Matilda of Scotland, Queen Consort of England

1079 - 1118  (39 years)

• Name	Matilda of Scotland  [1]
  Suffix	Queen Consort of England
  Birth	1079  [2]
  Gender	Female
  Death	1 May 1118	Westminster, Middlesex, England   [3, 4, 5]
  Burial	St. Peter's, Westminster, Middlesex, England   [3]
  Person ID	I7410	Ancestry of PNH, TNH, and others
  Last Modified	6 Jan 2018

  
  

  Father	Malcolm III Canmore, King of Scotland (Alba),   b. Between 1030 and 1035   d. 13 Nov 1093, Alnwick, Northumberland, England (Age ~ 63 years)
  Mother	St. Margaret of Scotland,   b. Abt 1050   d. 16 Nov 1093, Edinburgh Castle, Edinburgh, Midlothian, Scotland (Age ~ 43 years)
  Marriage	Between 1068 and 1069	Dunfermline, Fife, Scotland   [2, 4]
  Family ID	F3159	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart

  
  

  Family	Henry I, King of England,   b. 1068   d. 1 Dec 1135, Lyon-la-Forêt, near Rouen, Seine-Maritime, Normandy, France (Age 67 years)
  Marriage	11 Nov 1100  [2, 4, 6]
  Children	+ 1. Maud "The Empress",   b. Abt 8 Feb 1102, London, England d. 10 Sep 1167, Rouen, Seine-Maritime, Normandy, France (Age ~ 65 years)
  Family ID	F6341	Group Sheet  |  Family Chart
  Last Modified	6 Jun 2016

  
  

• Notes

  "Although she is usually called Matilda, she was born with the name Eadgyth (Edith), as Orderic Vitalis notes." [The Henry Project] From the Oxford Dictionary of National Biography: Reared at Romsey Abbey in Hampshire but never having taken religious vows, Matilda was the orphaned daughter of Malcolm III (Canmore), king of Scots (d. 1093), and his celebrated queen, the saintly Margaret (d. 1093), and, through Margaret, a direct descendant of Edmund Ironside and the West Saxon kings. Matilda's marriage to Henry would thus have pleased both Scots and Anglo-Saxons. More importantly, however, it reinforced Henry's claim to the throne by providing his children with a direct hereditary link to the old English royal line. The blood of both Alfred and William the Conqueror would flow through them. By an odd chain of circumstances, Matilda was also the god-daughter of Henry's brother, Duke Robert Curthose. [...] She became a widely admired queen, presiding competently as regent over England during Henry's frequent sojourns in Normandy and, through her patronage, making the English royal court a centre for writers and musicians. She commissioned the writing of a history of England by the monks of Malmesbury Abbey, for example, and thus became a benefactor of the great historian William of Malmesbury. She may also have given her patronage to the unknown writer who produced the first major poem to be written in Anglo-Norman French, the Voyage of St Brendan. Moreover, as a spiritual disciple of Anselm, Matilda used her close relationships with both the archbishop and her royal husband to intervene with some effect in the complex negotiations over lay investiture. The impression conveyed by her letters is that while her love of Anselm was deep and genuine, it was exceeded by her devotion to her husband and his policies.

  
  

• Sources

  [S764] Nathaniel L. Taylor, "Dynastic Chronology: Western Europe, X - XIII Centuries.". [S145] Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700 by Frederick Lewis Weis and Walter Lee Sheppard, Jr. 8th edition, William R. Beall & Kaleen E. Beall, eds. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2004, 2006, 2008. [S91] The Henry Project: The Ancestors of King Henry II of England, by Stewart Baldwin, Todd A. Farmerie, and Peter Stewart. [S142] Royal Ancestry: A Study in Colonial and Medieval Families by Douglas Richardson. Salt Lake City, 2013. [S145] Ancestral Roots of Certain American Colonists Who Came to America Before 1700 by Frederick Lewis Weis and Walter Lee Sheppard, Jr. 8th edition, William R. Beall & Kaleen E. Beall, eds. Baltimore: Genealogical Publishing Company, 2004, 2006, 2008., date only. [S76] The Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. Oxford University Press, 2004-ongoing.