John of Gaunt
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“….AN initiative to find the bones of Alfred the Great in the Hyde suburb of Winchester, sponsored more than 20 years ago by the City Council, has had a surprising outcome. This is the launch of a series of whodunnits in settings that many readers will find easy to imagine. “….The first title, Charter…
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As we all know, the Tudors were masters of propaganda. The lies about Richard III poured forth throughout their usurpation, and still persist to this day. If they could say something unpleasant and derogatory about him, they did. Perhaps it was in their blood, of course, because they were descended (one way or another) from…
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Philippa Mortimer, Countess of Pembroke and Arundel – a short, interesting and little-known life
accidents, annulment, Arundel Castle, Boxgrove Priory, dowries, Edmund Mortimer, executions, John Hastings Earl of Pembroke, John of Gaunt, jousting, Lord St. John of Basing, Philippa Mortimer, Philippa of Ulster, Richard Earl of Arundel, Sir John St. John, Sussex, Thomas Poynings, uxuriousness, Westminster ChroniclePhilippa was the younger of the two daughters of Edmund Earl of March and Philippa of Clarence,and second youngest of their four children, being born in November 1375. Philippa lost both her parents at a very young age, but her future was provided for (eventually) by her marriage to John Hastings, Earl of Pembroke after…
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Two butchers, an archer and a “bourgeois of Tournai”….
“Perkin”, archers, Belgium, Blaybourne, butchers, Cecily Duchess of York, DNA evidence, Edmund of Langley, Edward IV, Elizabeth of York, Ghent, Hainault, Henry IV, Henry Somerset Earl of Worcester, Henry VII, illegimacy rumours, John Ashdown-Hill, John of Gaunt, John Sperhauk, Leicester University, Lionel of Antwerp, Phillippa of Hainault, pre-contract, re-legitimisation, Richard III, Taunton, Titulus Regius, Titulus Regius 1486, Tournai, treason, Y-chromosome“….Consider, for example, the case of John Sperhauk, which came before King’s Bench in April 1402. The plea roll record opens with the memorandum of his confession taken on 13 April by the coroner of King’s Bench, before the king and ‘by [his] authority and command’. In this confession, Sperhauk admitted to publicly repeating allegations…
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Four Men Murdered by Henry Bolingbroke
Anthony Wydville, Bristol Castle, Cheshire, Constable of England, double standards, executions, Guienne, Henry IV, Henry VIII, John of Gaunt, King of Mann, Lord High Treasurer, Lord Protector of the Realm, Lords Appellant, Macclesfield Hundred, peers, Regency Council, Richard II, Richard III, Sir John Bussy, Sir Piers Legh of Lyme, Sir Richard Grey, Sir Thomas Vaughan, Speakers of the Commons, Treason Acts, William ScropeI wish I had a pound for every word written about the executions of Hastings, Rivers, Grey and Vaughan at the hands of Richard III. I should certainly be able to expand my portfolio of shares very substantially, indeed well beyond ISA limits. I might even be a millionaire. It may be that these men…
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… we showed you, through the use of snooker balls, how it is significantly more probable that the Y-chromosome break occurred in the long Gaunt-Beaufort male line than the Langley-York line to Richard III.Although snooker was a nineteenth century invention, some earlier monarchs might well have enjoyed it: Harold II, whose informal wife (in more…
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Henry Bolingbroke (Duke of Lancaster, soon-to-be the usurper Henry IV) was in mourning for his father John of Gaunt when he returned to England from exile and stole the throne of his first cousin, Richard II. I won’t go into all the details because what I’m about to write is rather, um, facetious. Apparently on…
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The Priory of the Holy Cross, also known as the Crossed or Crutched Friars, near Tower Hill, was one of about forty-five religious houses and over one hundred parish churches in medieval London. Oh, how many of these wonderful buildings were lost forever in the Great Fire, never to be replaced? My recent contact with…
The New Murrey and Blue blog 