Constance I (; 2 November 1154 – 27 November 1198) was reigning Queen of Sicily from 1194–98, jointly with her spouse from 1194 to 1197, and with her infant son Frederick II, Holy Roman Emperor, in 1198, as the heiress of the Norman kings of Sicily. She was also Holy Roman Empress and later Dowager by marriage to Henry VI, Holy Roman Emperor.
When she was young, as the sole heir to the throne of Sicily, she didn't marry until she was 30 because of an ominous prophecy; shortly after becoming empress she was involved in the succession war against her illegitimate nephew King Tancred of Sicily for the Sicilian throne, during which, rarely for an empress, she was captured, though she was later released unharmed. In the history of Holy Roman Empire only two empresses had ever been captured, the other being her mother-in-law Empress Beatrice.
Shortly before ascending the Sicilian throne, at the advanced age of 40, she gave birth to her only child – Frederick, thus continuing the bloodlines of both Holy Roman Empire and Kingdom of Sicily.
After the death of her husband, she gave up the throne of the Holy Roman Empire in the name of her son, despite him being King of the Romans, in favor of her younger brother-in-law Philip of Swabia, making her son merely King of Sicily; meanwhile she still claimed herself Holy Roman Empress Dowager. Passing away merely one year later, she entrusted her young son to Pope Innocent III.
Background and Marriage
Constance was the posthumous daughter of Roger II by his third wife Beatrice of Rethel.
Constance, unusually for a princess, was not betrothed until she was thirty, which later gave rise to stories that she had become a nun and required papal dispensation to marry. Boccaccio related in his De mulieribus claris that a prediction that "her marriage would destroy Sicily" led to her confinement to a convent as a nun from childhood to remain celibate, and by 15th century Santissimo Salvatore, Palermo, managed to claim Constance as a former member, which was assured by Giovanni Antonio Summonte. Meanwhile, Mary Taylor Simeti suggested that Constance, viewed as a potential heir to the throne and a valuable pawn to international diplomacy, would not be lightly ceded.
In the spring of 1168 when her elder nephew King William II was reigning, in Messina, the opposition against Chancellor Stephen du Perche was growing more and more, and a rumor spread that William was murdered and the chancellor planned to put his brother on the throne, who would marry Constance to legitimate his claim, despite the existence of Henry of Capua brother of William. Stephen was finally forced to flee.
Henry died in 1172, as King William II did not marry until 1177 and his marriage remained childless (or ever had a son named Bohemond in 1181), Constance became the sole heir to the Sicilian crown; nonetheless, while said to have been designated the heir and sworn fealty to in 1174, she remained confined to her convent with her marriage seemingly beyond consideration until she was 30-year-old.
Her betrothal to Henry, King of the Romans, was announced 29 Oct 1184 at the Augsburg episcopal palace, an event that Pope Lucius III initiated rather than objected. In 1185 Constance traveled to Milan to celebrate the wedding accompanied by a grand procession of princes and barons. Henry accompanied her to Salerno in August but had to return to Germany for the funeral of his mother. On August 28 Constance was greeted in the Province of Rieti by ambassadors from the Emperor. Henry and Constance were married on 27 January 1186 at Basilica of Sant'Ambrogio, Milan. In exchange for the marriage Frederick agreed to relinquish his claim to Southern Italy. Before leaving Sicily William II had three main nobles — his cousin Tancred, Count of Lecce, Roger of Andria and vice chancellor Matthew of Ajello swear fealty to her as the probable successor to the throne at the curia of Troia. Matthew strongly opposed this marriage. Abulafia (1988) points out that William did not foresee the union of German and Sicilian crowns as a serious eventuality; his purpose was to consolidate an alliance, with an erstwhile enemy of Norman power in Italy. Another aim of William to marry Constance off was to prevent Tancred from claiming the throne.
Constance interceded the succession conflict of her maternal-granduncle Count Henry of Namur with her husband and father-in-law: Henry had designated his maternal-nephew Baldwin V, Count of Hainaut as his heir while childless, but he had a daughter Ermesinde in 1186 and thus sought to replace Baldwin with her. Under the instruction of Frederick I, Baldwin succeeded Namur in 1189 while Henry was still living.