Normandy
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Trial by Combat.
banishment, Bolingbroke v Norfolk, castles, Chief Justice Thirning, Chris Given-Wilson, Constance of York, Court of Chivalry, duel, Edmund of Langley, executions, Fourth Lateran Council, France, Henry IV, Henry VII, King’s approver, Normandy, Parliament, Richard II, Sir John Annesley, St. Saviour’s Castle, Thomas Katrington, Thomas Mowbray Earl of Norfolk, Trial by combat, trial by jury, Tyburn, usurpation, Wars of the RosesYou might think that the Church would have approved of trial by combat. After all, it effectively remitted the cause to God’s judgement – assuming that you believe God intervenes in such affairs, as many people (presumably) did. In fact, as far back as the Fourth Lateran Council of 1215 (Canon 18) the Church…
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MAD, MURDEROUS MABEL
“Poisoned Chalice”, Arnulf, Arundel Castle, books, Bridgnorth Castle, Bure Castle, Earl of Shrewsbury, Ela of Salisbury, Eleanor of Castile, Giroie family, Haburga, Hugh Bunel, Mabel de Belleme, marriages, Matilda of Blois, mediaeval women, murder, Norman invasion, Normandy, Orderic Vitalis, Robert de Belleme, Roger de Montgomery, ships, William I, William Talvas de Belleme, William Talvas IVMany people still hold to the idea that all medieval women were quiet, timid, and downtrodden, unable to defend themselves and at the mercy of others. Clearly they have never heard of Mabel de Belleme! Mabel was a Norman noblewoman, born sometime in the 1030’s to William Talvas de Belleme and his first wife, Haburga.…
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Here is a Daily Telegraph review of Charles, Earl Spencer‘s book about the sinking of the White Ship in 1120. It includes a lot of hypotheses based upon the survival of William the Atheling, the tenager who was Henry I‘s only surviving legitimate son but was the most prominent casualty of this maritime incident, arguably…
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Eleanor the Crusader
Anjou, annulments, Antioch, Aquitaine, books, Byzantine Empire, consanguinity, Constantinople, Damascus, Eleanor of Aquitaine, Eugenius III, France, Geoffrey Plantagenet, Henry II, Jerusalem, John, Louis VII, Matt Lewis, Normandy, Plantagenets, Power of a Woman, Raymond of Poitiers, Richard I, Robert S.P. Fripp, Second Crusade, TurksMy next book – due for release in October, all being well – is about Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine. They were one of Europe’s most fabulous power couples, ruling lands that spread from the North Sea to the Mediterranean. Eleanor was nine years Henry’s senior. When they married in 1152, he was a…
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Henry VI: saint or sinner?
“Nicholas of the Tower”, Adam Moleyns, Archbishop Kemp, aristocratic lawlessness, Azincourt, Bertram Wolffe, biographies, Calais, Cardinal Beaufort, Charles VI, Charles VII, Christine Carpenter, debt, deposition, Duke of Orleans, Edmund Duke of Somerset, Eton, feudalism, First Battle of St. Albans, France, Great Council, Harfleur, Henry V, Henry VI, Henry VII, Humphrey of Gloucester, Hundred Years War, impeachment, insanity, Ireland, Jack Cade, John Blacman, John Duke of Bedford, John Duke of Suffolk, John Harvey, John Watts, Kent, King’s College Cambridge, Lord Protector of the Realm, majority, Margaret d’Anjou, Normandy, Parliamentary Roll, Polydore Vergil, Ralph Griffiths, Ralph Lord Cromwell, Readeption, Richard Duke of York, treason, Valois, Wakefield, William Duke of Suffolk, William TailboysA gentle and devotional life About seventy years ago, the historian John Harvey wrote this in an essay about King Henry VI: “The life and death, and the thwarting of his noble designs are one (sic) of the sorriest tragedies of English history. He was a victim of forces outside his control, for whose existence…
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