Sharon Bennett Connolly's 'Women of the Anarchy' 2024

Amberley Publishing first edition - 2024

I am afraid I have the same criticism as I had with Kathryn Warner's John of Gaunt, another Amberley production (see my Blog of 18 June 2022). Whilst there is certainly evidence of considerable 'secondary' research, there is also evidence of an inability to sort out the 'wheat from the chaff' - i.e to focus on the book's specific subject matter. All too often the narrative is drenched in yet another (often irrelevant) date or off piste account of who married who, who their ancestors were and, then, their offspring. A better title for the book, perhaps, would be The Anarchy: including a look at some of the Women involved. Perhaps I am being too critical, but there really wasn't enough information (or the author hasn't found/used it)) to sustain an account of nearly 250 pages. There is too much repetition (especially in the first, 'background' chapters); one gets the feeling that the author throughout forgets what she has written in previous chapters, as the same point or fact is regurgitated, often in almost the same words. It is entirely constructed from Secondary sources, or translations of Primary sources by other Historians. A clue lies in the Notes at the end, where the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography, oxforddnb.com appears to be the most favoured source.

Perhaps the most useful chapter is the Epilogue, where Connolly compares and contrasts the two most important women - the Empress Matilda and Queen Matilda, King Stephen's wife.

The disparity in the statuses of these two women is evidenced throughout the Anarchy. The empress is judged for fighting for her own inheritance, whereas the queen is praised for fighting for the inheritance of her son...on closer inspection, however, the similarities between the two women are more noticeable than their differences. Both empress and queen demonstrated a level of piety which can only have come from their family connection, namely their mutual descent from Margate of Wessex, Queen of Scots and later saint. Each Matilda was willing to do whatever it took to protect the interests of her children.

Both empress and queen were adept at negotiating to achieve their aims, demonstrating impressive diplomatic skills in the most difficult of circumstances.

What really differentiated them was the way they went about achieving their aims. The queen's deferential attitude, acting on behalf of her husband rather than in her own right, was more acceptable to the people of the time than the empress's more direct assertion of her own claim.

There were, of course, other positives to be taken from the book. Connolly rightly puts forward, and explains, the importance of other women - such as Aleliza of Louvain, Henry I's second wife; and the feisty Gundreda de Warenne, Countess of Warwick, Ada de Warenne and Matilda of Gloucester. The appraisals of King Stephen, his brother Bishop  Henry of Winchester, Empress Matilda's second husband,  Geoffrey of Anjou, and her half-brother Robert of Gloucester, are all standard fare. The de Beaumont and de Warenne families are flagged up, as are Brian FitzCount, Baldwin de Redvers and Miles of Gloucester. The [in]famous Geoffrey de Mandeville makes a fleeting appearance.

I learned material I hadn't known about. 

• The Queen's Ferry crossing on the Firth of Forth, for which Margaret of Wessex (later Saint Margaret) had persuaded her husband. King Malcolm III Canmore to remit the charges for genuine pilgrims going further north to St. Andrews, was named for the queen. 
• Queen Matilda (there are too many Matildas!), Henry I's wife, commissioned William of Malmesbury to write the Gesta Regum Anglorum.
• I hadn't previously twigged that Prince Henry of Scotland had married Ada de Warenne who, at one stage, was the first lady of the Scottish court. Two of their three sons became kings of the Scots: Malcolm IV and William I.

I finished the book admiring Queen Matilda of Boulogne, Stephen's wife, even more - particularly her steadfast and successful attempt to get Stephen released from captivity after the disastrous Battle of Lincoln; and retaining my liking for her husband, in spite of the serious errors he made. I further understood how important the Empress Matilda's brother, Earl Robert of Gloucester, was to her cause and how vital Bristol was as a base for her campaigns. Context, of course, is vital for the understanding of individual, whether past or present; but the 'context' here overwhelmed the more intimate account of the two Matildas and several other relevant women during what we refer to as the Anarchy. Perhaps their stories are best suited to the shorter accounts in the much-used Oxford Dictionary of National Biography.