Eleanor of Aquitaine was born in France sometime during 1122. Her father was a pretty decent guy named William X, who like most white people with rapper names also happened to be extremely rich. Nobody remembers her mother Aenor since they have sort of the same name. Mom died when she was like 7 or 8 so didn't have much impact anyways.
An intelligent yet spoiled little brat, Eleanor was given just about the best possible education a kid could have, especially a girl in medieval times, and was one of those annoying people that seems to be good at everything without really needing to try.
When she was a nubile ripe 15-year-old her father went off to do pilgrim shit and promptly died. With his final words, he gave all his stuff to Eleanor and told the King of France to take good care of her. Which was kind of a dick move since he actually had two daughters but whatever.
Turns out the King was terminally ill with dysentery at the time though! Literally a week after they got married he literally shit himself to death. The fat bastard, nobody really felt that upset about it. And so on Christmas Day, 1137, Eleanor became Queen of France.
Eleanor was never popular with the stuffy upper class of Paris however. Louis' mother in particular considered her a "bad influence" on her son and half the stuff she did was very scandalous in the eyes of the Church. Teenagers. Bah.
Louis was totally star-struck though, since she was sexy and sassy and stylish. He granted her every whim even though he didn't understand her at all, among other things he spent a fortune completely remodeling their house because she wanted it to be more comfy. Absolutely pussy-whipped.
He had a big argument with the Pope however, and also had a spat with a guy named Theobald. Turns out this other guy named Raoul had dumped Theobald's sister and shacked up with Eleanor's sister. Remember her? That’s okay, nobody else does either.
It got ghetto. At one point Louis, who was personally commanding the assault on a town called Vitry, couldn't stop his soldiers from trashing the place after they won. Among other bad things the big church in the center of town caught on fire, and more than 1,000 people were burned alive inside it.
On a happier note Eleanor gave birth to her first child in 1145, a daughter named Marie. It took eight years of trying to make that damn baby, so this was a pretty big deal for Eleanor. It's pretty strange that it took so long for her to be preggers but we'll get to why later.
Louis still felt guilty about that barbecue in Vitry though, and wanted to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land to atone. Hearing of this, Pope Eugene (a different Pope from the one he had a tiff with) decided now would be a smashing time for another Crusade and forthwith put Louis in charge of it.
Eleanor decided that having a two-year-old baby wasn't going to stop her from having fun, so she and all her gal-pals packed like a million suitcases and said they were coming along too. Her favorite uncle lived near there as well, and it would be a great excuse to visit.
The Second Crusade was a train wreck. Louis was a nice guy but a crap soldier and strategist. On the way there they took a three week vacation in Constantinople. The Byzantine Emperor, who low-key didn't like either of ‘em, told them not to worry. Go on ahead and have fun kids, the Germans just won a big battle against the Muslims so you'll be fine.
That was bullshit though, The Germans had been massacred and King Conrad barely survived. Eleanor and Louis found out about this when a few survivors of the battle, included Conrad who was coughing a lot and had real bad PTSD, staggered past their campfire without saying hello.
They brushed that off though, and everyone had a jolly Christmas! Except for the small army of Muslims they beat the shit out of. After waking up from the food coma, Louis decided to take a shortcut through the mountains to get to Eleanor's uncle's place. A couple left turns later, they stumbled across the gruesome sight of the entire dead German army, rotting all over the place in the sun since the Turks didn't feel like paying for their funeral. Have you ever paid for a funeral? How about 10? How about a few thousand? Can you really blame the Turks here?
It went downhill from there. At one point, after a shouting match, Louis was at the back of the train hanging out with the other pilgrims and all the luggage, while Eleanor was in a huff at the front of the train.
Louis had told them to stop and make camp at the summit of Cadmos, but Eleanor thought he was an idiot and wanted to continue a bit further to a nice plateau that would obviously make a better campsite, duh. So the two groups got really stretched out and separated.
Turns out that little army they fucked over had a much bigger older brother. The Turks saw their chance and jumped the helpless baggage train and camp followers. All their stuff got stolen and everybody died. Everybody except Louis that is!
You see, since he still felt bad about that burning people alive in a church thing, lately he had been slumming it with the pilgrims dressed like a hobo. The enemy was too busy chopping up his well dressed bodyguards to pay him any attention, so he scampered like a monkey up some tree roots sticking out of a cliff and escaped.
Right, so, eventually they got to her uncle Raymond's place. Eleanor had been close to him even as a kid and was very fond of the guy. A bunch of people felt she was showing him, "excessive affection" *cough*, and starting talking weird shit behind her back. Hearing about the drama between her and her husband, he offered to let her stay with him until the Crusade was concluded.
Louis was like, "Awwww Hell no. Bitch get in the car!", then publically dragged her ass to all the way to Jerusalem and back. By that point the army was in shambles, the knights were cranky and tired, and everyone decided to just give up and go home early.
Wasn't that easy though! Taking different ships because they were bickering, both got attacked by pirates sent by the Byzantine Emperor. Remember him? The guy was a low-key savage. Neither got hurt but their ships got waaaay off course and nobody heard from either for a couple months.
Eleanor showed up in Sicily, and wasn't happy to discover everyone believed she was dead and were arguing about what to do with her stuff. The Don, er, that is King Roger let her crash at his place for a while, and after a bit a rather scruffy looking Louis rolled into town too.
Eleanor found out Uncle Raymond had been beheaded by the Muslims, and this finally pushed the couple over the edge. Instead of going home they went to Pope Eugene, and told him they wanted a divorce.
His Popeness was like, "Now now, you two should try to work it out." When he discovered in one of the marriage counseling sessions they hadn't had sex in years, he prepped a big fancy bed and ordered them to get busy with it. No joke, that's a straight historical fact.
Now, modern readers of our tale might be reminded that the Pope was a lot more important back then than he is now. A command like that was basically the same as God calling you up on your cell and shouting "GO FORTH AND MULTIPLY" into your ear.
So a bit later, voila! Eleanor gave birth to her second child, another daughter named Alix. Like usual they discovered having a baby won’t fix your relationship. In March of 1152, they signed the divorce papers. Eleanor was 30 years old. Or maybe 29 again, her birthday is a little fuzzy. Louise got custody of both the kids which, to be brutally Frank (lol), didn't bother Eleanor.
On the way back to her hometown, two different dudes attempted to kidnap her, classic villain style, and do the whole "force the damsel to marry you" thing. This went about as well as could be expected for both of them... But fun fact! One of these guys, Theobald V who wasn't related to the other Theobald earlier, ended up in a long, happy marriage with Eleanor's daughter Alix. Which is the next best thing or even better depending on how you look at it! I digress...
As soon as Eleanor arrived in her hometown, angry and horny, she texted that hot teenage stud everyone was talking about Henry II, Duke of Normandy and maybe/maybe not the future King of England, demanding he visit her immediately.
On the way back to her hometown, two different dudes attempted to kidnap her, classic villain style, and do the whole "force the damsel to marry you" thing. This went about as well as could be expected for both of them... But fun fact! One of these guys, Theobald V who wasn't related to the other Theobald earlier, ended up in a long, happy marriage with Eleanor's daughter Alix. Which is the next best thing or even better depending on how you look at it! I digress...
As soon as Eleanor arrived in her hometown, angry and horny, she texted that hot teenage stud everyone was talking about Henry II, Duke of Normandy and maybe/maybe not the future King of England, demanding he visit her immediately.
And so he did! Being 11 years younger than her just meant he had lots of, eh, "enthusiasm". Can you blame him? Eleanor was a total milf! Two months, and probably more than two drinks, after getting divorced Eleanor got married again. This time to the King of England rather than the King of France. Go figure. Deep down this was probably the reason for the 100 Years War.
Henry may have been a hot teenage stud with a thing for older women, but he was ALSO a complete asshole, surprise surprise, who among other flaws and failings cheated on his wife constantly. They had one of those, I hate you but you are really good at sex sort of relationships, since Eleanor had eight more kids with him. Yep, that’s right, eight.
Now in all fairness Eleanor was very mellow towards Henry's many baby-mammas. She even adopted one of the little bastards when he brought the kid home unexpectedly. But when Henry stopped pretending to be secretive about it, and openly flaunted that cheap slut Rosamund, that was just going too far.
Eleanor and Henry split, but didn't divorce since that shit was complicated and annoying and expensive. Like, even more so than it is now. She moved back to her hometown, again, where she got real into poetry and the meaning of love and like... feminism. They called it "The Court of Love". Historians are not sure if this was a place of profound discussions regarding romance and culture or if it was the medieval version of trashy TV-shows like The Bachelor. 50/50 chance either way.
In the meantime Eleanor's son Henry (not to be confused with her husband Henry) was engaged at the ripe old age of 5 to the daughter of her ex, Margaret. Who was lucky to find a husband before it was too late, being all of 2 years old herself. Why anyone thought this was a good idea is hard to believe, since it resulted in multiple ugly fights between Eleanor's ex-husband and her current one.
Speaking of which, shit wasn't going well for Henry. Being an asshole and all, he had a lot of enemies and kept having to deal with revolts, rebellions, revolutions, etc. What's more Eleanor, who was still fabs wealthy and had lots of friends, was low-key helping them all fuck with him.
Henry got fed up with that eventually, and ordered the secret police to arrest her. For the next 16 years she lived in jail, constantly being moved around from one castle to another so she wouldn't figure out how to escape. It was comfy rich-people jail, but it still sucked.
During Eleanor's imprisonment, Rosamund died very suddenly at a young age. It was never proven but everybody believed Eleanor had her assassinated. She was gangsta like that. Eventually Henry finally died as well, at the age of 56. Took him long enough, nobody liked him anyways.
Eleanor's son Richard the Lionheart became king. Did we mention that she was the mother of Richard the fucking Lionheart? Anyhows, one of the first things he did after getting the crown was order Eleanor released. This messenger was none other than THE William Marshal, another undisputed Historical Badass to be discussed at another time. When William Marshal got there dramatically demanding she be set freeeeee he found out the guards had already released her a while ago and she wasn’t there. Lol.
Richard, who was technically King of England, didn't actually speak a word of English and generally didn't like the British Isles. He grew up there but once he became king never visited or took care of it. You know, typical responsible father of the nation.
Instead, his mother was in charge of everything and signed the paperwork with, "Eleanor, by the grace of God, Queen of England". Which was total bullshit but nobody dared say anything about it to her face.
Richard, who was also an asshole just like his father, got arrested by the Holy Roman Empire. The ransom was huge. Even for someone as filthy rich as Eleanor it was a ridiculous amount of cash. It took her years to squeeze it out of people, but eventually she paid for his bail like a nice Mom.
Then he got murdered. Yep. Crossbow bolt to the neck. He completely deserved it of course, brought it upon himself really, but as Richard had been her favorite child this made Eleanor rather depressed and she decided to retire from being queen bitch of the universe.
In 1199, her son King John made a deal with King Phillip II, the son of her ex Louis. Remember him? Turns out he actually wasn't in the closet the whole time and finally had a son with his third wife. And now her kid and his kid were homies. Small world huh?
Quick aside here, since Eleanor and Louis spawned like 20ish kids between the two clearly neither was impotent or infertile. So why in the world did it take 8 years for them to make the first one, especially when that was during the better half of their marriage? Truly a mystery for the ages...
Anyhows, John had a bunch of royal nieces and they decided to marry the prince of France to one of the princesses of Spain. It didn't actually matter which one, (gotta love medieval sexism) so John told his mother to just go pick whichever of her granddaughters she liked the most.
Eleanor was 77 years young by now, and traveling around before airplanes and handicapped parking spaces was hard on little old grandmothers. On the way back, she was delighted to be visited by Richard's old BFF, another complete asshole named Mercadier.
Unexpectedly bumping into Mercadier really put Eleanor into a cheerful mood, pity he was violently murdered a couple days later. I mean what are the odds? He deserved it of course, but it hit Eleanor really hard and that was sort of the last straw. She never truly recovered.
A couple life threatening sieges and such what later, Eleanor decided she literally can’t even deal with the kids these days and all their shit. In 1201 she went to a quiet little place called Fontevraud Abby and become a nun.
A few years later, at the age of 82, she died. Sadly her bones were intentionally smashed up by the cast of Les Misérables but her now mostly empty stone coffin is still around and you can visit it for a modest entry fee. I’m told the cafe has excellent smoked fish.