Edward III and two comparisons

695 years ago today, Edward III became King of England at the age of fourteen and was crowned a week later. His father was definitely alive for almost another eight months and probably several more years. His mother, Isabella of France is regularly described by some writers as having a relationship with Roger Mortimer, 1st…

Further facial reconstructions

Dundee University has shown itself to be the gold standard for facial reconstruction in recent years, working from their subjects’ remains, as with Richard III, Robert I and Henry Lord Darnley. As Kathryn Warner shows here, Panagiotis Constantinou has generated several from effigies, sculptures and other images. They range, chronologically, from Henry III and Eleanor…

Rebellion in the Middle Ages

This is the latest of Matthew Lewis’ books and covers a longer period than any of the others, from Hereward the Wake’s emergence after Hastings to the beginning of the Wars of the Roses, almost as long a period as this book. Lewis is already an expert on “The Anarchy” (chapter 2) and the Roses…

Long live the King

This interesting tome has finally appeared in paperback. The opening Parts read like an abridged biography of the story familiar to us through Warner’s The Unconventional King, but to be read with an open mind as to whether Edward II survived his “official death” today in 1327 or not. The reader will re-learn the events…

Was Roger Mortimer “anti-royal”….?

Was Roger Mortimer, 1st Earl of March, an “anti-royalist”? Surely being anti-Edward II and his favourites wasn’t the same thing as being anti-royalist in general? “….There she [Queen Isabella] openly took a lover, the English baron and anti-royalist Roger Mortimer (1287-1330 CE)….” The above extract is from this site and gave me pause for thought.…

The death mask of Edward III….

King Edward III of England reigned for fifty years. He was born on 13 November 1312, at Windsor, became a great and successful warrior king, and died at Sheen, a shadow of his former self on 21 June 1377. His decline was sad, because he’d been a truly able and shrewd monarch who’d steadied the…

THE THREE HUNDRED YEARS WAR – PART 2: the just cause

  Preface This is the second of three articles charting the course of continual Anglo-French conflict from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries. In the first article, I wrote about the rise and fall of the Angevin Empire, culminating in the Treaty of Paris (1259). This article picks up my narrative after the death of…

Nottingham’s medieval magic has disappeared from its castle….

I’m sorry, but even before the above fire in 1831, Nottingham Castle didn’t look anything like a proper castle. Gone are the medieval towers and battlements, and all that’s left is a mansion on a hill. Nothing smacks of the lost age of Plantagenet kings, knights and armour. Great events happened here in earlier centuries,…

The Mysterious Stone Masons of Herefordshire

Recently I had the chance to visit two of the most attractive female medieval tomb effigies I have yet encountered, both lying in their respective churches within ten miles or so of each other. Although one tomb effigy is in much better condition than the other, they are so stylistically close that it is likely…

History Book Part Two

A press release for the follow-up to this: History Book Part Two, February 2020. Song of a metal detectorist – About Ashley Mantle’s favourite hobby. A rare romance – Roger Mortimer escapes from the Tower of London and flees to France. Cade’s rebellion – The rebellion of 1450. De Cobham – Song for the De…