From she-wolf to martyr
Subtitle: the reign and disputed reputation of Johanna I of Naples
By: Elizabeth Casteen
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Published: 2015
Place of publication: Ithaca; London
Language: eng
Number of pages: 296
ISBN-13: 9780801453861
Subjects: Queens; Biography; History
Description: "In 1343 a seventeen-year-old girl named Johanna (1326-1382) ascended the Neapolitan throne, becoming the ruling monarch of one of medieval Europe's most important polities. For nearly forty years, she held her throne and the avid attention of her contemporaries. Their varied responses to her reign created a reputation that made Johanna the most notorious woman in Europe during her lifetime. In 'From she-wolf to martyr,' Elizabeth Casteen examines Johanna's evolving, problematic reputation and uses it as a lens through which to analyze often-contradictory late-medieval conceptions of rulership, authority, and femininity. ... Drawing on a wide range of textual and visual sources, Casteen reconstructs the fourteenth-century conversation about Johanna and tracks the role she played in her time's cultural imaginary. She argues that despite Johanna's modern reputation for indolence and incompetence, she crafted a new model of female sovereignty that many of her contemporaries accepted and even lauded."--Dust jacket.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (pages 267-286) and index.
Table of contents: title: The murder of Andrew of Hungary and the making of a Neapolitan she-wolf; title: From she-wolf to radiant queen : the reign of Louis of Taranto and the rehabilitation of Johanna of Naples; title: A most loving daughter : filial piety and the apogee of Johanna's reign; title: An especially good friend to saints : friendship, politics, and the performance of sovereignty; title: The schism of the western church and the division of Johanna of Naples.