Was Elizabeth Woodville a witch….?

  Royalty and magic (black or otherwise). Well, the connection isn’t new, after all, King Arthur had Merlin. And when it suited one’s enemies, a charge of witchcraft was always a guaranteed spanner in the works. The first section of this article this article deals with Elizabeth Woodville, and is perhaps of most interest to…

The black widow that bit herself

Since John Ashdown-Hill’s iconic Eleanor was published eleven years ago, we have seen some desperate attempts to contradict his proven conclusion that Lady Eleanor Talbot contracted a valid marriage to Edward IV before his contract to Elizabeth Widville and many such attempts have rebounded on the denialist in question. Now a troll naming herself Latrodecta…

A Calendar of Queens –Minus One

Recently I came across an interesting article on Royal Central   listing all the Queens who had anniversaries relevant to June-births, deaths, coronations, marriages and the start of  their reigns. However, I did notice a couple of  things in it that I would query–an error and an omission. CALENDAR OF QUEENS First the error. The article…

Elizabeth Woodville and witchcraft in medieval England….

  Aha, so Elizabeth Woodvile was a witch, and so was her mother, Jacquette of Luxembourg. Well, everyone knew that already, because Philippa Gregory wrote about it in great detail. So it just has to be true! Anyway, joking aside, this History extra article is interesting for the information it gives about what the English…

The strict etiquette of Elizabeth Woodville’s churching….

The Travels of Leo of Rozmital in the 15th century are fascinating, and if you register (free) for a virtual library card here you can read about them for 14 days. You can access up to five books all told. Between 1465 and 1467 Leo (a Bohemian nobleman and celebrated jouster who died this day in…

Yet another case

This year’s third series of “Versailles” reminded me of a further instance of secret marriage, even though some people maintain that nobody ever married in secret despite this case, that spawned two whole books, this one and this just decades ago, let alone Edward IV and Elizabeth Wydeville or her parents. In 1683 or 1684,…

1484 – TITULUS REGIUS: FACT OR FICTION?

  Introduction ‘ ‘This is indeed a mystery’ I remarked.’ What do you think it means?’‘I have no data yet. It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suite theories, instead of theories to suite facts.’   In Arthur Conan Doyle’s short story A Scandal…

Witchcraft (1): Witchcraft and Royalty: The Cases against Eleanor Cobham and Joanne of Navarre

Originally posted on Giaconda's Blog:
Fake news – smearing the opposition With the current interest in the media about the spread of ‘fake news’ and misinformation, it seems appropriate to reconsider the cases of two royal ladies who were both accused and found guilty of witchcraft during the early C15th. Were these simply cases…

Edward III, slanting eyes and the legend of Melusine…

These days, any mention of Melusine might conjure thoughts of Jacquetta of Luxemburg, Elizabeth Woodville, witchcraft and the like. But the story of Melusine was around before then. On browsing through John Gardner’s Life and Times of Chaucer, I came upon the following anecdote, which begins with Gardner’s rather precise description of Edward himself: “He…

Anti-history: Edward IV’s ‘Secret’ Illegitimacy

Originally posted on Helen Rae Rants!:
As the old saying goes, it’s a wise child that knows its own father; one might add it’s a sure child that knows its own mother, if only because maternity is harder to conceal, deny or be mistaken about. So while doubts have been cast on King Edward’s paternity…