ABSTRACT
Queen Helen (Jelena) of Serbia (*c. 1236, †February 8, 1314), the wife of King Stefan Uroš I (r. 1243–1276), is most often known and referred to in historiography as Queen Helen d’Anjou, or Jelena Anžujska. She was the granddaughter of the Byzantine emperor Isaac II Angelos (r. 1185–1195 and 1203–1204) and the great-granddaughter of the King of Hungary, Bela III (r. 1172–1196). Both Catholic and Orthodox identities had been a part of Helen's lineage from the very beginning. In her marriage to the King of Serbia she could, according to canon law, have remained Catholic. At the same time, Helen was the first Serbian queen to receive an official hagiography composed by Danilo II, archbishop of the Serbian Orthodox Church. She is well known as a great patron of the arts in both the Orthodox and the Catholic spheres of the Serbian medieval state of the Nemanide dynasty. In her lifetime she retained close ties with Rome while being a ktetor of the Serbian Orthodox monastery of Chilandar on Mt. Athos, as well as of the ancient Eastern Christian holy sites and monasteries in Sinai. The portrait that follows is an attempt to depict Helen as a powerful royal woman, wife of a Serbian king, Stefan Uroš I (r. 1243–1276), independent ruler governing her own lands which were part of the Serbian Nemanide kingdom, as well as the mother of two subsequent Serbian kings, Dragutin (r. 1276–1282) and Milutin (r. 1282–1321).
