Queen: Joanna of Navarre, Queen of England, 1370-1437

Navarre is the region along the border of France and Spain facing the western coast, along the Bay of Biscay.  It is composed largely of the Pyrenees Mountains that cut the Iberian Peninsula off from the rest of Europe.  It's home to the Basque people and a tourist haven for both France and Spain.  One of the most famous cities in the Navarre region is Pamplona, where the Feast of San Fermin is celebrated each year with the running of the bulls.  Centuries before that dangerous tradition got started, Navarre was its own independent kingdom and Navarrese princesses married into the royal houses of both England and France. 

One of these princesses was Joanna, daughter of Charles II of Navarre and his wife, Jeanne of Valois (one of the many French princesses with that name and designation).  Joanna was born in Pamplona in 1370 and had the traditional upbringing of a princess of that era, learning how to preside over a royal court once she'd been married.  In 1386, when she was about 15-16, she was married to John IV, Duke of Brittany.  She was his third wife and the only one of his wives to bear him children.  They had 9 in all.  At least 2 daughters died in infancy, but the rest of the brood lived to adulthood and most had children of her own.  Tragedy struck in 1399 when John IV died and was succeeded by his young son John V.  Joanna became Regent of Brittany for her son and continued to bring up her children. 

Enter Henry of Bolingbroke, the future Henry IV of England, who was in exile at the Breton court during the reign of his cousin, Richard II in the opening stages of the Wars of the Roses.  Henry was also a widower.  His first wife, Mary de Bohun, had died, leaving him with 6 children.  Henry needed a wife who would bring him better connections on the Continent and Joanna knew that, sooner or later, in a man's world, her rule over her son's duchy would be challenged.  But there was more to it between Henry and Joanna.  At some point during his stay at the Breton court he fell in love with the widowed Duchess and the feeling was mutual.  In 1400, after he claimed the English throne as King of England, Henry formally proposed to Joanna and she accepted.  Joanna arranged for the Duke of Burgundy, an English ally, to become guardian of her children and Regent of Brittany and departed for England with her daughters, marrying Henry at Winchester Cathedral in 1403.

Her reception among her new subjects was mixed.  She was described as beautiful and personally charming, but also greedy and stingy.  She preferred the companionship of her Breton courtiers over the English.  Eventually, Parliament ordered the Bretons to leave the country, an order which even Henry IV felt he could not oppose.  Joanna got along with her stepchildren, particularly her eldest stepson, the future Henry V.  She became attached to Henry's children, which was a good thing since, 3 years after her arrival in England, her son in Brittany ordered his sisters back home to begin the marriage proposal process that all princesses endured back in those days. 

Then, tragedy struck again in 1413, when Henry IV died.  Henry V trusted Joanna enough that, in 1415, he made her Regent of England while he was away at Agincourt, but it wasn't a popular move among his barons.  Upon his return, Henry brought back young Arthur of Brittany, Joanna's younger son by her first marriage, as a prisoner.  Joanna tried to have him released, but this caused friction between her and Henry V.  In 1419, their relationship was eroded so much that when she was accused of witchcraft in an attempt to poison or kill the King, he believed it.  He ordered her estate stripped and Joanna herself confined to Pevensey Castle.  She was released only on Henry V's deathbed in France in 1422.  Her property was returned and she had enough to live a comfortable life in retirement.  She held her own court at Nottingham Castle and survived into the reign of young Henry VI.  She died at Havering-atte-Bower in Essex and was buried next to Henry IV in Canterbury Cathedral.