Abstracts Womens Studies

Not Really a Whining Widow: Sophie of Bavaria in her Cultural Context

by Sophie Elise Charron

This paper provides an analysis of the inventory and correspondence from the widowhood of Sophie of Bavaria (1376–1428), the second wife of Wenceslas IV of Bohemia. It suggests Sophie had two overlapping and mutually reinforcing strategies by which she sought to retain her elite status (as the former Queen of Bohemia) and secure her income during her widowhood. First, her inventory reveals that Sophie displayed her royal magnificence through the retention and release of luxurious objects, by way of asserting her rank, and therefore entitlement to an income fit for a widowed queen; and second, she leveraged the obligations attached to sibling-bonds with her natal and marital families. She asserted her identities as a member of both families, in the hopes of influencing her brothers to advocate for her with the new Czech king, and for the latter, in turn, to provide her an income.