Henry I 'The Fat' OF NAVARRE King of Navarre ¹⁸⁶¹

   Other names for Henry were Rey Enrique I DE NAVARRA, "El Gordo" et Comte de Champagne et Brie ¹⁹³⁰ and Henri DE CHAMPAGNE.¹⁹³⁰

   FamilySearch ID: KZ99-JQG

  General Notes:

LifeSketch
Henry the Fat (Basque: Henrike I.a, Gizena, French: Henri le Gros, Spanish: Enrique el Gordo) (c. 1244-22 July 1274) was King of Navarre (as Henry I) and Count of Champagne and Brie (as Henry III) from 1270 until his death.

Early life
Henry was the youngest son of Theobald I of Navarre and Margaret of Bourbon. During the reign of his childless older brother Theobald II he held the regency during many of Theobald's numerous absences. In 1269, Henry married Blanche of Artois, daughter of the then-reigning King Louis IX of France's brother Count Robert I of Artois. He was thus in the "Angevin" circle in international politics.

Reign
Recognized as heir presumptive during his brother's reign, Henry succeeded to the thrones of the Kingdom of Navarre and County of Champagne upon Theobald II's death in December 1270. Henry I's proclamation at Pamplona, however, did not take place till the following year, 1 March 1271, and his coronation was delayed until May 1273. His first act was the swear to uphold the Fueros of Navarre and then go to perform homage to Philip III of France for Champagne.

Henry came to the throne at the height of an economic boom in Navarre that was not happening elsewhere in Iberia at as great a rate. But by the Treaty of Paris (1259), the English had been ceded rights in Gascony that effectively cut off Navarrese access to the ocean (since France, Navarre's ally, was at odds with England). Henry allowed the Pamplonese burg of Navarrería to disentangle itself from the union of San Cernin and San Nicolás, effected in 1266. He also granted privileges to the towns of Estella, Los Arcos, and Viana, fostering urban growth. His relations with the nobility were, on the whole, friendly, though he was prepared to maintain the peace of his realm at nearly any cost.

Henry initially sought to recover territory lost to Castile by assisting the revolt of King Alfonso X of Castile's brother Philip in 1270. He eventually declined, preferring to establish an alliance with Castile through the marriage of his son Theobald to Alfonso X's daughter Violant in September 1272. This failed with the death of the young Theobald after he fell from a battlement at the castle of Estella in 1273.

Death and legacy
Henry did not long outlive his son. He was suffocated, according to the generally received accounts, by his own fat. His only legitimate child, a one-year-old daughter named Joan, succeeded him under the regency of her mother Blanche. Joan's 1284 marriage to Philip the Fair, the future King of France, in the same year united the crown of Navarre to that of France and saw Champagne devolve to the French royal domain.

In the Divine Comedy, Dante Alighieri, a younger contemporary, sees Henry's spirit outside the gates of Purgatory, where he is grouped with a number of other European monarchs of the 13th century. Henry is not named directly, but is referred to as "the kindly-faced" and "the father-in-law of the Plague of France".
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Hijo de Teobaldo I y Margarita de Borbón1?. Durante el reinado de su hermano mayor Teobaldo II tuvo la regencia en varias ocasiones, durante algunas ausencias de Teobaldo. Se hizo cargo del reino a la muerte de su hermano al morir éste sin sucesión en 1270.

Se casó en 1269 con Blanca de Artois. Tras jurar los Fueros de Navarra se desplazó a Francia para prestar homenaje feudal a Felipe el Atrevido por sus dominios de Champaña.

Murió a los tres años de su reinado debido a la obesidad, lo que no permite formarnos una idea acertada de la personalidad de este monarca. Parece que mostró interés por el pueblo llano de Navarra. Permitió que la Navarrería se desvinculase de la unión de los burgos de San Cernin y San Nicolás, acordada en 1266 (ver Los burgos de Pamplona). Concedió privilegios a pueblos y ciudades como Estella, Los Arcos y Viana y mantuvo relaciones cordiales con la nobleza, con la que negoció compraventas y cesiones de patrimonio.

Al morir dejó una hija de tres años, Juana I de Navarra, pues su primogénito, Teobaldo, había muerto al caer desde una almena del castillo de Estella.2? Tuvo además un hijo natural antes de su matrimonio, Juan Enríquez de Lacarra.3?4?5?

Intentó mantener la paz a toda costa, lo que le llevó a desechar las pretensiones del infante de Castilla, Sancho, sublevado contra Alfonso X el Sabio.

  Noted events in his life were:

1. Title of Nobility: King of Navarre (as Henry I),,.

2. Title of Nobility: Count of Champagne and Brie (as Henry III), between 1270 and 22 July 1274,.

Henry married Blanche OF ARTOIS, daughter of Robert I 'The Good' OF ARTOIS Count of Artois and Mathilde VAN BRABANT, in 1269 in Melun, Seine-et-Marne, Île-de-France, France.¹⁸⁶¹ (Blanche OF ARTOIS was born in 1248 in Arras-en-Lavedan, Hautes-Pyrénées, Occitanie, France,¹⁸⁵⁸ died on 2 May 1302 in Paris, Paris, Île-de-France, France ¹⁸⁵⁸ and was buried in 1302 in Paris, Paris, Île-de-France, France ¹⁸⁵⁸.)