Do you fancy living in a STANLEY property….?

  Well, as a selling point and “a little bit of history” it would seem that the above property’s provenance isn’t quite certain. It’s reportedly part of the Stanley family’s estates. This in itself is a dubious recommendation to any Ricardian! I mean, as far as supporters of Richard III are concerned, the mere name…

Settling the Bosworth Debt….

With the denizens of Hades gathering to do their worst, here is a horror tale of Sir William Stanley’s final Hallowe’en, when retribution snatches him at last. “Settling the Bosworth Debt” is the story of what happened to William when he was confronted by some terrible truths about Henry Tudor. Friday, 31 October, 1494, Hallowe’en,…

The price of one royal progress….

  King Charles III’s fleeting visits to the separate nations of the United Kingdom have been the modern equivalent of the royal progresses of the past. From very early times each new monarch embarked on a progress through their realm, to show themselves to their people. As their only transport was the horse, it took…

Herald’s Lament

This Legendary Ten Seconds song, with lyrics by Sandra Heath Wilson, features on the new Musical Almanac album. A HERALD’S LAMENT . . .King Richard is dead Lyrics written by Sandra Heath Wilson   King Richard is dead! Such dread news I bring!No joy to cling to, no hosannas to singI tell a tale so…

Stanley, The Man Who Wasn’t There….

    Appropriately titled The Man Who Wasn’t There, there is a new book about Sir Thomas Stanley, aka 1st Earl of Derby. Hmm, not my favourite person, so I doubt I’ll be rushing to acquire it. That’s no reflection on the author or the quality of the book, just the subject matter. You can…

Bosworth – only ranked 9 out of 9….!

Bosworth, a victory for treachery – and for cowardice, because Henry Tudor didn’t raise a finger, but lurked at the back, behind a protective screen of bodyguards As far as Ricardians are concerned, the most important (and tragic) medieval battle was Bosworth, but 22nd August 1485 only makes it to number nine of nine! See…

THE SECRETS OF STRAWBERRIES

The use of strawberries in the works about Richard III written by Thomas More, Edward Hall, and William Shakespeare has always been puzzling to me, and I suspect, many others. The fact that strawberry are given such a prominent mention in the ‘council chamber’ scene where Richard reveals an, ahem, withered arm, is well known…

The “Princes in the Tower” are to get their very own opera….

  The myth of the “Princes in the Tower” is about to be turned into an opera. I notice too that their disappearance is immediately described as “one of history’s most notorious unsolved crimes”. What crime? No one knows if there ever was one, let alone that poor old Richard was responsible. It has always…

The portrait at Hever Castle is more like Henry VI than Richard III….

I’ve seen this (awful!) portrait of Richard before. It just doesn’t look like him, more one of the invented Tudor versions of him, i.e. monstrous and evil, or weak and terrified of all things Tudor. This one fits the ‘weak and terrified’ mould, and if it were listed as a portrait of Henry VI, I’d…

Tudor’s path to Bosworth took him through Powis….

Here’s a tale of treachery  and the cowardly theft of a throne. Such a shame though, because Powis Castle today is extraordinarily beautiful. I lament that Tudor‘s invasion with his foreign army didn’t take him into a particularly gluey and bottomless Welsh bog, or over a cliff on to jagged rocks in the middle of…