by Penny Lawne
There are very few surviving reminders of Joan. The chapel at Stamford where she was buried no longer exists and there are no traces of her tomb. The only surviving contemporary picture of her is the stylised representation of her in the St Albans Abbey book of benefactors, while the boss in the ceiling in the chapel of Our Lady Undercroft at Canterbury Cathedral, if indeed it is intended to be Joan, is of insufficient detail and quality to be a good likeness. None of her possessions survive, nor any of the records made and kept for her. There is only one copy of her seal. The castles and palace she spent most time in and considered her homes, Castle Donington, Berkhamsted, Kennington and Wallingford, are either ruins or no longer visible at all. The most enduring image is the white hart emblem adopted by her son, Richard. Despite the emphasis which Joan had encouraged him to place on his paternal ancestry, he chose his mother’s emblem of the chained and crowned white hart as his personal badge. Richard’s use of the white hart is generally considered to have been formally publicly adopted at the Smithfield tournament held in 1390, five years after Joan’s death, and it then became frequently used, appearing on buildings, the royal barge, banners, textiles and seals.147 There can be little doubt that his adoption of Joan’s emblem was Richard’s way of honouring his mother.
15
Conclusion: Joan’s Legacy
So absolute she seems
And in herself complete, so well to know
Her own, that what she wills to do or say
Seems wisest, virtuousest, discreetest, best.
Milton, Paradise Lost
Within a few years of Joan’s death, commenting on the role of women in society, the writer Christine de Pizan described in detail the behaviour expected of a noblewoman in her book The Treasure of the City of Ladies or The Book of the Three Virtues (Le Livre des Trois Vertus).1 Acknowledging that women were regarded as weak and irrational, subject to temptation, and expected to be obedient and quiet in public, Christine counselled noblewomen that as wives and mothers they should obey their husbands, run the household and bring up the children. But Christine also advised her readers that noblewomen should retain their independence and provide counsel to their husbands and children, and in their husband’s absence they should take his place, and run the estates to safeguard the family’s well-being and prestige. There was a balance to be struck between taking a subservient role to their husband and maintaining their own independence and integrity. Christine’s advice for a princess was more circumspect: she should be loyal and true to her husband, incline her heart towards humility, ‘behave respectably and speak softly, her conduct will be kindly and her expression gentle and pleasant … she will be patient … she will be an advocate and mediator between the prince her husband or her child if she is a widow and her people’, distribute gifts with great discretion and prudence, and ‘in neither word nor deed, appearance, ornaments nor bearing, conduct, social pomp or expression will there be anything for which she could be reproached or criticised’ for ‘above all things a princess should love honour and a good reputation’.2 Christine could have been describing Joan, and it is tempting to speculate that Christine might have had her in mind when she was writing. The respect and affection in which Joan was held, and the popularity of her public persona, made her a role model for her contemporaries; as Princess of Wales she had become almost universally esteemed and admired for her quiet dignity, unfailing tact and discretion, her loyalty and devotion, and her gentle persuasiveness and conciliation skills.3
Joan also provided contemporaries with a different kind of role model, as her beauty and her circumstances made casting her in the role of romantic heroine irresistible for writers like Froissart, Jean le Bel and Chandos Herald. The love affair with Thomas Holand, his dispute with William Montague and the whirlwind courtship with the prince firmly established her allure, and her romantic credentials were only enhanced by the shadow cast over her by the dubious nature of the legality of her marriage to Holand. Like many of the heroines in the popular romances, such as Guinevere in the story of Arthur, Joan was flawed. The combined attributes of her beauty, royal blood and tangled marital history were an irresistible combination which they embellished to present Joan as an idealised and fascinating heroine. In an age of chivalry, with its emphasis on status and beauty, Joan embodied the perfect chivalric knight’s consort, and it was hardly surprising that so many romantic stories cast Joan in the leading role. Froissart and Jean le Bel used Joan in their tales, as both one of the fair ladies for whom the chivalric knights at Valenciennes swore to wear an eyepatch until they had performed worthy deeds, and the young, beautiful and vulnerable Countess of Salisbury who defended Wark Castle until rescued by Edward III. Having firmly established Joan as a romantic heroine, subsequent writers were not slow to follow suit, and two centuries later Vergil seamlessly identified Joan as the inspiration for the founding of the Order of the Garter.
Such writings posthumously distanced and undermined the favourable reputation Joan had acquired during her lifetime. Joan was never the helpless beauty of the romantic stories she became associated with; she was both more complicated and more appealing, and had worked hard to acquire the universal approbation she enjoyed when she died. Joan’s early life was a complex mix of great privilege with considerable hardship. Born into a wealthy and royal family, her early childhood was blighted by the execution of her father and her mother’s subsequent obsession with the family estates. Adopted into the royal household and to a large extent abandoned by her mother, Joan was isolated and vulnerable, and seduced when she was barely into her teens by an attractive but unscrupulous young man. If she ever regretted her marriage to Thomas Holand she never showed it. This tough, ambitious career soldier was the great love of her life. In the ensuing nine years, as she grew into a young woman, she was bullied by her mother and uncle, forced into a bigamous marriage, incarcerated by her new husband and his family, abandoned by her foster parents and ostracised by society. Bravely defying her family and the pressures imposed on her, Joan showed tremendous strength of character and determination in her resolve to honour her marriage to Thomas Holand. She endured years of shameful treatment at the hands of the very people who should have been caring for her, becoming estranged from her immediate family. During that time her experience within the royal circle was in complete contrast to the chivalric ideal being fostered by Edward III, and she could only have been an embarrassment to him, reminding him of his failure to protect her and of his inadequacies with regard to the fate of her father. Joan’s stubborn loyalty to Thomas was in the end the deciding factor in ensuring their marriage was finally recognised and she then willingly followed him to war-torn France, embracing her life as a soldier’s wife and balancing her duties as his wife and the mother of his children. When her brother John died, the obligations and responsibilities of managing the vast Kent estates she inherited did not alter her determination to accompany her husband. When Thomas died, Joan had the freedom to live as she wanted for the first time in her life but she turned the focus of her love and concern to her family, and when her cousin proposed marriage she had no hesitation in accepting, knowing that the marriage would secure her children’s futures.
Joan made the most spectacular marriage of her generation when she married the prince, and it has always been regarded as a love match which defied convention. Yet in many ways it was an extremely suitable match, particularly for the prince – a fortunate combination of personal choice and expediency. The most difficult and controversial aspect of their marriage was Joan’s marital history, and they were both fully aware that her somewhat scandalous reputation could cause difficulties. The prince and his father took the steps they considered necessary to secure the legality of the match, but for Joan the consequences were more personal. The prince’s love for Joan is well documented, but it has never been clear that she reciprocated his feelings to the same degree, and it is unlikely that she ever felt the same intensity of love that she had experienced with Thomas Holan
d. Marrying the prince meant becoming Princess of Wales, and this was both an opportunity and a burden for Joan. From the beginning of their marriage and up to her death Joan knew what was expected of her and she was at pains to both fulfil those expectations and to diminish the notoriety caused by her marital history. That she was right to do so is apparent from the gossip recounted by the chronicler Adam Usk in 1399, around the time of Richard’s deposition (‘… concerning whose birth [Richard’s] many unsavoury things were commonly said, namely that he was not born of a father of the royal line, but of a mother given to slippery ways – to say nothing of many other things I have heard’), implying that her behaviour had been shameful, dishonourable, even outrageous.4 If Henry of Bolingbroke had been able to prove Richard’s illegitimacy in 1399, his claim to the throne would have been greatly strengthened. That Joan was successful is also clear, as she gained such approval and respect from her contemporaries that even the most ardent of Henry of Bolingbroke’s supporters did not attempt to foster the slander to her reputation.
Joan’s personality was a substantial contributory factor to her success as Princess of Wales. She was by nature gentle, warm and loving, a natural peacemaker with an innate ability to get on well with people and an inborn modesty and diffidence. During her marriages to Thomas Holand and the prince Joan was content to be dominated by and dictated to by her husbands, partly because this was a role which suited her personality but also because she loved them and knew and understood what was required of her. As the prince’s wife she behaved as he expected, quietly and with dignity, choosing to exercise her tremendous influence with restraint. Uninterested in political power, she never considered using the considerable influence she had with Richard for her own purposes after the prince died, and continued to conduct herself as she felt was expected of her. Yet, as she had shown in her youth, Joan was also courageous and independently minded, and prepared to fight for what she considered important. She relied on her own judgement and risked her reputation to come to Gaunt’s aid in February 1377, sheltering him from the wrathful London mob in the wake of the row with the Bishop of London and so ensuring her brother-in-law’s survival, an act of tremendous political significance. She showed she had lost none of her personal bravery when she insisted on remaining at Richard’s side during the Peasants’ Revolt. But throughout Joan chose to use her influence judiciously and discreetly. Her great gift was her capacity for love and loyalty; in her personal life she attracted the lifelong devotion of friends and retainers, and made few, if any, enemies. With these attributes it is not surprising that she grew to be generally admired and loved.
Joan’s most famous legacy was her son, Richard. Once it became clear that the prince would not live to succeed his father, Joan devoted herself to the future of their son, to the extent that she was prepared to suppress the interests of her older sons until Richard was secure on his throne. Much of her influence was beneficial. Her popularity and her good relationship with Gaunt eased Richard’s peaceful succession; Gaunt’s support for Richard’s accession was crucial, and although his loyalty to his brother had never been in doubt there were many who feared he would not support the son and would make a bid for the throne himself. That Gaunt was so stalwart in his support of his nephew was in no small measure due to the affectionate and fond relationship he enjoyed with Joan, and their mutual trust and respect. Gaunt would never forget that his sister-in-law had been willing to risk her own safety and reputation in coming to his aid in February 1377. Once Richard became king his relationship with his powerful uncle was never an easy one, neither being comfortable with the other, and on several occasions their relationship fractured, with potentially serious political consequences; while she was alive, Joan’s intervention was crucial in restoring accord between them. During the early years of Richard’s kingship, his mother’s conciliatory skills and her calm, authoritative and quiet tact helped achieve political harmony. She was a natural peacemaker with instinctive and natural warmth which enabled her to work quietly and effectively behind the scenes. Gentle and unassuming, Joan was generally respected as an influence for moderation and good sense.
Joan also forged strong friendships. Gaunt was not the only powerful magnate with whom she built a lasting friendship. Perhaps nowhere is her pleasant and gentle character better revealed than in the relationship she enjoyed with William Montague. Despite being married to him against her will and imprisoned by him, despite William’s humiliation in having their marriage annulled, Joan and William remained on good terms throughout her life, forging a close bond that was never broken. Throughout her marriage to the prince William was welcomed as one of the prince’s leading commanders, and maintained a regular presence among the prince’s entourage, while after the prince’s death William’s loyalty and devotion to Richard was marked and he became one of the young king’s most important supporters. There was never any doubt of William’s allegiance. The families stayed close, with William’s son (also called William) becoming brother-in-law to Joan’s eldest son Thomas when he married Elizabeth, daughter of the Earl of Arundel. Joan’s ability to maintain friendly relations with so many of the nobility was an undoubted factor in maintaining stability and accord among the conflicting interests.
Joan fostered family unity, maintaining close ties with her other brothers-in-law, Thomas of Woodstock and Edmund of Langley, while encouraging Richard’s Holand brothers and sisters to stay close to their brother. Joan knew that undue favouritism could be deeply divisive and damaging to Richard as a young king, and she ensured that no special partiality was shown to any one individual, in particular that her Holand sons were not seen to benefit from their brother’s status. Joan was remarkably successful in her management of her Holand sons, as both could reasonably have expected more preferential treatment from their brother after his accession, and might well have felt considerable resentment at their mother’s restraint, but both were to be loyal to Richard throughout their lives. Joan also ensured that Richard was surrounded by loyal and devoted retainers, men who were also cultured, literary and erudite, like Simon Burley, Lewis Clifford, John Clanvowe, Sir John Montague, Richard Stury and Philip la Vache.5 She provided a stable, unobtrusive, moderating and harmonious influence and her presence at Richard’s side throughout his earliest years as king, giving him support and guidance – and during the Peasants’ Revolt, when she encouraged in him the confidence and the resolve with which he faced the rebels – was invaluable. Joan was also, unusually, prepared to quietly remove herself from the centre of events when she felt the time was right, retiring to Wallingford Castle once she was satisfied that Richard was safe and had a wife at his side, while remaining in readiness should he need her again.
However, Joan’s influence may also have been detrimental to Richard, albeit unintentionally. Her genuine concern that her marital history could constitute a threat to Richard, coupled with the early death of Richard’s older brother, Prince Edward, and the lingering death of the prince, almost certainly made her overprotective. Ensuring that her son was surrounded by men who had served his father was a means for her to provide him with support and protection, but it also meant that Richard was served by men who were predisposed to defer to him. In addition, these loyal knights acted as a constant reminder to Richard of his father, and he would have been very aware of the veneration and admiration in which his father was held. The prince, as the most renowned and respected chivalric knight and military commander of his generation, presented an almost impossible role model for the young Richard to follow. Richard’s tutors, Abberbury, d’Angle and Burley, were all respected knights themselves, and had fought with the prince. Richard could hardly escape hearing almost daily plaudits about his father, although his own memories could only have been of a sick man. Joan’s protective instinct was inherently contradictory. Although Richard was taught to ride, hunt, fight with a sword and joust there was always an underlying fear that he might be injured, perhaps fatally, so it is unlikely that Joan encourag
ed him to take risks or allowed his teachers to do so. He was too important. There is no record of Richard taking part in tournaments and he did not have the opportunity to take part in a campaign until he was eighteen, whereas his father and grandfather had both proved themselves in battle by this age. Similarly Joan would have influenced Richard in his attitude towards the war with France. Her views could hardly have been anything other than ambivalent. The war with France had given Thomas Holand and the prince the opportunity to display their military genius, and had brought them fame and glory (and fortune for Thomas Holand), but it had also brought untimely death for both of them. Joan would have wanted to protect her son from this. She was also a natural pacifist, both by instinct and by upbringing. Richard’s marked disinclination towards continuing the war with France probably owed much to his mother’s unconscious influence.
Joan was not only extremely protective towards Richard, but increasingly deferential, behaving quite differently towards him than to her other children. To some extent this was inevitable, given that he was heir to the throne and then king, but Richard’s later exaggerated sense of his own importance probably had its origins in his mother’s treatment of him. Conscious of her awkward marital past and the care Edward III and the prince had taken to ensure the validity of her marriage to the prince, Joan almost certainly overemphasised the importance of her son’s royal lineage, while also passing on to him her own insecurity about it. Ironically, her fears appear to have been groundless. There is no evidence that her marital history posed a real threat to Richard; it was never raised as an issue at his succession, and even when he was deposed in 1399 by Henry of Bolingbroke it was not used against him. By 1377 it should have been clear that the precautions taken by the prince and his father had been amply sufficient, and Joan should have been able to relax. But unfortunately it continued to be a concern for her and it is obvious that she made Richard overly aware of it. The many documents validating his mother’s marriage to Thomas Holand, and her subsequent marriage to the prince, were considered so precious by Richard that he kept them in a safe box at his side at all times and it was only on his one military expedition abroad, when he went to Ireland in 1394, that he entrusted them to be kept for him elsewhere. Unlike his father and grandfather, as an adult Richard was obsessed with his lineage and royal status. The genesis for this, and for the insecurity which would later become so apparent in Richard, lay with his mother’s own insecurity. Joan reinforced this by suppressing her own importance while emphasising Richard’s, and this is most poignantly evidenced in the surviving letters she wrote to him, in which she addressed her son in humble, supplicatory tones.
