Bertha of Avenay
Overview
Biography
(See also Genealogical Table(s): 1.)Bertha was a Carolingian princess, the daughter of Ermengard and Lothar I. As abbess of Avenay, she incurred the wrath of Hincmar of Reims, who took the part of the brothers of the monastery of Altvillar against her. They had accused her of seizing possessions of their, but she insisted that his men had first attacked her monastery and her mother, the queen, defended her version. Apparently, she ultimately won, as Jo Ann McNamara notes: “ Bertha of Avenay, whose territorial claims against the powerful archbishop Hincmar of Reims were sealed in the peace treaty between the warring sons of Louis the Pious in 851.”1