THE MONUMENTAL EFFIGIES OF GREAT BRITAIN : CHARLES A STOTHARD

Reblogged from A Medieval Potpourri sparkypus.com Effigies of Ralph Neville 2nd Earl of Westmorland d.1491 and one of his wives.  Branchepeth Church, Durham.  These effigies, which were wooden, are now lost to us having since been destroyed by a disastrous fire in 1998.  Made in very dark oak it was difficult to get good photos of…

The Audley Case of 1431 Redux

We originally posted on this issue here. In summary, in 1431 or thereabouts, Alianore, Lady Audley, and her husband James were trying to demonstrate in the Church court that Alianore was legitimate and thus the heiress of her father, Edmund, Earl of Kent by Constance of York. Kent’s surviving sisters and the heirs of the…

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…

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…

If you have watched …

… Channel Five’s http://www.channel5.com/show/secrets-of-great-british-castles, let me reassure you of something. There really was a king named Richard III and Dan Jones has simply forgotten to mention him. Episode 2 was about Cardiff Castle, where Richard and Anne have a window devoted to them (seasons-greetings-2016-a-2). Episode 3 was about the structure at York, or Clifford’s Tower…

Anne Neville was a boar too….

We always hear about the badges of medieval families, e.g. Richard III’s white boar, the Warwick bear and ragged staff, the Stafford knot, Richard II’s white hart and so on and so on, but what about the ladies? Maybe they didn’t ride into battle with the banners streaming (well, there were some notable exceptions, of…

Another “Lancastrian” widow

Last week, we saw how Joan of Navarre, the widow of Henry IV, was imprisoned for witchcraft and only released after Henry V, her stepson, died. We were also reminded how legislation was passed just a few years later to prevent royal widows from marrying during their sons’ minorities – this was aimed at Catherine…

The trouble with Lancastrian Royal widows

Page 69 of Ashdown-Hill’s Royal Marriage Secrets indicates that an Act of Parliament was passed in 1427, forbidding the re-marriage of a royal widow without the consent of an adult king. It has also been clearly established that Catherine de Valois, the widow of Henry V at whom the legislation was surely aimed, died in…