Ida of Namur[1] |
| Born | c. 1103 |
| Died | 23 April 1151 (aged 48) Affligem Abbey, Brabant |
Adeliza of Louvain (also called Adela and Aleidis; 1103/1105 to April 23, 1151) was queen consort of the Kingdom of England from 1121 to 1135 as the second wife of Henry I. After his death, she married William d'Aubigny, 1st Earl of Arundel, who had been a chief adviser to Henry. Seven of their children survived to adulthood. Her grandson, William d'Aubigny, 3rd Earl of Arundel was one of the 25 guarantors of the Magna Carta.
Adezila was the daughter of Godfrey I of Leuven, Duke of Lower Lotharingia, Landgrave of Brabant and Count of Leuven and Brussels. She was a patron of the church and spent her final years in the abbey of Affligem, Flanders, Belgium where she died at the approximate age of 46-48.
Early life and first marriage
Adeliza was born around 1103 at Louvain, or Leuven, Belgium. Other than her being the daughter of [Godfrey I of Leuven] little is known of her life either before or after she married Henry I of England.
She married Henry, who was the son of William the Conqueror) on February 2, 1121. Her age at the time is uncertain, although she is thought to have been somewhere between 15 and 18 years old, while Henry was 53.
Henry's main reason for marrying again was his desire for a male heir. However, despite his reputation for siring the largest number of illegitimate children of any British monarch, Henry had only one legitimate male heir, William Adelin, who had died his father on November 25, 1120 in the White Ship disaster, the year before Henry married Adeliza.
Adeliza was reputedly a attractive and healthy young women. This, together with her father's pedigree as duke of Lower Lotharingia made her an good candidate to serve as the prospective mother of a new heir to the British throne. However, no children were born during the almost 15 years of the marriage between her and Henry.
Queen
Unlike some other Anglo-Norman queens, Adeliza played little part in the public life of the realm during her tenure as queen consort. Whether this is because of personal inclination or because Henry preferred to keep her nearby in hopes of her conceiving a male heir, is unknown. She did, however, leave a mark as a patron of literature. Several works, including a bestiary by Philip de Thaon, were dedicated to her. She is also said to have commissioned a verse biography of King Henry, but if she did, it is no longer extant.
When her husband died on December 1, 1135, Adeliza retired for a time to the monastery of Wilton, near Salisbury. She was present at the dedication of Henry's tomb at Reading Abbey on the first anniversary of his death.
Second marriage
As she was still young, she came out of mourning some time before 1139 and married William d'Aubigny, 1st Earl of Arundel, who had been one of Henry's chief advisers. She brought with her a Queen's dowry, including the great castle of Arundel, and the new king, Stephen of England, created d'Aubigny, Earl of Arundel and Earl of Lincoln.
Although her husband was a staunch supporter of Stephen during the Anglo-Norman civil war, her own personal inclination may have been toward the cause of her stepdaughter Empress Matilda. When the Empress sailed for England in 1139, it was to her stepmother that she appealed for shelter, and she landed near Arundel and was received as a guest of the former Queen.
Adeliza and William had seven children surviving to adulthood. All were born at Castle Arundel, Sussex, England but the dates are uncertain:
William d' Aubigny, (1140) 2nd Earl of Arundel; Olivia (1141), Godfrey (1143), Alice (1145), Agatha (1147), Rayner (1149), and Henry (1151).
Their son, William d'Aubigny, 2nd Earl of Arundel, was father to William d'Aubigny, 3rd Earl of Arundel who was one of the twenty-five guarantors of the Magna Carta.
Family
One of Adeliza's brothers, Joscelyn de Louvain (Jocelin, Gosuinus), came to England and married Agnes de Percy, heiress of the Percy family.
Although it is clear that the former queen and Joscelyn were very close, he may actually have been an illegitimate son of Adeliza's father and thus her half-brother. His children took their name from their mother's lineage, and their descendants include the medieval Earls of Northumberland.
Legacy and later life
Adeliza spent her final years in the abbey of Affligem (County of Brabant, Flanders, Belgium), which she richly rewarded with landed estates (three English villages called Ideswordam, Westmerendonam and Aldeswurda, probably near Arundel).
She died in the abbey and was buried in the abbey church next to her father, duke Godfrey I of Leuven (d.1139). The abbey necrology situates her tombstone next to the clockwork. An 18th century floor plan of the church shows her tombstone located halfway up the left nave. Her grave was demolished however during the French Revolution (abt. 1798). Her bones had been found and she was reburied in the cloister of the re-erected Affligem abbey.
Adeliza was a patron of literature and was said to have commissioned a non-surviving verse biography of King Henry. She also became an active patron of the church during her second marriage, giving property to Reading Abbey in honor of her former husband, King Henry I and to several other, smaller foundations.
| House of Leuven Born: 1103; Died: 23 April 1151 | ||
|---|---|---|
| English royalty | ||
| Preceded by: Matilda of Scotland |
Queen consort of England 2 February 1121–1 December 1135 |
Succeeded by: Matilda of Boulogne |
Notes
- ↑ The Peerage—Adeliza de Louvain Retrieved December 17, 2008.
ReferencesISBN links support NWE through referral fees
- Cokayne, George E., and Peter W Hammond. The complete peerage of England, Scotland, Ireland, Great Britain, and the United Kingdom, extant, extinct, or dormant, Gloucester : A. Sutton, 1982-1998. ISBN 9780750901543
- Hammond, Peter W., editor. The Complete Peerage or a History of the House of Lords and All its Members From the Earliest Times, Volume XIV: Addenda & Corrigenda. Stroud, Gloucestershire, U.K.: Sutton Publishing, 1998. ISBN 9780750901543
- McNaughton, C. Arnold. The Book of Kings: A Royal Genealogy. 3 volumes. London, U.K.: Garnstone Press, 1973. OCLC 59978599
- Weir, Alison. Britain's Royal Family: The Complete Genealogy. London, U.K.: The Bodley Head, 1989. ISBN 9780370313108
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