Chapter 2 - Creating Her Own Story

Summary

This essay considers queens and noblewomen as ߢmakersߣ of literary culture from the ninth to the sixteenth centuries, a period when they played key roles as patrons and book owners. Women such as Emma of Normandy and Edith of Wessex were involved in the production of and commissioned historical narratives, and were part of a wider Northern European network of culturally sophisticated aristocrats. Further evidence of the importance of understanding continental connections in élite womenߣs literary cultures is provided by Judith of Flanders, who joined the royal court in England and commissioned four highly ornate Gospel Books. Womenߣs literary and religious cultures often overlapped, as is illustrated in the examples of Margaret of Scotland, her daughter Matilda, her granddaughter Matilda, and her sister-in-law Adela, Countess of Blois. Eleanor of Aquitaine may be the most well-known example of a medieval literary patron but her activities were part of a wide-reaching culture of aristocratic womenߣs patronage that stretched across the globe.