The Lancastrian daughter who walked like a man….

  We all know that Philippa of Lancaster—John of Gaunt’s eldest daughter by his much-loved first wife, Blanche of Lancaster—was the ancestress of a line of Portuguese monarchs (do we not?). But do we all know that Gaunt’s second wife, Costanza/Constance of Castile, gave Gaunt’s a claim to the throne of Castile? Costanza was the…

Isabella of Castile takes the crown, in more way than one….

  This article lists the top five  great European queens as Elizabeth I, Maria Theresa of Austria, the Empress Elizabeth, Catherine the Great and Queen Victoria. Ah, but that’s the top five after Isabella of Castile, who reigned from 1474 until she died in 1504. Isabella snatches this particular crown right under the other ladies’…

Another king slain by a treacherous Henry….

  “….During his life and in the years following his death, Pedro [I of Castile, 1350 to 1369] became a central figure in a wide range of historical narratives composed in Castilian, French, English, Catalan, Latin, and Arabic. These accounts present contrasting depictions of Pedro; however, as it is well known, the lasting image of…

Maria de Padilla

I am surprised to find the internet has several images of Maria de Padilla. Her daughters married John of Gaunt and Edmund of Langley and she was the grandmother of Catherine of Lancaster, aka Catalina, Queen of Castile,  Edward, Duke of York, Constance of York and Richard of Conisbrough. (Richard of Conisbrough is known thus to…

Why I dislike John of Gaunt….

As Ricardians, we know very well now, history can be twisted to suit. The matter of those strawberries and what happened next, for instance. I mean, the different versions are legion, even to the point of whether or not Thomas, Lord Stanley was ever present at all, let alone injured in a scrap and obliged…

Fake news in Cheshire in 1388? Or UFOs….?

The above painting does not illustrate the Cheshire event of 1388. According to Jonathan Hughes in  his The Rise of Alchemy in Fourteenth Century England, on a day in August 1388, during Vespers, when Richard II was recovering his authority as king, two stars were observed hovering at Haulton, (Halton, Runcorn) Cheshire. They were in…

Edmund of Langley

  Today marks the anniversary of the death in 1402 of Edmund of Langley, 1st Duke of York, an undervalued and almost forgotten prince. Edmund deserves his place in history. Without him the House of York itself would never have existed, and its later members, who everyone finds so interesting, would never have been born.…

Henry VII’s iffy Beaufort claim….

There is always a howl of outrage if fingers are pointed at Katherine de Roet/Swynford and John of Gaunt, and the legitimacy of their Beaufort children is called into question. The matter is guaranteed to end up with someone’s digit jabbing toward Richard III. Why? Because in his proclamation against Henry Tudor, Richard derided the…

The truth about the Beauforts and the throne of England. . . .

  John of Gaunt, third son of Edward III, was the Duke of Lancaster, and his illegitimate children, the Beauforts, were barred from the throne by his legitimate, firstborn son, Henry IV. Clearly the latter wasn’t having any baseborn relative wearing the crown. Nevertheless, we eventually ended up with a Beaufort king, who claimed to…

How Edward IV ascended the throne of England….

  The Wars of the Roses did not commence, à la Bard, with white and red roses snatched and brandished in a garden by opposing lords, but they were foreshadowed at the turn of the fifteenth century when Henry of Bolingbroke, Duke of Lancaster, usurped and murdered Richard II. Bolingbroke was the son and heir…