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| Wigmore Castle, Herefordshire, which belonged to Roger Mortimer. |
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| Wigmore Castle. |
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| Inner bailey of Berkeley Castle, Gloucestershire. |
23 September, 2011
Blog Break And Pics
19 September, 2011
Letters
Some of my favourite extracts from letters of Edward II's era...
- Hugh Despenser the Younger to Sir John Inge, sheriff of Glamorgan, on 21 March 1321:
"Regarding that which you have heard, that the earl of Hereford is even more gloomy and thoughtful than usual, it is no wonder if he is, as he has turned his countenance against his liege lord, who has given him so many goods and honours, that he might well have much to think about" (avoir grant pensee, literally 'have great thinking').
The earl of Hereford was Humphrey de Bohun, widower of Edward II's sister Elizabeth (died May 1316).
- Hugh to Inge again, fifteen days previously; you can practically hear him sighing with exasperation:
"We have already so often sent letters on this subject in the past that we are quite tired of it, and we inform you that we will send no further instructions about it until we have need to write in answer to your letters, and therefore the instructions we have given before this must suffice."
- Edmund, earl of Arundel, to the "good and wise men and his dear and beloved bailiffs and the other burgesses and good men of the town of Shrewsbury" (bones gents et sages et ses chiers et bien amiez les bailiffs et lez autres burgoys et bone gent de la vile de Salopesbir) during the Despenser War on 4 June 1321, regarding a sum of money which they were keeping for him and which he evidently suspected his cousin Roger Mortimer of Wigmore of wanting to steal:
"And we beg you as friends, and charge you on pain of all that you are able to forfeit to the king, as well as our friendship, that you should keep safely for our use the money which you have received in our lord's [Edward II's] town, for we do not under any circumstances intend that our cousin of Mortimer, who is so close to us in blood [nostre cousin de mortemer qe nous est si pres de saunk], should do us such a great injury, which we have in no way merited."
Arundel and Mortimer, who were almost the same age (born on 1 May 1285 and 25 April 1287 respectively) were first cousins once removed: Arundel was the son of Richard Fitzalan, earl of Arundel (1267-1302), himself the son of Isabella Mortimer, elder sister of Roger Mortimer's father Edmund.
- Arnaud Caillau of Gascony to Edward II in March 1325, during the War of Saint-Sardos, perturbed because he had only had one letter from the king since leaving England the previous summer:
Mon cuer est en grant penssement, literally, 'My heart is in great thinking'.
This letter ended:
"May our Lord increase your honour and and grant you a good and long life, and give you vengeance over all your enemies, wherever they may be."
A similar ending, from Arnaud to Hugh Despenser the Younger in November 1324:
"I pray to God, who is all-powerful, that he increase your honour daily, and guard you from all evils, and multiply your goods, and give you vengeance over all your enemies."
- Hugh Despenser the Younger to Edward II's half-brother the earl of Kent in September 1324:
"And truly, sire, there is no other reason that the ships arrived late with you, except that a strong wind was against them, which we cannot divert by our own command."
- Eighteen-year-old Duke John III of Brabant to Edward II, his uncle, in May 1319. In late March and early April 1319, Edward had asked Pope John XXII to "proceed with severity against the Scots," and also sent letters to his nephew, to Robert of Bethune, count of Flanders, and to the towns of Bruges, Dunkirk, Mechlin, Ypres and others, asking them not to allow any Scots into their territory or to trade with them.
"Very dear uncle, we have well understood your letters which you sent us regarding Robert Bruce, and about his adherents and companions, and about the wrongs they have done to you and to my lord the king [Edward I] your father and my grandfather, on whom GOD have mercy, in Scotland, and also in your kingdom of England; which wrongs, damage, defiance and outrages that they have done to you and still do strike us dumb and weigh heavily upon our heart." (Foedera 1307-1327)
- Isabella of France to Walter Reynolds, archbishop of Canterbury, on 5 February 1326, about her husband Edward II:
"My very dear and very sweet lord and friend" (Mon treschier et tresdouche seignut et amy): how Isabella referred to Edward
"And certainly we desire above all else, save God and the salvation of our soul, to be in the company of our said lord [Edward] and to live and die there."
Sources
- Pierre Chaplais, ed., The War of Saint-Sardos (1323-1325): Gascon Correspondence and Diplomatic Documents
- Seymour Phillips, Edward II
- Foedera 1307-1327
- W.H. Stevenson, 'A Letter of the Younger Despenser on the Eve of the Barons' Rebellion, 21 March 1321', English Historical Review, 12 (1897)
J. Goronwy Edwards, Calendar of Ancient Correspondence Concerning Wales
- The National Archives, Arundell Deeds, 215/1
- Hugh Despenser the Younger to Sir John Inge, sheriff of Glamorgan, on 21 March 1321:
"Regarding that which you have heard, that the earl of Hereford is even more gloomy and thoughtful than usual, it is no wonder if he is, as he has turned his countenance against his liege lord, who has given him so many goods and honours, that he might well have much to think about" (avoir grant pensee, literally 'have great thinking').
The earl of Hereford was Humphrey de Bohun, widower of Edward II's sister Elizabeth (died May 1316).
- Hugh to Inge again, fifteen days previously; you can practically hear him sighing with exasperation:
"We have already so often sent letters on this subject in the past that we are quite tired of it, and we inform you that we will send no further instructions about it until we have need to write in answer to your letters, and therefore the instructions we have given before this must suffice."
- Edmund, earl of Arundel, to the "good and wise men and his dear and beloved bailiffs and the other burgesses and good men of the town of Shrewsbury" (bones gents et sages et ses chiers et bien amiez les bailiffs et lez autres burgoys et bone gent de la vile de Salopesbir) during the Despenser War on 4 June 1321, regarding a sum of money which they were keeping for him and which he evidently suspected his cousin Roger Mortimer of Wigmore of wanting to steal:
"And we beg you as friends, and charge you on pain of all that you are able to forfeit to the king, as well as our friendship, that you should keep safely for our use the money which you have received in our lord's [Edward II's] town, for we do not under any circumstances intend that our cousin of Mortimer, who is so close to us in blood [nostre cousin de mortemer qe nous est si pres de saunk], should do us such a great injury, which we have in no way merited."
Arundel and Mortimer, who were almost the same age (born on 1 May 1285 and 25 April 1287 respectively) were first cousins once removed: Arundel was the son of Richard Fitzalan, earl of Arundel (1267-1302), himself the son of Isabella Mortimer, elder sister of Roger Mortimer's father Edmund.
- Arnaud Caillau of Gascony to Edward II in March 1325, during the War of Saint-Sardos, perturbed because he had only had one letter from the king since leaving England the previous summer:
Mon cuer est en grant penssement, literally, 'My heart is in great thinking'.
This letter ended:
"May our Lord increase your honour and and grant you a good and long life, and give you vengeance over all your enemies, wherever they may be."
A similar ending, from Arnaud to Hugh Despenser the Younger in November 1324:
"I pray to God, who is all-powerful, that he increase your honour daily, and guard you from all evils, and multiply your goods, and give you vengeance over all your enemies."
- Hugh Despenser the Younger to Edward II's half-brother the earl of Kent in September 1324:
"And truly, sire, there is no other reason that the ships arrived late with you, except that a strong wind was against them, which we cannot divert by our own command."
- Eighteen-year-old Duke John III of Brabant to Edward II, his uncle, in May 1319. In late March and early April 1319, Edward had asked Pope John XXII to "proceed with severity against the Scots," and also sent letters to his nephew, to Robert of Bethune, count of Flanders, and to the towns of Bruges, Dunkirk, Mechlin, Ypres and others, asking them not to allow any Scots into their territory or to trade with them.
"Very dear uncle, we have well understood your letters which you sent us regarding Robert Bruce, and about his adherents and companions, and about the wrongs they have done to you and to my lord the king [Edward I] your father and my grandfather, on whom GOD have mercy, in Scotland, and also in your kingdom of England; which wrongs, damage, defiance and outrages that they have done to you and still do strike us dumb and weigh heavily upon our heart." (Foedera 1307-1327)
- Isabella of France to Walter Reynolds, archbishop of Canterbury, on 5 February 1326, about her husband Edward II:
"My very dear and very sweet lord and friend" (Mon treschier et tresdouche seignut et amy): how Isabella referred to Edward
"And certainly we desire above all else, save God and the salvation of our soul, to be in the company of our said lord [Edward] and to live and die there."
Sources
- Pierre Chaplais, ed., The War of Saint-Sardos (1323-1325): Gascon Correspondence and Diplomatic Documents
- Seymour Phillips, Edward II
- Foedera 1307-1327
- W.H. Stevenson, 'A Letter of the Younger Despenser on the Eve of the Barons' Rebellion, 21 March 1321', English Historical Review, 12 (1897)
J. Goronwy Edwards, Calendar of Ancient Correspondence Concerning Wales
- The National Archives, Arundell Deeds, 215/1
11 September, 2011
Was Edward II Trying To Annul His Marriage In 1325?
Almost certainly not, and here's why.
The Lanercost chronicler, a monk living in a convent near the Scottish border, claims that in 1325 Hugh Despenser the Younger "was exerting himself at the pope's court to procure divorce between the king of England and the queen, and in furtherance of this business there sent to the court a certain man of religion, acting irreligiously, by name Thomas Dunheved, with an appointed colleague, and a certain secular priest named Master Robert de Baldock." (Yes, the same Thomas Dunheved, Dominican friar, who temporarily freed the former king from Berkeley Castle in the summer of 1327.) The St Paul's annalist repeats the rumour that Edward was trying to annul his marriage to Isabella and that Dunheved was involved in this. [1]
This statement in two chronicles is often repeated as fact in modeern books, as yet another grievance Isabella had against her husband Edward II, along with supposedly 'removing' her children from her (rather than just setting up households for them in normal fashion), confiscating her lands and giving her a much smaller income to live on (he did do that), and so on. Let's look at this logically. Why exactly would Edward II have wanted to annul his marriage to Isabella? What benefits could he have gained from it? Precisely none. He would, however, have suffered a whole pile of negative consequences. Edward was at war with Isabella's brother Charles IV of France from the autumn of 1323 (although military action did not begin until the summer of 1324) until a peace treaty was signed in June 1325. As Edward's biographer Seymour Phillips points out, "An attempted divorce in the conditions of 1325 would have been political madness, since it would have meant the repudiation of all agreements between England and France, which Edward and Isabella's marriage had been intended to strengthen, and would have plunged England into an immediate war with France" (shortly after peace had finally been established between the two countries). [2] Even during Edward's war with Isabella's brother, over Gascony, there is no reason to suppose that he considered annulment, or that it would have gained him anything. The only possible grounds Edward could have had for an annulment of his marriage in 1325 was consanguinity, as he and Isabella were second cousins once removed. They had been granted a papal dispensation for this, however. An annulment would have meant that their marriage had never been valid in the first place (as a marriage then could not simply be ended, in the way we understand divorce), which would have made Edward and Isabella's children illegitimate. Edward II spent much of 1325 negotiating marriages for three of their children with the royal houses of Spain. Why on earth would he have risked making them illegitimate?
No proof of the two chroniclers' statement that Edward was trying to annul his marriage in 1325 has ever been discovered in the Vatican archives, nor is there any evidence that he ever wrote to the pope regarding this matter. He did send Thomas Dunheved to Pope John XXII in Avignon in 1325, it's true - but to complain about Alexander Bicknor, the archbishop of Dublin, whom Edward held responsible for his half-brother the earl of Kent's surrender at La Réole in September 1324, and who was not afraid to make his intense dislike of Hugh Despenser the Younger obvious and public. (Bicknor boasted that were he not a cleric, he would challenge Despenser to a duel.) John XXII, who made Dunheved a papal chaplain while he was visiting the papal court, wrote to Edward II in October 1325: "To the king, whose letters sent by Thomas Dunhevede, a Friar Preacher, the pope has received. The matter touching Alexander, archbishop of Dublin, cannot be heard in camera, but must be laid before the consistory...". [3] The Lanercost chronicler says that Edward also sent Robert Baldock to the pope regarding an annulment of his marriage. Baldock was chancellor of England from August 1323 until October 1326, after Isabella and Mortimer's invasion [4], and did not leave the country, to my knowledge.
As for other chroniclers, the very well-informed author of the Vita Edwardi Secundi does not mention an intended annulment. Neither does the royal clerk and chronicler Adam Murimuth, who knew the royal couple well and who visited the papal court in 1324. Neither does the author of the Flores Historiarum, who loathed Edward and who would have jumped on a chance to condemn him for humiliating his wife in this fashion. Neither does any other chronicler, even Jean Froissart, who a few decades later invented a tale of Isabella secretly fleeing to France from Winchelsea with her son in 1325, to escape from Edward's mistreatment of her (in fact she departed from Dover with a large retinue and, of course, Edward's full knowledge and consent). When Thomas Dunheved wrote to Edward II on 7 October 1325, he did not mention an annulment. [5] Edward was debating with his counsellors, by the end of 1324, the possibility of sending Queen Isabella to France to negotiate with her brother, and she departed for her homeland the following March. Why then would he suddenly decide to annul his marriage to her? It wasn't until late 1325 that it became apparent that the queen did not intend to return to England. Isabella herself wrote to her husband from France on 5 February 1326, addressing him as "our very dear and very sweet lord and friend" (nostre treschier et tresdouche seignur et amy) and informing him that although she wished nothing more than to return to his company and live and die with him, she did not dare, because of her fear of Hugh Despenser. Isabella did not mention that Edward was trying to annul their marriage; neither did any letters her brother Charles IV sent to Edward around this time or earlier (and Charles would have been utterly furious at this horrendous insult to his sister). [6] At Hugh Despenser's trial in November 1326, he was not accused of attempting to procure an annulment of Edward and Isabella's marriage. Why would Isabella not charge him with this, if he had done it? It was the gravest and most humiliating crime Despenser could have committed against her.
The Lanercost chronicler in his convent in the far north and writing a decade or more later, although an invaluable source for events in Scotland and Scottish raids in the north of England, knew little of what was going on at court in the 1320s, while the Pauline annalist was merely reporting a rumour he had heard (ut vulgariter dicebatur), not stating it as definitive truth. Plenty of rumours were flying around England in 1325/26, including one reported in the Brut that Edward II intended to strangle his wife and his son Edward of Windsor to death. Edward was, apparently, informed of this after his deposition, and was - as any normal human being would be when accused of something as monstrous as wishing to murder his own child - deeply upset and horrified ("God knows, I thought it never, and now I would that I were dead! So would God that I were! For then were all my sorrow passed.") [7] Just because rumours existed does not automatically make them true, and it's a shame that writers continue to declare as fact that Edward was trying to divorce his wife without considering the ample evidence that he was doing no such thing, and without considering the logical implications and consequences of this act. It does fit so nicely into the popular Victim!Isabella school of thought, though, doesn't it? Precisely why Edward would have wanted to annul his marriage to the queen in 1325 and what he would have gained from it in exchange for taking such a huge risk is never actually explained; his supposed nastiness and neglect of the queen and the nastiness of Hugh Despenser appears to be enough reason. Alison Weir claims in her biography of Isabella that "Lanercost's statement is to some extent corroborated by the fact that Dunheved was sent to the papal Curia on secret business at this time," but fails to notice the papal letter which demonstrates that Dunheved delivered Edward's letters regarding the archbishop of Dublin to the pope, and somehow confuses Thomas with his secular brother Stephen (as Lanercost clearly and correctly refers to the Dunheved brother in question as Thomas, I can't help but wonder how carefully she looked at the sources). Of course, it's entirely possible that Thomas Dunheved discussed other matters with the pope on the king's behalf, but we have no evidence, besides a rumour repeated in two chronicles, that an annulment of the king and queen's marriage was one of them.
I believe that it is virtually certain that Edward II was not intending to annul his marriage in 1325; he had no reason to do so, and the consequences would have been disastrous for him, his children and his kingdom. Having said that, it is just possible that he was considering this course of action in the summer of 1326, by which time he knew that Isabella was going to betroth their son to the count of Hainault's daughter without his consent and invade his kingdom with an army. It's perhaps hardly surprising if he then decided that an annulment would solve his problems, and that even making his children illegitimate would be worth it. I hasten to add there is no real evidence that he was planning to ask the pope for an annulment: again, there are no documents in either the Vatican or England to confirm it. Edward met the bishop of Rochester, his ally Hamo Hethe, at Boxley Down in Kent in June 1326, and he and Hugh Despenser the Younger rode with the bishop back to Rochester. Edward asked Hethe if it were true that there had once been a queen who had disobeyed her husband and had therefore been deposed from her royal dignity. Hethe was having none of it, and retorted that whoever had told the king this had given him very bad advice. [8] This does sound as if perhaps Edward was then considering the possibility of annulment. This may be confirmed by two letters Edward sent to his son in 1326, then in France with Isabella (whether willingly or not). The first, written on 18 March, orders the thirteen-year-old not to marry without his father's consent, and to obey Edward "under pain of forfeiting all that he may to the king...". The second, written on 19 June, ends with the words "if the king find him contrary or disobedient hereafter to his will, by what counsel soever it may be, he will ordain in such wise that Edward [of Windsor] shall feel it all the days of his life, and that all other sons shall take example thereby of disobeying their lords and fathers." [9]
Do these letters, and Edward's remark to the bishop of Rochester, imply that Edward was now indeed considering an annulment of his marriage? I don't know, and if Edward did think along these lines, he took no action, and it's highly doubtful that the pope would have consented to annul his marriage anyway. If they do imply this, it must be noted that this was months after Isabella had defied Edward and refused to return to him, and was planning an invasion of his kingdom. However justified her actions may have been, seen from Edward's perspective it's hardly surprising that he was furious with her and (perhaps unfairly, given how young the boy was) with his son, even to the extent that he was willing to infuriate Isabella's brother Charles IV by annulling the marriage and willing to disinherit his son and thereby avert the threat to himself by making the boy illegitimate. If an annulment of Edward II and Isabella of France's marriage was ever on the cards, it was a consequence of Isabella's actions against her husband, not a cause of them.
Sources
1) The Chronicle of Lanercost 1272-1346, ed. Herbert Maxwell, p. 249; Annales Paulini 1307-1340, in W. Stubbs, ed., Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I and Edward II, volume 1, p. 337.
2) Seymour Phillips, Edward II, p. 483 note. 169.
3) Calendar of Papal Letters 1305-1341, pp. 474, 479.
4) T.F. Tout, The Place of the Reign of Edward II in English History, p. 327.
5) F.D. Blackley, 'Isabella and the Bishop of Exeter', in T. A. Sandqvist and M. R. Powicke, eds., Essays in Medieval History Presented to Bertie Wilkinson, p. 226.
6) Isabella's letter is cited in Phillips, Edward II, p. 491. For Charles IV's correspondence with Edward II in the 1320s, see Pierre Chaplais, ed., The War of Saint-Sardos (1323-1325): Gascon Correspondence and Diplomatic Documents.
7) The Brut or the Chronicles of England, ed. F. W. D. Brie, volume 1, pp. 252-253.
8) Roy Martin Haines, 'Bishops and politics in the reign of Edward II: Hamo de Hethe, Henry Wharton, and the 'Historia Roffensis'', Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 44 (1993), pp. 605-606.
9) Calendar of Close Rolls 1323-1327, pp. 576-578.
The Lanercost chronicler, a monk living in a convent near the Scottish border, claims that in 1325 Hugh Despenser the Younger "was exerting himself at the pope's court to procure divorce between the king of England and the queen, and in furtherance of this business there sent to the court a certain man of religion, acting irreligiously, by name Thomas Dunheved, with an appointed colleague, and a certain secular priest named Master Robert de Baldock." (Yes, the same Thomas Dunheved, Dominican friar, who temporarily freed the former king from Berkeley Castle in the summer of 1327.) The St Paul's annalist repeats the rumour that Edward was trying to annul his marriage to Isabella and that Dunheved was involved in this. [1]
This statement in two chronicles is often repeated as fact in modeern books, as yet another grievance Isabella had against her husband Edward II, along with supposedly 'removing' her children from her (rather than just setting up households for them in normal fashion), confiscating her lands and giving her a much smaller income to live on (he did do that), and so on. Let's look at this logically. Why exactly would Edward II have wanted to annul his marriage to Isabella? What benefits could he have gained from it? Precisely none. He would, however, have suffered a whole pile of negative consequences. Edward was at war with Isabella's brother Charles IV of France from the autumn of 1323 (although military action did not begin until the summer of 1324) until a peace treaty was signed in June 1325. As Edward's biographer Seymour Phillips points out, "An attempted divorce in the conditions of 1325 would have been political madness, since it would have meant the repudiation of all agreements between England and France, which Edward and Isabella's marriage had been intended to strengthen, and would have plunged England into an immediate war with France" (shortly after peace had finally been established between the two countries). [2] Even during Edward's war with Isabella's brother, over Gascony, there is no reason to suppose that he considered annulment, or that it would have gained him anything. The only possible grounds Edward could have had for an annulment of his marriage in 1325 was consanguinity, as he and Isabella were second cousins once removed. They had been granted a papal dispensation for this, however. An annulment would have meant that their marriage had never been valid in the first place (as a marriage then could not simply be ended, in the way we understand divorce), which would have made Edward and Isabella's children illegitimate. Edward II spent much of 1325 negotiating marriages for three of their children with the royal houses of Spain. Why on earth would he have risked making them illegitimate?
No proof of the two chroniclers' statement that Edward was trying to annul his marriage in 1325 has ever been discovered in the Vatican archives, nor is there any evidence that he ever wrote to the pope regarding this matter. He did send Thomas Dunheved to Pope John XXII in Avignon in 1325, it's true - but to complain about Alexander Bicknor, the archbishop of Dublin, whom Edward held responsible for his half-brother the earl of Kent's surrender at La Réole in September 1324, and who was not afraid to make his intense dislike of Hugh Despenser the Younger obvious and public. (Bicknor boasted that were he not a cleric, he would challenge Despenser to a duel.) John XXII, who made Dunheved a papal chaplain while he was visiting the papal court, wrote to Edward II in October 1325: "To the king, whose letters sent by Thomas Dunhevede, a Friar Preacher, the pope has received. The matter touching Alexander, archbishop of Dublin, cannot be heard in camera, but must be laid before the consistory...". [3] The Lanercost chronicler says that Edward also sent Robert Baldock to the pope regarding an annulment of his marriage. Baldock was chancellor of England from August 1323 until October 1326, after Isabella and Mortimer's invasion [4], and did not leave the country, to my knowledge.
As for other chroniclers, the very well-informed author of the Vita Edwardi Secundi does not mention an intended annulment. Neither does the royal clerk and chronicler Adam Murimuth, who knew the royal couple well and who visited the papal court in 1324. Neither does the author of the Flores Historiarum, who loathed Edward and who would have jumped on a chance to condemn him for humiliating his wife in this fashion. Neither does any other chronicler, even Jean Froissart, who a few decades later invented a tale of Isabella secretly fleeing to France from Winchelsea with her son in 1325, to escape from Edward's mistreatment of her (in fact she departed from Dover with a large retinue and, of course, Edward's full knowledge and consent). When Thomas Dunheved wrote to Edward II on 7 October 1325, he did not mention an annulment. [5] Edward was debating with his counsellors, by the end of 1324, the possibility of sending Queen Isabella to France to negotiate with her brother, and she departed for her homeland the following March. Why then would he suddenly decide to annul his marriage to her? It wasn't until late 1325 that it became apparent that the queen did not intend to return to England. Isabella herself wrote to her husband from France on 5 February 1326, addressing him as "our very dear and very sweet lord and friend" (nostre treschier et tresdouche seignur et amy) and informing him that although she wished nothing more than to return to his company and live and die with him, she did not dare, because of her fear of Hugh Despenser. Isabella did not mention that Edward was trying to annul their marriage; neither did any letters her brother Charles IV sent to Edward around this time or earlier (and Charles would have been utterly furious at this horrendous insult to his sister). [6] At Hugh Despenser's trial in November 1326, he was not accused of attempting to procure an annulment of Edward and Isabella's marriage. Why would Isabella not charge him with this, if he had done it? It was the gravest and most humiliating crime Despenser could have committed against her.
The Lanercost chronicler in his convent in the far north and writing a decade or more later, although an invaluable source for events in Scotland and Scottish raids in the north of England, knew little of what was going on at court in the 1320s, while the Pauline annalist was merely reporting a rumour he had heard (ut vulgariter dicebatur), not stating it as definitive truth. Plenty of rumours were flying around England in 1325/26, including one reported in the Brut that Edward II intended to strangle his wife and his son Edward of Windsor to death. Edward was, apparently, informed of this after his deposition, and was - as any normal human being would be when accused of something as monstrous as wishing to murder his own child - deeply upset and horrified ("God knows, I thought it never, and now I would that I were dead! So would God that I were! For then were all my sorrow passed.") [7] Just because rumours existed does not automatically make them true, and it's a shame that writers continue to declare as fact that Edward was trying to divorce his wife without considering the ample evidence that he was doing no such thing, and without considering the logical implications and consequences of this act. It does fit so nicely into the popular Victim!Isabella school of thought, though, doesn't it? Precisely why Edward would have wanted to annul his marriage to the queen in 1325 and what he would have gained from it in exchange for taking such a huge risk is never actually explained; his supposed nastiness and neglect of the queen and the nastiness of Hugh Despenser appears to be enough reason. Alison Weir claims in her biography of Isabella that "Lanercost's statement is to some extent corroborated by the fact that Dunheved was sent to the papal Curia on secret business at this time," but fails to notice the papal letter which demonstrates that Dunheved delivered Edward's letters regarding the archbishop of Dublin to the pope, and somehow confuses Thomas with his secular brother Stephen (as Lanercost clearly and correctly refers to the Dunheved brother in question as Thomas, I can't help but wonder how carefully she looked at the sources). Of course, it's entirely possible that Thomas Dunheved discussed other matters with the pope on the king's behalf, but we have no evidence, besides a rumour repeated in two chronicles, that an annulment of the king and queen's marriage was one of them.
I believe that it is virtually certain that Edward II was not intending to annul his marriage in 1325; he had no reason to do so, and the consequences would have been disastrous for him, his children and his kingdom. Having said that, it is just possible that he was considering this course of action in the summer of 1326, by which time he knew that Isabella was going to betroth their son to the count of Hainault's daughter without his consent and invade his kingdom with an army. It's perhaps hardly surprising if he then decided that an annulment would solve his problems, and that even making his children illegitimate would be worth it. I hasten to add there is no real evidence that he was planning to ask the pope for an annulment: again, there are no documents in either the Vatican or England to confirm it. Edward met the bishop of Rochester, his ally Hamo Hethe, at Boxley Down in Kent in June 1326, and he and Hugh Despenser the Younger rode with the bishop back to Rochester. Edward asked Hethe if it were true that there had once been a queen who had disobeyed her husband and had therefore been deposed from her royal dignity. Hethe was having none of it, and retorted that whoever had told the king this had given him very bad advice. [8] This does sound as if perhaps Edward was then considering the possibility of annulment. This may be confirmed by two letters Edward sent to his son in 1326, then in France with Isabella (whether willingly or not). The first, written on 18 March, orders the thirteen-year-old not to marry without his father's consent, and to obey Edward "under pain of forfeiting all that he may to the king...". The second, written on 19 June, ends with the words "if the king find him contrary or disobedient hereafter to his will, by what counsel soever it may be, he will ordain in such wise that Edward [of Windsor] shall feel it all the days of his life, and that all other sons shall take example thereby of disobeying their lords and fathers." [9]
Do these letters, and Edward's remark to the bishop of Rochester, imply that Edward was now indeed considering an annulment of his marriage? I don't know, and if Edward did think along these lines, he took no action, and it's highly doubtful that the pope would have consented to annul his marriage anyway. If they do imply this, it must be noted that this was months after Isabella had defied Edward and refused to return to him, and was planning an invasion of his kingdom. However justified her actions may have been, seen from Edward's perspective it's hardly surprising that he was furious with her and (perhaps unfairly, given how young the boy was) with his son, even to the extent that he was willing to infuriate Isabella's brother Charles IV by annulling the marriage and willing to disinherit his son and thereby avert the threat to himself by making the boy illegitimate. If an annulment of Edward II and Isabella of France's marriage was ever on the cards, it was a consequence of Isabella's actions against her husband, not a cause of them.
Sources
1) The Chronicle of Lanercost 1272-1346, ed. Herbert Maxwell, p. 249; Annales Paulini 1307-1340, in W. Stubbs, ed., Chronicles of the Reigns of Edward I and Edward II, volume 1, p. 337.
2) Seymour Phillips, Edward II, p. 483 note. 169.
3) Calendar of Papal Letters 1305-1341, pp. 474, 479.
4) T.F. Tout, The Place of the Reign of Edward II in English History, p. 327.
5) F.D. Blackley, 'Isabella and the Bishop of Exeter', in T. A. Sandqvist and M. R. Powicke, eds., Essays in Medieval History Presented to Bertie Wilkinson, p. 226.
6) Isabella's letter is cited in Phillips, Edward II, p. 491. For Charles IV's correspondence with Edward II in the 1320s, see Pierre Chaplais, ed., The War of Saint-Sardos (1323-1325): Gascon Correspondence and Diplomatic Documents.
7) The Brut or the Chronicles of England, ed. F. W. D. Brie, volume 1, pp. 252-253.
8) Roy Martin Haines, 'Bishops and politics in the reign of Edward II: Hamo de Hethe, Henry Wharton, and the 'Historia Roffensis'', Journal of Ecclesiastical History, 44 (1993), pp. 605-606.
9) Calendar of Close Rolls 1323-1327, pp. 576-578.
04 September, 2011
The Despensers In Chronicles
What some fourteenth-century chroniclers wrote about Hugh Despenser the Younger (c. 1287/90 - 24 November 1326) and his father Hugh the Elder (1 March 1261 - 27 October 1326).
Scalacronica
"...the great men had ill will against him [Edward II] for his cruelty and the debauched life which he led, and on account of the said Hugh [the Younger], whom at that time he loved and entirely trusted."
It's interesting to note that Sir Thomas Gray or Grey, author of the Scalacronica, fails to point out anywhere that his father of the same name served in the retinue of Hugh Despenser the Younger for years. As late as March 1326, there's an entry in Edward II's chamber journal saying that the royal favourite had given Grey 200 marks because "Sir Hugh Despenser the son desired above all else that the said Sir Thomas remained with him all his life" (mons' Hughe le Despenser le fitz qe desirast sur toute rien qe le dit mons' Thomas demoerast ouesqe lui a toute sa vie).
Vita Edwardi Secundi
On Hugh the Elder in the mid-1310s, following a discussion of Edward II's reconciliation with the barons who had killed Piers Gaveston: "...and as for the other friends of the king matters were arranged as the king willed; but Hugh Despenser [the Elder] could find no favour. Let him beware of the earl of Lancaster and leave the country if he wishes to escape. The whole land has turned to hatred of him. Few would mourn his downfall. As an unjust official he did harm to many; he disinherited many magnates and rich men. Would that he might lose what he has thus acquired, that he might be punished in his crime."
On Hugh the Elder again in 1325: "...he was hated by everyone and even by the king's son."
On both men in 1321: "Hugh [the Younger] was accused of being too greedy and thus unsuitable to be with the king; he was accused of evil counsel; of conspiracy and falsehood; of being a destroyer of the people, a disinheritor of the crown, an enemy of king and kingdom. All these things the barons alleged against Hugh, and persistently accused father and son alike of these enormities...the brutal and greedy father had in the past wronged many, and promoted the excommunication of many...it was right that the son should share in the paternal guilt. According to some the malice of the son outweighed the father's harshness."
On Hugh the Younger in general after he became Edward's favourite: "confident of the royal favour, he did everything at his own discretion, snatched at everything, did not bow to the authority of anyone whomsoever."
Lanercost
On Hugh the Younger: "...Sir Hugh Despenser the younger, who was, as it were, the king of England's right eye, and, after the death of Piers de Gavestoun, his chief counsellor against the earls and barons...a most avaricious man..."
Geoffrey le Baker
Hugh the Younger was "another king, or more accurately ruler of the king…in the manner of Gaveston, so presumptuous that he frequently kept certain nobles from speaking to the king. Moreover, when the king, out of his magnanimity, was preoccupied with many people addressing him about their affairs, Despenser threw back answers, not those asked for but to the contrary, pretending them to be to the king’s advantage."
Brut
Hugh the Younger "kept so the king’s chamber [as Edward's chamberlain], that no man might speak with the king…all men had of him scorn and despite; and the king himself would not be governed by no manner of man, but only by his father and by him."
Anonimalle
On Hugh the Younger: "no man could approach the king without the consent of the said Sir Hugh"; it also calls him haughty, arrogant, greedy, evil and "more inclined to wrongdoing than any other man."
Robert of Avesbury, Vita et Mors Edwardi Secundi, Flores Historiarum
The first two say that Hugh the Younger was another king in England, and the Vita et Mors, referring to Hugh the Elder, comments that there were three kings of England. The Flores comments that Hugh led Edward around like a cat with a straw.
Jean Froissart
On Hugh the Younger: "Without him nothing was done and through him everything was done, and the king trusted him more than everyone...he was a heretic and a sodomite, even, it was said, with the king."
Scalacronica
"...the great men had ill will against him [Edward II] for his cruelty and the debauched life which he led, and on account of the said Hugh [the Younger], whom at that time he loved and entirely trusted."
It's interesting to note that Sir Thomas Gray or Grey, author of the Scalacronica, fails to point out anywhere that his father of the same name served in the retinue of Hugh Despenser the Younger for years. As late as March 1326, there's an entry in Edward II's chamber journal saying that the royal favourite had given Grey 200 marks because "Sir Hugh Despenser the son desired above all else that the said Sir Thomas remained with him all his life" (mons' Hughe le Despenser le fitz qe desirast sur toute rien qe le dit mons' Thomas demoerast ouesqe lui a toute sa vie).
Vita Edwardi Secundi
On Hugh the Elder in the mid-1310s, following a discussion of Edward II's reconciliation with the barons who had killed Piers Gaveston: "...and as for the other friends of the king matters were arranged as the king willed; but Hugh Despenser [the Elder] could find no favour. Let him beware of the earl of Lancaster and leave the country if he wishes to escape. The whole land has turned to hatred of him. Few would mourn his downfall. As an unjust official he did harm to many; he disinherited many magnates and rich men. Would that he might lose what he has thus acquired, that he might be punished in his crime."
On Hugh the Elder again in 1325: "...he was hated by everyone and even by the king's son."
On both men in 1321: "Hugh [the Younger] was accused of being too greedy and thus unsuitable to be with the king; he was accused of evil counsel; of conspiracy and falsehood; of being a destroyer of the people, a disinheritor of the crown, an enemy of king and kingdom. All these things the barons alleged against Hugh, and persistently accused father and son alike of these enormities...the brutal and greedy father had in the past wronged many, and promoted the excommunication of many...it was right that the son should share in the paternal guilt. According to some the malice of the son outweighed the father's harshness."
On Hugh the Younger in general after he became Edward's favourite: "confident of the royal favour, he did everything at his own discretion, snatched at everything, did not bow to the authority of anyone whomsoever."
Lanercost
On Hugh the Younger: "...Sir Hugh Despenser the younger, who was, as it were, the king of England's right eye, and, after the death of Piers de Gavestoun, his chief counsellor against the earls and barons...a most avaricious man..."
Geoffrey le Baker
Hugh the Younger was "another king, or more accurately ruler of the king…in the manner of Gaveston, so presumptuous that he frequently kept certain nobles from speaking to the king. Moreover, when the king, out of his magnanimity, was preoccupied with many people addressing him about their affairs, Despenser threw back answers, not those asked for but to the contrary, pretending them to be to the king’s advantage."
Brut
Hugh the Younger "kept so the king’s chamber [as Edward's chamberlain], that no man might speak with the king…all men had of him scorn and despite; and the king himself would not be governed by no manner of man, but only by his father and by him."
Anonimalle
On Hugh the Younger: "no man could approach the king without the consent of the said Sir Hugh"; it also calls him haughty, arrogant, greedy, evil and "more inclined to wrongdoing than any other man."
Robert of Avesbury, Vita et Mors Edwardi Secundi, Flores Historiarum
The first two say that Hugh the Younger was another king in England, and the Vita et Mors, referring to Hugh the Elder, comments that there were three kings of England. The Flores comments that Hugh led Edward around like a cat with a straw.
Jean Froissart
On Hugh the Younger: "Without him nothing was done and through him everything was done, and the king trusted him more than everyone...he was a heretic and a sodomite, even, it was said, with the king."
26 August, 2011
Poems On Piers Gaveston's Death
According to the Vita Edwardi Secundi, the death of Piers Gaveston on 19 June 1312 was an enormously popular act throughout England: "When Piers had met his end, and the voice of the people had dinned his death into the ears of all, the country rejoiced, and all its inhabitants were glad…The land rejoices, its inhabitants rejoice that they have found peace in Piers' death."
It is surely an exaggeration to say that all the country rejoiced at Piers' death, though for sure some did, as demonstrated by two contemporary poems, which are in Latin in the original:
"Celebrate, my tongue, the death of Piers who disturbed England, whom the king in love for him placed over all Cornwall; hence in his pride he will be called Earl, not Piers.
This is the work of our salvation, that Piers is dead; all the artfulness of the multifarious traitor has perished;
Henceforth let the good omen rejoice our hearts, for sorrow is past; when the fullness of time which was fit for the thing came, his head is cut off from the juncture of his body; he who raised trouble within is now troubled from without.
He who was unwilling to have an equal, clothed in the extreme of pride, against his will bends his neck to the executioner; of whose merited death this hymn is set forth.
He who placed himself as a head above his equals, loses his own head; justly his body is pierced, whose heart was so puffed up; both land, sea, stars and world, rejoice in his fall.
Ferocious and cruel among all men, he ceases now from his pomp,
Now he no longer behaves himself as an earl, or a king;
The unworthy man, worthy of death, undergoes the death he merits…
May the house of Piers, in which he is held, not be supported in strength;
May the other place [the Dominican friary of Oxford, where Piers' body was taken] be profane, and may it be in disgrace, which the filthy gore spilled from Piers’ body has defiled!
Glory be to the Creator! Glory be to the earls
Who have made Piers die with his charms!
Henceforth may there be peace and rejoicing throughout England!"
***
"The bad tree is cut down, when Piers is struck on the neck;
Blessed be the weapon which thus approached Piers!
Blessed be the hand which executed him!
Blessed the man who ordered the execution!
Blessed the steel which struck him whom the world would not bear any longer!
O Cross, which allowed to be suffered this wretched misery, do thou take from us all the material of misery.
Thee, highest God in Trinity, we pray earnestly, destroy and crush forever the maintainers of Piers."
(Both poems cited in T. Wright, The Political Songs of England (1839), pp. 258-261.)
According to the Vita, Edward II issued an edict ordering everyone to refer to Piers by his title, earl of Cornwall, rather than by his name (as mentioned in the first poem above), and talks of Piers "scornfully rolling his upraised eyes in pride and in abuse, he looked down upon all with pompous and supercilious countenance…indeed the superciliousness which he affected would have been unbearable enough in a king’s son." The somewhat later Scalacronica agrees that the "great affection" which Edward bestowed on Gaveston made him "haughty and supercilious" – although the author also calls him "very magnificent, liberal and well-bred" – and Lanercost says that Gaveston "had now grown so insolent as to despise all the nobles of the land." His behaviour evidently alienated many...
12 August, 2011
Friday Facts
Another post with some fairly random facts about Edward II and his reign. :-)
- The Gascon sheriff of Edinburgh and constable of Linlithgow, Piers Lubaud, was a cousin of Piers Gaveston, according to the Vita Edwardi Secundi. Shortly before Christmas 1312, Edward II sent Lubaud's wife Nichola a palfrey horse worth six pounds and a saddle "with a lion of pearls, and covered with purple cloth" worth five pounds. (Whatever a 'lion of pearls' is.)
- Thomas Cobham, bishop of Worcester, told Pope John XXII that at the Westminster parliament of October 1320 "Holy Father, your devoted son, our lord the king, in the parliament summoned to London bore himself splendidly, with prudence and discretion, contrary to his former habit rising early and presenting a nobler and pleasant countenance to prelates and lords. Present almost every day in person, he arranged what business was to be dealt with, discussed and determined. Where amendment was necessary he ingeniously supplied what was lacking, thus giving joy to his people, ensuring their security, and providing reliable hope of an improvement in behaviour."
- Edward's efforts were rewarded in April 1320 when Thomas Cantilupe, bishop of Hereford, who had died in August 1282, was canonised: he had written to Popes Clement V and John XXII half a dozen times between December 1307 and January 1319, asking them to canonise Cantilupe. The two archbishops and all the bishops of England asked Edward to be present at the "translation of the holy body" in Hereford Cathedral on 14 June 1321, as this "would be greatly to the honour of God and Holy Church" and to Edward himself. He responded "it pleases the king to be there." As it turned out, Edward was unable to be present; thanks to the Despenser War, he had far more pressing matters to deal with.
- In England on the day of Cantilupe’s canonisation, according to the Sempringham annalist, "about midnight, there were frightful thunders heard, with lightning, and immoderately high wind."
- Edward wrote to his first cousin and greatest enemy Thomas of Lancaster's adherent and friend Sir Robert Holland (who was destined to be beheaded in a wood in Essex in 1328) on 20 November 1311: "we are very joyous and pleased about the good news we have heard concerning the improvement in our dear cousin and faithful subject Thomas, earl of Lancaster, and that he will soon be able to ride in comfort. And we send you word and dearly pray that, as soon as he is comfortable and able to ride without hurt to his body, you should ask him to be so good as to hasten to us at our parliament." I wonder if he gritted his teeth as he dictated that one.
- At Bannockburn, according to the Scalacronica of Sir Thomas Gray (whose father of the same name fought for Edward there), Edward "struck out so vigorously behind him with his mace there was none whom he touched that he did not fell to the ground." And according to the St Albans chronicler, he fought "like a lioness deprived of her cubs." Not exactly the coward he's been depicted as in some novels, then.
- Edward's nephew Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester, killed at Bannockburn, was buried at Tewkesbury Abbey in Gloucestershire. His heart, however, was buried at Shelford near Nottingham: on 8 August 1317, Edward passed through the village on his way to York with Isabella, and attended masses and distributed five shillings and sixpence in oblations at the conventual church of Shelford in memory of the young earl, "whose heart lies there inhumed."
- Edward's name, in contemporary English documents, was always spelt the way it is today. In letters sent to him from France, however, it appeared as Edouwart, Eduart or Edduvart. Isabella's name was spelt in a variety of ways: Isabell, Isabele, Ysabel, Ysabell, Ysabelle, Yzabel. The name Hugh was often spelt Hughe, Hue, Hew, Hugg or Huge, while the foreign name of Edward II's elder brother Alfonso (November 1273-August 1284) baffled English scribes, who wrote it Anfuls, Aufos or Auffoms.
- The Gascon sheriff of Edinburgh and constable of Linlithgow, Piers Lubaud, was a cousin of Piers Gaveston, according to the Vita Edwardi Secundi. Shortly before Christmas 1312, Edward II sent Lubaud's wife Nichola a palfrey horse worth six pounds and a saddle "with a lion of pearls, and covered with purple cloth" worth five pounds. (Whatever a 'lion of pearls' is.)
- Thomas Cobham, bishop of Worcester, told Pope John XXII that at the Westminster parliament of October 1320 "Holy Father, your devoted son, our lord the king, in the parliament summoned to London bore himself splendidly, with prudence and discretion, contrary to his former habit rising early and presenting a nobler and pleasant countenance to prelates and lords. Present almost every day in person, he arranged what business was to be dealt with, discussed and determined. Where amendment was necessary he ingeniously supplied what was lacking, thus giving joy to his people, ensuring their security, and providing reliable hope of an improvement in behaviour."
- Edward's efforts were rewarded in April 1320 when Thomas Cantilupe, bishop of Hereford, who had died in August 1282, was canonised: he had written to Popes Clement V and John XXII half a dozen times between December 1307 and January 1319, asking them to canonise Cantilupe. The two archbishops and all the bishops of England asked Edward to be present at the "translation of the holy body" in Hereford Cathedral on 14 June 1321, as this "would be greatly to the honour of God and Holy Church" and to Edward himself. He responded "it pleases the king to be there." As it turned out, Edward was unable to be present; thanks to the Despenser War, he had far more pressing matters to deal with.
- In England on the day of Cantilupe’s canonisation, according to the Sempringham annalist, "about midnight, there were frightful thunders heard, with lightning, and immoderately high wind."
- Edward wrote to his first cousin and greatest enemy Thomas of Lancaster's adherent and friend Sir Robert Holland (who was destined to be beheaded in a wood in Essex in 1328) on 20 November 1311: "we are very joyous and pleased about the good news we have heard concerning the improvement in our dear cousin and faithful subject Thomas, earl of Lancaster, and that he will soon be able to ride in comfort. And we send you word and dearly pray that, as soon as he is comfortable and able to ride without hurt to his body, you should ask him to be so good as to hasten to us at our parliament." I wonder if he gritted his teeth as he dictated that one.
- At Bannockburn, according to the Scalacronica of Sir Thomas Gray (whose father of the same name fought for Edward there), Edward "struck out so vigorously behind him with his mace there was none whom he touched that he did not fell to the ground." And according to the St Albans chronicler, he fought "like a lioness deprived of her cubs." Not exactly the coward he's been depicted as in some novels, then.
- Edward's nephew Gilbert de Clare, earl of Gloucester, killed at Bannockburn, was buried at Tewkesbury Abbey in Gloucestershire. His heart, however, was buried at Shelford near Nottingham: on 8 August 1317, Edward passed through the village on his way to York with Isabella, and attended masses and distributed five shillings and sixpence in oblations at the conventual church of Shelford in memory of the young earl, "whose heart lies there inhumed."
- Edward's name, in contemporary English documents, was always spelt the way it is today. In letters sent to him from France, however, it appeared as Edouwart, Eduart or Edduvart. Isabella's name was spelt in a variety of ways: Isabell, Isabele, Ysabel, Ysabell, Ysabelle, Yzabel. The name Hugh was often spelt Hughe, Hue, Hew, Hugg or Huge, while the foreign name of Edward II's elder brother Alfonso (November 1273-August 1284) baffled English scribes, who wrote it Anfuls, Aufos or Auffoms.
05 August, 2011
Friday Facts
A post with some fairly random facts about Edward II and his reign. :-)
- Sometime before October 1311, Edward's first cousin once removed Fernando IV of Castile asked him "for a loan of money in aid of his war against the enemies of Christ." Edward politely declined that month, on the grounds that he "had been so engaged since his accession with the war in Scotland and other matters that he is unable to accede to this request." The 'other matters' presumably meant Piers Gaveston, in large part; Edward was at that time batting against the Lords Ordainer, who were determined to send Piers into exile for the third time. I'm a very long way from being knowledgeable about Spanish history, but I imagine Fernando's war had something to do with his and Jaime II of Aragon's crusade against the king of Granada.
(Close Rolls)
- Edward sent letters on 2 and 12 June 1319 to Haakon V of Norway regarding debts which the Norwegian king owed to eight English merchants - evidently unaware that Haakon had died on 6 May. Edward had as a child been betrothed to Haakon's niece Margaret the 'Maid of Norway', queen of Scotland. (Close Rolls).
- On 16 October 1325, Edward asked Pope John XXII to grant dispensations for his children Eleanor of Woodstock and Edward of Windsor (the future Edward III) to marry Alfonso XI and his sister Leonor of Castile, they being second cousins once removed, and sent letters to Jaime II of Aragon's son Alfonso and the regents of Castile two days later, thanking them for their affection for him and "the gracious and benevolent way” they had handled his affairs. (Close Rolls).
- On the same day, at Cippenham in Berkshire, Edward gave twenty-five shillings to his porter Will Shene and his new wife Isode as a wedding present. (SAL MS 122).
- Aymer de Valence, earl of Pembroke and also Edward's first cousin once removed, died on his way to Paris (the precise location is uncertain, but his biographer Seymour Phillips thinks probably Saint-Riquier near Amiens) on 23 June 1324; the news took only three days to reach the king at Tonbridge in Kent. (Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke 1307-1324: Baronial Politics in the Reign of Edward II by J.R.S. Phillips)
- During the war of Saint-Sardos (with Charles IV of France, over Gascony) in 1324, an atmosphere of fevered suspicion pervaded England: two letters were sent to Hugh Despenser the Younger, telling him that a fleet of foreign vessels with a hundred armed men aboard each ship had been seen in Falmouth and mysteriously disappeared in the middle of the night. This turned out to be a group of Genoese merchants making their annual trip to the Netherlands, with armed men to guard their valuable cargo. (Pierre Chaplais, The War of Saint-Sardos (1323-1325): Gascon Correspondence and Diplomatic Documents; Natalie Fryde, The Tyranny and Fall of Edward II 1321-1326).
- Edward's brother-in-law Philip V of France sent him a gift of a box of rose-coloured sugar in September 1317. Edward gave Philip's messenger William de Opere two and a half pounds for bringing it. (Thomas Stapleton, 'A Brief Summary of the Wardrobe Accounts of the 10th, 11th, and 14th years of Edward II',Archaeologia, 1836)
- Edward's huntsman William Twyt or Twici wrote a French treatise called Le Art de Venerie around 1320; the earliest text on hunting written in England, it opens "Here begins the art of hunting, which Master William Twici, huntsman of the king of England, made in his time to instruct others."
- "...we command you to watch our affairs that we may be rich and may attain our ends, of which you have good cognisance; and this cannot be attained without pain and diligence on your part." Hugh Despenser the Younger to Sir John Inge, sheriff of Glamorgan, on 18 January 1321; entirely open about his aims and ambitions. (J. Goronwy Edwards, Calendar of Ancient Correspondence Concerning Wales)
- From 8 July 1315 to 7 July 1316, Edward spent £627 on clothes for his household. He received in April 1316 two tunics for himself, comprising six ells of scarlet – expensive woollen cloth, not the colour – two ells of yellow cloth for sewing leopards, his heraldic arms, on them, and more scarlet for making bags or purses. He also received sixteen ells of green medley (dyed in the wool cloth) to make two sleeved tunics and two tabards, while three household knights had twelve ells of the same for their tunics. Green cloth lined with miniver was also given to Isabella, their son Edward of Windsor, the king's sister the countess of Hereford, his nieces Margaret Gaveston and Eleanor Despenser, and the dowager countess of Warwick. (Malcolm Vale, The Princely Court: Medieval Courts and Culture in North-West Europe).
- In November 1319, Edward wrote to William, count of Hainault, to raise the possibility of a marriage between his son Edward and William's eldest daughter Margaret (who later married the Holy Roman Emperor Louis IV; her sister Philippa ultimately married Edward III). His careless scribe addressed the letter to 'Robert, count of Hainault'. Names could prove a problem for inattentive scribes: Louis X's queen Clemence was called Elizabeth in a letter sent to her by Edward II in May 1316, and Edward's niece Jeanne de Bar, countess of Surrey, was called Isabella in a writ of 1313. (Foedera)
- Sometime before October 1311, Edward's first cousin once removed Fernando IV of Castile asked him "for a loan of money in aid of his war against the enemies of Christ." Edward politely declined that month, on the grounds that he "had been so engaged since his accession with the war in Scotland and other matters that he is unable to accede to this request." The 'other matters' presumably meant Piers Gaveston, in large part; Edward was at that time batting against the Lords Ordainer, who were determined to send Piers into exile for the third time. I'm a very long way from being knowledgeable about Spanish history, but I imagine Fernando's war had something to do with his and Jaime II of Aragon's crusade against the king of Granada.
(Close Rolls)
- Edward sent letters on 2 and 12 June 1319 to Haakon V of Norway regarding debts which the Norwegian king owed to eight English merchants - evidently unaware that Haakon had died on 6 May. Edward had as a child been betrothed to Haakon's niece Margaret the 'Maid of Norway', queen of Scotland. (Close Rolls).
- On 16 October 1325, Edward asked Pope John XXII to grant dispensations for his children Eleanor of Woodstock and Edward of Windsor (the future Edward III) to marry Alfonso XI and his sister Leonor of Castile, they being second cousins once removed, and sent letters to Jaime II of Aragon's son Alfonso and the regents of Castile two days later, thanking them for their affection for him and "the gracious and benevolent way” they had handled his affairs. (Close Rolls).
- On the same day, at Cippenham in Berkshire, Edward gave twenty-five shillings to his porter Will Shene and his new wife Isode as a wedding present. (SAL MS 122).
- Aymer de Valence, earl of Pembroke and also Edward's first cousin once removed, died on his way to Paris (the precise location is uncertain, but his biographer Seymour Phillips thinks probably Saint-Riquier near Amiens) on 23 June 1324; the news took only three days to reach the king at Tonbridge in Kent. (Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke 1307-1324: Baronial Politics in the Reign of Edward II by J.R.S. Phillips)
- During the war of Saint-Sardos (with Charles IV of France, over Gascony) in 1324, an atmosphere of fevered suspicion pervaded England: two letters were sent to Hugh Despenser the Younger, telling him that a fleet of foreign vessels with a hundred armed men aboard each ship had been seen in Falmouth and mysteriously disappeared in the middle of the night. This turned out to be a group of Genoese merchants making their annual trip to the Netherlands, with armed men to guard their valuable cargo. (Pierre Chaplais, The War of Saint-Sardos (1323-1325): Gascon Correspondence and Diplomatic Documents; Natalie Fryde, The Tyranny and Fall of Edward II 1321-1326).
- Edward's brother-in-law Philip V of France sent him a gift of a box of rose-coloured sugar in September 1317. Edward gave Philip's messenger William de Opere two and a half pounds for bringing it. (Thomas Stapleton, 'A Brief Summary of the Wardrobe Accounts of the 10th, 11th, and 14th years of Edward II',Archaeologia, 1836)
- Edward's huntsman William Twyt or Twici wrote a French treatise called Le Art de Venerie around 1320; the earliest text on hunting written in England, it opens "Here begins the art of hunting, which Master William Twici, huntsman of the king of England, made in his time to instruct others."
- "...we command you to watch our affairs that we may be rich and may attain our ends, of which you have good cognisance; and this cannot be attained without pain and diligence on your part." Hugh Despenser the Younger to Sir John Inge, sheriff of Glamorgan, on 18 January 1321; entirely open about his aims and ambitions. (J. Goronwy Edwards, Calendar of Ancient Correspondence Concerning Wales)
- From 8 July 1315 to 7 July 1316, Edward spent £627 on clothes for his household. He received in April 1316 two tunics for himself, comprising six ells of scarlet – expensive woollen cloth, not the colour – two ells of yellow cloth for sewing leopards, his heraldic arms, on them, and more scarlet for making bags or purses. He also received sixteen ells of green medley (dyed in the wool cloth) to make two sleeved tunics and two tabards, while three household knights had twelve ells of the same for their tunics. Green cloth lined with miniver was also given to Isabella, their son Edward of Windsor, the king's sister the countess of Hereford, his nieces Margaret Gaveston and Eleanor Despenser, and the dowager countess of Warwick. (Malcolm Vale, The Princely Court: Medieval Courts and Culture in North-West Europe).
- In November 1319, Edward wrote to William, count of Hainault, to raise the possibility of a marriage between his son Edward and William's eldest daughter Margaret (who later married the Holy Roman Emperor Louis IV; her sister Philippa ultimately married Edward III). His careless scribe addressed the letter to 'Robert, count of Hainault'. Names could prove a problem for inattentive scribes: Louis X's queen Clemence was called Elizabeth in a letter sent to her by Edward II in May 1316, and Edward's niece Jeanne de Bar, countess of Surrey, was called Isabella in a writ of 1313. (Foedera)
26 July, 2011
My Article
So, great news - my article 'The Adherents of Edmund of Woodstock, Earl of Kent, in March 1330' has now been published in the English Historical Review, volume 126, pp. 779-805. :-) Here's a link to the abstract. Needless to say, I'm very, very proud and excited to see my name in such a prestigious journal, and I really hope the article goes a long way to demolishing the often-repeated notion that the earl of Kent was stupid and that's why he believed Edward II was still alive in 1330. He wasn't stupid, you know. Really not. Neither were the many dozens of men who supported him in the plot to free Edward and, as far as I can tell, shared his belief in the survival of the former king. I do hope you'll read the article and enjoy it. :-)
17 July, 2011
Chronicles On Edward II's Accession
Here's a look at what some fourteenth-century chroniclers said about the death of Edward I and the accession of Edward II in July 1307:
- Vita Edwardi Secundi (Latin):
"On the day of the Translation of St Thomas in the thirty-fifth year of his reign [7 July 1307], died Edward the First after the Conquest, and his son Edward II began to reign, a robust young man in about his twenty-third year*. He did not achieve the ambition that his father had set before himself, but directed his plans to other objects. He recalled Piers Gaveston, who had recently abjured the realm at his father's command. This Piers had been the most intimate** and highly-favoured member, as soon became abundantly clear, of the young Edward's household when the latter was Prince of Wales and the old king still alive...
If our king Edward had borne himself as well [as Richard Lionheart] at the outset of his reign, and not accepted the counsels of wicked men, not one of his predecessors would have been more notable than he. For God had endowed him with every gift, and had made him equal to or indeed more excellent than other kings. If anyone cared to describe those qualities which ennoble our king, he would not find his like in the land...What hopes he raised as Prince of Wales! How they were dashed when he became King!"
* Edward was twenty-three, born 25 April 1284.
** Doesn't imply sexual intimacy.
- The Brut (Middle English; modernised spelling):
"And after this King Edward, reigned Edward his son, that was born in Caernarfon [Carnaryvan], and went into France, and espoused Isabel, the king's daughter of France...And anon [soon] as the good King Edward was dead, Sir Edward his son, king of England, sent after Piers Gauaston into Gascony*; and so much loved him that he called him his brother; and anon after gave him the lordship of Wallingford; and it was not long after that he gave him the earldom of Cornwall, against all the lords' will of the realm."
* Piers spent his first exile in 1307 in Ponthieu, Edward's inheritance from his mother Eleanor of Castile, not his native Gascony.
- The French Chronicle of London (French):
"In this year, on the Friday after the Feast of St Luke [18 October], King Edward was nobly buried at Westminster. At this time the Templars were destroyed. In this year, on the Sunday after the feast of St Peter's Chair [25 February 1308], the King and the Queen, Lady Isabele, were crowned; at which coronation, Sir John Bacwelle, a knight was killed by falling from a wall. In this year there was a great malady of the eyes, whereby many persons lost their sight*. At this time came Sir Piers de Gaverstone into England, who had been banished by King Edward the Conqueror; and was made Earl of Cornwall, to the great detriment of all the realm. In this year there was a very great frost on the Thames, so that many persons passed over on foot, upon the ice, to Suthwerk, and back again to London. In this year, judgment was given at Westminster against the franchise, as to the rights of bastardy; to the effect that if any one should die without heir and without testament made, his lands and tenements should escheat to the King."
* Wonder what that was!?
- Chronicle of Lanercost (Latin):
"...this illustrious and excellent King, my lord Edward, son of King Henry, died at Burgh-upon-Sands...in the thirty-sixth year of his reign and the sixty-seventh of his age.* Throughout his time he had been fearless and war-like, in all things strenuous and illustrious; he left not his like among Christian princes for sagacity and courage...Messengers were sent in haste to my lord Edward Prince of Wales, his son and heir...Thus Edward the younger succeeded Edward the elder, but in the same manner as Rehoboam succeeded Solomon, which his career and fate were to prove."
* Edward I was sixty-eight when he died, born 17 June 1239, and in the thirty-fifth year of his reign, acceded 20 November 1272.
- Scalacronica (French):
"After the death of Edward the First after the Conquest, his son, Edward the Second, reigned in great tribulation and adversity. He was not industrious, neither was he beloved by the great men of his realm; albeit he was liberal in giving, and amiable far beyond measure towards those whom he loved and exceedingly sociable with his intimates. Also, in body he was one of the strongest men in his realm."
- Vita Edwardi Secundi (Latin):
"On the day of the Translation of St Thomas in the thirty-fifth year of his reign [7 July 1307], died Edward the First after the Conquest, and his son Edward II began to reign, a robust young man in about his twenty-third year*. He did not achieve the ambition that his father had set before himself, but directed his plans to other objects. He recalled Piers Gaveston, who had recently abjured the realm at his father's command. This Piers had been the most intimate** and highly-favoured member, as soon became abundantly clear, of the young Edward's household when the latter was Prince of Wales and the old king still alive...
If our king Edward had borne himself as well [as Richard Lionheart] at the outset of his reign, and not accepted the counsels of wicked men, not one of his predecessors would have been more notable than he. For God had endowed him with every gift, and had made him equal to or indeed more excellent than other kings. If anyone cared to describe those qualities which ennoble our king, he would not find his like in the land...What hopes he raised as Prince of Wales! How they were dashed when he became King!"
* Edward was twenty-three, born 25 April 1284.
** Doesn't imply sexual intimacy.
- The Brut (Middle English; modernised spelling):
"And after this King Edward, reigned Edward his son, that was born in Caernarfon [Carnaryvan], and went into France, and espoused Isabel, the king's daughter of France...And anon [soon] as the good King Edward was dead, Sir Edward his son, king of England, sent after Piers Gauaston into Gascony*; and so much loved him that he called him his brother; and anon after gave him the lordship of Wallingford; and it was not long after that he gave him the earldom of Cornwall, against all the lords' will of the realm."
* Piers spent his first exile in 1307 in Ponthieu, Edward's inheritance from his mother Eleanor of Castile, not his native Gascony.
- The French Chronicle of London (French):
"In this year, on the Friday after the Feast of St Luke [18 October], King Edward was nobly buried at Westminster. At this time the Templars were destroyed. In this year, on the Sunday after the feast of St Peter's Chair [25 February 1308], the King and the Queen, Lady Isabele, were crowned; at which coronation, Sir John Bacwelle, a knight was killed by falling from a wall. In this year there was a great malady of the eyes, whereby many persons lost their sight*. At this time came Sir Piers de Gaverstone into England, who had been banished by King Edward the Conqueror; and was made Earl of Cornwall, to the great detriment of all the realm. In this year there was a very great frost on the Thames, so that many persons passed over on foot, upon the ice, to Suthwerk, and back again to London. In this year, judgment was given at Westminster against the franchise, as to the rights of bastardy; to the effect that if any one should die without heir and without testament made, his lands and tenements should escheat to the King."
* Wonder what that was!?
- Chronicle of Lanercost (Latin):
"...this illustrious and excellent King, my lord Edward, son of King Henry, died at Burgh-upon-Sands...in the thirty-sixth year of his reign and the sixty-seventh of his age.* Throughout his time he had been fearless and war-like, in all things strenuous and illustrious; he left not his like among Christian princes for sagacity and courage...Messengers were sent in haste to my lord Edward Prince of Wales, his son and heir...Thus Edward the younger succeeded Edward the elder, but in the same manner as Rehoboam succeeded Solomon, which his career and fate were to prove."
* Edward I was sixty-eight when he died, born 17 June 1239, and in the thirty-fifth year of his reign, acceded 20 November 1272.
- Scalacronica (French):
"After the death of Edward the First after the Conquest, his son, Edward the Second, reigned in great tribulation and adversity. He was not industrious, neither was he beloved by the great men of his realm; albeit he was liberal in giving, and amiable far beyond measure towards those whom he loved and exceedingly sociable with his intimates. Also, in body he was one of the strongest men in his realm."
11 July, 2011
Edward of Caernarfon and Rotting Animal Corpses
The chronicle of Geoffrey le Baker, written around 1350, vividly describes the torments supposedly inflicted on the former Edward II as he was taken from Kenilworth to Berkeley Castle in the spring of 1327, and during his incarceration at Berkeley, paraphrased here:
- Edward's jailers make him travel at night, riding bareheaded despite the cold, and deprive him of sleep. They taunt him by placing a crown of hay on his head, make him shave off his beard with cold, dirty ditch-water - whereupon Edward cries, thereby providing himself with warm water - feed him on rotting food to make him ill, and do their utmost to make him believe he is mad. Once this nightmare journey is over and he arrives at Berkeley, he is incarcerated in a cell with a deep hole nearby into which the rotting corpses of animals are thrown, in the hope that the putrefaction will kill Edward by asphyxiation. This failing, he is murdered by means of a red-hot poker, "the aid of enormous pillows and a weight heavier than that of fifteen substantial men."
Needless to say, this has been grist to the mill for a lot of writers over the centuries (including Christopher Marlowe), and is repeated all over the internet and in numerous published books as certain fact. But - surprise, surprise - it isn't. Geoffrey le Baker is the only even vaguely contemporary source for the notion that the former Edward II was so cruelly mistreated and abused at Berkeley, and Baker was not writing history but hagiography, at a time when the amusingly implausible campaign to have Edward canonised was well underway. (Miracles were widely reported at his tomb in Gloucester.) Baker's intention was to portray Edward as a Christ-like figure nobly suffering the slings and arrows of outrageous fortune and the torments of lesser men, the "satraps of Satan" as Baker memorably calls them: the Passion of Edward of Caernarfon. If we accept Baker's story of the former king's fate in 1327 as historical truth, we might as well accept Shakespeare's portrayal of Richard III as the hunchbacked epitome of evil as historical truth.
Geoffrey le Baker was about the only fourteenth-century chronicler who actually liked Edward II, and blamed all his faults and mistakes on the Despensers. As a corollary, Baker loathed Queen Isabella and portrayed her as, well, a she-wolf*, cruelly taking delight in making her husband suffer. Although I have to admit I find it quite amusing to see Isabella called 'Jezebel' and 'the iron virago', Baker's portrayal of her is very wide of the mark. Chronicler Adam Murimuth, a royal clerk who knew Edward II and Isabella well, was in the south-west of England in 1327 and is a much more reliable source than Baker (though by no means infallible), says that she sent Edward kind letters and gifts while he was at Berkeley - hardly, one might think, the actions of a woman keen to inflict torments on her husband. After all, after Edward's deposition in January 1327, Isabella had no reason to manipulate him into thinking she still loved him, and no reason to send him letters and gifts unless she wanted to.
* Not a contemporary nickname, as many people think, but invented by Shakespeare for Margaret of Anjou and first applied to Isabella in a 1757 poem by Thomas Gray.
King Edward III was too young in 1327 to be in a position to protect his father, but he wouldn't be fourteen forever, and one day he would take over the governance of his own kingdom. Thomas Berkeley and John Maltravers, appointed custodians of the former king in April 1327, would have been pretty stupid to mistreat the king's father, knowing that one day they would have to answer for their actions - and Edward III never accused them of mistreating Edward of Caernarfon. Adam Murimuth claims that although Berkeley treated Edward well and humanely, Maltravers did not. This may be correct, but is not supported by any other evidence - and most fourteenth-century chroniclers, even Murimuth, thought that Maltravers was accused of Edward II's murder, which he certainly wasn't; he was condemned to death in the November 1330 parliament for his role in entrapping the earl of Kent and bringing about his execution. At no point in Maltravers' very long life - he lived until 1364 - did Edward III accuse him of complicity in Edward II's death, or of mistreating and abusing the former king. Murimuth's statement that Maltravers behaved harshly towards Edward II may be an assumption based on the false (albeit widespread) belief that Maltravers was one of Edward's murderers.
Paul Doherty in his 2003 book Isabella and the Strange Death of Edward II (p. 119) says that kings and princes, once deposed, have suffered from the actions of their former minions, who were "only too quick to join in the fun of cruel mockery of one who formerly lorded it over them." Well, possibly, but that's missing the point. Edward II was no longer king in 1327, but he was still royal, the son of a king and, more to the point, the father of the present king. Edward II is unique among the deposed kings of medieval England, not just because he was the first, but because he was the only one succeeded by his son, who would not take kindly to allegations that his father had been abused by those appointed to care for him. (Incidentally, Paul Doherty, like many other writers, repeats the myth about John Trevisa on which I wrote a post.)
One of the charges against Roger Mortimer at his trial during the November 1330 parliament was that he had had Edward removed to Berkeley in order to have him killed, when "the father of our lord the king was at Kenilworth by the ordinance and assent of the peers of the realm, to remain there at their pleasure in order to be looked after as was appropriate for such a lord." According to the chronicler Jean le Bel, it was decided in early 1327 that Edward "would be well guarded and honestly kept for the rest of his life, according to his estate." 'According to his estate' and 'looked after as was appropriate for such a lord' does not mean 'OK, lads, we can abuse him as much as we want because he no longer wears the crown', it means 'he must be treated with all the respect, deference and courtesy due to a man of royal birth who is the father of the king'.
Paul Doherty (p. 120) also claims that "no real evidence exists that Edward was not mistreated." OK, here's one: Lord Berkeley bought wax for him, presumably for candles. Wax was expensive, and Berkeley might easily have bought the much cheaper tallow (made from animal fat) instead. But then, if Berkeley and his allies were mistreating Edward, why did they bother to buy him wax (or tallow) at all? Do people usually buy candles for a man they're keeping incarcerated in a dungeon or pit and trying to asphyxiate with animal corpses? The Berkeley Castle muniments roll records the purchase of wine, cheese, eggs, beef, capons and spices for Edward (Seymour Phillips, Edward II, p. 541 n. 118, citing rolls 39, 41, 42). Paul Doherty suggests (pp. 119-120) that Edward didn't get this food, but that "the supplies, the delicacies may well have gone to others" and furthermore that the produce purchased for him and Isabella's gifts are "perhaps not evidence enough to reject the allegations of ill-treatment." This is pure speculation. I don't see why there's any reason to assume that Edward didn't receive them. These purchases of food were recorded in Lord Berkeley's own household accounts; they were not intended to be presented to the Exchequer as proof that he was feeding Edward of Caernarfon properly. I don't see why Lord Berkeley would lie in his own accounts and record the purchase of food for Edward if the former king wasn't going to receive it.
And here's another piece of evidence: there are several entries on the Close Roll which record payments made to Thomas Berkeley and John Maltravers for Edward's upkeep, and refer to the expenses of Edward and 'his household'. There are also references in the Berkeley Castle records to liveries, i.e. clothes, provided for "the household of the king's father," as he was almost always referred to. Yes, Edward had servants at Berkeley. How many is not clear - a very small fraction of the 400 or 500-strong household he'd had as king, of course - but he wasn't locked up alone with no-one to attend him. Men imprisoned in pits do not, generally, have servants attending them. This evidence is ignored by writers who want to believe the notion that Edward was mistreated, among them Paul Doherty, who - following le Baker - is pushing the notion of Isabella as an evil nasty murderous b*tch and says several times that she desperately wanted Edward dead and to suffer as much as possible first. (If you have the book, notice that Doherty doesn't provide a note for his claim (p. 109) that Isabella publicly called for Edward's execution in early 1327, even before his deposition; that's because he can't back it up with any primary source. And "Isabella had murder in her heart" regarding her husband in late 1326/early 1327 (p. 108)? How can Doherty possibly know that?). An anonymous chronicle which Doherty makes much of claims that workmen at Berkeley Castle heard Edward sighing and groaning when he was incarcerated there in 1327. Maybe that's significant, maybe not. Edward of Caernarfon was a highly emotional man at the best of times, and 1327 was definitely not the best of times for him. He must have been suffering a great deal emotionally from losing his throne, his wife, his children and Hugh Despenser.
The guides at Berkeley Castle and numerous websites spread the stories of Edward of Caernarfon's mistreatment and supposed horrific red-hot poker murder. Lurid stories of murdered kings and agonised screams and vile torture and asphyxiation by animal corpse and men getting their just desserts for allowing themselves to be anally penetrated by other men (a theory of the supposed red-hot poker murder frequently repeated as though it's 'truth') bring in the tourists, don't they. Websites and books about Castle Rising in Norfolk do much the same thing, claiming that Isabella of France was imprisoned there by her son as punishment for her role in the murder of Edward II and subsequently went mad; the story of an imprisoned queen going insane and wailing for her dead lover Mortimer is apparently far more interesting than the truth, which is that Isabella lived a perfectly conventional life after 1330 as queen dowager. Geoffrey le Baker's tales of the vile abuse inflicted on Edward at Berkeley Castle are contradicted by contemporary evidence, and were concocted with a specific purpose which had little to do with actual historical events as experienced in 1327. It's a shame that they're still so often repeated as though they're certain truth.
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