A Biographical Dictionary of the Celebrated Women of Every Age and Country/Constance
CONSTANCE, (Daughter of Conan, Duke of Brittany) Wife of Geoffrey Plantagenet, Son of Henry II. King of England. Died 1202.
Was contracted to him while they were both in the cradle, and, by her right, Geoffrey became Lord of Brittany. By him she had two children, Eleanor, called the Maid of Brittany, and Arthur, who was born after the death of his father. She afterwards married Ralph Blundeville, earl of Chester, who suspected her, we know not on what foundation, of an intrigue with John, his most bitter enemy. He demanded and obtained a divorce. Constance become free, married Guy, brother of the viscount de Thouars. She had by him a daughter named Alix, whom the Bretons, on the refusal of John to set free her eldest sister, elected for their sovereign.
In virtue of the feudal law, the king of France claimed the guardianship of the children of Geoffrey; but since the cession of Brittany to Rollo duke of Mormandy, it was no longer but an arriere-fief; and Richard being duke of Normandy was its immediate lord, in consequence, laid in his claim for the same. Constance wished to keep it in her own name; she took care to foment divisions between the two kings, and to put herself, by turns, under the protection of each. As Richard incommoded her the most, and was most to be feared by her, she took the part of Philip in the war relative to the imperial succession; but did it feebly, and without any advantage to him.
On the death of Richard Cœur de Lion, he altered his former intention of making Arthur his heir by will, as he was by the law of succession, heir to all his possessions (excepting Brittany, which, holding from his mother, was not Richard's to give) and appointed his brother John his successor; who was governed by his mother as well as Arthur. John and Eleanor would have consented to the partition of empire, and have left the French provinces to Arthur, which was also the wish and interest of the French king; but justice would have given England also to Arthur; and this partition was prevented by the intrigues of his mother, and the interest this young prince himself inspired.
The marriage, which soon after took place between Lewis and Blanch, of Castile, did not long cement the friendship of John and Philip; and had not Constance, who was a woman of conduct and courage, died at the time when she could have taken advantage of circumstances, and again asserted the rights of her son, it is most likely he would not have fallen a victim to the barbarity of his uncle, or his sister languished all her innocent life in prison.