Celebrity Apprentice – the latest contestants

 

More Secret Marriages!

Back in 2010, historian Dan Snow was married in secret to Lady Edwina Grosvenor, daughter of the Duke of Westminster. I’ve looked but I can’t see that Dan mentions Edward IV‘s probable ‘secret marriage’ to Eleanor Talbot in any of his Twitter or other postings on history. (He did once post a very entertaining picture…

Digging up our monarchs; no, not Richard III this time….!

I’m told that even now, if you purchase a plot of ground in which to put your loved ones to rest, the chances are they’ll only lie in peace for eighty years, at which time they are removed and new occupants move in. Well, for centuries our dead haven’t always been left to enjoy their…

Please Melton, don’t invite Henry VII….

  Oh dear, the whole idea was excellent until I read the dreaded name Henry VII. Will someone please advise them not to bother with that piece of Tudor crud? He’s a party-pooper and will rain on their parade for sure. Go to site this site to read about the event at Melton.

Royal History’s Biggest Fibs

Lucy Worsley, having covered the Wars of the Roses, the “Glorious Revolution” and Britain in India, has returned with a further series. This time, the episodes earlier this year having been about the Reformation, the Armada and Queen Anne, she covers the eighteenth to twentieth centuries, reversing the contemporaneous “spin” on the French Revolution, the…

Who was old Hick Heavyhead then….?

  We all know that our royals have had nicknames – Longshanks, Rufus, Crouchback, Good Queen Bess, Prinny and, of course, Tricky Dicky. But HICK HEAVYHEAD????? 😲 And who was it? Richard II. Apparently because he was opposed to war when his barons wanted to swarm over to France and kick seven shades out of the…

Some dilgirunt for His Majesty, if you please….!

Don’t you just love it when glossaries cross-reference you from the word you seek, to another word, which then refers you back to the first word – with no definition or explanation whatsoever? I have just been looking at this culinary glossary, seeking more information about an intriguing medieval dish known as ‘dilgirunt’. Intriguing because…

The King’s Champion and his circus horse….!

We have all heard of the dashing King’s/Queen’s Champion riding fully armed into the coronation banquet, throwing down challenges to anyone who would dare to find fault with the monarch’s right to the throne. I did not know that there is a strong possibility that the Dymoke family, hereditary holders of the title, may have…

The Regale of France ruby: from a French king to Becket’s tomb to Henry VIII….and then lost.

Whatever the truth about this amazing ruby, it must be (still is?) one heck of a precious stone. It belonged to a French king, and leapt from his ring to attach itself to the tomb of Thomas Becket, who was born 900 years ago today, in Canterbury. The ruby then ended up belonging to Henry…

The Howards, Talbots and Seymours – England’s auxilliary royal families?

This document shows the descent of the known “wives”, secret wives, mistresses, illegal wives and alleged partners of five English and British kings, taken from Ashdown-Hill’s Royal Marriage Secrets: thosehowardsagain As a bonus, Laura Culme-Seymour, from a naval family, including Admiral Thomas Lord Seymour; Admiral Rodney and the first three Culme-Seymour baronets, has a famous…