anniversaries
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Was Roger Mortimer, 1st Earl of March, an “anti-royalist”? Surely being anti-Edward II and his favourites wasn’t the same thing as being anti-royalist in general? “….There she [Queen Isabella] openly took a lover, the English baron and anti-royalist Roger Mortimer (1287-1330 CE)….” The above extract is from this site and gave me pause for thought.…
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As we approach the holidays, I am flipping through at least fifty English cookbooks to get the lowdown on Simnel Cake. I know that it has long been associated with both Mothering Sunday (similar to North America’s Mother’s Day) and the Easter season. Nevertheless, it is a relatively simple fruitcake, covered in the usual marzipan…
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Leslau, Holbein, More and Clement
“Princes”, Dr. John Clement, Duchy of Lancaster, Edward VI, Elizabeth I, Erasmus, esses, Fleet prison, fleuur-de-lys, flowers, Germany, Hans Holbein, Henry Patterson, Henry VIII, infrared photography, Jack Leslau, John Dudley Duke of Northumberland, John Fisher, John Harris, jousting, Latin, Louvain, Matt Lewis, Mechelen, peonies, Pilgrimage of Grace, rebus, Richard III, Rowlandas Lockey, royal arms, Seneca, Sir Anthony Wingfield, Sir Edward Guildford, The Family of Thomas More, Thomas Cromwell, Thomas More, Thomas Wolsey, Tower of London, Utopia, William CecilBefore I begin, I have two words of warning. The first is that a huge spoiler for my novels Loyalty and the sequel Honour unavoidably follows. Just so that you know! Secondly, the following is my telling of the theory researched and expounded by Jack Leslau, an amateur art enthusiast who believed that he stumbled…
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Bamburgh Castle is a site with a long, frequently dramatic history. A wooden Saxon fortress built by Ida the Flame-bearer, a place frequented by saints such as Oswald and Aidan, a seemingly impregnable fortress attacked by William Rufus with his siege castle ‘Evil Neighbour’, and the first English castle to fall to cannon-fire, when Warwick…
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The Earliest Roots of the Wars of the Roses: Edward II and Thomas of Lancaster?
Bannockburn. Boroughbridge, Blanche of Lancaster, Boniface IX, canonisation, Chris Given-Wilson, cults, Despencers, Dukes of Lancaster, earls, Edmund of Langley, Edward II, executions, Henry IV, Henry of Lancaster, Ireland, John of Gaunt, miracles, Piers Gaveston, Pontefract Castle, popes, Richard II, Shrewsbury Parliament, Thomas Despenser, Thomas Mowbray Earl of Norfolk, Thomas of Lancaster, Waltheof, Wars of the RosesIt may seem bizarre to go back to the reign of Edward II (reigned 1307-27) when talking about the Wars of the Roses, but bear with me. Edward and his cousin, Thomas Earl of Lancaster, got on together quite well in the early years of Edward’s reign. Gradually, though, a feud between them grew…
