List of Characters
In Poitiers
Joanna: princess of England, daughter of King Henry and Eleanor of Aquitaine
Queen Eleanor: in her own right, Duchess of Aquitaine, married to Henry of England, previously married to King Louis of France
Eleanor: Joanna’s older sister, later married to King Alfonso of Castile
Young Henry: oldest son of Henry and Eleanor, heir to the throne of England
Marguerite: married to young Henry, daughter of Louis of France by his second wife
Richard: son of Henry and Eleanor, heir to the Duchy of Aquitaine
Alice: betrothed to Richard, daughter of Louis of France, younger sister of Marguerite
Geoffrey: son of Henry and Eleanor
Constance: daughter of the Count of Brittany, betrothed to Geoffrey
Nounou: Joanna’s nurse, a Norman woman whose given name is Jeanne
Sir William Marshal: champion of tournaments, made Master of Young Henry’s household
Marie: Countess of Champagne, daughter of Louis of France and Eleanor of Aquitaine, half-sister to Joanna
Scholastique: daughter of Marie of Champagne
Master Hubert: a pastry cook
Chrétien de Troyes: a poet in Marie of Champagne’s train
Sir Ralph: the seneschal (steward) at Poitiers
André: chaplain to Marie of Champagne, tutor to the royal children, author of the Code of Love
In other parts of France
Henry: Joanna’s father, King of England, Duke of Normandy, Count of Anjou, married to Eleanor of Aquitaine, based in Winchester, England, but moving all over his French possessions
Raymond de Saint-Gilles: son and heir to Count Raymond of Toulouse and a friend of Richard’s in Toulouse
King Louis: of France, in Paris
Philip: son and heir to King Louis, in Paris, born the same year as Joanna
Mother Audeburge: Abbess of Fontevrault
In Winchester
John: youngest child of King Henry and Queen Eleanor
Adèle: daughter of the Baron de Laigle, a lady-in-waiting to Joanna
In Palermo (Panorme to the Normans)
William: King of Sicily (which included Naples and the southern part of Italy), of the house of Hauteville in Normandy
Queen Margaret: mother of King William, formerly a princess of Navarre
Constance: aunt of William and his heir, later Holy Roman Empress
Count Tancred of Lecce, bastard cousin of William
Sybilla: wife of Tancred
Walter: Archbishop of Panorme, a Norman
Nicholas of Athens, Chamberlain of Joanna’s household
Matthew: William’s Chancellor, originally a notary from Salerno, thus a Sicilian
Caid Richard: William’s Great Chamberlain, a Saracen and a eunuch
Richard Palmer: Bishop of Syracuse, an Englishman
Count Roger of Andria: a Norman
Ahmed: William’s physician, an Arab