Tea at Trianon: Marozia and the House of Theophylact

John Wilson Croker on Marie-Antoinette

"We have followed the history of Marie Antoinette with the greatest diligence and scrupulosity. We have lived in those times. We have talked with some of her friends and some of her enemies; we have read, certainly not all, but hundreds of the libels written against her; and we have, in short, examined her life with– if we may be allowed to say so of ourselves– something of the accuracy of contemporaries, the diligence of inquirers, and the impartiality of historians, all combined; and we feel it our duty to declare, in as a solemn a manner as literature admits of, our well-matured opinion that every reproach against the morals of the queen was a gross calumny– that she was, as we have said, one of the purest of human beings."

~from History of the Guillotine by John Wilson Croker, 1844

Edmund Burke on Marie-Antoinette

"It is now sixteen or seventeen years since I saw the queen of France, then dauphiness, at Versailles; and surely there never lighted on this orb, which she hardly seemed to touch, a more delightful vision. I saw her just above the horizon, decorating and cheering the elevated sphere she had just begun to move in, glittering like a morning star full of life and splendor and joy. Oh, what a revolution....Little did I dream that I should have lived to see such disasters fall upon her, in a nation of gallant men, in a nation of men of honor and of cavaliers! I thought ten thousand swords must have leaped from their scabbards, to avenge even a look which threatened her with insult. But the age of chivalry is gone; that of sophisters, economists, and calculators has succeeded...."

~Edmund Burke, October 1790

Wednesday, November 8, 2023

Marozia and the House of Theophylact

The dark days of the papacy, which some people think gave rise to the myth about Pope Joan. From Medievalists:

It was during this time that a woman named Marozia entered the scene. Born between 890 and 892, she was the daughter of the Roman consul Theophylact, Count of Tusculum, and of Theodora, a senatrix and serenissima vestaratrix of Rome. This couple had risen to dominate Roman politics and made their share of enemies. One of them was Liudprand of Cremona, a diplomat and historian. He called Theodora a “shameless harlot…whose very mention is most foul, was holding the monarchy of the city of Rome, and not in an unmanly way.”
When Sergius III became Pope in 904 Theophylact and Theodora ensured that their teenage daughter was introduced to the Pontiff – soon Sergius and Marozia were lovers, until she became pregnant and bore him a son named John. For the Pope to have any children was a serious embarrassment, but it also gave the House of Theophylact political leverage. Afterwards, Marozia was then married off to Alberic I, Duke of Spoleto. (Read more.)

My posts on "Pope Joan" are HERE and HERE.