Marie-Louise Kerr will tell us about The woman who would be Queen: the life of  Empress Matilda and her connections with Oxfordshire.

Empress Matilda (1102 – 1167) was one of the claimants to the English throne during the civil war known as the Anarchy. The daughter and heir of King Henry I of England, she went to Germany as a child when she was married to the future Holy Roman Emperor Henry V. She travelled with the emperor to Italy in 1116, was controversially crowned empress in St Peter’s Basilica, and acted as the imperial regent in Italy.