Marie de Champagne Cultivates Courtly Love
Marie de Champagne (1145-1198) was born a princess of France, ruled one of its richest counties, presided as a judge at the Court of Love, and helped develop a new art form. She was the epitome of a 12th-century lady.
Marie was the eldest daughter of the king of France and his first wife, Eleanor of Aquitaine. When Eleanor bolted for her new job as Queen of England in 1152, she left her two young daughters in Paris with their dad. But that’s another story.
When Marie was eight years old, she was engaged to be married to the 26-year-old Henri, count of Champagne. Don’t worry; she didn’t marry him when she was that young. They waited until she was 19, almost an old maid by medieval princess standards. After that, the couple had four children, two with familiar-sounding French names, Henri and Marie, and two with, um, free-choice names, Scholastique and Theobald.
Champagne was one of the wealthiest counties in France, growing rich not from sparkling wine, but by hosting multiple trade fairs every year in key urban centers, bringing goods from the Low Countries to the north together with the goods from Italian trading cities to the south. With its central location and pro-trade policies, Champagne became the commercial and financial center of Northern Europe, and its counts counted on that sweet, sweet tax money.
In the county of Champagne, Marie was running things more than half the time. The countess served as regent when her husband went on crusade, when he was held prisoner there, and after he died. She ended up ruling on her own for 17 years before her son came of age and took over the family business.
In 1168, Marie joined her mother in Poitiers for the legendary Court of Love. They played a game where people brought their romantic dilemmas to the “courtroom.” There the noble ladies served as judges and would render a verdict and declare who was right and who was wrong.
Courtly love poetry emerged in southern France in the early 1100s through troubadours, poet-minstrels who traveled from town to town singing songs and telling stories. Courtly love was freely chosen by the pair, not part of an arranged marriage designed to increase the wealth and power of the family.
A knight would choose an unattainable lady (married, above him in station), and then devote himself to her service. Through this idealized romance and suffering, a lover was made better and stronger. A lover might perform great deeds in the name of a woman he never even met.
Historians never agree on anything, but they are particularly inclined to fight about whether the world of courtly love reflected reality or was just a favored kind of literature. They also love to fight about the Court of Love, if it was a real event or just a story for the page, and even if Marie was ever there. Sheesh.
Marie brought the southern French ideas of courtly love and troubadour poetry with her when she returned to Champagne in northern France. Her patronage of the arts would spread these ideas to the rest of Europe.
Marie made her biggest impact on literature with her patronage of Chretien de Troyes, a key author of Arthurian romances. He was a pioneer in elevating the legendary Celtic leader from 500 years earlier to the most noble king and knight with mega-popular adventures and chivalric romances.
This medieval literature influences stories down to today, from the retelling of the legends of King Arthur for the following centuries to modern romantic comedies. Whether you love romcom movies or hate them, you can thank Marie de Champagne every time you see someone standing on the lawn with a sign expressing their devotion to their beloved.
The author Seth Godin says, “Ideas that spread, win.” But how do ideas spread?
Almost all new ideas start out as weird ideas. They’re on the fringe of things, way outside the mainstream. Then a few people tell a few more people, then those people engage with the idea and tell even more people. Pretty soon it’s a hot new idea. If the idea eventually makes it to the mainstream, it’s an idea that will last.
In The Tipping Point, Malcolm Gladwell emphasizes the critical role of connectors to spread ideas. Connectors are people with large networks that introduce people to each other, allowing ideas to flow freely and reach a wider audience.
Singing love poetry was just a weird thing that troubadours did in southern France. Eleanor of Aquitaine learned to love this art form from her grandfather who really started the trend. She brought it to the royal courts of both of her husbands, but it didn’t spread from there.
Marie de Champagne enjoyed stories of Courtly Love at her mother’s court, then brought the concept with her back home. Champagne was centrally located and visited by merchants from everywhere, so when she sponsored chivalric romance literature, that idea spread far and wide. Echoes of it persist in literature and culture even today.
Ideas work best with network effects. As more people engage with an idea, that idea increases in value. So whatever your big idea is, get it out there into the world, even if you have to stand in the lawn holding a sign.
