Eleanor of Castile is one of medieval England’s most enigmatic and contentious queens. The daughter of King Ferdinand III of Castile by his second wife, Joan de Dammartin, countess of Ponthieu, Eleanor married Edward (the future King Edward I of England) in 1254 at Burgos in modern Spain, when she was around thirteen and her new husband fifteen. Eleanor became a devoted and loyal wife.
When England slid into civil war during the period of baronial reform and rebellion in England (1258-1265), troops from Ponthieu staffed the garrison at Windsor Castle in 1263 and rumours of Castilian mercenaries being recruited to the royalist cause prompted Eleanor’s close confinement by the rebels after the Battle of Lewes in 1264. Once royalist fortunes were restored, Eleanor accompanied Edward on crusade and was crowned queen of England alongside Edward as king upon their return in 1274. Eleanor and Edward’s marriage was affectionate and fertile, although sadly just one son and five daughters who childhood from perhaps sixteen pregnancies.
As queen, Eleanor was an active cultural and religious patron, diplomat, and arranger of marriages. Yet, there was also another, more sinister side to Eleanor’s rule. She was widely perceived as a harsh and unscrupulous estate administrator, whose activities were criticized by the archbishop of Canterbury. Controversially, Eleanor took over debts owed by English subjects to Jewish financiers, and then took over the lands pledged for the debts. Even so, on Eleanor’s death in November 1290, Edward I was devastated. Twelve, splendid monumental crosses marked the route of her funeral procession from Lincolnshire to Westminster; and three tombs were erected at Blackfriars Priory (London), Westminster Abbey and Lincoln Cathedral, for Eleanor’s heart, body and internal organs.
About your speaker – Louise Wilkinson is Professor of Medieval Studies at the University of Lincoln and a leading expert on royal and aristocratic women in medieval England. Her books include The Household Roll of Eleanor de Montfort, countess of Leicester and Pembroke, 1265 (Pipe Roll Society, 2020). She co-edits Routledge’s Lives of Royal Women book series and served on the advisory board of the British Library’s major ‘Medieval Women: In Their Own Words’ exhibition, running from 25 October 2024 to 2 March 2025.
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