ABSTRACT
The brief, but happy marriage of St. Elizabeth of Hungary and Landgraf Ludwig IV of Thuringia considerably exercised some of the saint’s hagiographers, including Jacobus de Voragine. It also happens to illuminate several important aspects of crusade history: the domestic rupture that leaving on crusade often entailed, rituals of departure, and, dramatically in Ludwig’s case, the dangers of the route itself. Ludwig secretly took the cross early in 1227, concealing his decision from his pregnant wife in order not to cause her anxiety. She devotedly accompanied him even beyond the borders of Thuringia when he left, and could only with much effort be persuaded to return home. Finally, her public and demonstrative grief upon receiving the news of his death from fever in Otranto and, later, his remains, suggests the devastating impact on an affectionate marriage that departure and death on crusade might have. 1 Ludwig’s death en route is also a reminder that the greatest risks of crusading did not come into play only in the Levant.
