She-Wolves: England's Early Queens

BBC Four HD

1:00 AM to 2:00 AM

Wednesday 29 July

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Historian Helen Castor explores the lives of Isabella of France and Margaret of Anjou, two French-born queens of England whose ambition and desire for power caused outrage in medieval Britain. Isabella, wife of King Edward II in the 14th century, was accused of murder, while 100 years later Margaret, who was married to Henry VI, was regarded as a destructively ambitious figure - and would go on to be labelled a 'she-wolf' by Shakespeare. However, Castor argues it was their gender, rather than their behaviour, that lay at the root of their public vilification