Thou shalt not spread porkies….

  “….[A] proclamation to tackle unrest, 1487… stated that any person found to be spreading rumours was to be put into the pillory….”  (from this  site ) Oh dear, Henry VII didn’t like doses of his own medicine! I speak of rumours and lies. What’s the word….? Um, calumny. That’s it. You know, the rumours…

Richard III’s many daughters….

  Fake news. Ah yes. We regard this as a modern curse, but, of course, it goes back through the centuries. Probably ever since the humans in one cave fell out with the humans in another. Lies…erm, fake news…soon circulated. And if there was one King of England about whom there is fake news in…

Calais – a bed of Tudor roses for Anne Boleyn….?

  Calais was at one time English territory, and Richard III made his son John of Gloucester the Captain of Calais. John was as ill-fated as his father. Further back, Warwick (the “Kingmaker”) was another Captain, and in 1469 his elder daughter Isabel was married there to Richard’s older brother George, Duke of Clarence. The…

The history of Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Somerset….

This interesting, very readable article is about Henry VIII’s illegitimate son Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Somerset. It’s interesting and very readable, and definitely not anti-Richard III, mostly the opposite in fact. But it doesn’t spare Henrys VII and VIII. I enjoyed reading it in spite of a few bloopers that are nevertheless not…

Katherine Plantagenet, her burial in St James Garlickhithe.

Reblogged from here The Great Fire of London. The devastating conflagration that consumed so much of medieval London including St James Garlickhythe.  Artist  Lieve Verschuier This post will of necessity prove to be short there being a dearth of information on both Katherine and the  pre-Fire St James Garlickhythe Church where she was buried.  The church…

The Royal Progress of Richard III

Following his coronation, Richard III – like all medieval monarchs – went on his “royal progress” through the realm.  Along with an entourage in excess of 200 household men, ecclesiastics, supporters, and administrative officials, he visited towns and cities as far west as the River Severn, as far north as the River Ouse, and as…

Why did Richard III allow Elizabeth of York such liberty at his court….?

  Today, 10th August, is my birthday, and on this date in 1485, the last Yorkist king, Richard III, was in Nottingham preparing for the imminent invasion of his realm by his Lancastrian foe, Henry Tudor, who didn’t have much of a blood claim to the throne but touted himself as the last remaining heir…

Richard III enters York

Richard III and his royal progress in York It is not that easy to find a city connected to King Richard III as York is. During his life, he visited the capital of Yorkshire many times and after he accepted the crown and became king, he left London for the Royal progress and stayed in…

Who was at Sheriff Hutton at the time of Bosworth….?

As I understand it, Richard sent his nieces Elizabeth and Cicely/Cecily to Sheriff Hutton before Bosworth, in the care of John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, who was then Richard’s successor as Lord of the North. Lincoln may have stayed there, because there is no proof that he fought alongside Richard. It is also…

A truncated reign and a truncated monarch

Right at the start of this series, Helen Castor (left) takes a black marker pen and illustrates the cause of the 1553 crisis on a large sheet of paper. Beginning with Henry VII, very few of his legitimate male descendants were alive at the start of that year – eliminating the obvious illegitimate cases, we…