Isabella of Bourbon, Countess of Charolais (1436 – September 25, 1465) was the second wife of Charles the Bold, Count of Charolais and future Duke of Burgundy. She was a daughter of Charles I, Duke of Bourbon and Agnes of Burgundy, and the mother of Mary of Burgundy, heiress of Burgundy.

Life[link]

Not much is known about Isabella's life. She was the daughter of the reigning Duke of Bourbon, and his Burgundian wife, Agnes, daughter of John the Fearless, the powerful Duke of Burgundy and sworn enemy of the "mad king" Charles VI of France and his regent, Louis of Orleans.

France was in the throes of the Hundred Years War, with the English, whose King claimed the French throne as a descendant of the Direct Capetian Line. The Burgundians and the Armagnacs were two factions vociferously fighting for control of the King, who was deemed unable to rule. Their rivalry deepened after the brutal assassination of Louis of Orleans, the leader of the Armagnac party. A temporary truce was sworn on to face the increasing threat of the English. Seeing the right opportunity, Henry V of England attacked France. However despite the aforementioned truce, Burgundy offered no troops to help the Armagnacs. Isabella's father, the Duke of Bourbon, was a staunch Armagnac and had distinguished himself in the Battle of Agincourt, which nevertheless ended with France suffering a humiliating defeat. In its aftermath, Burgundy swiftly occupied Paris, declaring himself regent of the King, forcing the Dauphin, Charles to flee to the South. With the North in English hands and Burgundy ruling Paris, the Dauphin sued for truce, which was sworn upon. The Dauphin called for a second meeting, on the grounds of the first one not being an assurance of truce. Expecting it to be a diplomatic meeting, Burgundy arrived Montereau, only to be assassinated by the Dauphin's men. This helped further deteriorate the enmity between the Armagnacs and the Burgundians.

Marriage and children[link]

Although politically opposed to his brother-in-law and the new Duke of Burgundy, Philip, he betrothed Isabella to Charles, Count of Charolais, only legitimate son and heir of Burgundy as a condition of truce. She and the Count of Charolais married in 30 October 1454 at Lille, France,^[1] and their marriage was reportedly good, perhaps due to her husband's faithfulness.

In 1459, Isabella stood godmother to Joachim, the short-lived son of the refugee Dauphin of France and his second wife, Charlotte of Savoy. Upon his succession to the throne of France, the Dauphin abandoned his wife in Burgundy, leaving the young Queen Charlotte dependent on Isabella's aid.

Tomb[link]

Isabella may not have been of any significance or had any influence during her lifetime, but in her death she became a symbol of the wealth of the Dukes of Burgundy, which would later be inherited by her only daughter Mary. Isabella's funeral monument was erected in the abbey church of St Michael near Antwerp in 1476. It was decorated with 24 bronze statuettes of noblemen and women standing in niches, known as 'weepers' or 'mourners', with a bronze effigy of Isabella herself surmounted on it. During the Iconoclast Fury of 1566, radical Protestants destroyed images in Catholic churches and monasteries. The destruction was justified by Calvin's contention that all images in churches were idolatrous and had to be removed. As a result, Isabella's tomb was stripped of its decorations and the 'mourners' disappeared.

However, ten of them turned up in Amsterdam. In 1691 the burgomasters of Amsterdam purchased the ten statues which they thought represented the counts and countesses of Holland. Pieter de Vos, 'clerk of the secretariat', was the man who sold the statuettes, which he had presumably inherited from his father. In exchange for the statues De Vos received an annual pension of 150 guilders. He died in 1721; the city had therefore paid De Vos around four thousand five hundred guilders for the mourners. The clothes worn by the mourners are of an earlier fashion than Isabella's. This is probably because the mourners were copied from older tombs, which are no longer in extant. The statuettes are copies from two earlier tombs, which were the work of the sculptor Delemer, the painter Rogier van der Weyden and the bronze-founder Jacob de Gerines, commissioned by Philip the Good. It is assumed that the models for the Amsterdam statuettes were supplied by Delemer or his workshop.

In fact the mourners are not Isabella's immediate family: they represent her ancestors. Two portraits have been identified as Emperor Louis of Bavaria (with the imperial crown and orb) and Albrecht of Bavaria, with the St Antony cross around his neck. These portraits have been identified on the basis of a list of names published in 1695 by Daniel Papebrochius. The statuettes reveal the kind of clothes worn by Burgundian nobles in the Late Middle Ages. An unusual aspect is the amount of cloth employed in the garments: the sleeves are exceptionally long, as are the robes. Various kinds of headgear are worn, both by men and women, the latter of whom have shaven heads, as was the fashion in those days.

Isabella

These statues have been on display in the Rijksmuseum for around a hundred years. The rest of the tomb, with the statue of Isabella, is now in Antwerp cathedral. Nothing more of the tomb furnishings survives.

Genealogy[link]

With the extinction of the progeny of her brothers, the title of Duke of Auvergne should have passed to her progeny. However with the confiscation of the possessions of Charles III, Duke of Bourbon, her niece's husband, the duchy of Auvergne was inherited by Louise of Savoy, King Francis's mother and hence was ultimately absorbed into the Crown lands. However, the title of Heir-General of the duchy of Auvergne passed through her daughter, Mary. Therefore the senior most claimant to the title as the heir General of Mary would be Infanta Alicia Of Spain

References[link]

External links[link]

• [1], Isabella's weepers, Ten Statues from a Burgundian Tomb by F. Scholten
• [2], the surviving statuettes from Isabella's tomb at Rijksmusuem, Amsterdam.

Ancestry[link]

Mary
Duchess of Brabant, Limburg, Lothier, Luxemburg and Guelders; Margravine of Namur; Countess Palatine of Burgundy; Countess of Artois, Flanders, Charolais, Hainaut, Holland, Zeeland and Zutphen
Reign	5 January 1477–27 March 1482
Predecessor	Charles the Bold
Successor	Philip the Handsome
Spouse	Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor
Issue
Philip I of Castile Margaret, Duchess of Savoy
House	House of Valois-Burgundy
Father	Charles the Bold
Mother	Isabella of Bourbon
Born	13 February 1457 Brussels, Brabant
Died	27 March 1482(1482-03-27) (aged 25) Wijnendale Castle, Flanders
Burial	Bruges, Flanders
Religion	Roman Catholicism

Mary of Burgundy (13 February 1457 – 27 March 1482) ruled the Burgundian territories in Low Countries and was suo jure Duchess of Burgundy from 1477 until her death. As the only child of Charles the Bold, Duke of Burgundy, and his wife Isabella of Bourbon, she was the heiress to the vast, and vastly wealthy, Burgundian domains in France and the Low Countries upon her father's death in the Battle of Nancy on 5 January 1477.^[1], and was accordingly often referred to as "Mary the Rich".

Early years[link]

Mary of Burgundy was born in Brussels, at the ducal castle of Coudenberg, to Charles the Bold, Count of Charolais, and his wife, Isabella of Bourbon. Her birth, according to the court chronicler, Georges Chastellain, was attended by a clap of thunder ringing from the otherwise clear twilight sky. Her godfather was Louis, Dauphin of France, in exile in Burgundy at that time; he named her for his mother, Marie of Anjou. Reactions to the child were mixed: the baby's grandfather, Duke Philip the Good, was unimpressed, and "chose not to attend the [Baptism] as it was only for a girl"; the grandmother, Isabella of Portugal, was simply delighted at the birth of a granddaughter.^[2]

Heiress presumptive[link]

Philip the Good died in 1467, making his son Duke of Burgundy and his 10-year-old granddaughter heiress presumptive. As the only child of Charles the Bold, Mary was heiress presumptive to a vast and wealthy domain, made up of the Duchy of Burgundy, the Free County of Burgundy, and the majority of the Low Countries, and her hand was eagerly sought by a number of princes. The first proposal was received by her father when she was only five years old, to marry the future King Ferdinand II of Aragon. Later the younger brother of Louis XI, Charles, Duke of Berry, made an approach, to the intense annoyance of his brother the King, who attempted to prevent the necessary papal dispensation for consanguinity.

Coat of arms of Mary of Burgundy.

As soon as Louis produced a male heir who survived infancy, the future King Charles VIII of France, Louis wanted his son to be the one to marry Mary, despite his son being thirteen years younger than Mary. Nicholas I, Duke of Lorraine, was a few years older than Mary, and his duchy lay alongside Burgundian territory, but his plan to combine his territory with hers was frustrated by his death in battle in 1473.

Reign[link]

Mary ascended upon her father's death in the Battle of Nancy on 5 January 1477. King Louis XI of France seized the opportunity afforded by his rival's defeat and death to attempt take possession of the Duchy of Burgundy proper, and also of Franche-Comté, Picardy and Artois.

The King was anxious that Mary should marry his son Charles and thus secure the inheritance of the Low Countries for his heirs, by force of arms if necessary. Mary, advised by her stepmother, Margaret of York, distrusted Louis, declined the French alliance, and turned to her Netherland subjects for help. Sensing her weakness, they gave her their help only at the price of great concessions.

The Great Privilege[link]

On 10 February 1477 at Ghent on the occasion of her formal recognition, known as the Joyous Entry, as Charles' heir, she was compelled to sign a charter of rights, called the Great Privilege. Under this agreement, the provinces and towns of Flanders, Brabant, Hainaut, and Holland recovered all the local and communal rights which had been abolished by the decrees of the dukes of Burgundy in their efforts to create a centralized state on the French model out of their separate holdings in the Low Countries. In particular, the Parliament of Mechelen (established formally by Charles the Bold in 1470) was abolished and replaced with the pre-existing authority of the Parliament of Paris, which was considered an amenable counterweight to the encroaching, if informal, centralization undertaken by both Charles the Bold and Philip the Good. The Duchess also had to undertake not to declare war, make peace, or raise taxes without the consent of the States, and to employ only native residents in official posts.

Such was the hatred of the people for the old regime that two of her father's influential councilors, the Chancellor Hugonet and the Sire d'Humbercourt, having been discovered in correspondence with the King of France, were executed at Ghent despite the tears and entreaties of the Duchess.

Marriage[link]

Mary now made her choice among the many suitors for her hand, selecting Archduke Maximilian of Austria, who became her co-ruler.^[3] The marriage took place at Ghent on 18 August 1477.^[4] The event initiated two centuries of contention between France and the Habsburgs (later of Spain, then of Austria) for their possession, which climaxed in the War of the Spanish Succession, 1701–1714.

In the Netherlands, affairs now went more smoothly, the French aggression was temporarily checked, and internal peace was in large measure restored.

Death and legacy[link]

Five years later, the 25-year-old Duchess died due to a fall from her horse on 27 March 1482 near Wijnendale Castle. She loved riding, and was falconing with Maximilian when her horse tripped, threw her, and then landed on top of her, breaking her back. She died several days later, having made a detailed will. She is buried in the Church of Our Lady in Bruges. 

Louis was swift to re-engage, and forced Maximilian to agree to the Treaty of Arras (1482) by which Franche-Comté and Artois passed for a time to French rule, only to be regained by the Treaty of Senlis (1493), which established peace in the Low Countries.

Family[link]

Mary's tomb effigy in the Church of Our Lady, Bruges.

Three children had been the issue of her marriage, and her eldest son, Philip, succeeded to her dominions under the guardianship of his father.

Her children were:

• Philip the Handsome, 22 July 1478 – 25 September 1506 who succeeded his mother as Philip IV of Burgundy, and became Philip I of Castile by marriage to Joanna of Castile^[5]
• Margaret, 10 January 1480 – 1 December 1530, married to 1) Juan, Prince of Asturias, the son and heir of King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile and 2) Philibert II, Duke of Savoy
• Franz, b. and d. 1481

Ancestry[link]

Titles[link]

Mary and Maximilian

• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Duchess of Burgundy
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Duchess of Brabant
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Duchess of Guelders
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Duchess of Limburg
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Duchess of Lothier
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Duchess of Luxemburg
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Margravine of Namur
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess Palatine of Burgundy
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess of Artois
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess of Charolais
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess of Flanders
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess of Hainault
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess of Holland
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess of Zeeland
• 5 January 1477–27 March 1482: Countess of Zutphen

See also[link]

Wikimedia Commons has media related to: Mary_of_Burgundy

• Dukes of Burgundy family tree
• Other politically important horse accidents
• Duchesse de Bourgogne beer

References[link]

Kingdom of France portal

1. ^ Vaughan, Richard, Charles the Bold: the last Valois Duke of Burgundy, (Boydell Press, 2004), 127
2. ^ Taylor, Aline, Isabel of Burgundy
3. ^ Paul Murray Kendall, Louis XI, (W.W.Norton Co. Inc, 1971), 319.
4. ^ Paul Murray Kendall, Louis XI, 319.
5. ^ Charles W. Ingrao, The Habsburg Monarchy, 1618-1815, (Cambridge University Press, 2000), 4.

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Chisholm, Hugh, ed. (1911). Encyclopædia Britannica (11th ed.). Cambridge University Press. 

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The Bourbons of Bhopal in India claim to be legitimate descendants of the House of Bourbon, descended from one Jean-Philippe de Bourbon-Navarre (John Philip of Bourbon-Navarre). As of 2007, first place in the lineage is claimed by Balthazar Napoleon de Bourbon, a Bhopal lawyer by profession, born on 29 July 1958 and who has three children: Frederick, Michelle, and Adrian. He is the son of Salvadore de Bourbon (1917–1978), who claimed the lineage in his memoirs Les Bourbons de l'Inde (de Bourbon 2003) which was edited by Lucien Jailloux and published posthumously with a preface written by historian of India and member of L'École Française d'Extrème-Orient Jean Deloche.^{[1][2][3][4][5][6]}

Salvadore de Bourbon's work is based upon 19th century articles by people such as Claude Sosthène Grasset d'Orcet writing in La Revue britannique (d'Orcet 1892), Gabriel Ferrand writing in La Revue de Paris (Ferrand 1905), and Colonel William Kincaid's Historical sketch of the Indian Bourbon family (Kincaid 1883).^[7] The story goes that Jean-Philippe de Bourbon-Navarre (simply "Jean de Bourbon" in some accounts^[8]), the secret son of Charles III, Duke of Bourbon (the so-called "Constable of Bourbon"), arrived in the court of Mughal emperor Akbar in 1560, relating a tale of his journey there that included pirates, kidnapping, and an attempt to sell him in a slave market in Cairo. Prince Michael of Greece has incorporated this into a historical novel, Le Rajah Bourbon (Michel de Grèce 2007), whose publication spurred a renewed interest in this claim to the French throne.^[2][4][5]

Traveller and photographer Louis Rousselet proposed a similar lineage in in Le Fils du Connétable (Rousselet 1882).^[3][9] He had visited Elizabeth de Bourbon, the so-called Bourbon Sirdar, in India and got struck by her "European type" .^[3][10] There are different accounts of Jean de Bourbon's posited lineage. One has the Constable survive the sack of Rome and eventually marry a Mughal princess named Alaïque, Jean Philippe’s mother. Another possible candidate is a member of the Bourbon-Busset branch, reported lost at sea in 1580.^[11][12]

Kincaid's account of Jean de Bourbon's exile and settlement in India is as follows:

In the latter half of the sixteenth century, about the year 1560, John Philip Bourbon of Navarre, who was a member of the younger brance of the family of Henry VI, sailed for India, having, tradition relates, been obliged to leave France because he killed a relative of high position in a duel. He landed at Madras, a priest and two friends accompanying him. The two latter died on the voyage, and the priest remained at Madras, but John Philip Bourbon, sailing on to Bengal went thence to Delhi and sought an interview with the Emperor Akbar. On hearing of the high rank of the exile, the Emperor sent for him, and being interested in his story, treated hom with much favour and distinction, eventually appointing him to a post at his Court. Not long afterwards the Emperor being much please at his courtly bearing and conduct, and desiring to retain his services, offered him in marriage to the Lady Juliana, sister of the Emperor's Christian wife, who on account of her skill and her knowledge of the European system of medicine, had charge of the health of the imperial ladies. This marriage was duly somenised, whereupon the Emperor conferred upon his brother-in-law the title of Nawab and placed the imperial seraglio under his care and the Lady Juliana was included in the select band of the imperial sisters. The honourable office conferred on Bourbon remained in the possession of the family until the sack of Delhi by Nadir Shah in the year 1737.

—Colonel William Kincaid, Kincaid 1887^[13]

More detailed accounts can be found in Malcolm 1824, pp. 341,^[14] Kincaid 1908^[14] and Kincaid 1946 (both written by Charles Augustus, William Kincaid's son^[15]), and Diver & Diver 1942, pp. 170 et seq..

Jean Philippe de Bourbon's supposed descendants moved to Bhopal in 1775^[16] and entered the service of the royal family, becoming the second most important family in Bhopal.^[17] Two of the most prominent members are Salvador III de Bourbon (~1830), chief general of Bhopal, and Balthazar de Bourbon († 1879), minister and regent.^{[citation needed]} After Indian independence, the new Indian state abolished the old jagirs (land entitlements) in 1948, and royal and noble status in 1971. Deprived of any privileges, the family joined the ranks of the working bourgeoisie.^[3][4]

However, as Patrick van Kerrebrouck points out, there is a problem with this story, as noted by Jean Deloche in the preface to Salvadore de Bourbon's book. There's simply no primary historical documentation, Indian or European, supporting the existence of Jean de Bourbon. There's nothing in India's official records nor anything in the records of the Jesuits.^[7] No such person as Jean de Bourbon (or Jean-Philippe de Bourbon-Navarre) is acknowledged in the official Bourbon family tree.

References[link]

Bibliography[link]

• "Indian lays claim to "Duke of France" title". Agence France-Presse. 15 April 2007. http://www.france24.com/france24Public/en/administration/afp-news.html?id=070415022148.j83uokuv&cat=null. 
• Calle, Marie-France (14 October 2007). "Un Indien serait en tête des héritiers au trône de France" (in French). Le Figaro (France). http://lefigaro.fr./international/2007/08/20/01003-20070820ARTFIG90091-un_indien_serait_en_tete_des_heritiers_au_trone_de_france.php. 
• Chrisafis, Angelique (3 March 2007). "Found in India: the last king of France". The Guardian (UK). http://guardian.co.uk./world/2007/mar/03/india.france. 
• Decloitre, Andre (2010). "Généalogie de la Maison Royale de France – Troisième branche: les Bourbons" (in French). Généalogies Royales et Princières. http://www.genroy.fr./bourbon.htm. 
• The Dublin review, Part 2. Burns and Oates. 1887. 
• Revise, Nicolas (12 April 2007). "Balthazar Napoléon III, le Bourbon "made in India" se rêve en duc de France" (in French). Aujourd'hui l'Inde. Agence France-Presse. http://inde.aujourdhuilemonde.com./balthazar-napoleon-iii-le-bourbon-made-india-se-reve-en-duc-de-france. 
• Rousselet, Louis; Buckle, Charles Randolph (1875). India and its native princes: travels in Central India and in the presidencies of Bombay and Bengal (reprinted Asian Educational Services, 2005 ed.). London: Chapman & Hall. ISBN 978-81-206-1887-9. http://www.archive.org/details/indiaitsnativepr00rousuoft. 
• Begam, Sultan Jahan (1918). Hayat-i-Qudsi: Life of the Nawab Gauhar Begum alias The Nawab Begum Qudsia of Bhopal. London: Kegan Paul, Trench, Trubner & Co. Ltd. 
• "Lost in France, found in India". The Telegraph (Kolkota, India). 5 March 2007. http://telegraphindia.com./1070305/asp/nation/story_7469891.asp. 
• Tharoor, Ishaan (8 March 2007). "The Bourbon of Bhopal". TIME. http://time.com./time/magazine/article/0,9171,1597249,00.html. 
• "France's king without a crown in India". The Taipei Times. Agence France-Presse. 10 January 2006. http://taipeitimes.com./News/feat/archives/2006/01/10/2003288377/2. 
• Seth, Mesrovb Jacob (1937). "Prince John Philip Bourbon at the Court of the Great Mogul". Armenians in India: from the earliest times to the present day (republished Asian Educational Services, 1992 ed.). Calcutta. ISBN 978-81-206-0812-2. 
• Tikekar, Aroon (1992). The Kincaids, two generations of a British family in the Indian civil service. Promilla & Co.. ISBN 978-81-85002-13-2. 
• van Kerrebrouck, Patrick (2004) (in French). La maison de Bourbon: 1256–2004. Nouvelle histoire généalogique de l'auguste maison de France. 4 (2nd ed.). ISBN 978-2-9501509-5-0.