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UPDATED VERSION ON sparkypus.com A Medieval Potpourri https://sparkypus.com/2020/05/20/did-richard-iii-love-anne-neville/ Thanks to the contemporaneous accounts given by Croyland (1) and the Acts of Court (2) we have a good insight into the events that followed, almost immediately, the death of Queen Anne i.e. the rumours that Richard, in his eagerness to marry his niece, hastened the death…
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Car parks have become Aladdin’s caves for archaeology and things as wonderful as the remains of Richard III. Coventry’s lost history is now coming to light. Be patient with the Coventry Telegraph site, I found it as much a pain for ads and slowness as the Leicester Mercury!
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In the book “Imagining Robin Hood”, by A.J. Pollard, there is an illustration of a brass effigy recovered from the mud of the Thames in the 19th century, during dredging. Pollard says it “has been identified as depicting a yeoman of the crown of Edward IV, whose duties were set down in the king’s household…
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I confess to not knowing that Edward V coins had ever been minted. There doesn’t really seem to have been time to have reached that point. However, as it’s clear they were coined and distributed, I have cause to consider the implication. We have the old, old story that Richard was a dastardly, murderous uncle…
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This documentary, presented by Robert Hardman of the Daily Mail, unveils some of our longest-serving King’s secrets, such as a draft abdication letter after American independence was achieved. It also discusses his health issues in greater detail. Until recently, it was thought that he suffered from porphyria, a physical disease that Mary Stuart carried to…
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We are always being told that medieval aristocratic marriages (and indeed most medieval marriages) were arranged and did not feature love. The object was to increase property and lands, enhance a family’s reputation and produce as many heirs as was humanly possible. I pity those women who had a child a year throughout their married…
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Recently excavations at Gloucester cathedral have unearthed some exciting new finds. Perhaps the most intriguing was a ‘Janus’ Bead of the 15th c., so-called because it is ‘two faced’ like the God Janus, with one face gazing forward and the other backward. What makes this one even more interesting, is that it is also a…
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It is said that eating cheese last thing at night is very bad indeed for the digestion, and will result in alternate sleeplessness or bad dreams. Well, so I have been told. I ate cheese last thing last night and slept like a log, but I woke up this morning with the odd thought about…
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An unlikely scene, surely? Would medieval ladies really go out snowballing in such décolleté gowns? Can’t believe it. One of them is even bending down to present a better target. I would be far better wrapped, and so would all of you, I’m sure. Or do I have some very daring minxes among my lady…
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Thomas Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, KG, from the Bruges Garter Book, 1430/1440, BL Stowe 594. This started out as my first crie de coeur of 2017, and things did not bode well from the outset because I muddled my Thomas Beauchamps. Father and son, both Earls of Warwick, but it turns out to be the…
The New Murrey and Blue blog 