Order of Medieval Women
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PictureEmperor Henry IV asking Matilda of Tuscany and abbot Hugo of Cluny for mediation, Walk to Canossa, King of the Germans and Holy Roman Empire, Vita Mathildis, Donizone, Codice Vaticani 4922, fol. 7v, c 1116, Biblioteca Apostolica, the Vatican, Rome. Credit Alamy Photos
  • ​Matilda of Tuscany, Imperial Vicar and Vice-Queen of Italy, 1046-1115, daughter of Margrave Boniface III of Tuscany, wife to Godfrey IV, Duke of Lower Lorraine and briefly to Welf V, no issue.  Matilda became one of the most powerful rulers of the Italian Middle Ages controlling most of central and northern Italy. Her revolt against the feudal system laid the foundations for the Italian Renaissance and is one of the few medieval women remembered for her forty year military accomplishments known to have fought in armor at the head of her troops.  She challenged the boundaries between military and gender, was a defender of the reforming papacy supporting them financially, militarily and diplomatically and stood with pope Gregory VII and the church against Henry IV, turning the tide of the first great war between Church and State known as the Synod of Worms, a controversy each claiming the right to appoint bishops and abbots within the Empire.

Her father’s death in 1052 placed the extensive family lands under her step-father as women in accordance with Roman laws had no rights to own or manage property.   Lands later passed to Matilda’s husband and then after his death in 1076 he willed her assets to his nephew Godfrey Bouillon.  The nephew’s nomination by the church as a leader for the first Crusade in 1095 “was hardly happenstance” dying during the crusades and finally placing her as the undisputed heir of all her parents' allodial lands yet she spent the remainder of her life fighting to be formally invested by the Holy Roman Emperor as the Margraviate.

​In 1088, Matilda founded  the first law school in Europe, reviving the study of Justinian’s code of Roman law giving women the right to own, manage and inherit property. She built or restored some of the most beautiful Italian Romanesque monuments in Florence, Lucca, Mantua, and Pisa and established a network of hospices throughout northern Italy that revived pilgrimage and trade, laying the foundation for the Italian Renaissance.  She founded over one hundred churches, monasteries, and built or restored bridges between the Alps and Rome.   At her request she was buried at the Abbey of San Benedetto di Polirone until 1634 when Pope Urban VIII had her remains reinterred in the Vatican in Rome with a memorial tomb prominently placed within one hundred yards of the apostle Peter, a place now  considered the Honor and Glory of Italy and is the only person besides the popes depicted as holding the key to heaven.  One hundred thirty-nine of her letters are extant with subjects ranging from charters, judgments, grants, and settling disputes.
Picture
Originally buried in Abbey of San Bendetto, reinterred in the Vatican by Pope Urban VIII, one of only 3 women buried in the Basillica , Tomb of Countess Matilda of Tuscany, Gianlorenzo Bernini, St. Peter's Basilica, Vatican City © Bede735 CC BY-SA 3.0.
Map of Canossa & Tuscany, Italy
Picture
​Read her letters:  https://epistolae.ccnmtl.columbia.edu/woman/29.html   


​References and Further Reading
  • Gravois, Aryeh.  The Illustrated Encyclopedia of Medieval Civilization.  Mayflower Books, 1980.
  • Jackson-Laufer, Guida M.  Women Who Ruled: A Biographical Encyclopedia.  Barnes & Noble Books, 1998.
  • Labarge, Margaret Wade. A Small Sound of the Trumpet, Women in Medieval Life.  Beacon Press, 1986.
  • “Matilda Canossa and the Origins of the Renaissance.”  Muscarelle Museum of Art.  Williamsburg, VA.  //muscarelle.org/wp-content/uploads/2014/10/Matilda-of-Canossa-Press-Release.pdf
  • Medieval Women’s Latin Letters.  https://epistolae.ccnmtl.columbia.edu/women
  • Spike, Michele K.  Tuscan Countess: the Life and Extraordinary Times of Matilda of Canossa.  Vendome Press, 2005.

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  • Home
  • About
    • Mission
    • Membership >
      • Genealogical Sources
  • Women of Consequence
    • Early Middle Ages (500-1000) >
      • St. Adelaide of Burgundy
      • St. Bathilde
      • St. Bertha of Kent
      • St. Clothilde
      • St. Olga of Kiev
      • St. Theophana
    • High Middle Ages (1000-1300) >
      • Adelaide of Turin and Susa
      • St. Adela of Normandy & England
      • Anne of Kiev
      • Berengaria of Castile
      • Blanche of Castile
      • Ela, Countess of Salisbury
      • Eleanor of Aquitaine
      • Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd
      • Margaret de Quincy
      • Matilda, the Empress
      • Matilda (Eadgyth) of Scotland
      • Nicholaa de la Haye
      • Sikelgaita, heiress of Salerno
    • Late Middle Ages (1300-1500) >
      • Caterina Sforza
      • Dorothea of Brandenburg
      • Elizabeth de Clare, 11th Lady of Clare
      • Isabella d’Este
      • Isabella I of Castile
      • Isabella of France
      • Jeanne de Belleville
      • Joanna of Flanders
      • Lucrezia Tornabuoni
      • Margaret Beaufort
      • Philippa of Hainault
  • Roll of Honor
    • Æthelflæd, Lady of the Mercians
    • Anna Comnena, Princess of Byzantium
    • Beatriz Gallindo, La Latina
    • Christine de Pizan
    • Emma of Normandy
    • St. Hildegard von Bingen
    • Hrotsvit von Gandersheim
    • Jacqueline Felice de Almania
    • St. Joan of Arc
    • Matilda of Tuscany
    • St. Rodegunda (Radegund)
    • St. Theodora, Byzantine Empress
    • Trota of Salerno
  • Connections
  • Genealogical Charts
    • House of Sforza
    • Welsh Ancestry of English Royalty
    • Descendants of Gwenllian ferch Gruffydd
    • Houses of della Rovere and Gonzaga
    • House of Este
    • House of Trastamara
    • Lords of Clisson
    • Descendants of Jeanne la Flamme
    • House of Medici
    • Genealogy of Nicholaa de la Haye
    • Welsh Kings
  • Maps
    • Early Middle Ages >
      • Kingdom of Burgundy
      • Merovingian Kingdoms
      • Kent England
      • Principality of Kiev, Drevlyans
      • Thuringi & Franci, 6th century Europe
      • Quedlinburg, Germany, circa 962 AD
    • High Middle Ages >
      • Turin & Susa, Italy circa 1050 AD
      • Europe circa 1000 AD
      • Spanish Kingdoms 1210 AD
      • France & Burgundy circa 1032 AD
      • England & France 1152-1327 AD
      • Salisbury, England
      • England & France in the Reign of Henry I
      • Wales
      • Lincoln, England
      • Norman Lands in Italy & Sicily
    • Late Middle Ages >
      • Forli, Italy
      • Sweden circa 1658
      • Usk, Wales and Cambridge, England
      • Ferrera & Mantuga, Italy
      • Iberian Peninsula 1257-1492
      • England & France 1152-1327
      • Clisson, Anjou, France
      • Brittany, France
      • Florence, Italy
      • England & Wales circa 1399
      • Hainault
    • Roll of Honor >
      • Kingdom of Mercia and Surrounding Kingdoms
      • Byzantine Empire 1000-1100
      • Iberian Peninsula 1257-1492
      • Paris, France
      • Dominions of Cnut
      • Bingen, Germany circa 962 AD
      • Gandersheim, Germany circa 962 AD
      • Military Campaign of Joan of Arc
      • Canossa & Tuscany, Italy
      • Eastern Roman Empire circa 565 AD
      • Duchy of Salerno
  • Members Only
    • The Board
    • Bylaws
    • Meetings
    • Newsletter
    • Pictures
  • Contact