Mother of Lions: Eleanor of Aquitaine, Part I

For some characters of the Plantagenet era, one post just doesn't do justice.  Nowhere is that more true than the Mother of Lions herself.  Eleanor, Duchess of the Aquitaine, Queen of France and later of England, patroness of learning and the arts, mother of a dynasty of legendary rulers. 

Eleanor, 1122-1204 was born into a tumultuous family.  Her father, William X, Duke of Aquitaine, may have been one of the early troubadours of southern France, writing under an alias.  Her mother, Aenor de Chatelherault, was the daughter of a woman known as Dangereuse de L'Isle Bouchard.  Dangereuse was most likely an alias, but she was a woman who knew few boundaries.  Dangereuse was the longtime mistress of Eleanor's grandfather William IX of Aquitaine in addition to being her maternal grandmother.   The Aquitaine court was the seat of poetry, art, learning, culture, intrigue and drama and young Eleanor soaked it up.  In addition to the regular household skills, she was also taught writing, history, Latin and other subjects usually reserved for a man.  Because she was her father's heir, she would be expected to marry well, but also be ready and able to rule her own vast domains, taking up most of what is now southern France, in her own right. 

Her father died in 1137, while the family was making a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. James of Campostela in Spain, leaving Eleanor, about fifteen, as his heir.  William bequeathed his lands to Eleanor and appointed the King of France, Louis VI as her guardian.  As such, the King had the right to the use and income from Eleanor's vast inheritance.  He also had the right to choose her husband.  He decided that his own son and heir, the future Louis VII was the right candidate.  Eleanor and Prince Louis were married in 1137 within weeks of her father's death and a more mismatched pair couldn't be imagined.  Louis wasn't meant to be king.  He'd been intended to enter the church.  Pious, bookish, with a disinclination for physical affection, he was the opposite of Eleanor, who'd grown up in a court that celebrated love in all its forms and expected to be a wife in every sense of the word.  Within days of their wedding, he was King Louis VII and Eleanor was Queen of France.  Despite their differences, she managed to bear him two children, Marie and Alix.  In those days, inability to bear a male heir, even if a woman had managed to bear children at all, was considered the woman's fault.  That Eleanor wasn't bearing sons was a result of strain in their marriage.

Crusade fever was sweeping Europe again and Louis declared his intention to go on Crusade in 1145.  As Duchess of the Aquitaine in her own right, Eleanor had to take the cross in order to commit her men and resources to the holy cause.  But she didn't intend her vow to be a mere formality.  Although she and her ladies didn't ride into battle dressed as Amazons, Eleanor expected to be a co-leader of the Crusade along with her husband, which created tension with him and with other leaders.  The Crusade was a disaster, and so by this time was Louis and Eleanor's marriage.  Raymond of Antioch, the leader of one of the Crusader states, was Eleanor's uncle.  Rumor soon spread that there was more to it between uncle and niece than mere family affection.  Louis bought the rumors and began thinking of divorcing Eleanor.  As the Crusade unraveled, Eleanor became more and more disenchanted with Louis.  On their way back to Rome, both parties sought the Pope's assistance to reach an annulment.  He tried to reconcile them and play for time. 

By this time, Eleanor was pregnant with her second child, another girl and neither side could get away from each other fast enough.  Finally, in March, 1152, the ticklish negotiations were over with and their marriage was annulled.  Eleanor's daughters were considered legitimate, but left in their father's custody.  Eleanor's lands were returned to her.  As she made her way home, two nobleman tried to kidnap her to claim her as a bride and take her lands by force.  One of them was the brother of Henry, Duke of Normandy and in process of claiming his rights as his mother's heir to England.  Eleanor opened correspondence with Henry and offered herself as a bride.  Henry accepted.  In 1154, they were married, Henry was crowned King and Eleanor was later crowned Queen.

In-Law: Jacquetta of Luxembourg, 1415-1472

The typical process for royal or noble women who were widowed young in the Medieval era was to be recycled back onto the marriage market.  Their child-bearing and alliance-building capabilities were too valuable to waste on rebound marriages.  Some women, though, weren't content to play the game.  Having made one marriage where their family needed it, they saw nothing wrong with following their heart the second time around.  And, some of them had the connections and strength of personality to get away with it.

Jacquetta of Luxembourg, 1415-1472, immortalized in the Philippa Gregory series on the Plantagenets and the movies spawned from it, was one such woman.  She was the daughter of Peter of Luxembourg, Count of St. Pol, but she had lion's blood.  Through her father, she descended from Henry III through his daughter Beatrice of England.  Through her mother, she descended from Simon de Montfort and Eleanor of England, daughter of King John.  To Medieval minds, though, she held a more important connection.  Like the Plantagenets, the Luxembourg royal family claimed descent from Melusine, a water-spirit said to have tempted and mated with several mortal noble men.  Melusine lives on today as the Starbucks goddess.  Perhaps because of all those connections, she was thought to be a suitable bride for John of Lancaster, Duke of Bedford.  Bedford had already been married once.  He was a childless widower and much older than Jacquetta.  They were married in 1433, when she was 17.  Bedford died in 1435, leaving Jacquetta a young widow.

Her nephew by marriage, Henry VI, accorded Jacquetta her late husband's title, income and estates to insure a comfortable retirement.  He continued to view her as his aunt and treated her well.  Because Jacquetta was in France at the time of Bedford's death, Henry assigned Sir Richard Woodville, Bedford's former chamberlain, the escort Jacquetta back to England.  Woodville and Jacquetta fell in love and married around 1437.  When Henry found out, his Plantagenet temper boiled over and he refused to receive the couple at court.  They paid a fine, and although Jacquetta lost her title, she kept her status in the family and most of her late husband's income and property.  Jacquetta and Sir Richard had fourteen children, most of whom lived to grow up.  This was the "pack" of Woodvilles that would later swarm the court of Edward IV after he married their sister, Elizabeth, said to be a great beauty like her mother.

Though Bedford had been a staunch Lancastrian and Henry VI was personally kind to her, Sir Richard and Jacquetta believed their best chance lay with the Yorkists.  Much as her mother had done, Elizabeth was involved in a secret romance with the future Edward IV.  When he won the Battle of Towton in 1461 and was acclaimed as King, he secretly married Elizabeth and later proclaimed her openly as queen, infuriating some of his supporters.  Jacquetta and two of her ladies were the only witnesses to the secret marriage, which took place in 1464.  Sir Richard became 1st Earl Rivers and there were titles, honors, marriages, land and privileges galore for the extended Woodville clan.  Several of Elizabeth's siblings arranged advantageous marriages into the higher nobility, with Jacquetta's maneuvering and Edward IV's blessing. 

Who to blame for all this good luck?  The mother-in-law, of course.  When Warwick the Kingmaker threw his support behind the deposed Henry VI, Richard Woodville was arrested and executed, leaving Jacquetta a widow.  Warwick came into possession of a sort of voodoo doll fashioned in the shape of a soldier almost cut in two at the middle.  According to witnesses arranged by Warwick, Jacquetta kept other dolls resembling Henry VI and Margaret of Anjou.  Jacquetta was in danger of being brought to trial as a witch, but Edward IV's victory and an inquiry by the royal council cleared her of all charges.  She died in 1472.  Years later, Richard III revived the witchcraft allegations, stating that Jacquetta had helped Elizabeth seduce Edward by witchcraft.  Jacquetta reputation as a conniver with a whiff of the supernatural has survived ever since.

The Longbow

English longbow men were the backbone of Plantagenet armies, particularly throughout the Hundred Years War.  The longbow itself was made of wood from the yew tree to a length of over six feet.  It took considerable skill and precision to work these bows and practice, which is why many kings authorize laws directing that subjects with a certain income level possess a longbow and devote time to practice, rather than wasting time at other games and pursuits.  A statute of Henry III required that all citizens, burgesses, freemen and villeins (peasants bound to land) to be armed.  Poorest men could arm themselves with a knife or a halberd.  Men with 2L income or more had to possess a bow.  Massed English archers sending up volleys of arrows at Sluys (1340), Crecy (1346), Poitiers (1356) and even Agincourt of 1415 were just as deadly as knights or pikemen.  It was only in later battles, when the French learned to break their lines with massed mounted attacks, as happened at Vermeil (1424) and Patay (1429), that French forces began to turn the war toward their side.

Longbows were known in England from pre-Roman times but none survive from the hey-day of the longbow, 1250-1450.  A few do survive from Tudor times, which gives some idea of their size and constructions.  The bows themselves were made of yew, a commonly available wood in England that almost anyone could afford to access.  Strings were made from hemp, flax or silk.  Arrows were made from a variety of materials, depending on the area and the craftsmen who made them.  It took considerable force to draw a longbow, but the trick was not in jerking or yanking the bowstring, but in learning how to draw it to its full strength, place or nock the arrow and then shoot.  For this reason, boys began learning to draw and shoot at an early age, progressing to larger bows as they grew older, until they were capable of handling a full bow.  English archers were famed for their skill at using the weapon, not only mastering the draw, but he ability to quickly fire volleys of arrows in tight formation.  Sources differ on how far a distance longbows could reach in the heat of battle, and at how accurate they were in piercing various types of armor.  But an arrow with the right kind of bodkin or tip could pierce most types of armor and, if it found a chink in armor, was even more deadly.  It was less effective against shields or men-at-arms using shield wall formations.

The first use of the word longbow comes from one of the Paston letters of the 15th century.  Arrows were deadly, not only depending on where they hit but also the means used to extract them.  Extracting an arrow was painful and could result in infection and death.  Being hit with an arrow was a long, slow, bleeding and agonizing death.  Because an armed citizenry was a mandate, English kings could easily raise an army by commanding their lords to raise their levies, knights, men at arms, and bowmen.  But it also meant that angry citizens could easily start an uprising on their own.  For this reason, Kings were reluctant to push the commons too far and sometimes the prospect of a rising might force a King to rethink some issue of policy, particularly if he didn't have the support of the barons or parliament. 

Incidentally, the idea of an armed citizenry prepared to use their weapons was the faintest glimmer of the militias and trained bands of Tudor and later Puritan England.  It was also the distant ancestor of the American militias and minutemen.

What Is: a Pipe Roll

Officials in Medieval England were meticulous record keepers, particularly when it came to land a financial records such as who owned what rights to which piece of land, and how much was owed in yearly taxes or goods and feudal services.  These records became known as the Pipe Rolls, Great Rolls or Great Rolls of the Pipe.  Unlike the Patent Rolls, which kept track of land ownership and grants of nobility and privileges, the Pipe rolls were financial, keeping track of taxes, fees, dues, fines and other monetary obligations in regard to land.  Each year, the sheriffs of the various counties had to present a yearly tax audit to the Exchequer.  These records were attached together, rolled into a continuous tight scroll similar to a pipe, and labeled as to county or districts covered. 

The paper used for the Pipe Rolls was parchment.  There's no evidence for the idea that they were called Pipe Rolls because of the money piped into the treasury or because they resembled a wine cask.  They look more like a scroll but were wound tightly to preserve them, like a pipe.  They were not intended as a complete record of all sources of royal revenue, nor as a running account system, but as a tax audit for each county.  The earliest Pipe Rolls were contemporaneous with the Domesday Book of Norman Times, the Book being an inventory of land.  The earliest surviving roll dates from the reign of Henry I in 1130.  The last Pipe Rolls were created in 1834, when other more modern accounting methods were put in place and the Pipe Office, which was responsible for keeping them, was abolished.  They are kept today in the National Archives in London.

 

Royal: John of Lancaster, Duke of Bedford, 1389-1435

John of Bedford is most famous as Joan of Arc's nemesis and ultimately one who sealed her doom, but there was more to his career.  His treatment of a national heroine aside, he was an able administrator and commander who figured primarily in the early reign of his nephew, Henry VI.  Possibly had he lived longer, Warwick the Kingmaker and the Yorkists might not have been as successful.

John was one of the sons of Henry IV.  He was one of a band of brothers that included Henry V, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and Thomas, Duke of Clarence, all capable military commanders who began accumulating wealth early when their father became Henry IV.  Bedford was knighted in 1399 at his father's coronation and throughout the years amassed a fortune in forfeited property from nobles who supported Richard II and, after his death, the rising Yorkists.  The honors continued when Bedford's brother became Henry V and made him Duke of Bedford.  After Henry V's death in 1422, Bedford and Gloucester began to quarrel over the regency for their baby nephew Henry VI.  Bedford was named Regent, but focused on the war in France.  He founded the University of Caen in Normandy and was a noted collector of illuminated manuscripts.  It was while in France that he came up against a determined, and some say inspired, 19-year-old peasant girl and began suffering embarrassing losses. 

Plantagenets were skilled at finding and neutralizing their enemies, through death if necessary, which it most often was.  Joan was captured by the Burgundians.  Bedford arranged to buy her ransom from them, thus bringing her under English control and making it almost impossible for Charles VII to save her, though he did make diplomatic efforts to do so.  It was at Bedford's urging that Joan was tried as a witch.  If he could prove that she was a witch and have her condemned by the church, he could render Charles VII's coronation void and perhaps place his own nephew Henry VI on the throne.  He probably didn't have any personal animus against Joan or even stopped to ponder the matter.  She was a political pawn. 

John of Bedford was married twice, first to Anne of Burgundy and later to Jacquetta of Luxembourg.  Both marriages were childless, though Jacquetta would have several children by her subsequent second marriage.  He did have one out-of-wedlock child, Mary, who married a Norman nobleman and had children.  John died at his castle in Rouen, in Normandy.  Not in battle, not as a result of a curse from Joan. 

What Is: a Hennin

The quintessential accessory of many storybook princesses is a tall, conical hat, often swath with veiling.  A similar conical hat often serves to identify witches, as well.  These hats were called hennins, after an old French word for a cock or rooster and were popular throughout the late Medieval era.

Anne of Bohemia, the first wife of Richard II is often credited with introducing the basic style of the hennin into England.  Bohemia at the time was one of the focal points of European culture, so it's likely this headdress, which was popular throughout Europe, would have been brought to England by a fashionable foreign princess.  In the years after Anne, the hennin went through several changes.  The cone went higher and higher.  Sometimes the tip of the cone was bent.  One cone morphed into two cones.  Hennins could also be short, giving the appearance of an up-ended flowerpot on the back of a woman's head, or the two-cone variety took the shape of two knobs on the either side of the head.  The veils remained, sometimes brushing over the face.  some hennins were decorated with jewels.  A woman's hair was usually tightly pulled back under the cone, with the hairline being plucked back to give a fashionable appearance.  In later years, the hair was braided into elaborate knots under the shorter one and two-cone varieties, bound with netting, again threaded with gold, silver or dotted with jewels.  Both Margaret of Anjou and Elizabeth Wydeville were pictured wearing these shorter, more elaborate forms of the hennin.  Like all styles, the hennin had its day and eventually faded into the English gable hood of Elizabeth York.

English Claim to the French Throne

For centuries, English kings claimed the throne of France, quartering French fleur-de-lys in their arms and styling themselves Kings of England, France and Ireland.  This claim caused no end of diplomatic friction and outright warfare between the two countries. 

So, how did it start and when did it end?

Isabella of France married Edward II in 1308.  She was the daughter of Phillip IV and the sister of Charles IV, the last king of the direct Capetian line.  French law functioned under ancient Frankish custom which denied women the right to rule in their own right, but didn't necessarily bar a woman from transmitting a royal claim to the throne.  Probably knowing his sister and not wanting the Plantagenets to get more of a foothold in France, Charles IV fixed that by decreeing in 1316 that women couldn't transmit royal inheritance to their children.  Charles IV died in 1328 and Isabella, never one to bother with rules, claimed the French throne on behalf of her son, Edward III.  The French simply ignored her, crowned the first Valois king Phillip VI at Rheims and got on with their lives.  For awhile, the French and English were willing to accept this status quo.  Then Phillip made the mistake of allying with Scotland against Edward III and Edward, not to be outdone, reasserted his dormant claim to the French throne.  The war was soon on, more than 130 years of it.  Battles such as Crecy, Patay and Agincourt were fought to settle this claim.  Leaders such as Edward III, Henry IV and Henry V spent blood and treasure defending it.  A young woman from Domremy, Joan of Arc, lost her life in defense of her chosen Valois King. 

After Henry V's victory at Agincourt, the French cause seemed lost.  By the 1320 Treaty of Troyes, Charles VI of France agreed to disinherit his own son, the future Charles VII, and make Henry and his heirs Kings of France.  Henry V was married to Catherine of Valois, Charles VI sister.  Charles VI's wife, Isabeau of Bavaria, was believed to have had an affair with his brother, the Duke of Orleans, making the Dauphin illegitimate.  Henry V died in 1422, as did Charles VI.  Their joint heir was a baby who became Henry VI.  The French once again ignored the English and their claim, preferring an adult male, Charles VII, who was crowned at Rheims in 1429, with Joan of Arc standing beside him in the cathedral at Rheims.  Also in 1429, Henry VI was crowned King of England.  The French, spurred on by Joan's heroism and the skill of their commanders, began making deep inroads into English territory in France. 

In 1453, the French won the final Battle of Castillon and the English were left with little else in France besides Calais and the area around it known as the Pale.  In England, Henry VI's tenuous hold on sanity finally snapped.  He was incapacitated until Christmas 1354, and when he finally came around, he had problems of his own.  His throne was seriously in jeopardy from his cousin, Richard of York and later Richard's son the future Edward IV.  Henry died a prisoner in the Tower in 1471, but the English never gave up the idea that they were Kings of France through two Plantagenet marriages with French princesses, Isabella of France, and Catherine of Valois.  Both sides bickered the point for years.  Calais was last in 1558, during the reign of Mary I Tudor.  France lost vast stretches of empire in North American courtesy of the Seven Years War (1755-1763), yet king after King, Plantagenets, Tudors, Stuarts and Hanoverians continued to claim themselves by the Grace of God, King of England, France, Scotland and Ireland.

It took the aftermath of the French Revolution, 1789-1795 and some royal housekeeping in 1800 to make the English forego a claim that had long since become pure historical fiction.  In 1800, the Kingdoms of Great Britain and Ireland were formally united.  Previously, they had been joined as a dynastic union, through the person of each sovereign, but with a form law it wouldn't matter who inherited the throne.  As part of the Acts, the English King, George III finally gave up quartering the French fleur-de-lys and styling himself King of France.  The arms of England, Scotland and Ireland were combined, and that was Kingdom enough for George's descendants to the present day.

Pretender: Lambert Simnel, c 1477- c 1525

As the main Plantagenet lines started to die out and the Tudor dynasty took control of England, a rash of pretenders continued to threaten Henry Tudor's still fragile hold on power.  While Henry Tudor could be ruthless in putting down the rebellions they caused, to the pretenders themselves he could be merciful, provided they caused no further trouble.

George, Duke of Clarence, died or was forcibly drowned in a butt of wine in the Tower of London in 1478.  His son, who claimed his maternal uncle's title the Duke of Warwick, remained in prison to insure no further trouble to either Edward IV or Richard III.  Having grown up in confinement, Warwick was a naïve young man who was killed trying to escape confinement in the Tower.  Meanwhile, in the English countryside, a young boy called Lambert Simnel was attracting attention because of his similar appearance to members of the late royal family.  He was blonde haired and blue eyed, straight out of Plantagenet Central Casting.  He came to the attention of an Oxford priest named Richard Simon, who wanted to capitalize on the youngster's resemblance to royalty.  He took young Lambert in and gave him an education and etiquette lessons.  To Simon's relief, Lambert lapped up the knowledge, quickly learning to act like a king.  Simon took him to London and presented him to the Earl of Kildare.

Kildare quickly caught on to Simon's plan and arranged for Lambert to be crowned in Christ Church Cathedral as Edward VI, at the age of 10 years old.  The story was quickly spread about that he was either the youngest Prince in the Tower, Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York, or more likely, Edward, Earl of Warwick.  His handlers stuck with Warwick and the legend spread.  While still a preteen, Lambert was already the head of a dangerous movement.  The Earl of Lincoln, another Plantagenet descendant, joined the movement and went to Burgundy to enlist the help of Edward IV's sister Margaret, who would promote another pretender, Perkin Warbeck.  As Simnel's troops staged in Ireland along with 2,000 Flemish mercenaries funded by Margaret, Henry VII began to scrape his army together.  Simnel's force landed in England and clashed with Henry's men at the Battle of Stokes Field.  Some of Simnel's noble supporters were killed, others fled into exile.  His sponsor Simon was imprisoned for life.

Henry VII decided he could be generous to Lambert Simnel, who was still a boy.  It was obvious to anyone who wasn't been on treason that he couldn't be any of the last Plantagenet striplings.  Henry took Simnel to work in the royal kitchens as a turn-spit.  His job would be to crouch near one of the roaring fireplaces where meat roasted and turn the large carcasses so that they cooked evenly.  Turn-spits were the lowest on the kitchen food chain, and probably Henry thought this was punishment enough.  Later, Simnel became a royal falconer, married and lived out his life without anymore bother to the Tudors.

  

The Black Prince's Ruby

When is a ruby not really a ruby?  When it's a spinel.  A ruby is composed of corundum or aluminum oxide.  A spinal contains magnesia, iron and chromium.  Centuries before the Periodic Table and Mohs Scale of Hardness, an opaque red gemstone was a ruby.  Because most of these rubies at the time came from what is now Tajikistan and were called balas rubies.  The Black Prince's Ruby and the Samarian Spinel in the Iranian Crown Jewels are two of the largest red spinels in the world.  And they both suffer from an unfortunate man-made flaw of a hole drilled through them. 

The ruby/spinel surfaces in the 14th century in the possession of Abu Said, the then-Prince of Granada, a Moorish kingdom in Spain.  Islamic traders were active throughout the Mediterranean and adjoining countries, so it's entirely plausible that a large uncut spinel was passed along the various trade routes and wound up in Abu's collection.  It was Abu's misfortune to make war with Pedro of Castile, known to history as Pedro the Cruel.  When Abu came to Seville to discuss peace, Pedro had him murdered instead.  The stone was found among Abu's possession and became Pedro's on the spot.  Then Pedro's brother rebelled against him and he had to call on foreign troops from England to help put down the revolt.  These men were led by Edward, the Black Prince, one of the foremost military commanders of his time.  Edward laid eyes on the ruby and demanded it as a personal tip for his services.

Edward took the ruby home to England, where it remained in the royal possession until its first famous outing at the Battle of Agincourt in 1415.  Henry V used the stone as part of the embellishment of his helmet.  It was at this time that someone drilled a hole in it to affix a spike or hook that would keep the stone on the helmet in the heat of battle.  By then it was already known as the Black Prince's Ruby.  Richard III may also have worn the ruby as an adornment on his helmet.  It came into the possession of the Tudors and was set in the elaborate crown created by Henry VIII for his coronation.  This crown, known as the Tudor Crown, appears in several portraits of Tudor and Stuart monarchs.  Unfortunately, during the English Civil War it, like most of the other Royal Regalia, was scrapped for metal and the gemstones sold.

Someone, it isn't known who, bought the ruby and later presented it back to Charles II.  It wasn't until the reign of Victoria that it was set in a brand new Imperial State Crown which she had commissioned for her own coronation.  It was then that the unsightly hole was plugged with a real ruby.  The stone resides in the front of the Imperial State Crown, above the diamond Cullinan II on the rim.

Royal: Blanche of England, 1392-1409

A stunning gold crown encrusted with gems resides in the treasury of the Residenz Palace in Munich, still connected with the former ruling family of Bavaria, the Wittelsbachs.  Once upon a time, an English princess carried this crown from her homeland in England to marry a distant Wittelsbach ancestor.  She bore a son, and died tragically young while carrying another child, who died in utero with her. 

Blanche, 1392-1409, was the daughter of Henry of Bolingbroke, the future Henry IV, and the granddaughter of John of Gaunt and his first wife, Blanche of Lancaster.  She was named for her grandmother.  At the time of her birth, Blanche was only one of many Plantagenet cousins.  Her mother, Mary de Bohun, Henry's first wife, died in childbirth to Blanche's baby sister Philippa, who would also survive and later find a brilliant marriage as Queen of Norway, but that was a long way off.  In 1399, her father deposed his cousin, Richard II, and became Henry IV of England.  His children were now princes and princesses and valuable dynastic alliances.  One of those alliances was with King Rupert of Germany, whose son Louis, a Wittelsbach, would one day become Elector Palatine of the Rhine, an hereditary office in the Witteslbach family. 

The formal betrothal contract was signed in 1401 and Blanche was soon on her way to her new home, her resplendent crown packed in her trousseau.  On July 6, 1402, she was married at Cologne Cathedral, all of ten years old.  By 1406, she and Louis were living together as husband and wife and Blanche bore a son, Rupert, named for his German grandfather.  Her father celebrated in 1408 by making her a Lady of Garter.  In 1409, Blanche was carrying another child when she caught a fever.  Both she and the baby died in Alsace.  She was buried at the Church of St. Mary in Neustadt, where her tombstone survives today.  Louis went on to become Elector Palatine and marry again, having other children by his second wife Matilda.  Blanche's son Rupert died while still a teenager, not yet old enough for children of his own.

Places: Wakefield Tower, Tower of London

On the evening of May 21, 1471, deposed King Henry VI knelt in prayer in the chapel of the Wakefield Tower at the Tower of London.  His situation couldn't have been more bleak and dangerous.  He'd lost his place as King of England for the second time, and his only son and heir, Edward, Prince of Wales, had been killed in battle at Tewkesbury.  Without an heir, with few supporters and not in firm control of his mind, Henry was easy prey for anyone who might want him out of the way.  As he prayed in the chapel, several armed men burst in behind him and bludgeoned him to death with swords.  Though rumor puts Richard of Gloucester, the future Richard III in the room, likely his role in Henry's murder would have been transmitting secret orders from Edward IV to have the former king executed.  As cruel as it sounds now, it had to be done.  Henry's supporters had already risen once and sent Edward IV into exile.  It could happen again, bringing yet another bloody chapter to the War of the Roses.  Did Henry suspect that he, like Edward II and Richard II, might be killed in captivity?  We will never know.

The Tower of London is not a single tower, but a complex of several towers built over the successive reigns of Norman and Plantagenet kings.  The motte or keep is the White Tower, built by William the Conqueror soon after his arrival in England and augmented by Henry II.  Later, Richard I, Henry III and Edward I expanded and enlarged the Tower precincts to include two defensive walls and a moat or ditch.  The inner wall consists of several towers, each with its own distinctive name.  One of these is the Wakefield Tower, which served as Henry VI's prison in 1471.  Though the phrase, Bloody Tower came to symbolize the entire complex, it was originally a name given in Tudor times to the tower next to Wakefield, which housed Henry's two young cousins, the Princes in the Tower.  The chapel where Henry spent his last fateful night still exists and, on each anniversary of his death, flowers are placed on the spot in commemoration of the event.

King: Henry VI, 1421-1471

History is full of many mad kings, some of them homicidal maniacs who murdered hundreds or thousands of their subjects.  Others were gentle dreamers who weren't up to the task of governing because of matters beyond their control.  Henry VI, 1421-1471, was of the latter variety.

Henry was born at Windsor in December, 1421, the child of Henry V and Catherine of Valois.  When he was 9 months old, his father Henry V, victor of Agincourt, died still campaigning in France, leaving Henry VI the youngest king ever to ascend to the English throne, in August, 1422.  Further, in accordance with the Treaty of Troyes of 1420, he also became titular King of France because of his mother's claim to her father Charles VI's throne.  Thus, while still in diapers, Henry inherited two kingdoms at war with each other.  The Hundred Years War was still very much alive, despite the Treaty of Troyes.  Being a child king in the Medieval era was a dangerous proposition.  There were several able-bodied adult males in the Lancastrian and Yorkist sides of the Plantagenet family, any of whom could have exploited Henry's youth to take the throne for themselves.  His mother, young and suspicious because of her French heritage, wasn't able to offer much support.

Henry's three uncles, John, Duke of Bedford, Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, and Henry Beaufort, Bishop of Westminster, were among the nobles on his royal council.  Henry, as custom demanded, was placed in the care of Richard de Beauchamp, Earl of Warwick, who would oversee his education and military training.  Henry was crowned King of England in 1429, and then in 1431, crowned King of France at Notre Dame de Paris.  Most Frenchmen disregard his claim.  They had already crowned Charles VII at Reims in 1429 and that was the only coronation that mattered.  Henry assumed royal authority at the age of 16, and early on seemed to take an interest in governing his realm.  Then tragedy struck.  His mother died when he was sixteen and Henry, shy, pious and bookish, soon fell under the sway of favorites, the ultimate doom of many a Plantagenet king.

Henry was averse to resuming an active war with France and agreed to a marriage with Margaret of Anjou, a French princess with ties to the House of Lorraine and the Valois.  If Henry was shy and a bit nerdy, Margaret was not.  Where Henry was backward in taking charge of his realm and keeping his nobles under control, Margaret was determined to take control.   She had Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester, imprisoned on charges of treason.  He died before he could be tried.  While the cause was most likely a heart attack or stroke, enemies whispered of poison.  She also alienated the Yorkist faction by excluding Richard, Duke of York and Henry's cousin, from council and court.  He was banished to Ireland to serve as governor there, no a wise move in the long run.  The council broke down into factions and the country followed suit.  The economy foundered, law and order dissolved.  Blame fell on another Plantagenet relation, the Duke of Suffolk, who was exiled, but captured at sea and brought back to England for execution.  English troops were losing ground in France.  Margaret remained childless.  Returning troops and unemployed peasants and laborers rose in Jack Cade's rebellion in 1450.

In the midst of this chaos, Henry's already fragile hold on sanity finally snapped.  He slept for days at time and seemed unaware of what was going on around him.  Modern sources believe he had a form of schizophrenia.  He had little idea, if any, that his son Edward had been born.  Richard of York took complete control of the government and he had a powerful ally.  Richard Neville had inherited the Warwick earldom through his wife, a Beauchamp.  An able administrator and tactician, the future Kingmaker had Beaufort thrown into the Tower on charges of treason and excluded Margaret from any governmental decisions.  Henry finally came around on Christmas Day, 1454, but his mind wasn't strong enough to resist York and Warwick.  He agreed to disinherit his own son, on grounds that the boy may not have been his, but the result of a liaison between the Queen and Beaufort.  Henry VI named Richard of York and his heirs as heirs of the throne, to Margaret's fury.  The factions in the Plantagenet family, the nobility and council exploded into war in 1460 at the Battle of Northampton, touching off the Wars of the Roses.

Following Northampton, Henry was captured and imprisoned as Richard of York's forces took control.  Richard was killed at Wakefield the following year and his son, Edward IV took the throne, deposing Henry at the Battle of Towton.  By this time, Henry had relapsed again.  Henry and Margaret fled with their son to Scotland.  Henry was eventually recaptured in 1465 and placed in the Tower.  Margaret galvanized the Lancastrian side from France.  And she had gained a powerful ally.  Warwick, who had done so much to put Edward IV on the throne, had grown alienated by Edward's secret marriage to a commoner and the flood of her relatives into lucrative positions at Court.  Warwick threw his allegiance to Henry, allowed his daughter Anne to marry Edward, the Prince of Wales, and began working with French backing to amass an army.  Warwick landed in England and Edward IV fled into exile as his brother, Richard of Gloucester, kept up the fight for the Yorkist side.  Edward IV's younger brother, George of Clarence backed Henry VI.

But Henry VI's freedom was short-lived.  He was barely aware of the measures Warwick took in his name, including declaring war on Burgundy, which had supported Edward IV.  Edward landed with an army and met Warwick at Barnet, in April, 1471, where Warwick was killed and Clarence hastily changed sides.  Henry VI was captured and returned to the Tower.  Then, in May of 1471, Edward, Prince of Wales was killed and Henry VI was a shell of a man.  On the night of May 21, 1471, as Henry VI knelt at prayer in the chapel of the Wakefield Tower, he was killed.  Debate goes on about whether Edward IV specifically ordered the death, and what part Gloucester, the future Richard III had in it.  Most likely, Edward IV did order the murder and Gloucester transmitted the order but the actual deed was left to others.  Edward IV ordered Henry VI's body to be buried in Chertsey Abbey.  Ironically, it was Richard III who had Henry reinterred at St. George's Chapel.  By that time, Henry had acquired the status of a local saint.  Miracles were reported at his tomb in Chertsey and there was talk of a cause for canonization, but it never came to fruition.  Centuries later, workers uncovered the body of Henry VI.  Wounds in the skull and the evidence of blood on still-existing hair indicated that he had, in fact, died violently, yet another Plantagenet in the Tower. 

While in the Tower, Henry VI supposedly wrote a poem, as follows:

Kingdoms are but cares
            State is devoid of stay,
 Riches are ready snares,
            And hasten to decay
 Pleasure is a privy prick (private bother)
            Which vice doth still provoke;
 Pomps, imprompt; and fame, a flame;
            Power, a smoldering smoke.
 Who meaneth to remove the rock
            Out of the slimy mud
 Shall mire himself, and hardly scape
            The swelling of the flood.

(Source, Wikipedia).

Did It Happen: Falconry and the Hierarchy of Birds

A common myth persists that Medieval people who enjoyed hawking or falconry used birds ranked according to their status.  The most common pairings of royal or noble to bird include, emperors hunted with eagles, kings with gyrfalcons, earls with peregrines, knights with sakers, women with goshawks, and on down the social scale. 

So, did it happen?  Nope, we can pour cold water on this one, too.

 The idea of a hierarchy of birds for hunting isn't attested in the many Medieval treatises on hunting, one of which was written by an Emperor, Frederick II of Germany in 1250.  It first appears in a volume known as the Book of St. Albans.   This book, or boke, as it was written at the time, was one of series of early printed books from the third printing press to be set up in England, that of St. Albans in 1479.  At the end of the edition, the book credits, "explicit, Dame Juliana Barnes in her boke of hunting."  The book consists of three parts, a portion on heraldry, hunting and hawking.  The attribution is at the end of the chapters on hawking, some of the material of which appears to be lifted from an earlier treatise written during the reign of Edward IV.  Juliana Barnes, Bernes or Berners was said to have been a prioress of St. Mary of Sopwell, a priory not far from St. Albans.  Berners was a noble family, but there are gaps in their family genealogy and no other record of a Juliana Berners.  If she existed, she was probably a noble woman who'd engaged in hawking during her youth, and gave it up when entering convent life, but remembered enough of it to write a treatise about it later. 

But does any of what she said about the hierarchy of birds hold water?  Most sources point to the many mistakes in the hierarchy as evidence that Dame Julia was at best fanciful in the birds she assigned to the various social orders.  While it wouldn't have been past Frederick II to try to hunt with an eagle, the man lived a very daring and dangerous life, eagles are large, powerful and hard to tame.  Juliana suggests the alternative of a vulture, but a vulture is a carrion bird, not a falcon or a hawk.  Gyrfalcons do exist, but the most common falcon for falconry at the time was the peregrine.  Kings, earls and other practical hunting folk would want a bird that is obtainable, flexible on a wide variety of game and/or hunting conditions and willing to cooperate with humans.  Peregrines have been used as falconry birds since ancient times. 

Bustard is a strange one.  A buzzard, like a vulture, is a carrion bird.  It may also be a French term for a game bird, again not a bird of prey.  Hobbies and goshawks might have been used as starter or training birds, King Edward I ordered his falconers to catch and train hobbies.  However, if common priests and holy water clerks are hunting, where are cardinals, bishops and other prelates?  They aren't included in the hierarchy at all, and this is a treatise supposedly written by a nun!  And, since when do poor men hunt with falcons?  Falconry required a great deal of time and money to train and plenty of open land to work.  It was a known sport of royalty, nobles, gentry and the seriously wealthy, not peasants and laborers.  Likely, people who could afford to spend their leisure hours hunting, and could outlay the costs for training and upkeep of birds used whatever birds were readily obtainable and compatible with their skill level, interest and personal budget. 

Michaelmas Day

In modern times we're used to printed calenders and digital readouts.  If we want to indicate a day, it's easy to say October 11 of x-year and let that be that.  People in Medieval times used different means for indicating dates.  While calendars and almanacs were available, they were expensive.  Clocks and chronometers were non-existent.  Everyone rich or poor alike were familiar with the feast, fasts and holidays of the liturgical calendar.  If something was supposed to happen on October 11, it was much simpler just to say Michaelmas, and be done with it.  BTW: Michaelmas is now on September 29 of each year, given the switch in the 16th century to the Julian Calendar.  The Plantagenets and their contemporaries would have known the Gregorian Calendar, instead.

Michaelmas, or Michael's Mass, was the feast day of St. Michael the Archangel.  More properly, it was the feast day of the four known archangels, Michael, Gabriel, Raphael and Uriel, sometimes called the Feast of St. Michael and all Angels.  By Church custom, it was a day of Obligation, similar to Christmas and Easter, when all faithful were supposed to attend mass.  Because it was a special day, it was easy for people to keep track of and use as a references.  Because it fell in October, it came after the year's harvest had been gathered in.  Rents and other obligations were often made due on Michaelmas Day.  If the reeve on a particular estate were elected by the peasants, the elections were held on this day.  Later, when people were free to trade their labor, laboring fairs and fairs in general were often held on Michaelmas.  It became a day to mark the third financial quarter of the year, as well as one of four legal terms or court sessions.  Michaelmas is still used as the start of legal terms in England and other countries which base their law on English common law.  In countries whose legal tradition hails back to England, Michaelmas is often celebrated as a red mass, in honor of lawyers, judges and the legal profession. 

Lancastrians versus Yorkists: Battle of Barnet, April 14, 1471

Battles often turn on moments where strategy goes out the window and movements on the field take a turn for the worst.  The Battle of Barnet, between the Yorkists under Edward IV and the Lancastrians, under Richard "the Kingmaker", Earl of Warwick is a perfect example.

Warwick had for many years been a loyal supporter of Edward IV.  His daughters were married to Edward's two younger brothers, George of Clarence and Richard of Gloucester.  He'd invested his own men and resources in fighting for Edward to take the throne in 1460.  Over the years, he'd soured on his allegiance to Edward for the some of the same reasons that others soured on Edward.  Edward had married a common, Elizabeth Woodville, against the protestations of his entire council.  Warwick in particular was offended.  He'd personally put a lot of effort into securing a French alliance for Edward.  Edward favored Burgundy over France, and his new wife and her relatives over everyone else.  When Elizabeth became Queen her relatives flocked to court in droves, particularly her brother Anthony, Earl Rivers, who set himself up as a rival to Warwick.

Warwick had enough, as had George of Clarence.  In their minds, Henry VI was far better than Edward.  He was married to a French princess, Margaret of Anjou.  Because of his mental condition, he was malleable, and he had a young son who would depend on somebody like Warwick for a number of years.  In 1470, Warwick and Clarence deserted Edward, began raising an army, and brought Henry back from exile in France.  With Warwick's cunning in battle, they soon claimed London and Edward had no choice but to flee to Burgundy, where his sister Margaret was Duchess.  Edward IV persuaded his brother-in-law Charles of Burgundy to back him in an effort to win his kingdom and landed in England in March.  Barons loyal to Edward began summoning their levies, basically homegrown armies made of men at arms, archers, and even farmers and laborers with improvised weapons.  As men flocked to Edward, Warwick scrambled to raise an army to defend Henry VI and play for time until Margaret of Anjou could arrive with her son and reinforcements from France.  Edward, meanwhile, had captured Henry VI, who was a prisoner in Edward's army.

In early April, 1471, these two forces converged on the town of Barnet, in Hertfordshire north of London.  On Edward IV's side were his brother, Richard of Gloucester, and his cousin and best friend, William, Baron Hastings.  On Warwick's side were his brother, John Neville, Marquess of Montague, Henry Holland, Duke of Exeter, and John de Vere, Earl of Oxford.  The morning of April 14, 1471 dawn with a heavy fog.  The armies, which had been maneuvering close to one another, faced each other with their placement off.   Richard of Gloucester should have been facing the Duke of Exeter, on Edward's right wing.  Instead, he was facing thin air, in a position to wind around Exeter in a flank maneuver.  The left wing was also crooked, Oxford in a great position to swoop around Hastings.  Edward and Richard quickly pressed their advantage, taking on Montague, in the center and Exeter.  Oxford quickly rushed at Hastings, and broke Edward's line.

Hastings' men broke and fled back to Barnet with Oxford in hot pursuit.  Once in Barnet, Oxford's men decided to loot the town.  Oxford finally scraped his men together and marched them back to the battlefield, where some uniform red and white rose banners would've come in handy.  Instead, Montague's men mistook De Vere's star emblem for Edward's own Sun in Splendor banner.  Believing they had Edward at bay, Montague's men attacked Oxford.  Oxford's men believed that Montague had deserted to Edward, and attacked back.  Warwick, in reserve, tried to straighten out this mess, but it was too late.  One by one, his commanders broke ranks and fled, leaving Warwick to chase down his own army.  In the ensuing confused retreat, Warwick was killed.  In two or three hours, it was over.  Edward was King, Warwick was dead, Henry VI was a prisoner, and George of Clarence, who hadn't been at the battle, was in serious trouble. 

John Neville, Marquess of Montague, was also killed.  Rather than have him and Warwick disemboweled and quartered as traitors, Edward brought them back to London.  They lay in repose at Old St. Paul's so that the populace would know that these two legendary leaders had died.  Then Edward sent them to be buried in their family vaults at Bisham Abbey.  Margaret of Anjou landed at Weymouth with her French army and began attracting leftover Lancastrians to her forces.  Edward would have to defeat them at Tewkesbury on May 4, 1471, with Clarence, who had rejoined his brothers.  Exeter, who'd been left for the dead on the battlefield, recovered and was imprisoned for four years before being pardoned by Edward.  Oxford would later escape from prison and join Henry Tudor, commanding a force at Bosworth in 1485.  Henry VI was killed in the Wakefield Tower in May, 1471. 

In-Law: Isabel/Hawise of Gloucester, 1173-1217

There's a black sheep in most families, and for Henry II and Eleanor of Aquitaine, it was their youngest surviving son John.  He was known in his day as John Lackland and it wasn't a compliment.  While his older brothers Henry and Richard inherited the domains of their father and mother respectively, and his brother Geoffrey made a brilliant marriage with a duchess in her own right, John had to be content with a few scraps and pieces.  Henry II's solution to his youngest son's lack of land was less than brilliant.

Enter Hawise, also known as Isabel, 1173-1217, the daughter of William FitzRobert, 2nd Earl of Gloucester.  Through her father, she was a great granddaughter of Henry I, the last Norman King of England, though from an out-of-wedlock son.  John was the great-grandson of Henry through his grandmother, the Empress Matilda.  William FitzRobert had three daughters.  Isabel, the eldest, stood to inherit his Earldom but would have to divide the land inheritance with her two other sisters.  As a potential female heiress to a noble estate, she was of interest to Henry II, who had an immediate use for her.  He betrothed her to his son John in 1176.  William FitzRobert was okay with it, but the Church would have to be consulted, as the bride and groom were cousins.  The marriage contract specified that, if the Pope refused consent to the marriage, Henry would find a suitable bridegroom for Isabel.  In fact, he had no intention of letting such a rich prize get out of the family.  Isabel and John were married.

Baldwin, Archbishop of Canterbury, declared the marriage null and placed the Gloucester inheritance under an interdict.  Pope Clement handed Henry his just desserts with a unique conundrum.  He lifted the interdict and agreed to the marriage, so long as it was never consummated.  No Plantagenet male would've stood for this and John was furious.  His father-in-law William died in 1183 and Henry disinherited Isabel's two sisters.  She was Countess of Gloucester in her own right and had plenty of land, but no children and no reasonable prospect of doing anything to beget children.  Henry died in 1189 and Richard saw no reason to help John out of his predicament.  Finally, in 1199, John became King and sought an annulment.  Isabel agreed and stepped aside before she was crowned Queen.  John rewarded her grace by taking away the Earldom of Gloucester and giving it to her cousin. 

Not to be outdone, Isabel got on with her life.  She married twice, Geoffrey FitzGeoffrey de Mandeville, Earl of Essex, and after his death, Hubert de Burgh, Earl of Kent.  Essex's death left her a wealthy widow and in 1213, she got the Earldom of Gloucester back after her childless cousin died and left no other heir.  At least John was still around for this glorious bit of sweet revenge.  A month after her third marriage, Isabel died at Keynsham Abbey, where she'd gone to seek medical care as her health began to fail.  She was buried in Canterbury Cathedral.  She figures in a few novels, but her most spectacular appearance was in Russell Crowe's version of the Robin Hood legend, in 2010, played by Jessica Rains.

What Is: A Chantry

Royal families are drama.  Power and wealth could, and did, make enemies of fathers and sons, husbands and wives, siblings and cousins.  In some cases, only death allowed the feuding family members to remember only their blood ties and not the throne they'd won or lost.  One of the more poignant expressions of this sorrow was the chantry chapel.  Chantries were chapels endowed for the sole purpose of chanting masses for the repose of a dead person, or even collective members of a family.  The Plantagenet family arranged for quite a few chantries, usually in cathedrals or larger chapels such as Westminster Abbey or St. George's Chapel.  Some of them have their own sad tales.

Henry II warred with all his sons but the most bitter fight with was with Henry, Jr., known as the Young King.  Henry II intended that his namesake would inherit the throne of England and Normandy, two of the larger pieces in the Plantagenet inheritance.  By crowing young Henry as junior king of England as part of the larger Becket controversy in 1170, Henry II set the scene for constant strife with his eldest son.  In 1183, the Young King died while still in rebellion against his father.  Then, in 1185, another Plantagenet, Geoffrey, Duke of Brittany, died, also at enmity with Henry II.  As furious as he'd been with them in life, Henry II was now torn with grief.  He commissioned a beautiful chantry chapel in the Cathedral of Rouen to commemorate the Young King.  Henry II was also anxious for his own soul, commissioning prayers to be said for his soul in certain chapels throughout his realm.  Henry II gets credit for introducing the concept of the chantry, a purpose-built chapel to house prayers for a dead soul and commemorate that person, into England. Henry's son John also endowed chapels with priests to pray for his soul, even before he became King.

Other Plantagenet kings who endowed chantries included Edward III, who created one at St. George's Chapel, Windsor, and Henry V, who endowed a chantry at Westminster Abbey.  John of Gaunt endowed a chantry for the repose of his soul and that of his first wife, Blanche.  Nobility and the seriously wealthy followed the royal family's example.  Becoming a priest in a chantry was a sought-after benefice, or paid clergy position.  It could provide a good living wage with light duties, since the only obligation was to pray perpetually for the souls of the person or family commemorated by the chantry.  Not surprisingly, it was one of the abuses targeted by Reformers.  Chantries were specifically abolished by statute during the reign of Henry VIII in 1545 and 1547.

The Duchess: Blanche of Lancaster, c 1345-1368

For most people, the only love of John of Gaunt's life was his long-term mistress and 3rd wife, Katherine Swynford.  However, he may have had a loving relationship with his first wife, Blanche of Lancaster, c 1345-1368.

Blanche was born at Bolinbroke Castle, Lincolnshire.  She, too, had lion's blood.  Her great-great grandfather was Henry III.  She was, thus, a Plantagenet through Henry's son, Edmund Crouchback, 1st Earl of Lancaster.  Blanche was the younger of two sisters, and both were heirs to their father's estates, which included the Earldom of Lancaster, the Earldom of Leicester, the Earldom of Derby and the Earldom of Lincoln.  Maude of Lancaster also married well, but died childless, leaving Blanche the sole heir of their father.  In 1359, at Reading Abbey, Blanche married her third cousin John of Gaunt.  When Blanche's father died in 1361, the Lancaster inheritance was recreated as a Duchy.  In 1362, with Maude's death, John, through Blanche, inherited the other earldoms to add to his own considerable wealth.  He later became Lord High Steward of England.  He and Blanche had three surviving children, Henry of Bolingbroke, the future Henry IV, Philippa, Queen of Portugal and Elizabeth, Duchess of Exeter.  Four other children died as invents.

Blanche was a beautiful woman.  Chronicler Jean Froissart described her as young and pretty.  Geoffrey Chaucer, who began his court career in John of Gaunt's patronage, wrote his first major work, the Book of the Duchess, at her encouragement and with the central character being inspired by her.  Like many women of that era who endured multiple pregnancies, Blanche's health began failing.  It was about that time that Gaunt began his relationship with Katherine Swynford, though they wouldn't marry until years later.  Blanche died at Tutbury Castle, Staffordshire in 1368, while Gaunt was overseas on military service.  John of Gaunt arranged a beautiful tomb for her in Old St. Paul's Cathedral.  Each year, he arranged for special commemorative masses to be said for her soul.  When John of Gaunt himself died, he chose to be buried beside Blanche at St. Paul's, where he'd commissioned a chantry chapel for perpetual prayers for their souls.  When the tomb was completed, it was scene that his right hand clasped her right hand on the double effigy, rather than the two simply lying side by side.  Had love's dart struck twice for John of Gaunt?

Regalia: Ampula and Anointing Spoon

In Medieval times the high point of a coronation was not the moment the crown was placed on the sovereign's head.  Rather, it was the moment when he was anointed with holy oil, usually from a sacred vessel.  Two of the oldest pieces of today's Crown Regalia have to do with this ritual, and both have ties to the Plantagenet era.  According to legend, in 1170, not long before he was martyred, Thomas Becket received a visit from the Virgin Mary.  She presented him with a vessel in the shape of a golden eagle, containing what she said was sacred oil to be used in the crowning of all future English kings.  The legend dates from the 14th century and is a convenient moral on the right of the Archbishops of Canterbury to crown English kings.  Regardless of whether one believes the legend, a golden ampula in the shape of an eagle has been used in each subsequent coronation of a English sovereign. 

Most of the coronation regalia is quite new, being created in 1661 for the coronation of King Charles II.  This was because, in 1649, soon after the execution of Charles I, Oliver Cromwell ordered all the old regalia to be broken up and sold for scrap to pay his troops.  Orbs, crowns, spurs, scepters, swords and other valuable pieces, some said to date back to Edward the Confessor, were destroyed in this way.  A Yeoman of the Wardrobe bought the anointing spoon and tucked it away, later returning it to Charles II.  The spoon is gilt, silver covered in gold, and consists of a long-handled bowl with two grooves.  At the coronation ceremony, the Archbishop of Canterbury pours oil from the ampula into the spoon, dips two fingers, one in each groove, and touches the King (or Queen's) forehead, breast and hands with the oil.  This spoon has been traced to the coronation of King John in 1199 and thus, is the oldest piece of the regalia in existence.

What Is: a Seneschal

Every drama has to have its curmudgeon, and it the Arthurian tales that role is almost always filled by King Arthur's loyal but unlikable half-brother Kay.  A skilled knight and loyal, but tending toward bluntness and being a braggart, Kay is foot in mouth, sword in hand.  Despite a tinge of jealousy on Kay's part for Arthur's luck in becoming King, Arthur trusts Kay with one of the most sensitive post in a king's command, that of seneschal. 

A seneschal (Sin-ess-shal), is more of a European term than English.  Plantagenet rulers would've been familiar with the term and appointed seneschals to handle affairs in their Continental domains.  Depending on his post, a seneschal could be a steward, handling household affairs, particularly the administration of servants.  He might also function as a bailiff or marshal, punishing any wrongdoing or criminal conduct in the King's household, or taking command of troops.  In England, those roles were handled by bailiffs, reeves, sheriffs, stewards, marshals and other officials.  However, in Europe, seneschals were often highly-placed royal administrators, functioning as governors and commanders of key outposts and garrisons.  Thus, being named a seneschal was a post of high honor and usually went to a skilled administrator, trusted knight and experienced commander, often a great noble or even a member of the royal family. 

King Arthur and Medieval England

To say that Medieval Britons were obsessed with King Arthur puts it mildly.  Stories of Arthur, his beautiful Queen Guinevere, his knights, the Sword in the Stone, Lady of the Lake, etc., etc., were known and loved by all classes, not only in England, but also in France and other parts of Europe with Celtic roots.  The Plantagenet family reflected their society in this regard.  They patronized poets who wrote songs and recited poems about Arthur.  Edward III had a replica of the Round Table placed in Westminster Great Hall.  The whole idea of chivalric orders, such as the Garter, took their inspiration from Arthur and his trusty Knights of the table round.  Richard II patronized John Gower, who wrote a story about Sir Gawain and the Green Knight.  Unlike the Tudors, who claimed a spurious descent from Arthur's father, Uther Pendragon, the Plantagenets were more about proving that their kingdom was every bit as good if not better than Arthur.  Whatever Arthur had done, he could do better.

Historians differ on whether Arthur existed and who exactly he was.  However, as early as the 5th and 6th centuries, references to him in Welsh and Breton works cropped up.  One Welsh poet extolling the deeds of a warrior who slew 300 enemy still said that the man was no Arthur.  For these references to resonate with readers and listeners, they had to have some idea of who Arthur was and why even the most decorated warriors of the day couldn't match him or beat his record.  It took Geoffrey of Monmouth, a chronicler and cleric living in the 12th century, to flesh out who Arthur was.  From Geoffrey, Arthur emerges as an early British king who battled enemies both human and otherworldly, and who amassed an empire including what is now Britain, Ireland, Iceland, Norway and Gaul.  Uther Pendragon was his father, Merlin his mentor and assistant.  Arthur was born at Tintagel Castle in Wales, later married Welsh princess Guinevere, and obtained the magical sword Excaliber.  Mordred is his nemesis and he lies buried at Avalon, supposedly to this day if Avalon can be found.

French poet Chretien de Troyes also wrote in the 12th century, adding Sir Lancelot to a love triangle with Guinevere and the Grail Quest.  Through Troyes and another author, who wrote Roman de Brut, Brutus being another early British king and possible substitute for Arthur, the Arthur stories spread to France.  Knights' names and backstories began popping up.  Other stories were cast as spin-offs of the Arthurian legend, such as Tristan and Isolde.  Marie of France, a noblewoman who wrote lais, or chivalrous poems similar to the chansons of the troubadours, further embellished the legends, and added more characters and stories to the Arthurian universe.  Poetry soon led to prose stories, often serialized versions of the more popular tales, known as cycles.  The Arthurian stories became part of a body of legend known as the matter of Britain, legends of Britain, and by extension Wales, Scotland, Ireland and Brittany.  Medieval Europe couldn't get enough Arthur.  Chaucer alludes to him in some of the Canterbury Tales.  Finally, in the 15th century, Sir Thomas Malory wrote his magnum opus, Le Morte de Artur, which was one of the first books printed by William Caxton's printing press in 1485.  It went through several additions and no library for centuries afterward was complete without it. 

Descendants: the Beaufort Family

Being born out of wedlock during Medieval times didn't always have to be the disgrace that Victorian dime novelists made it out to be.  If the biological father was royal or noble, children could be provided for with titles, lands, and advantageous marriages that would vault them from illegitimacy to a place among the nobility of England.  This is the story of the Beauforts, and their rise to power, which they have steadily held onto till the present day.

John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, one of the sons of Edward III, was married three times.  His first wife, Blanche of Lancaster, a Plantagenet in her own right, was the mother of Henry of Bolingbroke, the future King Henry IV of England.  John's third wife, and the love of his life, was Katherine Swynford, with whom he had at least four children and subsequently married.  In Medieval times, under certain conditions, a subsequent marriage legitimized the children of the marriage, even if they weren't allowed to inherit a place in the line of succession.  John of Gaunt, one of the wealthiest men of his day, had enough land to support John, Jr., Henry, Thomas and Joan.  Their cousin Richard II declared them legitimate under the name of Beaufort, a derivation from an estate held by John of Gaunt in France, Beaufort-Montmorency.  John's half-brother, Henry IV, made him Earl of Somerset in 1397.  His son, another John, became Duke of Somerset in 1443.  And the other Beaufort kids didn't do too bad.  Thomas became Duke of Exeter, and Joan married the Earl of Westmoreland.  Among her descendants were the Dukes of York (ironically), the Dukes of Norfolk and Buckingham, the Earls of Northumberland, Warwick the Kingmaker and Queen Catherine Parr.  John of Somerset's granddaughter Margaret was the mother of Henry VII. 

And it keeps getting better.  The 3rd Duke of Somerset died during the Wars of the Roses, but his biological son was legitimate under his title and began the Somerset line of the Earls of Worcester.  The Beauforts remained staunch Royalists during the English Civil War.  Charles II, a Plantagenet descendant himself many times over, made Henry Somerset, 3rd Marquess of Worcester into the 1st Duke of Beaufort.  Today, David Somerset, the 11th Duke of Beaufort, carries on the family line.  Plantagenets walk the earth today, even if under a different name. 

 

The Peasants' Revolt of 1381

Popular revolts happened during the Middle Ages, but they were rare.  Most people accepted their lot in life, as hard as it was.  The King and God were far away and most people were concerned with feeding themselves and finding enough money to pay various taxes to have the time or inclination to revolt.  That all changed in the wake of the Black Death, 1348-49.  Whole villages were either wiped out or seriously decimated by the disease.  Estates were abandoned or undermanned.  Laborers walked off the land and made their way to the cities.  Landlords were forced to increase rents and land space to keep the land under cultivation.  The administration of Edward III issued several ordinances to keep laborers on the land and to return errant peasants who'd strayed into towns looking for work.  The King and the landlords increased taxes, both to meet revenue for the ongoing Hundred Years War and to keep people's heads down.

The repressive measures ultimately backfired.  In addition to the newfound freedoms of the labor market, many English people had discovered popular religion, including the teachings of John Wycliffe and later John Ball.  John Wycliffe had printed the first Bible in English.  Though many people couldn't read, there were enough who could, and could read to others.  Wycliffe's followers soon went from reading the Bible to discussing it and spreading their views.  Even after the English government condemned Wycliffe as a heretic and began confiscating copies of his Bible, the common people had their first tastes of freedom and popular action.  They wouldn't soon forget it.  On May 31, 1381, a local official tried to collect the royal poll tax in Brentwood, Essex.  A protest turned into a riot, and into an armed march, which gathered steam as it headed toward London, ultimately led by Ball and Wat Tyler. 

Tyler and Ball were met on Blackheath by representatives of King Richard II's government.  Negotiations stalemated and things turned ugly.  On June 13, 1381, the Kentish contingent wreaked havoc.  They broke open jails, destroyed John of Gaunt's sumptuous palace of Savoy House, set fire to the law college at the Temple, and killed any government representative they could find.  Finally, Richard himself met them at Mile End.  Despite his attempts at gaining control of the rebellion by putting himself at their head, more violence broke out.  Some of the rebels went to the Tower of London and killed the Lord Chancellor and Lord High Treasurer.  Richard took his Plantagenet courage in hand and went to Smithfield in an attempt to negotiate with the rebels further.  Armed conflict erupted and Tyler was killed, enraging his followers.  Richard calmed things down long enough for the Lord Mayor of London to rouse the city militia. 

The city militia disbursed the mob, but trouble had spread to other towns and counties were mobs were forming and heading toward London as fast as they could walk.  Cambridge University was attacked and buildings burned.  Hugh le Despenser, one of the King's favorites, marshalled an army and defeated the rebels at the Battle of North Walsham on June 25-26, 1381, but the conflagration had spread.  Richard had to mobilize 4000 soldiers and put down the revolt piecemeal, disbursing mobs and rounding up and executing their leaders.  The Revolt did have one effect, Parliament was deterred for several sessions from raising further money for the war effort.  But the general impact wouldn't last for very long.  It was the barons and members of the royal family who deposed Richard in 1400, not the common people.  The War ground on and taxes were collected.  Not until the time of the Reformation in the 16th century would England have a Bible in the vernacular and talk of religion would turn to current events, and then to grassroots political action.

Eleanor of Aquitaine's Rock Crystal Vase

Objects of art were more than just keepsakes in the Medieval era.  They could also be status symbols, special occasions gifts, collateral and offerings to churches.  A beautiful rock crystal vase once belonging to Eleanor of Aquitaine and now in the possession of the Louvre in Paris probably fulfilled all of these roles.

The vase is made of rock crystal, with a gold base and neck inset with jewels.  It was of Muslim manufacture, dating to about the 800's.  It was first given to William IX, the troubadour Duke of Aquitaine.  It then passed into the possession of his granddaughter, Eleanor.  When she married Louis VII of France in 1137, she presented the vase to him as a wedding present.  Later, When Eleanor and Louis' marriage broke up, the vase remained with him.  An inscription on the vase indicates that he later gifted it to the Abbey of St. Denis.  St. Denis is one of the patrons of France and the Abbey was an important resting place for deceased French kings and royals.  Thus, this was an expensive gift to an important shrine within Louis' realm.  The treasures of St. Denis and other French churches and cathedrals were looted during the French Revolution, but the vase survived and eventually made its way into the collection of the Louvre.

Royal: Princess Bridget of York, 1480-1517

Royal and noble families in the Medieval era provided early for their offspring, arranging marriages for their children almost from the time of infancy.  They also provided well for their immortal souls.  Royalty, nobles and the seriously wealthy donated generously to the Church, lands, money, objects d'art, and sometimes their own children.  Giving a child, usually a daughter, to become a nun was a common act of piety among those who could afford the dower.  Becoming a nun or a Bride of Christ was considered a form of marriage, complete with a contract and a dowry.  Just as young women were sent to the court of their future husband to be brought up, girls often found their way into a convent as mere children.  They would take formal vows later.

Edward IV and Elizabeth Woodville had much to be thankful for.  Like all Medieval kings, Edward would see his place on England's throne as an outworking of God's will.  They also had a large family, with five surviving daughters.  Their youngest child, a daughter named Bridget, was born in 1480.  Her name, Bridget, reflects St. Bridget of Sweden, another royal princess who had embarked on a career as a nun.  Likely, Bridget was seen early on as a potential alliance with a powerful religious institution.  The convent chosen was Deptford Priory, in Kent.  Edward died in 1483, and sometime between 1486-1492, Bridget, who was roughly 6-12 accordingly, was taken to Deptford to live.  Later on, she took formal vows as a nun. 

Just like any nun, Bridget would have been expected to lead a life of chastity, not marrying or having children as her sisters did.  Rumor held, though,
 that Bridget might have been the mother of a young orphan the convent, Agnes of Eltham, who was later sent to be raised by Elizabeth of York.  Bridget wasn't totally sealed off from the outside world.  She and her sister, Elizabeth, kept up a frequent correspondence.  Elizabeth and another sister, Cecily, donated generously to Deptford Abbey throughout their lives.  Bridget lived until 1517, seeing her nephew Henry VIII take the throne as the second Tudor king. 

The Poor in Plantagenet England

The Black Death of 1348-49 brought with it disease and population breakdown on a scale never before seen in English history.  No one was spared, from common farmers, laborers and beggars, to members of the royal family, including at least one of Edward III's children.  Depopulation of large estates, though, proved a potential benefit to some on the bottom of the social scale.  Ever since Saxon times, serfdom had been the lot of most of England's peasants.  They were bound to the land and sold or transferred with it.  Unlike slaves, they couldn't be sold individually, but their daily lot of work and hopelessness wasn't much better.  In the wake of the plague thousands of these downtrodden laborers simply walked away from estates where their ancestors had been born, lived and died.  Their destinations were the cities and towns, where work could be had for the lucky few.  Many, though, wandered about the countryside, trying to find land of their own to squat on, or an estate where conditions were better.  When that failed, vagrancy and crime were the next options.

To counteract this, the administrations of Edward III and later Richard II enacted laws mainly aimed at keeping laborers on the land, but, by extension, dealing with beggars and vagrants who simply showed up in towns and cities with no job skills or prospects and soon took to begging or worse.  In 1349 and 1350, King Edward's government issued Statutes of Laborers, commanding workers to stay put on their estates and landowners to keep them employed.  This forced some landowners to give their workers more freedom and higher wages.  But laborers were still walking away.  In 1351, the government issued a Statute of Laborers which required every able bodied person to work.  Vagrants were punished, usually by shaming in the stocks or beating, and sent back to the estates they came from.   In 1388 the Statute of Cambridge again forbad workers to leave their estates and placed harsher penalties for those who did, or for anyone caught idling or begging.

These early laws fixed official attitudes to the plight of the poor that lasted until the 20th century, resulting in the harsh poor laws of the Tudor Era and the Victorian workhouse system of the 19th century.  Being poor was seen as a character flaw, a lack of industry and effort.  If a person were willing to work hard enough, there was no reason they should be poor.  Being ill or unlucky was no excuse.  While parishes and religious institutes would care for those who were visibly ill, disabled or dying, everyone else had to work, no excuses.  Able-bodied poor caught idling or begging would be shamed and punished repeatedly until they either got on their feet, or moved on to another locality where the cycle repeated.