Pawn and Political Player: Observations on the Life of a Thirteenth-Century Countess

This article explores the transformation of Margaret de Lacy, countess of Lincoln (d. 1266), from a young and vulnerable heiress into one of the most important and wealthy noble widows of her day, whose friendship was courted by Henry III's queen. Hitherto Margaret's career has been dogged by misconceptions about her father's identity and her marriages. A fresh consideration of the evidence affords a unique window on to the social and political factors that influenced the arrangement of noble marriages in the thirteenth century and might later allow an aristocratic widow to carve out a distinctive role for herself.