9691 Individuals
in our Database | |  | | | QUEEN OF JERUSALEM
Melisende D'Édesse Sex: Female | | | | |  | | Birth Date | 1089 | | Death Date | 1143 Acre, The Holy Land (died from riding accident while hunting near Acre | | Father | Fulk | Born: 1043 | Died: 1109 | | Mother | Bartrada of Montfort | Born: 1059 | Died: 1117 | | Fulk V of Anjou KING of JERUSALEM THE YOUNGER Notes: | Foulques became count of Anjou upon his fathers death in 1109, at the age of approximately twenty. He was originally an opponent of King Henry I of England and a supporter of King Louis VI of France, but in 1127 he allied with Henry when Henry arranged for his daughter Matilda to marry Fulks son Geoffrey of Anjou. Fulk went on crusade in 1120, and become a close friend of the Knights Templar. After his return he began to subsidize the Templars, and maintained two knights in the Holy Land for a year. By 1127 Fulk was preparing to return to Anjou when he received an embassy from King Baldwin II of Jerusalem. Baldwin II had no male heirs but had already designated his daughter Melisende to succeed him. Baldwin II wanted to safeguard his daughters inheritance by marrying her to a powerful lord. Fulk was a wealthy crusader and experienced military commander, and a widower. His experience in the field would prove invaluable in a frontier state always in the grip of war. However, Fulk held out for better terms than mere consort of the Queen; he wanted to be king alongside Melisende. Baldwin II, reflecting on Fulks fortune and military exploits, acquiesced. Fulk abdicated his county seat of Anjou to his son Geoffery and left for Jerusalem, where he married Melisende on June 2, 1129. Later Baldwin II bolstered Melisendes position in the kingdom by making her sole guardian of her son by Fulk, Baldwin III, born in 1130. Fulk and Melisende became joint rulers of Jerusalem in 1131 with Baldwin IIs death. From the start Fulk assumed sole control of the government, excluding Melisende altogether. He favored fellow countrymen from Anjou to the native nobility. The other crusader states to the north feared that Fulk would attempt to impose the suzerainty of Jerusalem over them, as Baldwin II had done; but as Fulk was far less powerful than his deceased father-in-law, the northern states rejected his authority. Melisendes sister Alice of Antioch, exiled from the Principality by Baldwin II, took control of Antioch once more after the death of her father. She allied with Pons of Tripoli and Joscelin II of Edessa to prevent Fulk from marching north in 1132; Fulk and Pons fought a brief battle before peace was made and Alice was exiled again. | | |
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