Matilda: Empress, Queen, Warrior

Generally speaking, when I pick up a book outside of my staple choices (science fiction & fantasy, military history, etc.), it's because, at some point, I had a question. In this case, the question was how do you go from the Norman rulers of England, to the Plantagenet monarchs, not that I expected this book to necessarily answer that question, but because Matilda seemed like an interesting personage. Well, by the time I was done, I now have the sense that the history I was exposed to back in the day (we're talking 1970s here), just glossed over this woman as being something of an embarrassment. And there was nothing to be embarrassed about; betrothed to the German Emperor at 8, regent of Imperial holdings in Italy at 16, polished show more diplomat and executive in her 20s, ruthless defender of her rights until she fought her opposition to a draw, the ancestor of every English/British monarch down to the current day, and arguably, the first exemplar of a national female executive in the Western world. Even if you want to accuse Hanley of putting the best spin possible on Matilda, one can't help but be impressed. If you want to argue that the best stories can't be made up, this book is your proof. The only reason I don't give Hanley five stars is because, for all I know, I'd be more impressed with some of the more canonical books on Matilda that she's glossing for a general audience. show less

A very solid biography of Matilda, one-time German Empress and would-be Queen of the English in the twelfth century. Matilda has long been in that shadowy hinterland of a historical figure whose name is well-known but who has attracted comparatively little historiographical attention in her own right, dismissed as an arrogant woman doomed by her own folly. Historians in the 19th century would even go so far as to write not of "Matilda's party" but of "Robert's party" in the war, attributing the impetus for the struggle over the English crown not to a mere woman such as Matilda, but rather to her half-brother and loyal general, Robert of Gloucester.

Marjorie Chibnall's The Empress Matilda: Queen Consort, Queen Mother and Lady of the show more English was the first full-length study of Matilda, produced in the early 1990s, and it still has much to recommend it. However, Catherine Hanley's Matilda has the benefit of incorporating the insights of some 30 years of subsequent scholarship on women's history and queenship studies, and Hanley also writes clearly and accessibly for general audiences. I particularly liked her habit of pausing every so often to remind the reader of who was who among the plethora of Matildas and Williams.

Inasmuch as one can in a biography of a medieval figure, Hanley sketches a Matilda who is both more appealing and more convincing than the general stereotypes. I do have a number of question marks against some of Hanley's conclusions about medieval gender and power, and some things I would have liked to see more of. Matilda's patronage of the church, for instance, is only glanced on here but it was an important part of her exercise of authority—I know less sexy than battles and escapes, but still crucial to getting as rounded a picture of her as possible. But those are of course differences of interpretation and emphasis, and those and indeed the book as a whole would be excellent to use in an undergraduate classroom. show less