Blind Dates: An Investigation

One of the problems I'm struggling with in trying to come up with a detailed database of events for the Albigensian Crusade is that sometimes it's really unclear when things happened.  Sometimes, sources differ on when something happened and it isn't immediately obvious which source is correct.  Sometimes, sources contradict themselves.  Here's a great example:

When did Maria of Montpellier die? 
Her brief Wikipedia page itself gives three different answers:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Maria_of_Montpellier
(In case some enterprising soul fixes that, I'm including a screenshot below)



The first sentence gives her date of death as 18 April 1213, the right hand column summary gives it as 21 April 1213, and the text in the "Life" section gives it as 21 January 1213.

Now, how is the amateur historian like me to solve this riddle?  The bibliography on the Wikipedia page lists three sources, none of which seem to be at the local university library or in English translation.  My French isn't quite fluent, but I could certainly find the information I was looking for in a French source if it were available.

J. M. Lacarra, L. Gonzalez Anton, 'Les testaments de la reine Marie de Montpellier' in Annales du Midi vol. 90 (1978) pp. 105–120.

M. Switten, 'Marie de Montpellier: la femme et le pouvoir en Occitanie au douzième siècle' in Actes du Premier Congrès International de l'Association d'Etudes Occitanes ed. P. T. Ricketts (London: Westfield College, 1987) pp. 485–491.

K. Varzos, I genealogia ton Komninon (Thessalonica, 1984) vol. 2 pp. 346–359.

 It also lists its one source as William of Puylauren's "Chronique."  That, I have ...

A look at the Primary Source

In William of Puylaurens' brief eleventh chapter, "On Peter, the King of Aragon, who married Maria of Montpellier, whose mother he had repudiated; and the birth of his son James," I find his mention of her death but it reads as follows:

"After the marriage had lasted some time without issue, the King repudiated her.  Later however he yielded to the please of the prelates and became reconciled to her.  On their first night together, in the camp where he happened to be, she became pregnant with James, who now rules as King of Aragon.  She returned to Montpellier to bear her son.  She was again repudiated by her husband, and took her case against him to the Holy See for judgment; there she met her death, displaying praiseworthy devotion.  King James was born in 1208."

So we see that the primary source is of no use at all in determining the date of her death, other than it was obviously later than her son's birth in 1208.  William of Puylaurens does, however, seem to clearly state that she died in Rome.

The translators, the Siblys, however, do add some notes which may be helpful.  In footnote 121 we learn that "... she died in Rome in April 1213.  For further details and references, see J. Rouquette, Marie de Montpellier, reine d'Aragon, 1181(?)-1213 (Montpellier, 1914); HGL VI, p. 248, and VII, pp. 38-42, Note XIV; Roquebert II, pp. 113-18."  A quick look at the Abbreviations and Bibliography section informs me that HGL is "Histoire generale de Languedoc," eds. Devic and Vaissete.  At the moment, we can confirm that the one primary source listed did not provide any of the three conflicting dates on the page.

A look at the Secondary Sources on hand

She's not in Sumption's index in the back of "The Albigensian Crusade," nor Maudette's in his work of the same title, nor in Marvin's "The Occitan War," nor in Graham-Leigh's "The Southern-French Nobility and the Albigensian Crusade."  She is referenced once by Oldenbourg in "Massacre at Montsegur" but only to say that her husband was annoyed at the pope for not granting a divorce from her.  There is no mention of her death.  Pegg, in "A Most Holy War," tells the most entertaining story of the troubled marriage between Maria and the king of Aragon, but also omits to mention her death.  He does mention that she "never mourned her husband" (p. 133), seemingly placing her death after the Battle of Muret, on 12 September 1213 and thereby contradicting all three of Wikipedia's dates and the notes of the Siblys, which place her death before that of her husband.

A look on the Internet

Seemingly stuck on my present written sources, I turn to a google search which turns up a date of death of 1218 at:
http://www.geni.com/people/Maria-Montpellier/6000000005599075872

The other hits are brief references which list various of the three dates which the Wikipedia article suggested.


A search of the University of Nottingham library site for "Maria of Montpellier" (including all the variations such as "Marie de Montpellier" etc) and for Montpellier history comes up dry.

So much for the Internet!

A look at the Secondary Sources' Sources

I turn back to Pegg, the only historian I've found so far in my search who has paid much attention to Maria.  I look at his notes in back of the book for the section in which he discusses her.  He first cites HGL 8, no. 132.  Then, "On Pere II and Maria de Montpellier, see Damian J. Smith, Innocent III and the Crown of Aragon: The Limits of Papal Authority (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2004), pp. 39-40, 70-74.  On Montpellier, see Kathryn L. Reyerson, The Art of the Deal: Intermediaries of Trade in Medieval Montpellier (Leiden: Brill, 2002), especially 47-48."

I know that the University of Nottingham Library has the first volume but it turns out not to have the second.

A trip to the Library

Two hours later and I am back from the library with a copy of Smith's "Innocent III and the Crown of Aragon."  On pp. 129-30, I find the following:

"On 20 April 1213, Marie, 'quamis egra corpore, mente sana', made her third and final will. ⁹⁷ Among others, the pope's doctor, curial lawyers and the abbot of Aniane were present....  She died the next day and achieved her dying wish by being buried by the altar of Saint Petronilla in St Peter's.  According to her son and to the Gesta Comitum Barcinonensium, miracles were worked at her tomb.⁹⁸"

So Smith is clearly of the 21 April 1213 opinion.  Let's have a quick look at his sources to find out where the original information comes from.

Footnote 97, due to its placement, seems to be about the will of 20 April, rather than Marie's death.  It reads:

Lacarra and Gonzalez Anton, 'Les Testaments de la Reine', pp. 117-20; Miret, 'Itinerario', 4, pp. 96-7; F. Soldevilla, Els Primers Temps de Jaume I, Barcelona 1962, pp. 42-3; Rouquette, Marie de Montpellier, pp. 75-7; Foreville, Innocent III et La France, p. 291; Baumel, Montpellier, 1, pp. 279-80.

The books by Lacarra and Anton, and by Rouquette, have come up before.  I quickly check the online catalogue of the University of Nottingham and confirm they don't have the others either.

Footnote 98 seems to be more about the miracles than about her death.  It reads:

Llibre dels Fets, ch. 7; Gesta Comitum Barcinonensium, p. 52

Presumably, the French sources, especially Rouquette's book on Maria, contain the details of the date of her death and I would have to track them down in order to find out what primary source they were using.

But at this point I'm reasonably confident that the 21 April 1213 date is correct.  Why, then, did Pegg state that Maria never mourned her husband?  Could it be that he merely meant that she never mourned him because she died five months before him?  That hardly seems likely.

In context, he says (p. 133):

"Arrogance and sheer incompetence by the king, or rather, a nonchalant trust in his own invulnerability, a trust nobly embodied in his knights, led to the devastation at Muret.  More salaciously, though no less profligate, the king whiled away the night before battle with a mistress and, too tired to even stand for Mass the next morning, was worn out all day.²  Maria de Montpellier never mourned her husband.  Innocent III, despite his recent enmity, was deeply saddened by the death of Pere II" (emphasis added)

The footnote is about the story of Pere's lack of readiness for battle and does not contribute that I know of to the next sentence.  The paragraph seems to put Pegg's comment clearly in the context of reactions to the news of Pere's death. But if that is true, then the Siblys and Smith are wrong about Maria dying the day after she composed her will.

Time to ask Mark Pegg!

A question for the historian

I sent an email to Pegg, asking him about this and eagerly awaited his response.  He was kind enough to email me back the following day.  An editorial error in the compilation of "A Most Holy War" left the sentence in the ambiguous state in which I found it.  The story of Pere II of Aragon's exhaustion came from his son Jaume's book "Llibre dels fets" and Jaume then commented that his mother Maria would never have mourned her husband.

Pegg affirmed that Smith, "a very meticulous scholar", could be relied on for dates such as the 21 April 1213. 




Conclusion

Overall, it goes to show how easily errors or ambiguities can occur, but also how they can be resolved by even an amateur historian with a couple of hours to spare.  In my research, I never found a source for the 21 January or 18 April dates which showed up in the Wikipedia page.

Case closed.

-- Sam Taylor