The Best Laid Plans: Female Succession and the Nascent 12th-Century State

The political history of the middle of the twelfth century saw scholars such as Joseph Strayer, John Baldwin, and C. Warren Hollister apply the ideas of Charles Homer Haskins and others to the question of state formation. Applying Haskins’ ideas about the increasing rationalization of twelfth-century society led to classic works that placed the births of modern institutions and tools of government in this period, with monarchs such as Henry I of England (d. 1135) emerging as the creators of this new form of administrative kingship. In this paper, I will examine what happens in these kingdoms when it becomes apparent that a woman is likely to succeed to the throne, and the lengths to which the leaders of the “state” went to try to ensure orderly successions. The paper is primarily focused on England, but uses cases in medieval Spain, the Latin kingdom of Jerusalem, and the kingdom of Georgia as a comparative framework.