A NOTICE OF THE

LIFE OF BERENGARIA,

CONSORT OF RICHARD THE FIRST.

BY F. MANSEL REYNOLDS, ESQ.

BERENGARIA was a princess of Navarre; and a descendant of that Sancho the Third, styled the Great, who, about the year 980, was King of Navarre and Arragon. He married Nugna, the heiress of Castile, and by this accession of territory, became so powerful that he pretended to be denominated the Emperor of Spain. But, upon his death, his dominions were divided among four of his children; and his transitory acquisition, which, if it could have been bequeathed in its integrity to a resolute successor, might have been beneficial, was productive of no permanent results.

Sancho the Sixth, surnamed the Wise, was the parent of Berengaria. Her brother succeeded him on the throne of Navarre, by the title of Sancho the Seventh, the Strong. He was deposed, and died childless, in prison; consequently, the sovereignty of Navarre passed to the house of Champagne; Thibaud the Fifth, count of that province, having married Blanche, the second and younger sister of the dethroned prince. This luckless sovereign was an intrepid warrior, and at the famous battle of Toloza, in which was determined the fate of Spain, distinguished himself pre-eminently. The deed by which he achieved so signal a renown that it is perpetuated in the armorial bearings of Navarre, is too chivalrously characteristic of the clumsy warfare of those ages, to be omitted from a memoir of his crusading sister.

When Mahomet el Nagir, whom the Spaniards call Le Vert, from the colour of his turban, invaded Spain, at the head of an army of, it is stated, six hundred thousand men, all the princes of that affrighted land thought that their destruction was at hand. From every quarter they besought assistance; and the pope, Innocent the Third, preached a crusade against the infidels. The results of these united efforts were, that more than sixty thousand men from Italy and France united themselves to the Spaniards.

Alphonso of Castile, Peter of Arragon, and Sancho of Navarre, were the chiefs of the allied army; and, on the 16th of July, 1212, they came into conflict with their invaders, who were commanded by the caliph. This prince had stationed himself on the top of a hill, which he had protected by triple chains; and whence he could see all the incidents of the fight, and be himself in view to all the combatants. Thus, in a seemingly impregnable circle of iron, with his sabre in one hand, and the Koran in the other, and surrounded by his bravest horsemen, he trusted he should be enabled to encourage his troops, yet incur no personal danger.

Florian, in his Précis Historique sur les Maures, makes the error of calling the hero of this fight, Sancho the Eighth; but his description of it is sufficiently animated to incite a quotation from the concluding part.

"The Castilians directed their efforts against this eminence. At first, they forced the Moors to retreat; but afterwards, repulsed in their turn, they retired in disorder, and began to fly. Alphonso, running here and there, to rally them, said to the Archbishop of Toledo, who accompanied him everywhere, preceded by his great cross- Archbishop, it is here that we must die. No, sire,' answered the resolute prelate, it is here that we must live, and conquer.' At this moment, the brave canon who carried the cross threw himself with it into the midst of

the Mussulmans; the archbishop and the king follow him; the Castilians rush to save their prince and standard. The kings of Arragon and Navarre, already conquerors of the wings opposed to them, unite to assault the hill. The Moors are everywhere attacked; they resist, the Christians still press onward. The Navarese, the Arragonese, the Castilian, each tries to surpass the other in prowess. The brave King of Navarre, armed with his huge battle-axe, breaks through every obstacle; arrives at the palisade, strikes, and sunders the massive chains with which the Moorish prince is environed. Mahomet then escapes; his warriors, seeing him no longer, lose their courage and their hope. All yield, all fly, before the Christians; tens of thousands of Mussulmans fall beneath their blows; and the Archbishop of Toledo, with the other prelates, surrounding the royal victors, sing the Te Deum on the field of battle.”

Thus was lost and won the famous struggle at Toloza; and thus was gained for the arms of Navarre those chains of gold which they exhibit on a field gules.

As

This Sancho appears to have been precisely the sort of character to have attracted the partiality of Richard Cœur de Lion ; and accordingly we are not surprised to find it stated that a close friendship existed between them. In addition to his bravery, which in itself was a tie for the English prince, Sancho possessed also a strong predilection for the provençal poetry of which Richard was an enthusiastic admirer. Duke of Guienne, Richard was a near neighbour of the court of Navarre, and had ample opportunities of cementing his friendship for the brother, and of originating an affection for the sister. Probably, during the familiar intercourse arising from some sojourn at the castle of her father, Richard contracted his passion for Berengaria; and, it is affirmed, that, fierce, ungovernable, licentious, and wayward as he was, for a time he really passionately loved her. Whether this love was

wholly merited does not unequivocally appear; but we are told that she was gentle, beautiful, and instructed. These qualities are great advantages, yet alone they may not be sufficient to maintain the happiness of matrimonial life; something more may be requisite; however, the sequel will show. But the man who had given such flagrant proofs of want of principle and duty, in his eminently ungrateful and unfilial course with regard to his great and unfortunate father, never could have been likely to have made a permanently tender and faithful husband. Yet, while novelty existed, this pleasing princess must have made some strong impression on his volatile heart; for during nearly two years which followed his accession to the throne, he evidently maintained his desire to be wedded to her. Nevertheless, long after this passion commenced, that is, in 1189, he would have married Alice of France, for the sake of the advantages which that alliance would then have brought to him. When, however, he became king, and needed no longer the support of Philip in his wicked hostility to his affectionate and beneficent father, he prepared himself to take for his bride, cæteris paribus, her whom personally he preferred. But this sacrifice of the heart to the head, of passion to policy, was as little flattering to both ladies as it was ill calculated to obtain for him, preux chevalier as he really was, the epithet of leal lover.

Nevertheless, whatever the exact actual extent of his predilection, it was sufficient to induce the warlike prince to despatch his mother to Navarre, to obtain for him the hand of the Princess Berengaria. To the proposition of Queen Eleanora, Sancho the Sixth gladly acceded; and into her custody surrendered his willing daughter. They then bade farewell to his court, and commenced their journey to Naples, not to England; for by this time, the restless Richard, insatiate of military renown, had completed his preparations for his crusade against the

infidels. On the plains of Vezelay, on the borders of Burgundy, Philip and Richard had assembled their mighty forces; and there, after swearing mutually good faith, and to hold each other's dominions sacred during their absence, they arranged the plans of their expedition. Philip then took the road to Genoa, and Richard departed for Marseilles; from which ports they embarked, environed by their respective and formidable

armaments.

Probably Richard's intention was to have touched at Naples to have received his bride; but if this intention ever existed, it was defeated by a tempest, which compelled him to take shelter with his whole navy in the harbour of Messina, whither Philip, by the same ill wind, was also necessitated to fly for refuge. Through this disastrous influence of the elements occurred events which not only threatened for a time to prevent his union with the fair Navarese, but matured, if not sowed, those seeds of dissension between the two haughty monarchs which ultimately induced the failure of their expedition against the Saracens.

In the inactivity which this unlucky incident occasioned, alone existed sufficient elements of mischief; but many other adverse causes combined to strengthen irritation and animosity between the jealous and fiery chiefs of France and England. An artful Italian prince, Tancred, King of Naples and Sicily, was the great promoter of these divisions; in order that their minds might be so engrossed by their mutual antipathy, that neither of them should have thought or leisure to be inimical to him; for in both he had but too much reason to expect to find a foe. Richard was indignant with him because he had imprisoned his sister, Joanna, the Dowager Queen of Naples, on account of her opposition to his usurpation of the throne; while Philip was displeased insomuch that the rightful heir to it was the wife of his ally, Henry the Sixth, Emperor of Ger