conference, at which Frederick swore to depart by 15 August 1227. As a
clear sign of his commitment to the enterprise, the emperor secured
John’s permission to marry Isabella straight away. As a result, she was
married to Frederick’s proxy in the Holy Land, crowned queen of
Jerusalem and then brought out to the West, accompanied by a grand
retinue.^153
The‘real’marriage, which took place on 9 November 1225, gave rise
to a dramatic rupture between John and Frederick, when the latter
refused to be bound by the deal that he had made allowing John to
retain his crown for life. There was nothing that John could do if his
subjects accepted the emperor’s claim to be the new king of Jerusalem,
and this they did en masse, including even John’skinsmanOdoof
Montbéliard, whom John had left behind as regent at Acre. Frederick
had a strong position in law as husband to the rightful heiress, the
reigning queen, and many regarded him as the main hope–indeed, as
the prospective saviour–of the Holy Land. In this way, Frederick made
John his enemy for life, and so, after a briefrapprochement, the Brienne–
Hohenstaufen relationship returned to hostility.^154 It is worth adding
that a number of chroniclers recall the families’history when they
describe the events of November 1225. This can make their accounts
highly entertaining but also far-fetched. For example, the‘Colbert-
Fontainebleau’continuation states that the emperor moved against his
new father-in-law largely because he had come to believe that the
Briennes were plotting, once again, to seize the kingdom of Sicily. In
other words, memories of Walter III were still very much alive.^155 For
his part, the Italian raconteur Salimbene gives another version of the
same story, in which the Briennes’main aim is to secure the kingdom
of Jerusalem permanently for themselves. Salimbene offers a number of
picturesque details: for instance, that the young Walter IV was to be
murdered whilst he sat playing chess with Frederick. However,‘King
John got wind of the plot and led his kinsman away from the game. Then
he roundly cursed the emperor in his pithy French:‘Fi di becer diabele!’
(‘You son-of-a-butcher!’)^156
John rushed to complain to the pope, but Honorius was disinclined to
risk a rupture with the emperor over a matter such as this. However, he
clearly did agree with John on the fundamental issue at stake: namely,
(^153) Perry,John, 125–35. (^154) Adapted from Tyerman,God’sWar, 741.
(^155) ‘Colbert-Fontainebleau’, 359.
(^156) Salimbene,Cronica, ed. G. Scalia, inCorpus Christianorum: Continuatio Medievalis,
no. 125, 2 vols. (Turnhout, 1998), i, 61–2.
66 Breakthrough and High Point (c. 1191–1237)