The Three Estates – and a useful comparison

In June 1483, as we all know, the Three Estates of England met, declared the throne vacant due to the illegitimacy of Edward IV’s offspring. They also decided that the Duke of Clarence‘s children were barred by his attainder, thereby offering the Crown to the Duke of Gloucester. The usually hostile Gairdner, as we know,…

Sibling marriages again

In the teeth of the evidence, some authors maintain that Richard Duke of Gloucester and Anne Neville required a third dispensation because his brother had already wed her sister, an argument that Barnfield has conclusively fisked. We don’t have to go very far to find a similar case of sibling marriages – the Neville sisters’…

The Precontract that Gave Us King Richard III

One of the main reasons we now have an amazing King in the list of British monarchs is without doubt the precontract between Lady Eleanor Talbot and King Edward IV. The turning point in the election of Richard, Duke of Gloucester, as king of England was the discovery of a precontract between the former king…

They don’t like it up ’em?

It seems that some of the denialists are becoming even more sensitive than before and dislike being called Cairo dwellers. One Michael Hicks acolyte went to the point of giving Matthew Lewis well-researched biography of Richard III a one-star review. Sadly for “Alex Brondarbit”, the introduction to his own latest book (below) by the Professor…

The Trial That Should Have Happened in 1483

Originally posted on RICARDIAN LOONS:
Putting aside the mystery of what ultimately happened to Edward IV’s two sons, one enduring difficulty for a student of history is whether Richard III used the proper legal procedure in having them declared illegitimate because of their father’s precontracted marriage to Eleanor Talbot.  The most (and only) significant defect…

Women were abducted in medieval England….

The above book, Stolen Women in Medieval England, by Caroline Dunn, is subtitled Rape, Abduction and Adultery 1100-1500. This subtitle is well earned, because all three activities become very tangled indeed in those records that survive of cases that reached courts. The general impression the modern world has of medieval women is that they were…

John Fortescue Speaks

John Fortescue (1385-1479) on the subject of illegitimate children inheriting or having rights of succession to their father’s estate or patrimony: “The civil [Roman] law [followed on the Continent] legitimates children born before matrimony as well as after, and causes them to succeed to the parental inheritance. But the law of England does not allow…

You only reign twice?

Edward of Caernarvon, who was born in 1284, was king of England for nearly twenty years from 1307 as Edward II. What of his childhood? In about October 1289, he was contracted to Margaret, known as the Maid of Norway and Queen of Scotland since 1286 when her grandfather Alexander III died. She was a year…

Richard and “Incest”

In BBC History, Richard III Special Edition, Professor Hicks returns to his theory that Richard III’s marriage to Anne Neville was incestuous because of the prior marriage of his brother, George Clarence, to Isabel Neville. I have to confess to surprise that a historian of Professor Hicks’ fame and academic stature is still chasing this…

Fabricating Precontracts: Richard III vs Henry VIII

On 10 and 11 June 1483, Richard duke of Gloucester wrote to his affinity in the North and asked for troops to support him against the Woodvilles who, he claimed, were plotting his destruction. On 22 June Ralph Shaa preached his “bastard slips” sermon, followed by similar speeches by the duke of Buckingham, and on…