anniversaries
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An Irish take on the British peerage system
Anglo-Saxon kingdoms, Charles “III”, Charles I, Charles II, Duke of Edinburgh, Earl of Birkenhead, Earl of Wessex, Edward Earl of Wessex, executions, Godwin Earl of Wessex, hereditary peers, House of Lords, Ireland, Irish Central, Irish Treaty, Niall O’Dowd, Oliver Cromwell, posthumous execution, royal titles, Thomas Hardy, Viscount CastlereaghHere is an article from Niall O’Dowd of “Irish Central” to mark the accession of Charles III. It makes a number of good points, although some others are debateable:1) Wessex may have ceased to be as a Kingdom when Athelstan took over the others (Mercia, Northumbria and East Anglia) but it had Earls in the…
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RICHARD WHITTINGTON c.1350-1423. MERCER, MAYOR AND A MOST BENEVOLENT CITIZEN OF LONDON
Alice Fitzwaryn, Anne Sutton, Blitz, cats, charitable donations, City of London, College Hill, Edward VI, estates, Gloucestershire, Henry IV, Henry V, John Earl of Somerset, John of Gaunt, John Stow, la Riole, legends, Lord Mayors of London, Mary I, medicine, mercers, moneylenders, pantomimes, Pauntley Court Manor, Richard II, Sir Ivo Fitzwaryn, Sir Richard Whittington, Sir Simon Burley, Somerset, Staffords, Thomas of woodstock, Westminster Abbey, WiltshireReblogged from A Medieval Potpourri @sparkypus.com A delightful artist’s impression of ‘Richard Whittington dispensing his charities’. Artist Henrietta Ray before 1905 oil on canvas. Royal exchange. Even the most disinterested in history children would recognise the name Dick/Richard Whittington and also his best, and only friend, his cat, most of them being familiar with the rather delightful folk…
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We all know the story of John of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford/de Roët. It was a wonderful, passionate love affair that ended with Gaunt, a prince of the realm, making the relatively lowly Katherine his third duchess. Yes, a great romance, and it was fact, not fiction. However, historically speaking, both of them had…
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This locomotive ‘Fair Rosamund’ was the only one of its class to carry a name. It was, of course, named after Rosamund Clifford and usually worked on the Great Western Railway’s Woodstock branch, near Oxford. Rosamund Clifford (mistress of Henry II) came from Clifford Castle near Hay in the Marches. This castle was associated with…
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Henry VI is not my favourite king, in fact I think he was a real pain in the posterior, whether in his lucid moments or not. This link is to a paper about him, which I confess to not having finished because I lost faith in its accuracy. No fewer than three times Richard II…
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Coldharbour – An Important Medieval London House
Aldgate Ward, All Hallows the Less, Antony van den Wyngaerde, City of London, Coldharbour, Cuthbert Tunstal Bishop of Durham, Earls of Shrewsbury, Edmund of Langley, Edward III, Edward of Woodstock, Elizabeth of York, Great Fire of London, Henry VII, John Holland, John of Gaunt, John Stow, Kingsford, l’Erber, Lady Margaret Beaufort, London Topographical Society, maps, Marjorie Honeybourne, Mondial House, Pountney’s Inn, Reginald Bray, renovation, Richard II, Samuel Pepys, Sir Robert Cecil, Wolsey LaneReblogged from A Medieval Potpourri @sparkypus.com A segment of the Visscher Panorama of London 1616 showing Coldharbour after the earlier medieval house had been demolished by the Earl of Shrewsbury c.1585 and rebuilt up to the waterfront. The rebuild incorporated many tenements ‘now letten out for great rents to people of all sorts’ (Stow). …
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Recently I went on a little jaunt to visit some fine Welsh Castles. One of those happened to be Carew in Pembrokshire, an impressive limestone fortress overlooking Carew inlet, which is part of the Milford Haven Waterway. Built by the Norman Gerald of Windsor, the site stands on the lands of his wife, the…
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“….Two years later, after being cast by Laurence Olivier as Henry Tudor in Richard III, he played a villain again in Child in the House….” Oh, the bliss of taking a sentence out of context. Yes, of COURSE Henry Tudor was a villain! The quote is from this link about the great Welsh actor…
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The present Priory House at Earls Colne (judged Best Village in Essex in 2015) may be early 19th-century but has a great history because it’s “….built on the site of a Benedictine priory founded by the de Vere family, Earls of Oxford, in the early 12th century, the remains of which lie buried under…