Majorca (d. 1375), and later Otto of Brunswick, prince of Taranto. The queen had no sons, and as both her daughters were dead she made Louis I. duke of Anjou, brother of Charles V. of France, her heir. This proceeding so angered Charles, duke of Durazzo, who regarded himself as the future king of Naples, that he seized the city. Joanna was captured and was put to death at Aversa on the 22nd of May 1382. The queen was a woman of intellectual tastes, and was acquainted with some of the poets and scholars of her time, including Petrarch and Boccaccio.
See Crivelli, Della prima e della seconda Giovanna, regine di Napoli (1832); G. Battaglia, Giovanna I., regine di Napoli (1835); W. St C. Baddeley, Queen Joanna I. of Naples (1893); Scarpetta, Giovanna I. di Napoli (1903); and Francesca M. Steele, The Beautiful Queen Joanna I. of Naples (1910).
JOANNA II. (1371–1435), queen of Naples, was descended from
Charles II. of Anjou through his son John of Durazzo. She had
been married to William, son of Leopold III. of Austria, and at
the death of her brother King Ladislaus in 1414 she succeeded
to the Neapolitan crown. Her life had always been very dissolute,
and although now a widow of forty-five, she chose as her lover
Pandolfo Alopo, a youth of twenty-six, whom she made seneschal
of the kingdom. He and the constable Muzio Attendolo Sforza
completely dominated her, and the turbulent barons wished to
provide her with a husband who would be strong enough to
break her favourites yet not make himself king. The choice
fell on James of Bourbon, a relative of the king of France, and
the marriage took place in 1415. But James at once declared
himself king, had Alopo killed and Sforza imprisoned, and kept
his wife in a state of semi-confinement; this led to a counter-agitation
on the part of the barons, who forced James to liberate
Sforza, renounce his kingship, and eventually to quit the country.
The queen now sent Sforza to re-establish her authority in Rome,
whence the Neapolitans had been expelled after the death of
Ladislaus; Sforza entered the city and obliged the condottiere
Braccio da Montone, who was defending it in the pope’s name, to
depart (1416). But when Oddo Colonna was elected pope as
Martin V., he allied himself with Joanna, who promised to give
up Rome, while Sforza returned to Naples. The latter found,
however, that he had lost all influence with the queen, who was
completely dominated by her new lover Giovanni (Sergianni)
Caracciolo. Hoping to re-establish his position and crush
Caracciolo, Sforza favoured the pretensions of Louis III. of
Anjou, who wished to obtain the succession of Naples at Joanna’s
death, a course which met with the approval of the pope. Joanna
refused to adopt Louis owing to the influence of Caracciolo, who
hated Sforza; she appealed for help instead to Alphonso of
Aragon, promising to make him her heir. War broke out between
Joanna and the Aragonese on one side and Louis and
Sforza, supported by the pope, on the other. After much fighting
by land and sea, Alphonso entered Naples, and in 1422 peace
was made. But dissensions broke out between the Aragonese
and Catalans and the Neapolitans, and Alphonso had Caracciolo
arrested; whereupon Joanna, fearing for her own safety, invoked
the aid of Sforza, who with difficulty carried her off to Aversa.
There she was joined by Louis whom she adopted as her successor
instead of the ungrateful Alphonso. Sforza was accidentally
drowned, but when Alphonso returned to Spain, leaving only a
small force in Naples, the Angevins with the help of a Genoese
fleet recaptured the city. For a few years there was peace in
the kingdom, but in 1432 Caracciolo, having quarrelled with the
queen, was seized and murdered by his enemies. Internal
disorders broke out, and Gian Antonio Orsini, prince of Taranto,
led a revolt against Joanna in Apulia; Louis of Anjou died while
conducting a campaign against the rebels (1434), and Joanna
herself died on the 11th of February 1435, after having appointed
his son René her successor. Weak, foolish and dissolute, she
made her reign one long scandal, which reduced the kingdom
to the lowest depths of degradation. Her perpetual intrigues
and her political incapacity made Naples a prey to anarchy and
foreign invasions, destroying all sense of patriotism and loyalty
both in the barons and the people.
Authorities.—A. von Platen, Storia del reame di Napoli dal 1414 al 1423 (1864). C. Cipolla, Storia, della signoria Italiana (1881), where the original authorities are quoted. (See also Naples; Sforza.)
JOASH, or Jehoash (Heb. “Yahweh is strong, or hath given”), the name of two kings of Palestine in the Bible.
1. Son of Ahaziah (see Jehoram, 2) and king of Judah. He obtained the throne by means of a revolt in which Athaliah (q.v.) perished, and his accession was marked by a solemn covenant, and by the overthrow of the temple of Baal and of its priest Mattan(-Baal). In this the priest Jehoiada (who must have continued to act as regent) took the leading part. The account of Joash’s reign is not from a contemporary source (2 Kings xi. 4–xii. 16), and 2 Chronicles adds several new details, including a tradition of a conflict between the king and priests after the death of Jehoiada (xxii. 11; xxiv. 3, 15 sqq.).[1] At an unstated period, the Aramaeans under Hazael captured Gath, and Jerusalem only escaped by buying off the enemy (2 Kings xii. 17 sqq.). This may perhaps be associated with the Aramaean attacks upon Israel (2 below), but the tradition recorded in 2 Chron. xxiv. 23 seq. differs widely and cannot be wholly rejected. The king perished in a conspiracy, the origin of which is not clear; it may have been for his attack upon the priests, it was scarcely for the course he took to save Jerusalem. He was succeeded by his son Amaziah, whose moderation in avenging his father’s death receives special mention. After defeating the Edomites, Amaziah turned his attention to Israel.
2. Son of Jehoahaz and king of Israel. Like his grandfather Jehu, he enjoyed the favour of the prophet Elisha, who promised him a triple defeat of the Aramaeans at Aphek (2 Kings xiii. 14 sqq. 22–25). The cities which had been taken from his father by Hazael the father of Ben-hadad were recovered (cf. 1 Kings xx. 34, time of Ahab) and the relief gained by Israel from the previous blows of Syria prepared the way for its speedy extension of power. When challenged by Amaziah of Judah, Joash uttered the famous fable of the thistle and cedar (for another example see Judg. ix. 8–15; see also Abimelech), and a battle was fought at Beth-shemesh, in which Israel was completely successful. An obscure statement in 2 Chron. xxv. 13 would show that this was not the only conflict; at all events, Amaziah was captured, the fortifications of Jerusalem were partially destroyed, the treasures of the Temple and palace were looted, and hostages were carried away to Samaria. According to one statement, Amaziah survived the disaster fifteen years, and lost his life in a conspiracy; but there is a gap in the history of Judah which the narratives do not enable us to fill (1 Kings xv. 1; see xiv. 17, 23). See further Uzziah; Jeroboam (2); and Jews. (S. A. C.)
JOB. The book of Job (Heb. אִיּוֹב ’Iyyob, Gr. Ἰώβ), in the Bible,
the most splendid creation of Hebrew poetry, is so called from the
name of the man whose history and afflictions and sayings form
the theme of it.
Contents.—As it now lies before us it consists of five parts. 1. The prologue, in prose, chr. i.–ii., describes in rapid and dramatic steps the history of this man, his prosperity and greatness corresponding to his godliness; then how his life is drawn in under the operation of the sifting providence of God, through the suspicion suggested by the Satan, the minister of this aspect of God’s providence, that his godliness is selfish and only the natural return for unexampled prosperity, and the insinuation that if stripped of his prosperity he will curse God to His face. These suspicions bring down two severe calamities on Job, one depriving him of children and possessions alike, and the other throwing the man himself under a painful malady. In spite of these afflictions Job retains his integrity and ascribes no wrong to God. Then is described the advent of Job’s three friends—Eliphaz the Temanite, Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite—who, having heard of Job’s calamities, come to condole with him. 2. The body of the book, in poetry, ch. iii.–xxxi., contains a series of speeches in which the problem of Job’s afflictions and the relation of external evil to the righteousness of God and the conduct of men are brilliantly discussed. This part, after Job’s passionate outburst in ch. iii., is divided into three cycles, each containing six speeches, one by each of the friends, and three by Job, one in reply to each of theirs (ch. iv.–xiv.; xv.–xxi.; xxii.–xxxi.), although in the last cycle the
- ↑ That the murder of Zechariah the son of Jehoiada (2 Chron. l.c.) is referred to in Matt. xxiii. 35, Luke xi. 51 is commonly held; but see Cheyne, Ency. Bib. col. 5373.
