The retirement of Henry, the husband of Hedwige, which lasted for twenty years or more, was the result of a strange form of piety and self-renunciation not uncommon in the middle ages. The Duke and Duchess of Silesia had been married twenty-three years, and had had six children, three of whom died in infancy. A little after the birth of the youngest, in 1209, Hedwige, still in the bloom of her years (she was only thirty-five and her husband forty-one), and after many prayers and struggles, felt herself impelled to dedicate the rest of her life to God only, and, with her husband’s consent, to live separate from him. They had always loved each other tenderly, and Henry’s conduct, unlike that of many sovereigns of his and of later times, had been irreproachable; he looked upon his wife as a saint, and upon her wishes as commands; he had allowed her to guide his charities and public improvements, had followed her advice, had trusted to her to bring up his children exactly as she thought fit, which was more rigorously and less luxuriously than is often the case with royal children—in a word, had leant wholly upon her. To signify his full acquiescence in this half-monastic vow, he received the tonsure, and, contrary to the custom of his class at that time, let his beard grow, whence came his surname, the Bearded. Hedwige retired to Trebnitz, where she lived in a separate house with her own women and the chamberlain Schavoine, who took his name from the estate which Henry gave her on their separation. Other grants of money were also made her, and her husband promised his countenance and help in any good work she should wish to do there or elsewhere throughout his possessions. They often met in after years, generally at festive ceremonies for the building or opening of churches, and once at the grave of their unhappy son Conrad; and Henry himself, though keeping up a court and moving from place to place, betook himself to prayers, study, and good works, having given over the government to his sons. In his old age he came forth again in the character of a sovereign and a leader, and, indeed, led a stormy, stirring life for a few years before his death. Hedwige, in this proceeding of her retirement, had another object in view—that is, the example which she hoped her voluntary giving up of married life would be to the married priesthood of Poland and Silesia. Such was, to a great extent, the case, and the celibacy of the clergy, so long preached in vain, became in a few years the rule instead of the exception.