Bertrade of Montfort, also known by other names, was a Norman noble from the House of Montfort. She was countess of Anjou (1089–1092) through her first marriage to Fulk the Rude and then queen consort of France (1092–1108) through her initially bigamous marriage to Philip I. Condemned in her era's ecclesiastical histories, she played a role in the popularization of pigache footwear and founded a daughter house of Fontevraud Abbey at Hautes-Bruyeres.
Bertrade with Philip
Fulk IV, better known as Fulk le Réchin, was the count of Anjou from around 1068 until his death. He was noted to be "a man with many reprehensible, even scandalous, habits" by Orderic Vitalis, who particularly objected to his many women and his influential footwear, claiming he popularized the pigaches that eventually became the poulaine, the medieval long-toed shoe.
Coins minted by Fulk
Fulk, King Philip, Bertha, and Bertrade, from the Chronicle of St Denis (14th cent.)
Pigaches in an 11th cent. illumination from an Aquitaine tonary