Blanche of Burgundy

Blanche of Burgundy ( 1296 – 1326) was Queen of France and Navarre for a few months in 1322 through her marriage to King Charles IV the Fair. The daughter of Count Otto IV of Burgundy and Countess Mahaut of Artois, she was led to a disastrous marriage by her mother's ambition. Eight years before her husband's accession to the thrones, Blanche was arrested and found guilty of adultery with a Norman knight. Her sister-in-law, Margaret of Burgundy, suffered the same fate, while her sister Joan was acquitted. Blanche was imprisoned and not released even after becoming queen, until her marriage was annulled when she was moved to the coast of Normandy. The date and place of her death are unknown; the mere fact that she died was simply mentioned on the occasion of her husband's third marriage in April 1326. Early life Blanche was the younger daughter of Otto IV, Count of Burgundy, and Mahaut, Countess of Artois. Her father died in 1303, leaving the county to Blanche's elder sister, Joan. Joan was supposed to marry Louis, the heir of Philip IV of France, but Philip changed his mind and arranged for her to marry his second son, Philip, in 1307. The Countess of Artois was proud of this achievement and quickly started negotiating her younger daughter's marriage to Charles, King Philip's third son, offering a huge dowry. The negotiations were successful and on 23 September 1307, the eleven-year-old Blanche and thirteen-year-old Charles concluded a marriage contract. The marriage ceremony was hastily performed at Countess Mahaut's castle in Hesdin in January 1308. Adultery accusations In 1313, Blanche's sister-in-law and brother-in-law, Isabella and Edward II of England, visited King Philip IV. Isabella presented her brothers and sisters-in-law with embroidered coin purses. Later that year, upon their return to London, Isabella and Edward held a banquet during which Isabella noticed that the coin purses she had given to Blanche and Margaret were now in the possession of the Norman knights Gautier and Philippe d'Aunay. From that she concluded that the brothers were having relationships with her sisters-in-law. When she visited Paris again in 1314, she informed King Philip about her suspicions. Blanche's sister Joan was accused of hiding the affair and later of participating in it.