The six-year-old girl stood before the English ambassadors, her small hands clasped together, and delivered the words that would seal her fate. When the Earl Marshall of England dropped to his knees before her, she did not flinch. She replied without hesitation, her voice steady beyond her years, stating that if it pleased God and her father for her to become Queen of England, she would be well pleased, for she had been told she would then be a great lady.
With that single, rehearsed response, Isabella of Valois was sold into a destiny that would make her the youngest queen consort in English history, a title she still holds today, more than six centuries later.
Born on November 9, 1389, at the Louvre Palace in Paris, Isabella entered a world of madness and political chaos. Her father, King Charles VI of France, was famously insane, at one point believing he was made of glass. Her mother, Isabeau of Bavaria, has been historically painted as neglectful, though records show she spoiled her children with books and pet parrots.
Isabella was the first of her siblings to survive infancy, followed by seven others who lived to adulthood. The family bond remained strong even when vast distances separated them.
Negotiations for Isabella’s marriage began when she was still an infant, a common practice among European royalty. She was initially engaged to Jean, son of the Count of Anjou. But in 1396, everything changed.
Richard II of England, then 29 years old, had been on the marriage market since his first wife, Anne of Bohemia, died in 1394. The marriage was a political tool, designed to promote peace between England and France amid the on-again, off-again Hundred Years War. Richard had already turned down three other French princesses who were not daughters of the king, holding out for a direct royal match.
Historians have long debated why a childless king would accept a bride who could not provide an heir for years. Some argue that Richard was still in genuine mourning for Anne of Bohemia and sought a platonic marriage. Others suggest he wanted to emulate Edward the Confessor, who was believed by some to have lived a pure, unconsummated life with his queen for religious reasons.
Richard himself offered little explanation, only stating that he was young enough to wait for children. He had become king at age ten himself, perhaps viewing early elevation to majesty differently than most.
The marriage treaty was extraordinary in its financial terms. England and France agreed to a 28-year truce. Isabella was given a dowry of 800,000 francs, with 300,000 payable upon the marriage and the rest in installments.
If she refused the marriage, Richard would keep the entire amount. If he rejected her, he would have to return twice that sum. Isabella was to receive 500,000 francs for herself, but if she had daughters and no sons, the entire dowry would be used for those girls when their turns came to marry.
The couple’s children were to have no claims on the French throne.
Isabella was granted lands worth 6,666 pounds, 13 shillings, and 4 pence per year from her new husband, far exceeding the 4,500 pounds typically given to English queens. These lands included holdings once owned by the deceased Earl of Pembroke, including Pembroke Castle in Wales, where Henry Tudor would later be born. The financial stakes were immense, and the little girl was the centerpiece of a transaction that would shape the future of two warring kingdoms.
The proxy marriage took place on March 12, 1396, with the Earl Marshall of England standing in for Richard. Isabella was betrothed and despaired, as the chronicler Jean Froissart wrote, and the lady ever after was styled Queen of England. Froissart noted that even at her young age, she knew well how to act the queen.
When the ambassadors took their leave and returned to England, they were joyfully received by the king and his court.
Later that year, Richard traveled to France to collect his bride. During a dinner with Charles VI, the issue of Isabella’s age arose. Richard brushed it away, telling his father-in-law that the age of his wife pleased him right well, that he paid no attention to her age as he valued their love and the unity of their subjects.
He declared that no king in Christendom could hurt them now. With that, the handover was complete. Isabella was placed in a rich litter prepared for her, attended by the Lady of Coucy and the duchesses of Lancaster, York, Gloucester, and Ireland.
On All Saints Day, October 31, 1396, just days shy of Isabella’s seventh birthday, the marriage was solemnized by the Archbishop of Canterbury in the Church of St. Nicholas at Calais. Another source, the St.
Albans Chronicle, places the marriage on November 4, but either way, the bride was not yet seven years old. She was now England’s youngest ever queen consort, a title she still holds to this day. For the handover, she wore a blue velvet dress decorated with fur and an expensive crown on her head.
A little over two weeks after her arrival in England, Isabella was formally welcomed into London. She spent one night in the Tower of London, then processed through the streets toward Westminster Palace in great pomp. The Londoners gave her great presents, but some were crushed to death in the rush to see her.
It is doubtful Isabella knew much about this tragedy. A tournament was organized at Westminster for Candlemas, and she was crowned queen in Westminster Abbey on January 7, 1397.
Isabella was installed at Windsor Castle with a staff to care for her, including the Lady de Coucy as governess. Some staff members were inherited from Anne of Bohemia’s time as queen. She received jewels to wear that reflected her status, some of which may have once adorned Anne, much like the Tudor consort necklace worn by four of Henry VIII’s wives.
Despite her youth, she took part in standard queenly duties, including petitioning for pardons for convicted criminals from her husband, though the names were likely chosen for her by others.
Her relationship with Richard was thankfully paternal rather than romantic. He spoiled her with gifts, including an engagement ring of sapphire and ruby. She reciprocated with presents, though it is hard to imagine a seven-year-old directing the creation or selection of such items.
She was devoted to Richard by all accounts, viewing him as a father or older brother figure. They communicated in French, as Richard was born in Bordeaux and spoke the language fluently.
In early 1399, as Richard prepared for a campaign in Ireland, he dismissed Lady de Coucy, who was suspected of stealing the queen’s possessions, and installed his niece, Eleanor Holland, Lady Mortimer, in her place. Before he left in late May, Richard and Isabella shared what contemporaries described as a touching farewell. Richard took the queen in his arms and kissed her more than forty times, saying sorrowfully, Adieu, madame, until we meet again.
Isabella wept, asking if he would leave her there. Richard’s eyes filled with tears, and he promised she would join him later.
They parted with wine and comforts, and Richard lifted her from the ground, holding her a long while in his arms, kissing her at least ten more times. The chronicler wrote that he never saw so great a lord make so much of nor show such affection to a lady as did King Richard and his queen. Great pity it was that they separated, for never saw they each other anymore.
Isabella was miserable for weeks after he left, hoping to join him across the Irish Sea as he had promised.
Those plans were overtaken by events. Richard had exiled his paternal first cousin, Henry Bolingbroke, to France in 1398. Henry had spent time with Isabella’s father, Charles VI.
In late June 1399, Henry left France and returned to England, taking advantage of Richard’s absence. At first, he claimed he was only there to reclaim his lands. But events moved swiftly, and he gathered significant support among English lords who favored deposition.
Richard returned to England in late July to find a kingdom where resistance to Bolingbroke had already been broken. He ended up in Henry’s custody by the end of August and was sent to Chester, then Westminster, then the Tower of London. At first, it seemed Henry would only assist Richard in ruling.
That facade did not last long. Richard was forced to abdicate on September 29, 1399, in favor of his cousin, who became Henry IV. The new reign was confirmed by Parliament the following day, and Henry was crowned on October 13.
This action would set off the Wars of the Roses. For Isabella, it meant she was no longer queen. She was initially held at Wallingford Castle, then moved to Sonning near Reading in January 1400.
Henry IV ordered 400 pounds for her expenses that August, indicating she was kept in style. There were attempts to restore Richard early in the year, during which rebels appealed to Isabella for assistance, but they were quickly put down. Richard died under suspicious circumstances at Pontefract Castle on February 14, 1400, rumored to have been starved to death.
Isabella was now a widow at age ten. Under the terms of her marriage treaty, she should have been sent home to France with 200,000 francs and much of her property, including jewels. But Henry IV could not afford the expense and was interested in keeping her as a bride for his son, the future Henry V.
Charles VI refused this new match for his daughter. When it was put to Isabella, despite her youth, she showed great spirit and loyalty to Richard, who she did not yet know was dead, and refused to countenance it.
This was important because she was closing in on her twelfth birthday, when she would be able to give or withhold consent to a union. It would have been tricky to force a princess of France and a dowager queen of England into another marriage against her will without risking that marriage being declared void. She continued to be well treated by the new king and was housed at Havering-atte-Bower in Essex until the terms of her return to France were finally agreed upon.
On July 21, 1401, Isabella arrived home dressed in mourning blacks for the husband she now knew was deceased. She took some of her jewels with her, but the part of her dowry already sent to England was never repaid. Despite her widowed status, she was a child of eleven and was sent back to her mother, Isabeau, whom she had not seen for nearly five years.
The future Henry V, who had been suggested as a second husband, would later marry Isabella’s little sister Catherine, making them the only pair of sisters to both become queens consort of England.
On June 29, 1406, when Isabella was sixteen, she entered into her second child marriage. This time, the groom was the youngster. He was her eleven-year-old cousin, Charles, Count of Angoulême, who later became Duke of Orleans in 1407, making Isabella its duchess.
The youth of her second husband explains why it was several years before she became pregnant. She conceived in December 1408, less than a month after her husband turned fourteen, the youngest age a boy was allowed to sleep with his wife.
On September 13, 1409, at age nineteen, Isabella died giving birth to her only child, a daughter named Joan. She was buried in the Chapel of Notre-Dame de Bonne-Nouvelle at the Abbey of Saint-Lomer, now the Church of Saint-Nicholas. Her body was rediscovered in 1624 and moved to the Orleans Chapel in the convent of the Celestines in Paris.
Her grave was later destroyed during the French Revolution, leaving nothing left of England’s youngest ever queen consort.
Her daughter Joan grew up to marry John II, Duke of Alençon, who was the son of Isabella’s first fiancé. Joan died in 1432 of unknown causes, having had no known children. Isabella’s second husband lived until 1465 and had three more children by his third wife, including Louis XII of France, who was briefly married to Henry VII’s sister Mary.
Isabella herself has made little impact on history books or literature. When William Shakespeare wrote his play on Richard’s life two hundred years later, he presented the little queen as a fully grown woman, perhaps balking at the idea of putting a six-year-old on stage.
This is the story of England’s child queen, Isabella of Valois. Used as a pawn from a shockingly young age, she was queen for less than three years, part of a marriage that raised eyebrows even in the fourteenth century. Ultimately and tragically, it was all for nothing.
Her life was a series of transactions, each one stripping away another piece of her childhood, until there was nothing left but a grave that no longer exists.
