Scandal, romance, political affairs: Walter Map’s ‘Portuguese king’ and Anglo-Flemish relations in the twelfth century

The essay analyses a specific chapter of Walter Map's De Nugis Curialium to show how the scandal of adultery, besides being a topos of medieval romance, was also used to point at very specific political issues. Walter Map was an itinerant justice active at the English court of King Henry II (1154-1189). Chapter 12 of the First Distinctio narrates the story of the 'King of Portugal' and his reaction to an accusation of adultery involving his wife and one of his knights. However, the issue has no confirmation from other sources. As a result of both the impossibility of identifying Map's king in one of the coeval rulers of Portugal and Walter Map's fame as a witty storyteller, scholarship usually considers the tale just a case of medieval fiction. Nevertheless, Henry II's court and its authors played a significant role in the rise of romance and in its political use, making adultery and scandal part of the English court's language and propaganda. Considering that, the analysis of Walter Map's tale moves to reconstruct possible references to contemporary political issues involving the English kingdom. The essay identifies the 'Portuguese king' in Philip, count of Flanders, by following the path of a famous Anglo-Flemish rumour regarding the murdering of Walter de Fontaines, presumed lover of Philip's wife Elisabeth of Vermandois, and Philip's marriage with the Portuguese princess Theresa, arranged with the active involvement of Henry II. Thus, the essay contextualises this alleged scandal in the turbulent Anglo-Flemish political relations.