Scholar Introduction: Louise Gay

Louise Gay is a postgraduate in Medieval Studies from the University of Toulouse Jean Jaurès (France), currently preparing the beginning of her PhD next fall. Her Master’s dissertation focused on Capetian queenship and warfare, investigating the French queens’ policies of war and diplomacy from the late X^th to the early XIV^th centuries. This project explored the contexts in which queens took an active role in warfare and focused on the mutations of such reginal power in connection to the establishment of the royal dynasty throughout the centuries. As a member of the Visiting Researcher scheme of the University of Winchester during her last year of MA, Louise discovered and enthusiastically joined Team Queens. Alongside fellow comrade Catherine Capel, she specialises in high-status women’s involvement in warfare and its repercussions on their lives and reputations, hoping to contribute to our understanding of gender within a military framework within the medieval period.

Louise has presented parts of her research at several academic conferences, most notably at the WIF Women & Power and Women and War International Conferences in 2019. She also presented a paper on the medieval queen’s plural body for the medievalist association Questes at the Sorbonne Research House in 2020.

Louise’s current publication:

Gay, L., 2020. Des commandements militaires féminins en guerre sainte: Marguerite de Provence et Sagar al-Durr lors de la septième croisade. Royal Studies Journal, 7(1), pp.39–56. DOI: http://doi.org/10.21039/rsj.237