1/2 Carlin - Joan of Naples

Joan I ruled Provence and Naples simultaneously, a dual inheritance that made her one of the most powerful women in fourteenth-century Europe — and one of the most embattled. Her reign coincided with the worst decades of the Black Death, repeated Angevin succession crises, and her own three additional marriages following the murder of her first husband Andrew of Hungary in 1345, a crime for which Pope Clement VI briefly held her accountable. She was eventually strangled on orders of her cousin Charles of Durazzo in 1382, the terminal year of this issue's production run.