Constance of Antioch
Template:Short description Template:Good article Template:Infobox royalty Constance of Hauteville (c. 1128–1163) was the ruling princess of Antioch from 1130 to 1163. She was the only child of Bohemond II of Antioch and Alice of Jerusalem. Constance succeeded her father at the age of two after he fell in battle, although his cousin Roger II of Sicily laid claim to Antioch. Alice assumed the regency, but the Antiochene noblemen replaced her with her father (Constance's grandfather), Baldwin II of Jerusalem. After he died in 1131, Alice again tried to take control of the government, but the Antiochene barons acknowledged the right of her brother-in-law Fulk of Anjou to rule as regent for Constance.
Constance was given in marriage to Raymond of Poitiers in 1136. During the subsequent years, Raymond ruled Antioch while Constance gave birth to four children. After Raymond was murdered after a battle in 1149, Fulk of Anjou's son Baldwin III of Jerusalem assumed the regency. He tried to persuade Constance to remarry, but she did not accept his candidates. She also refused to marry a middle-aged relative of the Byzantine Emperor Manuel I Komnenus. Finally, she found a love interest and was married to Raynald of Châtillon, a knight from France, in 1153.
After her second husband fell into captivity around 1160Template:Ndash1161, Constance wanted to rule Antioch alone, but BaldwinTemplate:NbspIII of Jerusalem declared her fifteen-year-old son, Bohemond III, the lawful prince. Constance disregarded this declaration and took control of the administration of the principality with the assistance of Emperor Manuel. Constance was dethroned in favor of her son shortly before her death.
Early life
Born in 1128, Constance was the only child of Prince Bohemond II of Antioch and Princess Alice, the second daughter of King Baldwin II of Jerusalem.Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn She was named after her paternal grandmother, Constance of France.Template:Sfn Bohemond was killed in a battle at the Ceyhan River in February 1130.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn After his death, Alice assumed the regency for Constance.Template:Sfn According to rumors spreading in Antioch, Alice was planning to send Constance to a monastery or to marry her off to a commoner.Template:Sfn Bohemond's cousin Roger II of Sicily regarded himself as Bohemond's lawful successor because he was the senior member of the House of Hauteville.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
The Antiochene noblemen sent envoys to Baldwin II, urging him to come to the principality,Template:Sfn but Alice decided to resist her father.Template:Sfn The 12th-century historian, William of Tyre, also accused her of seeking assistance from Imad ad-Din Zengi, atabeg of Aleppo.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn According to William of Tyre's account, her envoys were captured by BaldwinTemplate:NbspII's soldiers, who had meanwhile reached Antioch.Template:Sfn Before long, Alice was forced to beg for mercy from her father.Template:Sfn He removed Alice from the regency, ordering her to leave Antioch.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
Reign
Childhood
The Antiochene noblemen acknowledged Baldwin II as regent, swearing fealty to him and Constance.Template:Sfn He made Count Joscelin I of Edessa her guardian to rule the principality until her marriage.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn BaldwinTemplate:NbspII died on AugustTemplate:Nbsp21, 1131, and JoscelinTemplate:NbspI died a week later.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
Alice again laid claim to the regency.Template:Sfn However, most Antiochene lords remained hostile to the idea of a female ruler and sent envoys to BaldwinTemplate:NbspII's successor, Fulk of Anjou, who was Alice's brother-in-law.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Alice made an alliance with Counts Joscelin II of Edessa and Pons of Tripoli in early 1132.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn King Fulk had to travel to Antioch by sea because Pons did not allow him to march through the County of Tripoli.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Fulk landed at St. Symeon where the Antiochene barons acknowledged him as regent.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn He appointed Rainald I Masoir, constable of Antioch, to administer the principality.Template:Sfn
Fulk returned to Antioch when Zengi dispatched Sawar, governor of Aleppo, to invade the principality in 1132 or 1133.Template:Sfn After defeating the invaders, Fulk entered Antioch.Template:Sfn Since the principality needed a firm government, the Antiochene noblemen approached Fulk to select a husband for Constance.Template:Sfn He chose Raymond of Poitiers, the younger son of William IX, Duke of Aquitaine.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn He did not announce his decision in public because he wanted to prevent Alice and RogerTemplate:NbspII of Sicily from intervening.Template:Sfn
Alice's sister, Queen Melisende, Fulk's wife, persuaded Fulk to allow Alice to return to Antioch in 1135.Template:Sfn Alice wanted to tighten the relationship of the principality and the Byzantine Empire; therefore, she offered Constance's hand to Manuel, a son of Emperor John II Komnenos.Template:Sfn To prevent the Byzantine marriage, Fulk sent his envoy to France to Raymond of Poitiers to urge him to come to Antioch, which he did, traveling in disguise, because RogerTemplate:NbspII of Sicily wanted to capture him in southern Italy.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
First marriage
Raymond of Poitiers arrived at Antioch in April 1136.Template:Sfn Ralph of Domfront, Latin Patriarch of Antioch, made Alice believe that Raymond came to Antioch to marry her instead of her eight-year-old daughter.Template:Sfn However, Constance was kidnapped from the palace, and Ralph of Domfront blessed her marriage to Raymond in the cathedral.Template:Sfn With the marriage, Raymond became the ruler of the principality, and Alice retired to Lattakieh.Template:Sfn
In early 1147 Roger II of Sicily extended an offer to Louis VII of France to transport the French crusaders to the Holy Land during the Second Crusade.Template:Sfn Fearing that Roger only wanted to assert his claim to Antioch, LouisTemplate:NbspVII and his wife Eleanor of Aquitaine (niece of Raymond of Poitiers) declined.Template:Sfn Louis and his crusaders came to the principality in March 1148.Template:Sfn Before long, rumors spread among the crusaders about a love affair between Raymond and Eleanor.Template:Sfn The crusaders tried to convince her husband to launch a campaign against Aleppo, the capital of Nur ad-Din, but LouisTemplate:NbspVII decided to leave Antioch to Jerusalem, forcing Eleanor to accompany him.Template:Sfn
Widowhood
Raymond was killed in the Battle of Inab during an expedition against Nur ad-Din Zangi on JuneTemplate:Nbsp29, 1149.Template:Sfn Since Raymond and Constance's four children were still underage, there was no one to "perform the duties of a prince and raise the people from despair", according to William of Tyre.Template:Sfn Nur ad-Din invaded the principality and seized all Antiochene territories to the east of the Orontes River.Template:Sfn Aimery of Limoges, Latin Patriarch of Antioch, directed the defense, but most noblemen preferred a secular ruler.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn After learning of Raymond's fate, Constance's cousin, Baldwin III of Jerusalem, hurried to Antioch and assumed the regency.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn He also concluded a truce with Nur ad-Din.Template:Sfn
Baldwin III returned to Antioch in summer 1150.Template:Sfn He wanted to persuade Constance to remarry, proposing three candidates (Yves, Count of Soissons, Walter of Saint Omer, and Ralph of Merle), but she declined.Template:Sfn Urged by BaldwinTemplate:NbspIII, Constance went to Tripoli in early 1152 to meet him and her two aunts, Melisende and Hodierna.Template:Sfn The two ladies tried to persuade Constance to choose among the three candidates, but she returned to Antioch without making a promise to remarry.Template:SfnTemplate:SfnTemplate:Sfn According to William of Tyre, Patriarch Aimery convinced Constance to resist, because he wanted to control the government of the principality.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn The Byzantine Emperor ManuelTemplate:NbspI Komnenos sent his widowed brother-in-law, the middle-aged John Rogerios Dalassenos, to Antioch to marry Constance.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn However, because of his age, she "regarded him with displeasure", according to the contemporaneous John Kinnamos, and refused to marry him.Template:Sfn
Historian Steven Runciman says that Constance may have refused the candidates proposed by BaldwinTemplate:NbspIII and ManuelTemplate:NbspI because she had met Raynald of Châtillon, a knight from France.Template:Sfn Even though William of Tyre described Raynald as a "knight of common sort", Constance decided to marry Raynald.Template:Sfn Their betrothal was kept secret because Constance wanted to obtain BaldwinTemplate:NbspIII's permission for the marriage.Template:Sfn
Second marriage
After Baldwin sanctioned the marriage, Constance and Raynald married in early 1153.Template:Sfn Raynald took charge of the administration of the principality.Template:Sfn However, he was unpopular because his subjects regarded him as an upstart.Template:Sfn His frequent attempts to raise funds brought him into conflict with Patriarch Aimery and Emperor ManuelTemplate:NbspI during the subsequent years.Template:Sfn The emperor forced Raynald to pay homage to him in the spring of 1159.Template:Sfn Raynald was captured and imprisoned by Majd al-Din, governor of Aleppo, during a plundering raid in November 1160 or 1161.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn
After her husband fell into captivity, Constance announced her intention to administer the principality, but most Antiochene noblemen preferred a male ruler.Template:Sfn BaldwinTemplate:NbspIII of Jerusalem hurried to Antioch and declared Constance's fifteen-year-old son, Bohemond III, the lawful prince, charging Patriarch Aimery with the administration of the principality.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Constance did not accept Baldwin's decision and protested against it to Emperor Manuel.Template:Sfn
Manuel dispatched his nephew, Alexios Bryennios Komnenos, and John Kamateros to Antioch to begin negotiations about his marriage to Constance's daughter, Maria.Template:Sfn The marriage contract was signed and the emperor's delegates confirmed Constance's position as the ruler of the principality.Template:Sfn BaldwinTemplate:NbspIII, who came to Antioch to meet the imperial envoys, did not protest.Template:Sfn
Constance's son, Bohemond, reached the age of majority in 1163.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn To strengthen her position against her son, Constance sought assistance from Constantine Kalamanos, Byzantine governor of Cilicia.Template:Sfn However, the Antiochene barons made an alliance with Thoros II of Cilician Armenia and forced her to leave Antioch.Template:Sfn After Constance's removal, BohemondTemplate:NbspIII took control of the principality.Template:Sfn Before long, Constance died, probably in Lattakieh or Byblos, according to Steven Runciman.Template:Sfn
Family
Constance's first husband, Raymond of Poitiers, was the second son of William IX, Duke of Aquitaine and his second wife, Philippa of Toulouse.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn He was born in 1114.Template:Sfn According to William of Tyre, Constance was left with "two sons and as many daughters still underage" when her husband died in 1149.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Their elder son, Bohemond, was five at the time of Raymond's death.Template:Sfn He seized Antioch from his mother in 1163. Constance and Raymond's daughter Maria, famed for her beauty, married the Byzantine Emperor Manuel I Komnenos in 1161.Template:Sfn Another daughter, Philippa, was given in marriage to Humphrey II of Toron in the late 1160s.Template:Sfn
Whether the father of Constance's second son, Baldwin, was Raymond of Poitiers or Raynald of Châtillon cannot be determined with certainty.Template:SfnTemplate:Sfn Baldwin died fighting at the head of a Byzantine cavalry regiment in the Battle of Myriokephalon on SeptemberTemplate:Nbsp17, 1176.Template:Sfn It is certain that Raynald fathered Agnes, who became the wife of Béla III of Hungary.Template:Sfn Raynald and Constance's second daughter, Alice, became the third wife of Azzo VI of Este in 1204.Template:Sfn
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References
Sources
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Further reading
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