Much more pertinently, we have Johanna’s own account of the murder from a letter she wrote to her allies in Florence:
An unutterable crime, a prodigious iniquity, a sin inexpiable, hateful to God and horrifying to mortality, perpetrated with inhuman ferocity and the shedding of innocent blood, by the hands of miscreants, has been committed on the person of our hitherto lord and husband.
On the 18th of this month, our lord and husband, late at the hour of retiring, would have gone down to a certain garden adjoining the gallery of our palace at Aversa, unwisely and unsuspecting, boy-like rather (as often, both there and elsewhere, at doubtful hours, he was wont to do), taking no advice, merely following the rash impulse of youth, not permitting a companion, but closing the door after him. We had been awaiting him, and owing to his too long delay, had been some time overtaken by sleep. His nurse, a good and respected woman, took a light to search anxiously (for him), and at length discovered him close to the wall of the said garden, strangled. It is impossible for us to describe our tribulation. And albeit from the vile perpetrator of this unheard-of crime is sought by stern justice done (already) whatever can be extracted or ascertained [she refers to Tomasso Mambriccio, who had already been executed for the crime]; nevertheless, viewing the atrocity of his deed, the severity must be considered mild…. He carried out his outlandish crime with the aid of a menial who is not yet caught. The villain adduced for motive of his setting on, that he had brought upon himself the punishment of death by designing against our former lord and husband …
When, therefore, we find ourselves, in consequence of such a disaster, environed by perplexities, it is our trust, relying on God, Holy Church, and our faithful subjects and allies, that the guidance of divine mercy and the grace of God’s pity will not be lacking to us. (Dated at Aversa, on September 22, under our secret seal.)44
Johanna’s account is notable for scrupulously observing the proprieties (referring to Andrew as her ‘lord and husband’) while at the same time getting in a merciless dig at Andrew’s immaturity and ‘boy-like’ behaviour. She expressed her horror at the crime, but she also made it plain that Andrew was not fit to be king. She was more diplomatic when she wrote to Andrew’s brother Louis the Great of Hungary: ‘I have suffered such intense anguish by the murder of my beloved husband, that, stunned by grief, I wellnigh died of the same wounds.’45
She was wise to justify herself in this way, because the crime caused horror throughout Europe. Petrarch best expressed the shock everyone felt over the death. He lamented at how quickly Naples had changed and what had happened at ‘unhappy Aversa’, writing that he wished Andrew had been killed by ‘a sword, or another manly way, so that he was killed by the hands of men, not torn by the claws and teeth of wild beasts’.46
There were abundant factions in the court who might have desired Andrew’s death before his coronation, and the fact that Andrew was lured from the very room he shared with Johanna, yet she claimed to be sleeping and know nothing about the crime, was highly suspicious. The people of Naples immediately blamed Johanna, and various chroniclers and commentators also believed the queen was responsible, either personally or through acquiescence. Johanna herself, in the elliptical reference quoted in her letter above, accused Tommaso Mambriccio, Andrew’s chamberlain, of carrying out the murder, but even if this were true, Tommaso could only have been acting at the instigation of others. The Hungarians blamed the Angevin royal family in general, not surprisingly, considering that the central problem of the court was whether or to what extent Andrew would be king alongside or instead of his Neapolitan cousins, and they had a vested interest in removing him.
The Hungarian branch of the family were quick to make the connection between Johanna’s presumed involvement in the murder, her alleged immorality and the fundamental illegitimacy of Neapolitan Angevin rule. Elisabeth of Hungary, Louis the Great and Andrew’s mother, was the early standard bearer for the Hungarian position. She wrote numerous letters to Pope Clement and by summer 1346 had explicitly accused Johanna of the murder, and further demanded that she be deposed and Naples given to Louis the Great.
Elisabeth, and numerous contemporaries seizing on similar arguments, drew on a long and inglorious literary tradition about female rulers, female morality and the inherent ‘danger’ of uncontrolled female sexuality. The most striking image in this arsenal is that of the ‘she-wolf’ (lupa), which was also slang for a prostitute. Boccaccio wrote an allegorical poetic account of a pregnant she-wolf representing Johanna who murdered the prince ‘Alexis’, and the term had already been applied to Isabella, the wife of Edward II of England. The tradition would culminate with Shakespeare’s condemnation of Margaret of Anjou, Angevin wife of Henry VI, who became the most notorious she-wolf in English history and literature. The accusations against Johanna quickly and inevitably linked the murder to immorality and other sexual crimes, and contemporaries described her as the ‘harlot-queen’ and gave detailed accounts of her multiple partners in adultery as well as her personal involvement in the murder.47
The pope, however, stood by Johanna, and the factions within Italy that tended to support the pope generally accepted her innocence. This was an interesting historical juncture, since Clement repeatedly insisted on his rights as overlord of Naples, and if he had decided to condemn Johanna and remove her from the throne, he could have given the kingdom to Louis the Great (as Louis frequently requested) and perhaps spared the kingdom much turmoil. On balance, it seems probable that Clement truly believed in Johanna’s innocence, since nothing in his later behaviour suggests that his support of her was opportunistic, and supporting Louis would likely have been the easier option.
Clement was genuinely interested in punishing the murderers, so he sent commissioners to Naples with judicial authority. Tomasso Mambriccio had been executed before they arrived, and much more importantly Charles of Durazzo took it upon himself to arrest many of Johanna’s friends and supporters, including even Robert the Wise’s illegitimate son Charles of Artois. By the summer of 1346, the papal delegates had arrived and they swiftly began a reign of terror. No one believed that Tomasso Mambriccio was solely responsible, and it was rumoured that his tongue had been cut out before his execution to prevent him naming anyone else. Now Johanna’s servants and even members of the royal family like Charles of Artois’s own son were publicly tortured, broken on the wheel and finally burnt at the stake.48
Charles of Durazzo had attempted to stay ahead of events by hosting the inquiries in his own palace, and it was he who had executed Tomasso Mambriccio so quickly (before he could implicate Charles?), but as fear mounted of a Hungarian invasion he needed another suspect. He joined those who sought to shift suspicion to Johanna, and she became a virtual prisoner in the Castel dell’Ovo. In light of his marriage to Johanna’s sister, Charles certainly had an eye on the possibility that he could become king of Naples if Johanna were imprisoned or removed from the throne, but he seems to have underestimated the Hungarian threat and failed to realize that Louis the Great had the same idea.
Johanna had given birth to a son in December 1345, which would have seemed to be a cause for celebration and to provide stability for the dynasty. She sent an envoy to Hungary with the news, but the response was this chilling statement from Louis:
Your former ill-faith, your impudent assumption of the government of the kingdom, the vengeance you have neglected to take, the excuse made for it, all prove you to have been accessory to the death of your husband. Be sure, however, that none ever escape retribution for such a crime.49
Louis had now joined his mother in explicitly linking Johanna’s ‘usurpation’ of the kingdom to her guilt for Andrew’s death, and it was clear that she would need to marshal support for herself and her son. She had named him Charles Martel, after Carobert’s father and Louis the Great’s grandfather, but this reference to his right of descent through the Hungarian line, as well as through Johanna, probably only inflamed Louis’s belief that Johanna should be depose
d. Louis was marshalling his forces and gathering support in central Europe and Italy for an invasion, but where could Johanna look for help?
The Hungarian Invasion of Italy
Johanna may have formed a plan very early on, for only weeks after Andrew’s death a petition was sent to the pope requesting dispensation for her to marry her cousin Robert of Taranto. Naturally when this became known, it was taken by some as evidence of Johanna’s guilt, since she was attempting to replace Andrew with indecent haste. There are two points to bear in mind: first, that the origin of the petition isn’t clear and it may have been sent at the instigation of Robert, rather than Johanna; and second, as is stressed repeatedly in any study of medieval relationships, marriage – and most especially royal marriage – was a political and financial arrangement with no basis in romance or any notion of ‘love’. True, remarrying only weeks after a previous husband had been murdered would be in bad taste, but as Johanna’s kingdom was in turmoil and facing a Hungarian invasion, she desperately needed political support, and neutralizing her cousins of Taranto, potentially her most dangerous enemies, through a marriage alliance was a sensible approach.
The pope refused permission for Johanna to marry Robert, but in a move that does appear to be part of a carefully calculated strategy, either by Johanna or the Tarantini, Robert’s younger brother Louis of Taranto now came to the fore. Louis commanded a body of Neapolitan troops and had been asked to come to Naples to restore order, and it was now proposed that Johanna marry him instead. Charles of Durazzo in turn barred the city gates against Louis, because clearly he still believed he could claim the throne if Johanna were deposed, and her marriage to Louis of Taranto would provide a significant stumbling block to his ambitions.
Contemporary rumour had smeared Johanna’s name with accusations of adultery even before Andrew’s murder, and now these only increased. She had allegedly had adulterous affairs with both Robert and Louis of Taranto (amongst many others), so her enemies looked on her attempts to marry one of them as proof of her infidelity. Application was made to the pope for dispensation for Johanna to marry Louis, which again was refused. The maelstrom of Angevin family politics seemed to reach its most chaotic moment now, with all the branches, represented by Johanna, Louis of Taranto, Charles of Durazzo and Louis the Great of Hungary openly vying for the throne. Louis of Taranto successfully entered Naples in spite of Charles of Durazzo, and by August 1347 he was living with Johanna in the royal residence. They ignored the pope’s refusal to sanction their marriage, and on 22 August they married privately.
We can never know the true circumstances of their marriage, but contemporaries found the liaison highly irregular, variously criticizing the union as adulterous, illegal, immoral and incestuous. That the marriage was wrong everyone agreed, but who was responsible? Although many continued to accuse Johanna of murdering Andrew so she could marry her adulterous lover Louis, others criticized Louis as the instigator of the irregular marriage. Domenico da Gravina went so far as to accuse the family of Taranto of scheming to marry Johanna, with the brothers Robert and Louis competing for her hand. He even suggests that Louis may have raped Johanna to force the marriage, a course of action that had already been and would again be used against Johanna’s sister.50 Johanna’s rapid remarriage was the last straw for Louis the Great, and he finally launched his invasion of Italy.
Louis was involved in a war over Zara, that perennial bone of contention between Hungary and Venice since the time of the Fourth Crusade. The papacy was constantly in conflict with Venice in the 14th century (there had even been a Crusade against the Venetians), and there was a risk for Johanna that the pope would seek an alliance with Louis the Great, who had extended his realm to the shores of the Adriatic and could be a useful ally. Indeed, Louis had been writing to the pope constantly in the aftermath of Andrew’s murder seeking Johanna’s condemnation and deposition, and the pope may have been tempted to agree. However, Louis had already angered the pope by his support for the Emperor Ludwig of Bavaria, and now he ended any hope of papal favour by reaching an agreement with the Venetians. They, aware of Louis’s main priority, offered to transport his army across the Adriatic if he would abandon the siege of Zara, and Louis accepted. One detachment of the Hungarian army had already invaded, and now the main body arrived in force. Louis himself made a progress through the peninsula, being feted in Padua, Mantua and even traditionally pro-Angevin Florence, where Villani – convinced of Johanna’s guilt – approvingly described the banquets and celebrations.
Although Louis of Taranto led a small force to attempt to resist the Hungarians, he had no success, and it was plain that Naples would fall. Johanna was now pregnant with Louis’s child, and decided to flee. She would seek protection with the pope, but the sea journey to Provence was too dangerous for the infant Charles Martel, so she left him with the papal legate. She ordered the city to surrender to Louis the Great to avoid being sacked, and on 16 January 1348 she took ship to Provence.
Louis of Taranto challenged Louis the Great to single combat, but it seems to have been the Hungarian king who found a way to avoid the challenge without even the farce that Charles of Anjou and Peter of Aragon went through. It was clear enough that there would be no resistance to the Hungarian invasion, so Louis the Great would have been foolish indeed to accept such a challenge. As all the Angevin allies fell away, Louis of Taranto, advised by the increasingly influential Niccolo Acciaiuoli, decided to join Johanna in Avignon, and the two left Naples. This was portrayed by many chroniclers as cowardice, especially on Louis’s part, and it tainted his reputation when he did return to Naples.51
Louis the Great, now at Benevento, received the submission of Robert of Taranto and Charles of Durazzo, who had decided to try their luck remaining in the kingdom and blaming Johanna for the murder. Louis received them graciously, and they accompanied him to Aversa where he wished to see the place of his brother’s death. It was here that Louis took his vengeance on the man he blamed for the murder. Giovanni da Bazzano – who argued that Charles of Durazzo was innocent of the crime – described the scene in detail, with Louis demanding to be shown the balcony from which Andrew was thrown, then furiously turning on Charles of Durazzo and murdering him, then throwing his body from the balcony in a parody of Andrew’s death.52
Louis’s savage action alienated the Neapolitan nobles, who refused to support him when he declared himself king. Louis’s actions in Naples did not seem to be those of someone who believed he was assuming his rightful throne or planned to reign for long, as he persecuted locals and relied upon Hungarian and German supporters for his new administration rather than forming relationships with Neapolitans.
Louis’s actions certainly offended the pope, whose authority over Naples had been flouted, and he now publicly denounced Louis as well as taking more practical measures. Petrarch himself carried papal instructions to the northern Italian cities to refuse Louis passage should he attempt to leave the peninsula.
Johanna was delayed in Provence and arrived in Avignon just after Louis of Taranto, and shortly before the Black Death. One of Petrarch’s correspondents – amongst others – declared that the plague was a physical manifestation of the queen’s iniquity.53 Johanna’s situation was desperate, since she was widely believed to have murdered Andrew and she would require not only papal belief in her innocence, but full papal backing with monetary and military support to regain her throne. Fortunately for Johanna, there never seems to have been any doubt about Clement’s support for her, and she was received at the papal court and allowed to defend herself in a closed papal consistory before the pope and cardinals, leading to Clement’s public declaration of her innocence.
One reason for Johanna’s warm reception at the papal court was financial. Florentine bankers were heavily involved in financing Charles of Anjou’s conquest of Sicily and had subsidized the Angevins ever since, to their detriment under Robert the Wise and Johanna. They also funded the papacy, and one of the important banking ho
uses was that of the Acciaiuoli, whose scion Niccolo rose to power through his work in Greece for Catherine of Valois-Courteney, where he managed the claims of the Tarantini with great success, and he was now Louis of Taranto’s chief supporter.54 The fact that Niccolo was securing lucrative contracts for Florentine merchants in Naples that would help them recoup some of the losses suffered under Robert and Johanna, and secure future funding, would have substantially improved Johanna’s prospects should she return to power, and must have been a factor in Clement’s decision to back her rather than Louis the Great.
Another financial consideration was more pertinent. As we know, Avignon belonged to the Angevins, but as it had been the residence of the papacy for several decades, the popes were eager to secure it for themselves. In May, Clement arranged to buy the city from Johanna for 80,000 florins, providing her with money to fund her return to Naples, and the pope with outright ownership of his home. Niccolo may have been behind this arrangement, and even if Johanna and Louis proposed the deal themselves, Niccolo would certainly have organized the complex financial arrangements it required.
Johanna quickly cleared herself of the murder charge, but she had still married Louis without papal consent, which she required as a papal vassal, or the dispensation required because they were cousins. Clement was well disposed towards Johanna, but Louis’s connections to the Acciaiuoli must also have been a factor in the swift approval given to Johanna’s choice of him as her new husband. It would also have been behind Clement’s decision on 30 March to award Louis, like Fulk Réchin before him, the Golden Rose as the leading figure at the papal court on the fourth Sunday in Lent.55
Angevin Dynasties of Europe 900-1500 Page 39