major role in the politics of Scandinavia from the 19th
century to the present day.
Further Reading
Literature
Erslev, Kristian. Danmarks Historie under Dronning Margrethe
og hendes nærmeste Efterfølgere 1375–1448. 1. Dronning
Margrethe og Kahmarunionens Grundlæsggelse. Copenha-
gen: Erslev, 1882.
Lönnroth, Erik. Sverige och Kalmarunionen 1397–1457. Gothen-
burg: Elander, 1934; rpt.: Akademiförlaget, 1969.
Linton, Michael Drottning Margareta. Fullmäktig fru och rätt
husbonde. Studier i kalmarunionens förhistoria. Studia Histor-
ica Gothoburgensia, 12. Gothenburg: Akademiförlaget, 1971.
Christensen, Aksel E. Kalmarunionen ognordisk politik 1319–
- Copenhagen: Gyldendal, 1980 [with extensive refer-
ences to scholarly literature].
Hørby, Kai. Danmarks historie. 2.1: Tiden 1340–1648. Copen-
hagen: Gyldendal, 1980 [with extensive bibliography in vols.
2.1 and 2.2].
Albrectsen, Esben. Herredømmet over Sønderjylland 1375–1404.
Studier over Hertugdømmets lensforhold og indre opbygn-
ing på dronning Margrethes tid. Copenhagen: Den danske
historiske forening, 1981.
Etting, Vivian. Margrethe den Første. Copenhagen: Fogtdal, 1986
[lavishly illustrated].
Søren Balle
MARGUERITE D’OINGT
(ca. 1240–1310)
Marguerite was born to noble parents in the French
Beaujolais region. By 1288, she became prioress of the
Carthusian monastery of Poletains at Lyon. Although
she was never canonized, a popular cult in her honor
fl ourished until the Revolution, and she was revered as
blessed. Marguerite is the only medieval Carthusian
woman writer known to us. The Pagina meditationum,
a response in Latin to a visionary experience during
Mass, interweaves liturgical sections with refl ections
on Christ’s Passion and the Last Judgment. In a remark-
able passage, Marguerite develops the image of Christ
as a woman undergoing the suffering of labor. The
Speculum, written in Franco-Provençal and dedicated
to Hugo, prior of Vallebonne, describes three visions
and their meaning. In the fi rst, Christ shows her a book
with white, black, red, and golden letters symbolizing
his suffering. In the second, the book opens and reveals a
vision of Paradise and the heavens, whence all goodness
emanates. In the third, she is shown the glorifi ed body
of Christ and meditates on its meaning for Christian
spirituality. Marguerite’s fi nal work is the biography of
Béatrice of Ornacieux (ca. 1260–1303/09), a stigmatized
nun at the charterhouse of Parmenie, whose cult was
recognized by Pope Pius IX in 1869. Also written in
the vernacular, the biography stresses Beatrice’s intense
mystical experiences, including frequent apparitions,
the gift of tears, severe acts of penance to ward off the
Devil, and eucharistic visions and miracles. Marguerite’s
christocentric mysticism includes not only Carthusian
but also Franciscan and Cistercian elements. Some let-
ters by Marguerite also survive.Further Reading
Marguerite d’Oingt. Les œuvres de Marguerite d’Oingt, ed.
Antonin Duraffour, Pierre Gardette, and Paulette Durdilly.
Paris: Les Belles Lettres, 1965.
——. The Writings of Margaret of Oingt, Medieval Prioress and
Mystic, trans. Renate Blumenfeld-Kosinski. Newbury-port:
Focus Information Group, 1990.
Dinzelbacher, Peter. “Margarete von Oingt und ihre Pagina medi-
tationum.” Analecta cartusiana 16 (1988): 69–100.
Maisonneuve, Roland. “L’expérience mystique et visionnaire de
Marguerite d’Oingt (d. 1310), moniale chartreuse.” Analecta
cartusiana 55 (1981): 81–102.
Ulrike WiethausMARGUERITE OF PROVENCE
(ca. 1221–1295)
Marguerite was the eldest of four daughters of Count
Raymond-Berenguer V of Provence. In 1234, at the age
of twelve or thirteen, she became queen of France by
her marriage to Louis IX. The wedding and her corona-
tion as queen were celebrated at the cathedral of Sens.
Eleven children were eventually born to the couple. The
marriage was diffi cult in a number of respects. From the
beginning, Marguerite resented and was resented by
her mother-in-law, Blanche of Castile; yet she admired
Blanche’s infl uence with Louis. She tried to achieve
the same position with her son, the future Philip III, but
provoked her husband to intervene and have the young
Philip’s ill-considered oath to obey her until the age of
thirty quashed. Though Marguerite by no means lacked
in courage or ability (e.g., she successfully preserved
order in Damietta in Egypt in 1250 at a particularly
diffi cult moment in her husband’s fi rst crusade), Louis
almost always ignored her political advice.
After the king’s death in 1270, Marguerite became
a more active political fi gure. She was particularly exi-
gent—to the point of raising troops—in defending her
rights in Provence, where her husband’s brother, Charles
of Anjou, maintained his political authority and control
of property after his wife’s (her sister’s) death, contrary
to the intentions of the old count, who had died in 1245.
Philip III had his hands full in restraining her. Only his
death in 1285 and Charles of Anjou’s in the same year
resolved the situation. At the behest of the new king,
Philip IV, she accepted an assignment of income from
Anjou as compensation for recognizing the preeminent
rights of Charles of Anjou’s heirs in Provence. Her last
years were spent in doing pious work, including found-
ing in 1289 the Franciscan nunnery of Lourcines, which
eventually became a focal point of the cult of her lateMARGRETHE I