The play’s the thing
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Recently I came across this print by Robert Walton, who was a 17thc printer and publisher. It was a part of a series of Kings. Although the rather bad poem beneath the picture toes the usual line, no doubt influenced by a certain Mr William Shakespeare’s then fairly new play, the drawing itself, although not…
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I’ve seen this (awful!) portrait of Richard before. It just doesn’t look like him, more one of the invented Tudor versions of him, i.e. monstrous and evil, or weak and terrified of all things Tudor. This one fits the ‘weak and terrified’ mould, and if it were listed as a portrait of Henry VI, I’d…
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When I was at school (before the Flood in 1960!) and studying O level English Literature I had to endure Memoirs of a Fox-hunting Man (Siegfried Sassoon)😟, Henry IV Part I (the Bard, of course)😦 and Keats 🙃. Well, Keats was OK, I suppose, but what I remember about him most was all the sniggering…
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No longer passing the Buc(k)?
accuracy, Arthur Kincaid, Battle of Bosworth, British Library, CAJ Armstrong, Constable of England, Crowland Chronicle, Domenico Mancini, Earl Marshal, Elizabeth of York, fire, Flodden, George Buck, Joanna, John Howard Duke of Norfolk, Manuel Duke of Beja, new edition, patron, Portuguese archives, pre-contract, Richard III, Shakespeare, Sir George Buc, Sir Robert Cotton, Thomas Howard Earl of Arundel, Thomas MoreNow for some very interesting news: Arthur Kincaid’s The History of King Richard the Third is set for a new edition, based on forty years of further research. Kincaid has managed to distinguish the forensic research of Sir George Buc (1560-1622), whose great-grandfather fought at Bosworth and whose grandfather was at Flodden, from that of…
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Ferdinando Stanley (1559-1594) was very briefly 5th Earl of Derby. He was descended from Mary Tudor, Duchess of Suffolk, and according to the terms of Henry VIII’s will, which had statutory force in this respect he was the heir to Elizabeth I, since the Scottish branch were excluded. It is worth mentioning that he was…
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“….[Richard’s] teeth, judging by the perfectly preserved skull, are magnificent….” Well, so they are! This article says so! However, it also mentions hunchbacks and the University of Leicester “leading” the search for Richard’s remains, so there are minuses as well. BUT, his teeth are great! Which is more than can be said of Henry…
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Dan Snow (who married in secret, although nobody has ever done that) and Alice Loxton have been filming in Stratford-upon-Avon for a new documentary about Shakespeare, to be released in September. I do hope it’s sensible!
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Elizabeth Vernon, Countess of Southampton.
Constance of York, Diana Princess of Wales, Duke of Cambridge, Elizabeth I, Elizabeth Vere, Elizabeth Vernon, Essex rebellion, Henry Earl of Southampton, Henry IV, Humphrey of Gloucester, imprisonment, maids of honour, Margaret Audley, marriages, Robert Devereux Earl of Essex, Tower of London, William Cecil, Winston ChurchillElizabeth Vernon, who lived from 1572 to 1655, was a maid-of-honour to Queen Elizabeth I. In 1598, while serving in that capacity, she became pregnant by Henry Wriothesley, Earl of Southampton (1573-1624) who is perhaps best remembered as a patron of Shakespeare. Queen Elizabeth was not amused, and had the pair of them thrown in…
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Henry V DRIVER (presses bell) BUTLER (opens door) DRIVER: Mr. Monmouth? BUTLER: Sorry, he is busy at the moment. DRIVER: Dauphin’s Sporting Goods here. I have a delivery for him; can he spare a moment to sign for it? Otherwise I’ll probably have to take it back to the warehouse. BUTLER: He is with some…
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A paper by Professor Tim Thornton of the University of Huddersfield, first published on 28 December 2020, has reached the national press with claims … The More I Read
The New Murrey and Blue blog 