Navarre

Description

In Paradiso XIX, v. 143, Dante exclaims "beata Navarra," expressing a wish that the small Pyrenean kingdom know how to defend itself against the French thanks to the chain of the Pyrenees that girdles it on the north. The notes to the passage recall that the kingdom was wisely governed by Joan, daughter of Henry I of Navarre and wife of Philip the Fair, from 1274 until 1304; to her son Louis, who ascended the throne in 1314, fell the union of the crowns of France and Navarre, an event that ancient commentators read as the beginning of the subjection of the kingdom to France. The link with the dynasty is also recalled in Purgatorio VII 104, where Henry I appears alongside Philip III, father of Philip the Fair, a sign of the union between the two lineages already before the daughter's marriage. The name also recurs in Inferno XXII 48, where Ciampolo declares himself "del regno di Navarra," indicating a dominion that the notes extend also to Champagne, in French territory.