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Cecile
BNF, Mss fr 68, folio 143
Marriage of the daughters of Philippe Ier Guillaume de Tyr, Historia
Lady of Tarsus and Mamistra, Countess of Tripoli
Personal details
Born 1097
Died 1145 (aged 47–48)
Spouse(s) Tancred, Prince of Galilee
Pons, Count of Tripoli

Cecile of France (1097 – after 1145) was a daughter of Philip I of France[1] and Bertrade de Montfort.[2] Her parentage is recorded by William of Tyre, who also records her marriages.[3]

Her first marriage was arranged while Bohemond I of Antioch was visiting the French court seeking support against Alexios I Komnenos. She sailed for Antioch at the end of 1106 and became Lady of Tarsus[4] and Mamistra, in Cilician Armenia. Cecile married firstly (late 1106) Tancred, Prince of Galilee, Regent of Antioch, who succeeded in 1111 as Prince of Antioch.

While dying in 1112, Tancred made Pons of Tripoli, promise to marry her, and Tancred gave her the fortresses of Arcicanum and Rugia as a dowry. They married in 1112. In 1133, Pons was besieged at his castle of Montferrand by Imad ad-Din Zengi, atabeg of Mosul, and Cecile appealed to her half-brother Fulk, King of Jerusalem, to come to his aid. Zengi abandoned the siege, but during a second siege in 1137, Pons was captured and killed. He was succeeded by his son with Cecile, Raymond II. Cecile died in 1145.

Children with Pons[]

  • Raymond II, Count of Tripoli
  • Philip?[5]
  • Agnes[6] wife of Renaud II, Lord of Margat

Sources[]

  1. Ivan Gobry, Histoire des Rois de France, Philippe Ier, père de Louis VI, Paris, Pygmalion, 2003, p. 366. ISBN 2-85704-799-1
  2. The Historia Regum Francorum Monasterii Sancti Dionysii names "Philippum et Florum et filiam unam" as children of "Philippus rex [et] Fulconi Rechin Andagavorum comiti uxorem", specifying that the (unnamed) daughter married "Tanchredus Anthiochenus".
  3. Cecile of France. Medieval Lands.
  4. Sturdza, M. D. (1999). Dictionnaire Historique et Généalogique des Grandes Familles de Grèce, d'Albanie et de Constantinople (2e edition Paris), p. 631.
  5. Family of Pons, Count of Tripoli
  6. Röhricht, R. (ed.) (1904) Regesta Regni Hierosolymitani, Supplement (Oeniponti) 270a, p. 18.
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