Cultural Networks in the Early Angevin Kingdom of Sicily, 1266–1309

Abstract

The conquest of 1266 and the subsequent maintenance of Angevin rule in the kingdom of Sicily demanded of Charles I that he make political alliances. The purpose of this article is to give three examples of the cultural networks that evolved, almost accidentally, from these political alliances. The first example relates to Adenet le Roi’s most ambitious poem, Cléomadès, produced in 1283 or 1284, which acknowledges the patronage of Count Guy of Flanders, Count Robert II of Artois, and Queen Marie of Brabant, second wife of King Philip III. His three named patrons, along with Philip III, were the most prominent French allies of Charles I in the period immediately after the outbreak of the Sicilian Vespers rebellion. They clearly shared cultural as well as political interests. The second example relates to the copy of al-Razi’s Kitab al-Hâwi, given to Charles I by the emir of Tunis as a result of the 1270 peace treaty made between the two. The Latin translation of this text, made under Charles’s constant supervision, finally reached Paris, where it had an impact on the medical faculty of the university. The third example concerns the effects on Queen Marguerite of Nevers of the saintly way of life she became acquainted with after the marriages of two of her step-children with members of the Hungarian royal family.