Margaret, Countess of Vertus (French: Marguerite d'Orléans; 4 April 1406 – 1466), was a French vassal, ruling Countess of Vertus and Etampes 1420–1466. She was the daughter of Louis I, Duke of Orléans, and Valentina Visconti.
Contents
Life
Margaret was the daughter of Louis I, Duke of Orléans, and Valentina Visconti. Her mother was the daughter of Gian Galeazzo Visconti, Duke of Milan, and Isabella of France. Her brother was Charles, Duke of Orléans, captured at Agincourt and imprisoned for twenty-five years in England and who during his long captivity, became the greatest poet of the 15th century in the French language.
In 1423 she married Richard of Montfort, son of John IV, Duke of Brittany, and Joanna of Navarre. Margaret succeeded her brother Philip as Countess of Vertus. Margaret, widowed in 1438, lived for a long time at Longchamp and in other monasteries with her younger daughters, Margaret and Madeleine. She was described as a very pious woman.
The Book of Hours of Marguerite d'Orleans, regarded as a defining example of the Illustrated Prayer Book of the Fifteenth Century, was made for her so that she might practice her devotion on a daily basis.
She obtained a declaration from the Cardinal of Estouteville that sheltered her liberty and that of her daughters as they moved among the convents and religious monasteries of northern France. She finally retired to the Abbey at Guiche, order of Sainte Claire near Blois, where she died 24 April 1466 at the age of sixty.