Sybille d’Anjou, comtesse de Flandre à Béthanie

Biography

Retrieved from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sibylla_of_Anjou

Sibylla of Anjou (c. 1112-1165) was a daughter of Fulk V of Anjou and Ermengarde of Maine, and wife of William Clito and Thierry, Count of Flanders.

In 1123 Sibylla married William Clito, son of the Norman Robert Curthose and future Count of Flanders. Sibylla brought the County of Maine to this marriage, which was annulled in 1124 on grounds of consanguinity. The annulment was made by Pope Honorius II upon request from Henry I of England, William's uncle; Fulk opposed it and did not consent until Honorius excommunicated him and placed an interdict over Anjou. Sibylla then accompanied her widower father to the crusader Kingdom of Jerusalem, where he married Melisende, the heiress of the kingdom, and became king himself in 1131. In 1139 she married Thierry, Count of Flanders, who had arrived on his first pilgrimage to the Holy Land.

She returned to Flanders with her new husband, and during his absence on the Second Crusade the pregnant Sibylla acted as regent of the county. Baldwin IV, Count of Hainaut took the opportunity to attack Flanders, but Sibylla led a counter-attack and pillaged Hainaut. In response Baldwin ravaged Artois. The archbishop of Reims intervened and a truce was signed, but Thierry took vengeance on Baldwin when he returned in 1149.

In 1157 she travelled with Thierry on his third pilgrimage, but after arriving in Jerusalem she separated from her husband and refused to return home with him. She became a nun at the convent of St. Lazarus in Bethany, where her step-aunt, Ioveta of Bethany, was abbess. Ioveta and Sibylla supported Queen Melisende and held some influence over the church, and supported the election of Amalric of Nesle as Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem over a number of other candidates. Sibylla died in Bethany in 1165.:

Sibylla had six children with Thierry:

• 1 Philip, Count of Flanders
• 2 Matthew, Count of Boulogne, married Marie of Boulogne
• 3 Margaret, Countess of Flanders and Hainaut, married Baldwin V, Count of Hainaut
• 4 Gertrude, married Humbert III, Count of Savoy
• 5 Matilda
• 6 Peter

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Sources

• * N. Huyghebaert, Une comtesse de Flandre à Béthanie, in "Les cahiers de Saint -André", 1964, n°2, 15p.
• * Steven Runciman, A History of the Crusades, vol. II: The Kingdom of Jerusalem. Cambridge University Press, 195
• * William of Tyre, A History of Deeds Done Beyond the Sea. E. A. Babcock and A. C. Krey, trans. Columbia University Press, 1943.

Categories: 1165 deaths | Counts of Flanders | Women of the Crusader states

Marriage 1 Thierry d' Alsace b: ABT 1099 in of, Alsace, Upper Lorraine, Germany

Married: 1134

Children

• Marguerite de Lower Lorraine b: ABT 1135 in of, Lower Lorraine, France
• Matthieu d' Alsace b: ABT 1137 in of, Alsace, Upper Lorraine, Germany

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Sibilla d'Anjou

d/o Fulk V d'Anjou & Erembourg

m 1. Guillaume de Normandie (annulled by Papal Bull)

2. Thierry I Count of Flanders

Children: BAUDOUIN

              Philippe

From Medlands;

SIBYLLE d’Anjou ([1112/16]-Bethany 1165, bur Bethany, Abbey of St Lazarus). She is named by Orderic Vitalis, who also names her father and specifies that he arranged her (first) marriage as part of the support he gave to Guillaume de Normandie, on the suggestion of Amaury de Montfort, and that her dowry was the county of Maine[311]. According to Orderic Vitalis, King Henry broke off the marriage "making use of threats and pleas and an enormous quantity of gold and silver"[312]. Both passages in Orderic Vitalis refer only to a betrothal, but a marriage must have taken place otherwise a papal annulment would have been unnecessary. Her father supported her husband against his uncle Henry I King of England, indignant that the latter retained the dowry of his other daughter Alice, married to King Henry's son who had been drowned in the Blanche Nef [White Ship] in 1120[313]. Orderic Vitalis records Sibylle's second marriage[314], as does William of Tyre (who says she was her father's older daughter)[315]. The Cartulaire de Saint-Bertin records the marriage of "Sibillam comitis Andegavensis filiam" with Thierry after the death of his first wife[316]. She left France with her second husband in Jun 1147 on the Second Crusade[317]. She accompanied her husband to Palestine in 1157 but refused to return with him to Europe in 1158. She became a nun at the convent of St Lazarus at Bethany. After the death of her stepmother Mélisende Queen of Jerusalem in 1161, Ctss Sibylle assumed a position of influence among the royal family of Jerusalem[318]. The Annales Aquicinctini record the death in 1165 of "Sibbilla comitissa Flandrie apud Sanctum Lazarum"[319]. m firstly (1123, annulled by papal bull 26 Aug 1124[320]%29 as his first wife, GUILLAUME de Normandie, son of ROBERT Duke of Normandy & his wife Sibylle de Conversano (Rouen 1101-St Omer, Abbey of St Bertin 27 Jul 1128, bur St Omer, Abbey of St Bertin). He succeeded in 1127 as GUILLAUME I "Clito" Count of Flanders. He died from wounds received at the battle of Aalst. m secondly (1134) THIERRY I Count of Flanders, son of THIERRY II Duke of Lorraine & his second wife Gertrude de Flandre ([1099/1101]-17 Jan 1168).

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