Richard the Lionheart travelled to far-flung realms, went on crusade, met kings and popes, and exerted a great deal of influence on the world around him… And so did his sister. The sons of Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine have been the subject of much historical attention, but their daughters have been curiously overlooked. […]
Joanna Plantagenet, the lionhearted woman
Joanna Plantagenet, Queen of Sicily, later Countess of Toulouse, was every bit as lionhearted as her more famous brother Richard I. As her biographer, Catherine Hanley, says, she “led an extraordinary life full of adventure and danger”, the more so because she was a woman. Joanna’s eventful life also illustrates many of the major issues […]