The rebellion failed and Eleanor tried to flee Aquitaine for France, but she was captured en route and returned to King Henry II, who was furious that she had supported their sons. In 1173, three of her sons - Richard, Geoffrey and Henry - attempted to overthrow their father. Around the late 1160s, she left England and returned to Aquitaine. The sons included England's King Richard I (the Lionheart) and his brother John, who became King on Richard's death while one daughter married a duke of Saxony and Bavaria, another the king of Castile, and the third the king of Sicily, ensuring the family's power stretched far and wide.Įleanor reportedly did not get along much better with her second husband than she did her first. Sometimes called the 'grandmother of Europe,' Eleanor had five sons and three daughters with Henry. Just a few weeks later Eleanor married Henry Plantagenet, Duke of Anjou, who became England's King Henry II in 1154 (at which point Aquitaine became an English possession, and remained as such for the next three centuries). They had their marriage annulled in 1152, on the grounds that they were third cousins. The Crusade was largely a failure, demonstrating Louis's lack of military prowess, and the couple was dealing with the added stress of their inability to produce a male heir. In 1147, the marriage began to suffer when they traveled together to join the Second Crusade. When her father died in 1137, 15-year-old Eleanor became Duchess of Aquitaine and inherited a fortune, and soon after she wed France's King Louis VII (at which point Aquitaine became a French territory). This real-life queen of France and England serves as Marie's foil and the source of considerable turmoil, as both women seek to hold and maintain power over their very different kingdoms.Įleanor was born circa 1122 the eldest daughter of William, the 10th Duke of Aquitaine, which was at the time an independent kingdom in modern day Bordeaux, France. In Lauren Groff's novel Matrix, the protagonist Marie (based on 12th century poet Marie de France) spends the majority of her life pining for Eleanor of Aquitaine.

Marie de france matrix