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There was never a message to her from Richard, she was not thanked for the money she raised, nor was she ever - according to the records - to be summoned to his side again, except for perhaps one occasion.13
According to the chronicler Roger de Hoveden, in the year 1195 Richard was once again berated by a sage hermit. (If Roger is to be credited, it appears that soothsayers were thick on the ground in the twelfth century: his pages are replete with their fire and brimstone sermons).
During his time at court, the hermit preached words of eternal salvation to Richard, and continued:
"Be thou mindful of the destruction of Sodom, and abstain from what is unlawful..."
The reference to the infamy of Sodom seems to barely require translation, referring to a charge of homosexuality.
(If this was the case, it is the only direct proof that some people at that time questioned the king's sexual orientation. It is on this basis that the familiar edifice of Richard's character now rests).
It may be, however, that it can be read as simply a general imprecation against unlawful sexual activity.
This was not to be the first, nor the last, time that Richard was blamed for gross sensuality, a sin of major note in the eyes of the medieval church. Several years later, Richard was accused of having three daughters.
"Three daughters?" he replied. "Everyone knows I have no daughters."
The response was that indeed he did have three daughters: pride, greed and sensuality.
In that case, responded the king, I consign my daughters thus: pride to the Templars, greed to the Cistercians and sensuality to the prelates.14
At this earlier encounter, Richard spurned the advice of the hermit, and continued on his way, until in the Easter week he fell ill, possibly with a recurrence of the illness he had contracted in the East.
Richard despaired of his life, and confessed his sins:
"...and, after receiving absolution, took back his wife, whom for a long time he had not known: and putting away all illicit intercourse, he remained constant to his wife, and they two became one flesh, and the Lord gave him health both of body and of soul."15
If this was true, it was perhaps a small enough compensation for a much wronged woman to shine briefly in the favour of her all consuming husband a last time, before they finally parted forever.
1. Amongst other things, his lust for noble women caused major rebellions by important nobles. The first, probably legendary, perhaps based on a kernel of fact, occurred after John had taken the throne from his late brother. According to semi legendary, semi historical records, John desired Maud, wife of the border baron, Fulk Fitz Warrene. In 1200, for this and other disputes between them, it is recorded that Fulk fled into the forest, accompanied by his wife, and began a life of outlawry. Fulk and his band of 38 followers were eventually pardoned in 1202. In 1215, he was one of the barons present at Runnymede, to witness the ultimate triumph of the people of England over the will of their tyrant king. See M. Keen, The Outlaws of Medieval Legend Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1977, p.40. At the same period in history, John divorced his first wife, the childless Isabella of Gloucester, to pursue twelve year old Isabella of Angouleme. John stole her from her fiancee, Hugh of Lusignan, and this together with land disputes resulted in war between Hugh and John in 1201. John had other motives apart from his besottedness with his new wife for this brinksmanship. Through the marriage he was able to secure the alliance of Isabella's father, the Duke of Angouleme in his bid to hold Plantagenet possessions in France. It is perhaps significant of Isabella's thoughts on the matter that she married Hugh the son of her former fiancee following John's death in 1216.
2. Richard of Devizes "Of the Time of King Richard I" in English Historical Documents, Volume III.
3. Ibn al Athir claims that it was Saladin who paid for the murder, Gabrielli, Arab Historians, p.241. Roger de Hoveden says the French blamed Richard.
4. Im ad Din, ibid., p.240.
5. Grousset, Epic of the Crusades, p.200.
6. Mitchell, Berengaria, p.73.
7. Ibid., p.75.
8. Richard of Devizes in EHD vol.III.
9. Roger de Hoveden, p.271. cf Richard of Devizes.
10. de Hoveden, p.287.
11. Ibid., 292.
12. Seward, Eleanor of Aquitaine, p.180.
13. de Hoveden, p.312.
14. Ibid., p.448.
15. Ibid., pp.356-7.
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