Speaker 1: Welcome to Noble Blood, a production of I Heart Radio
Speaker 1: and Grim and Mild from Aaron Mankie. Listener Discretion advised.
Speaker 1: In thirteen fourteen, many bewitched events occurred, which you will
Speaker 1: here recount it if you stay near me. So begins
Speaker 1: the account of the year thirteen fourteen in one medieval chronicle,
Speaker 1: and dear listener, that unknown writer was not wrong. Thirteen
Speaker 1: fourteen was an exceptionally dramatic year for France. At this time,
Speaker 1: the country was ruled by Philip the Fourth, a member
Speaker 1: of the Compecian dynasty, which had occupied the throne since
Speaker 1: nine hundred and eighty seven. The king was commonly known
Speaker 1: as Philip LaBelle or Philip the Fair after his striking
Speaker 1: good looks, but his less appealing qualities also inspired several
Speaker 1: less flattering nicknames. For his ruthlessness, self righteousness, and moral absoluteness,
Speaker 1: some called him the roy de Fair or the Iron King.
Speaker 1: Dante Alighary took it even further, referring to Philip in
Speaker 1: his Inferno as the Plague of France. As you might
Speaker 1: have guessed, Philip's twenty nine year reign was filled with controversy.
Speaker 1: He battled with the Pope the Flemish, the English, and
Speaker 1: the Jews of France, among others. But a few years
Speaker 1: of his reign would be as eventful as thirteen fourteen.
Speaker 1: Thirteen fourteen was the year that Philip finally won his
Speaker 1: war against the Knights Templar, a religious order heavily involved
Speaker 1: in banking and trading. Philip had begun arresting the Templars
Speaker 1: in thirteen oh seven, alleging that they were hair atics.
Speaker 1: His motives here weren't entirely pure. Philip was heavily indebted
Speaker 1: to the Templars, and while destroying the order's offices, the
Speaker 1: king found a way to also transfer their asset to
Speaker 1: his treasury. By thirteen fourteen, nearly all of the French
Speaker 1: Templars had been exiled or executed, and Philip sealed his
Speaker 1: victory with a gruesome public celebration in which he had
Speaker 1: the last grand Master of the Templars burned at the state.
Speaker 1: Thirteen fourteen would also be the final year of Philip's reign.
Speaker 1: He died that year, aged only forty six. He had
Speaker 1: been in good health, according to observers, but suffered a
Speaker 1: stroke while hunting. The king held on for several weeks
Speaker 1: before finally dying November twenty nine, thirteen fourteen. Some say
Speaker 1: that the king's sudden death was the result of a
Speaker 1: curse laid on him by the Templars, but others suspected
Speaker 1: something far more personal. The King, they said, had died
Speaker 1: of shame. Not shame over his persecution of the Templars,
Speaker 1: or his expulsion of the Jews in thirteen oh six,
Speaker 1: or his wars with the Church. No, it was whispered
Speaker 1: that the king had been humiliated by something even worse,
Speaker 1: betrayal within his own family. They were speaking, those whisperers,
Speaker 1: of one of the greatest adultery scandals of the Middle Ages,
Speaker 1: a scandal that would lead to the brutal execution of
Speaker 1: several noblemen, the imprisonment of princesses, and eventually the collapse
Speaker 1: of the kap Had dynasty itself. History would remember it
Speaker 1: as the Tordonell Affair, and of all the bewitched events
Speaker 1: of thirteen fourteen, it was perhaps the worst. I'm Dana Schwartz,
Speaker 1: and this is noble blood. Our story begins with Philip
Speaker 1: the Fair, not to be confused with the Castilian king
Speaker 1: Philip the Handsome, who lived almost a hundred years later.
Speaker 1: Philip the Fair had seven children with his wife, Queen
Speaker 1: Joan of Navarre, four of whom would survive to adulthood.
Speaker 1: Three of the four surviving children were boys, Louis, Philip,
Speaker 1: and Charles. The fourth was a girl, Isabella, born in
Speaker 1: twelve or twelve nine. Arranging good marriages for his children
Speaker 1: was crucial for Philip. Strategic marriages could secure a strong
Speaker 1: future for his kingdom, and so he began looking for
Speaker 1: potential spouses while his children were still toddlers. Don't worry,
Speaker 1: he wouldn't marry any of them off until at least
Speaker 1: the ripe old age. Often Philip was especially interested in
Speaker 1: creating marital ties with the ruling families of Burgundy. The
Speaker 1: territory of Burgundy was culturally rich and strategically important, lying
Speaker 1: like a bulwark between France and the Holy Roman Empire. Remember,
Speaker 1: at this point, the Kingdom of France was much smaller
Speaker 1: than the Country of France today. During Philip's reign, Burgundy
Speaker 1: was split in two, with the Duchy of Burgundy lying
Speaker 1: to the east and the County of Burgundy lying to
Speaker 1: the west. The dukes of the Duchy of Burgundy were
Speaker 1: allegiance to the King of France, though their land did
Speaker 1: not belong to the king, while the counts of the
Speaker 1: county were allegiant to the Holy Roman Emperor Philip, through
Speaker 1: shrewd marriage, negotiations began to formulate a plan that would
Speaker 1: bring all of Burgundy under his control. His first overture
Speaker 1: was to Count Otto of Burgundy. In addition to Burgundy,
Speaker 1: Otto was also heir to the County of Artois, a
Speaker 1: region to the northwest of France, via his marriage to
Speaker 1: the Countess of Artois. Like Burgundy, Artois was strategically important.
Speaker 1: Otto and his wife had a daughter, Jean, who was
Speaker 1: only a few years older than Philip's sons Louis and Philip.
Speaker 1: The negotiations were protracted. The king wanted to keep his
Speaker 1: options open and so he wouldn't declare which of his
Speaker 1: sons would marry Joan. While the count and Countess wanted
Speaker 1: to ensure financial security for their family, they wanted to
Speaker 1: close the deal. Otto, who was verging on bankruptcy, made
Speaker 1: a desperate move, handing over the County of Burgundy to
Speaker 1: King Philip in exchange for a generous income for life.
Speaker 1: Philip could hardly refuse, but there was one more obstacle
Speaker 1: before the marriage question was settled. Any engagement would also
Speaker 1: require special dispensation from the pope. Since John and the
Speaker 1: boys shared great great grandparents. Church law at the time
Speaker 1: prohibited marriage between anyone who was so closely related, but
Speaker 1: the pope could make an exception. Philip was a powerful
Speaker 1: king and no stranger to fighting the Church to get
Speaker 1: what he wanted. It seemed a wedding was inevitable, and
Speaker 1: indeed letters from the time indicate that Prince Louis and
Speaker 1: John had become engaged. However, by thirteen hundred, the always
Speaker 1: opportunistic king had found an even better potential match for
Speaker 1: Prince Louis. This prospective bride, Marguerite, came from the Duchy
Speaker 1: of Burgundy. Her father, Robert the Second of Burgundy, had
Speaker 1: been causing trouble in the region ever since Otto had
Speaker 1: given the County of Burgundy to Philip, and so the
Speaker 1: king hoped to secure his control over Burgundy and also
Speaker 1: appeased Robert by tying their families together in marriage. Marguerite
Speaker 1: had another advantage over Jean. As a granddaughter of King
Speaker 1: Louis the ninth, her lineage was more noble. Yes, this
Speaker 1: did technically make her an even closer relative of the prince.
Speaker 1: They were first cousins once removed, but it was a
Speaker 1: royal connection which makes it all worth it. A papal
Speaker 1: dispensation could take care of the awkward issue of interrelatedness,
Speaker 1: and so in thirteen oh five Philip turned to Pope
Speaker 1: Clement the fifth for his blessing for the marriage of
Speaker 1: Marguerite and Crown Prince Louis. Pope Clement was hesitant to
Speaker 1: grant a dispensation. It was well known that Louis had
Speaker 1: been previously engaged to Jean, but King Philip had a
Speaker 1: trick up his sleeve. He revealed to Clement that Marguerite
Speaker 1: and Louie were in fact already married. The two had
Speaker 1: wed in a simple ceremony sometime in the first half
Speaker 1: of thirteen o five. If Clement refused to issue the bull,
Speaker 1: he would be declaring that the Crown Prince of France's
Speaker 1: marriage was illegitimate, and King Philip didn't stop there. He
Speaker 1: also reminded Clement that he had been responsible for Clement's
Speaker 1: election as pope earlier that year. Clement bowed to the pressure,
Speaker 1: granting papal dispensation for the marriage. In August of thirteen
Speaker 1: o five. Marguerite and Louie were remarried in a more
Speaker 1: formal ceremony on September twenty three of that year. Both
Speaker 1: bride and groom were fifteen. In the meantime, Philip had
Speaker 1: not forgotten about Jean, daughter of the Count. Rumors circulated
Speaker 1: that the king himself planned to marry the young heiress. However,
Speaker 1: he ultimately decided that John should marry his second son,
Speaker 1: Prince Philip, after again getting a papal dispensation from Clement,
Speaker 1: who made it clear that he was irritated to have
Speaker 1: to constantly be granting the French royal family exemptions from
Speaker 1: the law. The couple was married in an extravagant ceremony.
Speaker 1: Philip was sixteen, Jean was nineteen or twenty. Now the
Speaker 1: king began to plan matches for his two remaining children,
Speaker 1: Prince Charles and Princess Isabella. Philip considered a number of
Speaker 1: potential brides for Charles, including princesses from Spain, Bohemia, and Hungary,
Speaker 1: daughters of the Count of Saint pol and the Duke
Speaker 1: of Brittany, But the most attractive proposal came from an
Speaker 1: unexpected source, Mayor of Artois, the now widow of the
Speaker 1: Count of Burgundy, mother of Prince Philip's bride Jean. She
Speaker 1: wasn't offering herself in marriage, though she was in fact
Speaker 1: a widow, but instead proposed her daughter Blanche. The union
Speaker 1: would be enormously helpful for Mouth, a powerful and ambitious
Speaker 1: woman who longed for even closer ties to the royal family,
Speaker 1: and she wanted the King's support for her claim to
Speaker 1: her hereditary land. In our Toy along with her daughter's hand,
Speaker 1: Mayo proposed to give the king a fortune in cash
Speaker 1: and land. These deal sweeteners were crucial in convincing King
Speaker 1: Philip because the pairing had its problems. As the historian
Speaker 1: Elizabeth A. R. Brown writes, the marriage quote raised problems
Speaker 1: of legality as well as taste and propriety end quote,
Speaker 1: which of course is how any engaged couple would love
Speaker 1: to be described. After all, it would be two of
Speaker 1: Philip's sons marrying two sisters. Besides being siblings in law,
Speaker 1: and besides sharing great grandparents, Charles and Blanche had even
Speaker 1: closer tie. Maha was charles godmother in the eyes of
Speaker 1: the church. This spiritual relationship between Mao and Charles made
Speaker 1: them literal relatives furthering the taboo between Charles and Blanche.
Speaker 1: Marriage between two people with this kind of connection were
Speaker 1: not unheard of. King Philip himself had married his godmother's daughter,
Speaker 1: but it was still troubling. And then there was the
Speaker 1: issue of age. Charles was thirteen and Blanche was barely twelve.
Speaker 1: A physician would later claim that neither child had reached
Speaker 1: puberty at the time of their marriage, but the money
Speaker 1: and land that Mao offered was too great for King
Speaker 1: Philip to resist. Blanche and Charles were married on January thirteen,
Speaker 1: o eight at mau Chateau in Hesdin. Their wedding, however,
Speaker 1: was overshadowed by another. Just a week later, King philip
Speaker 1: daughter Isabella secured the most powerful marriage of any of them.
Speaker 1: She married King Edward the Second of England. As you
Speaker 1: may know, Isabella and edwards marriage was a notoriously unhappy one.
Speaker 1: For more on the tragic consequences of their union, listen
Speaker 1: to the episode Piers Gaveston, The King's Favorite. But it's
Speaker 1: the outcome of her brother's marriages that concern us this week,
Speaker 1: and like that of Isabella and Edward, the marriages of
Speaker 1: the new royal couples would soon be troubled by betrayal, infamy,
Speaker 1: and death. It was common knowledge that not all of
Speaker 1: the royal couples were especially happy together. Louie, it said,
Speaker 1: preferred playing tennis to spending time with Marguerite. Less is
Speaker 1: known about Charles and Blanche's relationship, but we do know
Speaker 1: that contemporary He's found at Charles to be stiff and
Speaker 1: stand offish. Neither couple had many children. They both just
Speaker 1: had one each. Jean and Philip were much better suited.
Speaker 1: Philip would later declare that from the day of their wedding,
Speaker 1: he and Jean quote lived in peace, concord, and love
Speaker 1: without dissension, rancorps or hatred end quote. In the spring
Speaker 1: of thirteen fourteen, the couple had at least four living daughters.
Speaker 1: Now in April, the public heard the rumors of the
Speaker 1: princess's arrest and wondered what they had done to merit
Speaker 1: such treatment. Mere marital discord wasn't enough to justify and arrest,
Speaker 1: and besides, Philip and John seemed happy. It was only
Speaker 1: in the coming weeks that the full story, or at
Speaker 1: least the full allegations, would come to lay. At the
Speaker 1: same time that the princesses were seized. Two brothers were
Speaker 1: arrested in the nearby city of Pontois. They were knights
Speaker 1: minor nobles named Philippe and Gautier del Nay. Their father
Speaker 1: was a lord in a small region in north central France.
Speaker 1: Gautier was the elder brother, aged somewhere between twenty three
Speaker 1: and twenty six in thirteen fourteen and unmarried. Philippe, somewhere
Speaker 1: between twenty two and twenty four at the time, was
Speaker 1: married to a woman named Agnes, with whom he had
Speaker 1: had several children. We don't know much else about their
Speaker 1: lives before thirteen fourteen, but at some point they must
Speaker 1: have crossed paths with the princesses, for the stunned public
Speaker 1: was soon to learn Marguerite and Blanche had been arrested
Speaker 1: for committing adultery with the Dolnay brothers. The two princesses.
Speaker 1: These two were the ones who were just sisters in
Speaker 1: law and not also actually sisters, were alleged to have
Speaker 1: carried on a years long affair with the knights. The
Speaker 1: group was said to have met regularly in the Tour d'annelle,
Speaker 1: a stone guard tower that stood on the left bank
Speaker 1: of the Seine in the center of Paris. John was
Speaker 1: also arrested, but she was not accused of infidelity, only
Speaker 1: of knowing about the affairs and helping conceal them. How
Speaker 1: exactly the alleged affair was uncovered is unknown. Some contemporary
Speaker 1: chroniclers write that it was Isabella, King Philip's daughter and
Speaker 1: Queen of England, who had sniffed it out. The story
Speaker 1: goes that Isabella had given her sisters in law beaded pouches,
Speaker 1: and then, at a banquet months later, had been shocked
Speaker 1: to see those same pouches in the possession of the
Speaker 1: Dolnigh brothers. She brought her suspicions to her father, who
Speaker 1: put the group under surveillance and caught them in the act.
Speaker 1: Others sight the king's notoriously cunning minister as having revealed
Speaker 1: the affair. But whatever the source of the accusations, King
Speaker 1: Philip was not slow to act. The Domnae brothers were
Speaker 1: arrested and then subjected to three days of torture, after
Speaker 1: which one of them confessed to the affair. The Dolna's
Speaker 1: suffering did not end there, though, having been found guilty
Speaker 1: of treason, given that they had interfered with royal marriages.
Speaker 1: They were sentenced to a gory end. Different chroniclers give
Speaker 1: different descriptions of their executions, but what we know was
Speaker 1: that they were violent, painful, and public. The brothers were
Speaker 1: most likely castrated, then flogged or flayed or broken on
Speaker 1: the wheel before being beheaded or hanged. The princesses, though,
Speaker 1: were not subject to the same physical ordeals, though they
Speaker 1: did undergo a public humiliation of their own. They were
Speaker 1: brought to trial by the Paris Parliament. Blanche and Marguerite
Speaker 1: were both found guilty and sentenced to life imprisonment. Before
Speaker 1: they were sent off, they were forced to kneel and
Speaker 1: have their heads shaved in front of the jeering crowd. John,
Speaker 1: because she wasn't guilty of adultery, was more fortunate, thanks
Speaker 1: in part to the intervention of her husband, Philip, who
Speaker 1: stood by her. She was found fully innocent of adultery,
Speaker 1: but for being an accomplice to the affair, she was
Speaker 1: sentenced to house arrest. Philip campaigned constantly for her release,
Speaker 1: and she would soon be freed to return to his side.
Speaker 1: There are two theories as to i Philip supported John
Speaker 1: so staunchly. The first theory is the more cynical one,
Speaker 1: and it suggests that he supported his wife because she
Speaker 1: had the most personal wealth of all three of the wives.
Speaker 1: But I prefer the second theory, which seems to be
Speaker 1: supported by the written record. Philip just really really loved her.
Speaker 1: Blanche and Marguerite were not so lucky, without large dowries
Speaker 1: or lands under their own control, and with husbands who
Speaker 1: were at best apathetic towards them to begin with, their
Speaker 1: fate was sealed. The women were sent to Chateau Gaillard,
Speaker 1: an imposing castle in Normandy built two centuries before Richard
Speaker 1: the Lionheart. Conditions there were harsh, conflicting reports have Marguerite
Speaker 1: and Blanche being kept either underground in daint chambers with
Speaker 1: no natural light, or else in the highest rooms of
Speaker 1: the castle, where they were exposed completely to the elements.
Speaker 1: One of them would never walk free again. In November thirteen, fourteen,
Speaker 1: seven months after the Tordonel affair began, King Philip the
Speaker 1: Fair died. His eldest son Louis succeeded him, becoming King
Speaker 1: Louis the Tenth. Louis was nicknamed the quarrel Sum, although
Speaker 1: this had more to do with the circumstances he inherited
Speaker 1: as king, not necessarily his inherent personality, which was described
Speaker 1: by a contemporary chronicler as quote childlike, credulous, and ill
Speaker 1: prepared for rulership and quote. The issue he seemed to
Speaker 1: care most about was annulling his marriage to the imprisoned
Speaker 1: adulteress Marguerite. This was mainly because he wanted another heir.
Speaker 1: Though Marguerite and Louis had a daughter, Joan, her paternity
Speaker 1: was now in question because of the scandal. Unfortunately for Louis,
Speaker 1: Pope clement the fifth died just as the scandal broke,
Speaker 1: and no new pope had been selected yet, and so
Speaker 1: there was just no one who could annull his marriage.
Speaker 1: Conveniently enough, Marguerite, who was still in prison but technically
Speaker 1: Queen of France, soon died. Her cause of death was
Speaker 1: either illness brought on by the harsh prison conditions or
Speaker 1: some alleged strangulation murdered by an ally of the king's
Speaker 1: Louis went on to marry Clementia of Hungary, who quickly
Speaker 1: became pregnant. He wouldn't live to see his second child's birth.
Speaker 1: Louis the tenth died in June thirteen sixteen, having exhausted
Speaker 1: himself playing tennis, the very pastime he had preferred to Marguerite,
Speaker 1: leaving her time for her own extra curricular activities. Clementia
Speaker 1: gave birth to a son in November, who became King
Speaker 1: John the First of France, but the baby died after
Speaker 1: only five days. Technically, at this point the throne should
Speaker 1: have gone to Louis and marguerite daughter Joan, and indeed
Speaker 1: Louis had finally recognized Joan as his own shortly before
Speaker 1: his death. But Louie's younger brother Philip, had his own plans,
Speaker 1: and he seized the crown in January thirteen seventeen. At
Speaker 1: his side was his wife, John, who had been formally
Speaker 1: exonerated and returned to court. Protests broke out across France,
Speaker 1: but Philip was quick to solidify his power, establishing a
Speaker 1: new rule of succession that barred women from inheriting the throne,
Speaker 1: which would soon become a formal French law. This same
Speaker 1: principle eventually prevented any of Philip's children from inheriting, because
Speaker 1: by the time he died in thirteen twenty two, he
Speaker 1: had no surviving sons, only daughters. After Philip's death, the
Speaker 1: throne went to the youngest brother, Charles. Like Louis, Charles
Speaker 1: was eager to annul his marriage, and lucky for him
Speaker 1: by this point he had a pope who could do so.
Speaker 1: Funly enough, his marriage to Blanche was annulled on the
Speaker 1: ground that they were too closely related, not because of
Speaker 1: their blood ties, which they had received a papal dispensation for,
Speaker 1: but because of their spiritual relationship based on Blanche's mother
Speaker 1: being Charles's godmother. King Philip the Fair had somehow neglected
Speaker 1: to get a special dispensation for that. Once charles marriage
Speaker 1: was annulled, Blanche's remaining life is a mystery. Some say
Speaker 1: that she was allowed to move to a remote castle,
Speaker 1: while others say that she became a nun serving at
Speaker 1: the same abbey she had been arrested for for adultery
Speaker 1: eight years earlier, but there's no clear evidence of that.
Speaker 1: The only thing we know for sure is she died
Speaker 1: some time before April five, thirty six. Charles was the
Speaker 1: last Cape king, though he married twice following the annulment
Speaker 1: of his marriage to Blanche, he had no sons. Had
Speaker 1: Philip the Fair been told in thirteen that his sons
Speaker 1: would mark the end of his dynasty. Surely he would
Speaker 1: have scoffed. He had three healthy adult sons, all of
Speaker 1: whom were married, but the Tordonell affair changed everything. Charles
Speaker 1: was succeeded by his cousin Philip Vlois, But nine years
Speaker 1: later Philip's right to rule was challenged by Edward, the
Speaker 1: third son of Isabella, who argued, possibly correctly, that he
Speaker 1: was the closest male relative of the last king, even
Speaker 1: if he descended from the female line. This is the
Speaker 1: claim that would spark one of medieval Europe's greatest conflicts,
Speaker 1: the Hundred Years War. For all of that impact act,
Speaker 1: the actual truth of the Tordonelle affair is murky. We
Speaker 1: don't even know if a literal affair occurred. Historians are
Speaker 1: split on the matter. Many historians who believe that the
Speaker 1: queens were unfaithful argue that King Philip would not have
Speaker 1: undergone such a public humiliation unless the case was concrete. However,
Speaker 1: the historian Tracy Adams notes that none of the princesses
Speaker 1: had sons by thirteen fourteen, which was a relatively common
Speaker 1: reason to want to dispose of royal wives. Others speculate
Speaker 1: that the affair was a political distraction, orchestrated by either
Speaker 1: Philip the Fairs advisers, or by his enemies. Still others
Speaker 1: say that it was all a manipulation by Queen Isabella
Speaker 1: of England, part of a grand plan to get her
Speaker 1: son on the throne, although that seems, at least to me,
Speaker 1: very far fetched. There is no way she could have
Speaker 1: known that none of her brothers would go on to
Speaker 1: have some, especially if she helped dispose of their lives.
Speaker 1: The uncertainty around the facts of the case did not
Speaker 1: stop contemporaries or even modern historians from casting aspirations on
Speaker 1: the women. In her two thousand six biography of Queen Isabella,
Speaker 1: Alison Weir calls the princesses quote stupid promiscuous girls end
Speaker 1: quote where isn't wrong about one thing. At the time
Speaker 1: of their arrests, the princesses were barely more than girls.
Speaker 1: Sean was twenty six or twenty seven, Marguerite was twenty four,
Speaker 1: and Blanche was only seventeen. They had spent their entire
Speaker 1: lives as bargaining chips, bartered away by their parents for
Speaker 1: money and power, sent off to be the wives of
Speaker 1: men who they barely knew, stripped of their agency and
Speaker 1: their independence. It's the kind of situation in which it
Speaker 1: might be easy for a young woman to be tempted
Speaker 1: to rebel, not to mention hypocrisy. Louis and Charles were
Speaker 1: both known to have had illegitimate children of their own,
Speaker 1: but Blanche, Marguerite and Jean were women, and different rules
Speaker 1: applied to them. Ironically, it was that very treatment of women,
Speaker 1: dismissing women, first through the imprisonment of the princesses and
Speaker 1: then introducing the law of bearing women from inheriting the throne,
Speaker 1: that would ultimately doom the Cape line only fourteen years
Speaker 1: after the Tordonelle affair allegedly occurred. Of all the princesses,
Speaker 1: Jean got off the lightest. She had been exonerated and
Speaker 1: restored to her place at court. She had been queen,
Speaker 1: though unlike her sister and sister in law, who were
Speaker 1: queens in name only, she had actually served in the role.
Speaker 1: She had a loving marriage, she had four daughters, wealth
Speaker 1: and land. But she never forgot the events of thirteen fourteen,
Speaker 1: and she never forgot her sister, Blanche, who had died
Speaker 1: in disgrace the year before the Tourdenell affair, Jean and
Speaker 1: Philip had had a daughter who they named after Blanche.
Speaker 1: Seven years later, after Jean had become queen, she made
Speaker 1: a dramatic decision. She would send her youngest daughter, her
Speaker 1: sister's namesake, into a nunnery, as a way to a
Speaker 1: tone on her sister's behalf. It was an enormously difficult decision.
Speaker 1: Jean loved her children, and she knew she would be
Speaker 1: sending Little Blanche from a castle to a very hard life.
Speaker 1: But she was a deeply religious woman and she believed
Speaker 1: it was something that she had to do. However, Jean
Speaker 1: did use her power as a queen to ease the
Speaker 1: transition for herself and for her daughter. Blanche was given
Speaker 1: more worldly comforts than the average nun, and unlike most
Speaker 1: cloistered sisters, she would be allowed to see her mother
Speaker 1: and father occasionally. We don't know what Little Blanche thought
Speaker 1: about the decision, but Jean was resolute, and so Blanche
Speaker 1: entered long Champ Abbey in thirteen twenty. The separation proved
Speaker 1: harder than John had expected. She and her husband Philip
Speaker 1: visited a little Blanche so often that they were reprimanded
Speaker 1: by the Pope. Besides her sacrifice of her daughter on
Speaker 1: her sister's spiritual behalf, Jean made one more attempt to
Speaker 1: make up for the sins of the past. At some
Speaker 1: point during her husband's reign, Philip had given John a
Speaker 1: special property, the Tour Donnell, the location of so much shame, sadness,
Speaker 1: and loss, must have been a difficult legacy for John,
Speaker 1: and so she decided to enact a transformation in her will,
Speaker 1: revealed after her death, in Jean left the building to
Speaker 1: the University of Paris to serve as a new college,
Speaker 1: the College of Burgundy. There, students from her home territory
Speaker 1: could board while they studied at the university. What had
Speaker 1: once been a site of infamy became one of learning
Speaker 1: and companionship, a place where young people could grow, experiment,
Speaker 1: and perhaps even make mistakes of their own with less
Speaker 1: dire consequences. Noble Blood is a production of I Heart
Speaker 1: Radio and Grim and Mild from Aaron Manky. Noble Blood
Speaker 1: is hosted by Me Danish for additional writing and researching
Speaker 1: done by Hannah Johnston, hannah's Wick, Miura Hayward, Courtney Sunder
Speaker 1: and Laurie Goodman. The show is produced by rema Il Kali,
Speaker 1: with supervising producer Josh Thayne and executive producers Aaron Manky,
Speaker 1: Alex Williams, and Matt Frederick. For more podcasts from I
Speaker 1: Heart Radio, visit the I heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
Speaker 1: or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.