Isabella of Jerusalem
Overview
Biography
(See also Genealogical Table(s): 2.3, 2.4.1, 2.4.2, 4.1, 6, 7.)
Isabella was the daughter of king Amalric I and his second wife, Maria Comnena. In 1180, when she was eight her half-brother Baldwin IV betrothed her to Humphrey IV of Toron, stepson of Reynald of Chatillon and grandson and heir-apparent to Oultrejourdain, through his mother. Isabella’s mother was now married to Balian of Ibelin. The wedding ceremony three years later took place as Saladin besieged Reynald’s castle of Kerak. There were serious differences between the mothers of the young couple, but the groom, then 17, was kind to his bride and she was loyal to him. The accession after Baldwin IV raised difficulties between supporters of Sibylla, Baldwin’s full sister, and Isabella, in 1186. Humphrey, however, who did not want to be king, went to Sibylla and did hommage to her husband Guy de Lusignan, effectively ending the attempt to put Isabella on the throne instead of Sibylla. Isabella succeeded after the death of Sibylla in 1190. But when Sibylla’s husband refused to give up power, Isabella’s supporters insisted she take a more forceful husband. Isabella’s mother persuaded her daughter to give up Humphrey and the marriage was annulled on the grounds that she had been too young when it was arranged and that Humphrey was homosexual. Isabella was then married to Conrad of Montferrat, which effectively negated Guy’s claim, though he retained royal power until 1192, when he was given the kingship of Cyprus and Conrad was finally recognized as king of Jerusalem. But Conrad was assassinated in the same year and, though she was pregnant with Conrad’s child (Maria), Isabella was quickly married to Henry II of Champagne, nephew to king Richard of England, and king Phillip of France. Henry died in 1197 in a fall from a window, and in 1198 Isabella took a fourth husband, Amalric of Lusignan, king of Cyprus [Guy’s brother], who died in 1205. Isabella herself died shortly thereafter and was succeeded as queen of Jerusalem by the child she had had with Conrad, Maria, who was now thirteen. Isabella’s surviving children were all daughters, two from her marriage to Henry, Alice and Philippa – Philippa and her husband Erard de Brienne-Ramerupt would make a strong claim to Champagne but eventually lose to Thibaut IV and his mother, the regent Blanche of Navarre – and two with Amalric of Cyprus, Sibylla, who married Leo I of Armenia, and Melisende, who married Bohemund IV of Antioch. 1
Letters from Isabella of Jerusalem
A letter to Brothers of the hospital of St. Mary of the Teutons (1200)A letter to Henry, prior of the church of the Teutons (1194)
A letter to Henry, prior of the church of the Teutons (1196)
A letter to Public (1193)
A letter to Public (1193)
A letter to Public (1195)
A letter to Public (1197)
A letter to Public (1198)
A letter to Public (1200)