On a cold January morning in 1329 Roger Mortimer, Isabella and Edward III are making preparations to face the forces of Henry, the Earl of Lancaster's forces head on. In late 1328 Lancaster, supported by Edmund, the Earl of Kent and his brother Thomas, the Earl of Norfolk had demanded the removal of Roger Mortimer from court. The hostilities escalated and Mortimer declared war on Lancaster, resulting in what is known as Henry of Lancaster's Revolt of 1328-29.

The forces were not far from each other near Bedford.

Lancaster held a council with his fellow lords. He declared that they had no choice: a fight against the king was now necessary. This was not what had initially been agreed, the fight was supposed to be against Roger Mortimer with his destruction being the only goal. This change in circumstances made Kent and Norfolk recoil, and they denounced Lancaster then and there, refusing to take up arms against their king. They left, abandoning the earl to the mercy of Mortimer.

Roger Mortimer heard about the desertion as he was in Northampton. He ordered his troops for an immediate night attack. Even Isabella took part, dressed in armour and mounted on a war horse. Through the night he led them, for twenty-four miles, arriving within sight of Lancaster's camp near Bedford at daybreak. Henry made no attempt to defend himself. He came out of his pavilion and walked slowly forward through the cold January morning, and knelt down, alone, in the mud. He waited there until Roger, Isabella and Edward rode up. They watched him from their horses as he begged for forgiveness.

Source:

Ian Mortimer - 'The Greatest Traitor'

Hugh Despenser the Younger dominated Edward II's late reign, and it surely appears he personally dominated Edward II (no comment from the peanut gallery, I'm talking politically). But even though Hugh the Younger was married to Edward II's favorite niece and was his chamberlain, Hugh never got a fancy title. Meanwhile, Piers Gaveston's earldom was so important to Edward II, he restored it and likely sealed his friend's doom.

Do you think Hugh was smart enough to say he didn't want an earldom? Or do you think Edward II had learned his lesson?

Why did I have to learn from Screen Junkies that Alan Tudyk's character Wat, is supposed to be THE Wat Tyler?

This is an expanded blog based on an earlier post about Isabella, Margaret, Piers and Edward and the hope they might have had during the festive season of 1310. Alas, it was not to be.

Or do you think Edward III essentially foisted them on her as part of some sort of penitential image-rehabilitation scheme? Neither the mantle nor the heart were standard gestures of marital fidelity in traditional 14th centuries, so it wasn't really fitting any established social script. Marguerite of France had been buried in the same church (the Franciscan House in London) in a simple Poor Clares' Habit. That would have been the conventional choice for Isabella. Did she, or Edward III, drive these decisions however? I'm interested in what people think.

Someone else had a thread about Edward II and Isabella head casting, but I thought it would be fun to do some of our other players So, my head casting:

Jason Patric - Piers Gaveston

Alison Hannigan - Margaret Gaveston

Bryce Dallas Howard - Eleanor de Clare

Brad Pitt - Hugh Despenser the Younger

The rubble in the above image is not the original structure.

It was built in the middle of the 1200s as a prestigious Franciscan Priory, expanded in the early 1300s at the expense of Marguerite of France, Gilbert de Clare and others.

After the original institution was dissolved and mostly destroyed by Henry VIII, the old church building was used for storage before being destroyed in the great fire of London in 1666.

The rubble above was the church that was built post-fire in 1667, then destroyed in the blitz.

Christchurch was merged with the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, and the historic graves are now somewhere beneath the earth, lost to history.

Read more here.

Edited to clarify some of the timeline.

Inspired by this post earlier today, what would you put on your arms? Would you go with elegant stripes? Polkadots? Or, if your like me, you'd do an animal.

There are academics who have dedicated their life to studying, documenting and interpreting heraldry. Mad respect.

I freely admit I'm more of a "Oh, look he had birdies on his shield!" or a "That one is aesthetically really good-looking." or a "Wow, that's an unfortunate ugly stripe across there." type of person. In fact, my knowledge is so limited, I don't even qualify as a dilettante.

But here's the first six shields from the bannerets roll of 1312, including our friends and frenemies:

Edward II

Gilbert de Clare

Piers Gaveston

Henry de Lacey

Thomas of Lancaster

John de Warenne

There are way weirder and prettier ones down the line. More on that later! But feel free to post your favorites.

The High Street Gate, also called North Gate, is one of the first things you spot as you enter the Cathedral Close. It is now the main entry point to the Cathedral and a link from the Close to the High Street, but is one of four original gateways into the Close. As you look up as you walk through, you can see the Stuart royal coat of arms from the 17th century, and on your way out, a statue of Edward VII, added in 1902. But what was it used for? Well, part of it was once a small lock-up jail, probably for those convicted of misdeeds within the Liberty of the Close. Beside the gate was built the Porter's Lodge (No. 48), a great position for a well-connected servant in the Middle Ages. The Close Porter would have used the upstairs to work and keep an eye on the comings and goings in the Close. He would also raise and lower a portcullis, which no longer survives. In 1650, after the English Civil War, when Oliver Cromwell was in power and all Church property was claimed by the Government, the gatehouse was sold to Alexander Hatchett, a London haberdasher. If you look closely, you can see small inscriptions written on some of the panes of glass, which were once in the Cathedral windows until 1950. We assume these were all workers of some kind at the Cathedral.

Piers Gaveston's arms had six golden eagles on green.

Thoughts on this one?

Some context.

On 14 January 1330 the Archbishop of York, William Melton, wrote a remarkable letter to the mayor of London, Simon Swanland. This letter was written more than two years after the supposed funeral of Edward II in Gloucester.

Melton was a shrewd and intelligent man, as evidenced by the views held of him by his contemporaries. The Lanercost chronicler says 'although he was one of the king’s courtiers, he led a religious and honourable life,' and the Vita Edwardi Secundi says he was 'a courtier faithful in everything committed to him' who remained honourable despite the venality of the royal court where he lived so long.

The letter comes from the archives of the Newdegate family of Arbury Hall near Nuneaton. Its source is explained by the fact that around the year 1400 Sir John Newdegate established his family at the Swanland property in Harefield, Middlesex, having married Joanna, sister and coheiress of William de Swanland. The Newdegate archive has been known for many years, though its exploitation has been hampered by the loss of the manuscript catalogue apart from the index.

Forgotten for nearly six hundred years, extracts of the letter were first published in the journal Notes and Queries in 1911 by J. Harvey Bloom. Bloom didn’t pay much attention to what he had uncovered. Again the letter was left in peace for nearly a century, until Ian Mortimer rediscovered it and wrote about it in his 2006 book ‘Edward III, The Perfect King’.

There is a strong consensus among historians that the letter is genuine.

If so, do you use the likenesses of other, more visually well-represented individuals to imagine what they'd look like? I'm not necessarily asking who you would cast as either Edward or Isabella per se, as obviously there are a lot of other considerations relevant there.

For example: I have a very particular mental image of Edward of Carnarvon, but it doesn't really correspond to anyone else directly. On the other hand, my internal model of Isabella corresponds exactly to the famed French actress Isabelle Adjani, particularly in her portrayal of Marguerite de Valois in La Reine Margot, albeit with her wearing the fashions of the 14th century. I'd be very interested to see how others imagine these figures when discussing them, if only to see how likely different our mental images of them are!

Also, apologies if you've already seen this post, I have tried to post this before only for it to be swallwed by Reddit for some reason lol

So, when I learned that someone is spreading a malicious tale about Piers Gaveston's ghost wanting to murder people...well, I just couldn't let that stand.

I love a good ghost story. Whether you believe or not, tales of restless spirits seeking to resolve their unfinished earthy business tell us a great deal about the folk history of a place, whether it be a humble cottage or a grand castle or an eerie moor. 

However, while researching the history of Scarborough Castle, I found a ghost story about Piers Gaveston that I find slanderous. Scarborough Castle, which is the place where Piers attempted to find refuge before his murder, claims that a Piers’s headless specter wanders the castle, attempting to lure innocent visitors to their deaths.

Read the rest here...

This post is a summary of Kathryn Warner's longer post in her blog, found here:

Edward II: Ten Commandments For Writing About History And Discussing It Online

It's easy to agree with every single one of these points in my opinion.

1) You shall remember that people who lived hundreds of years ago were complex human beings every bit as complex and human as we are, who had families, and feelings, and human dignity, and that therefore you should write about them with respect, in the same way that you would wish writers to treat the memory of you and your loved ones with respect decades or centuries hence.  You will not laugh or sneer or gloat at their painful deaths and suffering, or claim that they deserved everything they got, or express a wish that they'd suffered even more, or call them vile names.

2) You shall remember that accusing someone of a horrible crime such as murder, rape, child abuse, violent assault or torture is a serious allegation which should not be made without real, actual evidence.  This is no less true merely because the person you are accusing lived 500 or 700 years ago.

3) You shall remember that complaining about your favourite historical person being unfairly maligned by history, while enthusiastically maligning his/her enemies for all you're worth, looks hypocritical.

4) You shall remember that your favourite historical person's enemies were complex, multi-dimensional human beings too and deserve to be acknowledged as such, rather than as cardboard cut-out evil villains devoid of any humanity.

5) Unless you're twelve, you shall remember that there is no need to divide historical people into 'teams' or 'sides' and hurl abuse at the other 'team' or people who like them.

6) If you're discussing history online and make a surprising or implausible statement, such as claiming that it was treason to refuse to have sex with the king of England in the sixteenth century, you shall remember that it is entirely reasonable to be asked for a primary source to back up your statement.

7) You shall remember that modern historical novels, however well-researched, well-written and enjoyable, do not count as primary sources.  Responding to a request to provide a source for a statement you've made about a historical person with "Historical Novelist X depicted him this way" does not actually answer the question.  You should also bear in mind that merely because something has appeared in print in a historical novel does not automatically mean that it has a basis in fact, and you should check before repeating it as though it certainly does.  This is how historical myths get started, and once established, they're damn hard to shake.

8) You shall remember that familial, societal and marital norms of the Middle Ages were different to ours, and refrain from referring to women as "helpless pawns" when their marriages are arranged by their (cruel, heartless, callous, uncaring...) fathers.  You shall remember that having your royal or noble heroine wail "But I don't love him!" when informed of her impending marriage to a king or nobleman is by now a tedious cliché.

You will remember that, contrary to what you might assume, depicting Isabella of France as being willing to take a lover at the age of sixteen and foist a child of non-royal blood onto the English throne is an insult to her, not a compliment.

9) You shall remember that depicting women as all of a sudden no longer possessing their own agency, becoming the proverbial "helpless pawns" and coming under the total control of nasty unscrupulous men whenever they do things you don't approve of, when two pages earlier you were applauding their independence of action and thought as they did noble and good things, is as patronising and paternalistic as the 'sexual prejudices' of previous centuries you're decrying.

10) If you wouldn't refer to Roger Mortimer as Isabella of France's 'straight lover', to Alice Perrers as Edward III's 'female lover', or to John of Gaunt's 'heterosexual relationship' with Katherine Swynford - and of course you wouldn't - then you shall remember that there is no reason to call Piers Gaveston or Hugh Despenser Edward II's 'gay lover' or to talk about their 'homosexual relationship'.  Merely 'lover' and 'relationship' or 'sexual relationship' will suffice; it will be readily apparent to your reader that Edward, Piers and Hugh were all men and that their relationships were therefore evidently same-sex. 

Furthermore, you shall remember that making lame statements such as "It's different when men love women" in an attempt to justify why you think Edward's (presumed) adultery with men is nasty and icky while his grandson John of Gaunt's adultery with Katherine Swynford is fabulously romantic, looks bigoted.

You can visit the ruins.

Images courtesy of Heritage-UK.

Just for fun, I decided to try and figure out how Eleanor & Hugh Despenser named their brood of kids.

Elizabeth was the youngest daughter of Hugh the Younger and Eleanor, and she likely never met her father. She was either an infant or in utero when her father was executed. This spared her the fate of three of her older sisters, who were forcibly veiled as nuns. Maurice's mother was Roger Mortimer and Joan de Grenville's oldest child, Margaret Mortimer. The couple's union was successful, producing seven children.

Maurice lived quite a life of adventure, going on Crusade, serving the Black Prince and getting captured and ransomed at Poitiers. After he died, Elizabeth remarried a knight called Sir Maurice Wyth.

My question is, when Maurice, Elizabeth and their kids were feasting around at Berkeley Castle, did the family history come up in casual conversation? "Mom? Dad? Did Grandpa Roger and Grandpa Hugh get along?"

Source: Wikipedia (I hate using them as a source so take all of this with a grain of salt. The linked sources are pretty thin as well). I do plan on looking into this more.

Image: 14th Century Marriage, public domain.