The New Murrey and Blue blog

Royal stepchildren

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For the first time since 1558, England (thus also Wales and Northern Ireland) has a monarch with stepchildren, two in number, a record complicated by the double-consort Emma of Normandy whose sons by Ethelred II included Edward the Confessor. In Scotland, after the case of Lulach who was Macbeth‘s stepson, there seem to be no others.

Since the Conquest, Henry II, Henry IV, Edward IV (apparently) and Mary I also took spouses who already had children. Eleanor of Aquitaine had left her eldest daughters behind with Louis VII when their marriage was annulled. Joan of Navarre had six surviving children from her marriage to John IV of Brittany, although only brought her daughters from the Duchy in 1403. Elizabeth Wydeville had already borne two Grey sons before “marrying” Edward, whilst Phillip II had a son, Don Carlos, from his first marriage, before claiming the English crown matrimonial in 1554.

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  1. viscountessw Avatar
    viscountessw

    Edward the “Black Prince” married Joan of Kent, who already had children by her first husband, Thomas Holand, 1st Earl of Kent. Those children were therefore the half-siblings of Richard II. When Richard was usurped by his own first cousin, Henry IV, two of the Holand men were part of a rebellion to put Richard II back on the throne and dispose of Henry IV. It was called the Epiphany Rising, but unfortunately it went the wrong way and the Holands and their accomplices paid the ultimate price. After that so did Richard II, who’d hitherto been a prisoner at Pontefract Castle. He became a late prisoner very swiftly. But if the Rising had succeeded, what might have happened? Henry IV was also the Duke of Lancaster and therefore the first Lancastrian king. Richard had married a child bride, but given time and the consummation of the marriage, might he have had heirs of his own? If not, we might have had a Mortimer monarch. Or, of course, we’d still have ended up with the Wars of the Roses.

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