14 October, 2012

Stuff

Only a quick post today, I'm afraid, as I've just come back from holiday and haven't had time to write a proper one yet.

My friend Colin now has a website about Eleanor Fitzalan, Lady Percy (c. 1284-1328), daughter of Richard Fitzalan, earl of Arundel (d. 1302), sister of the earl executed in 1326, and wife and mother of two of the long line of Henry, Lord Percies.  Best of luck to Colin with his excellent and extremely well-researched site and his novel about Eleanor, and thanks to him for the lovely mention and links to my blog!

Inaccuracies and weirdnesses spotted online lately:

"Piers even sat closer to Edward than his own bride (the then thirteen year old Isabella of France) at their wedding!"  Nope; Edward and Isabella married in Boulogne on 25 January 1308, and Piers, who remained in England as regent, was 80 miles away in Kent at the time.

"The marriage was purely political, both Edward II and Philip IV had hoped it would create a friendship between England and France; Isabella and Edward were not in love."  Whereas every other royal couple of the Middle Ages married purely for love and it had nothing at all to do with political alliances, obviously. *rolls eyes*

"It takes Edward 4 years to consummate the marriage and Isabeau quickly becomes pregnant. It is clear the King is doing his duty, nothing more."  Because obviously it would have been vastly preferable for Edward II to have had regular intercourse with a girl of twelve or thirteen and forced her to go through pregnancy and childbirth at that age.  Do these moaners even think a tiny little bit about the implications of what they're saying?  Do they ever even bother to try to see things from Edward's perspective, that having to marry a very young girl he'd never met before and trying to build a relationship with her possibly wasn't a walk in the park for him either?  Has there ever been any other man in history so often criticised for not having sex with a twelve-year-old, even one who was, according to her modern-day fans, officially The Most Beautiful And Intelligent Pre-Pubescent In All Europe?  How do they know Edward only 'did his duty, nothing more'?  Do they have a webcam set up in his bedchamber?

"....Isabeau, daughter of Philip IV of France, marrying Edward II of England, who is quite obviously bored by the whole affair and disinterested in his 13 year-old bride...".  Isabella was almost certainly twelve at marriage, actually.  And yeah, let's all continue to point the finger at those men in their twenties who are uninterested (not 'disinterested'; that means something different) in pre-pubescent girls, those sick weird bastards.

"...like other girls of her station in that age, [Isabella] was little more than a pawn on a political chessboard."  I am so completely beyond bored with all this yawn, I mean pawn, nonsense.  Why is it only ever applied to women?  It's not like Edward II had the slightest choice in who he married either.  He was only five years old when his father arranged his betrothal to the young Margaret of Norway, queen of Scotland, and over the years was betrothed to various other girls in alliances that suited Edward I's political needs at the time; I have yet to see anyone whine about 'poor Edward, little more than a pawn on his father's political chessboard'.  Not that I'd want them to, of course, as it would be ridiculous, but this whole 'royal and noble women (but not men) of the Middle Ages were nothing but tragic helpless pawns whose heartless fathers arranged marriages for them even though they weren't in luuuurrrve, oh woes' notion is becoming a really tedious cliché.

"Edward's murder was by ordered of his wife, Isabella of France, to ensure the succession of his son Edward III."  I'd love to see the evidence for the statement that Isabella did any such thing, except - of course! - there isn't any.  Edward II's death supposedly took place in September 1327, a full nine months after his son's succession, which was already 'ensured'.

Some of the comments left on the post directly above, which also stated the red-hot poker myth as fact:

"There is also rumor that at the Death bed of his father, (Edward the first) Isabella of France, his wife, announces that son, Edward the third belongs to William Wallace."  Words. Fail. Me.  I have fantasies about burying every last copy of That Film in a deep hole on Jupiter and wiping all awareness of it from the memories of humankind for the rest of eternity.

"Lord, no wonder we rebelled in the colonies."  Hmmmm, yes, I'm sure events of the 1770s were directly related to the deposition and supposed murder of a king of England 450 years previously.  ("Never mind all this taxation without representation stuff, friends, have you heard what those savages allegedly did back in 1327?  We've got to get rid of them right now!")

"The poker story is Not a myth."  Stated with such certainty that this person (who also wrote the 'death bed' comment above) must surely have been present in the room at Berkeley Castle on 21 September 1327, or at least has that webcam up and running.  And what's With the Random capitalisation?

Somewhat bizarrely, someone posted a link to my site on an article called 'The term obstinate child is a racist dog whistle' - near the bottom of the comments section, dated 10 October, with the statement 'This site will debunk all the myths about “gay Edward and William Wallace’s time-traveling sperm”.'   Well, I certainly try.  A few weeks ago someone linked to my site in the comments section of an article in The Telegraph.  It does get around.  ;-)  It was also linked on a Russian forum recently - actually, I get quite a few hits from Russian sites, and Russia is always in the top seven countries where my blog visitors come from (*waves hello at Russian readers*) - and when I ran what was written there through Google Translate, I got "Some Brits still can not move vilify the memory of the Monarch. Befitted a migrant-occupier, edyaschemu English bread and butter, distribute new homeland defamatory rumors." Ummm, OK then.  ;-)


Visitors to my blog.  No Edward II fans in Madagascar, Greenland, Tierra del Fuego, the Horn of Africa or most of Siberia then. How disappointing.
Some recent blog searches (not many as I've hardly been online lately to check them):

queen isabella naked pics

every time you cus a kitten kills a man

who was the edward who killed his father that was edward?

gay film robin hood

did edward ii and robin hood have sex


did isabella love edward the second?  

did king edward ii have gout

edward iii not edward ii 

was edward of france gay

was the son of edward 2 a bastard

20 comments:

Anonymous said...

I hope the person who searched "every time you cus a kitten kills a man" got the answer in your blog. I mean, that's the bulk of your blog posts, I believe.

Kathryn Warner said...

;-) Oh, absolutely. I mostly just write about kittens and their ways of killing people. :D :D

Anonymous said...

Welcome back, Kathryn! I missed you:-) And I missed your posts. I can't quite recall when I had almost laughed my head off... I know!!! (How could I ever forget?) It was just a few minutes ago after spotting 'William Wallace's time-travelling sperm'!!!! Sounds so catchy and lewd at the same time! Don't you think it would serve as a perfect title for Braveheart sequel, or even better than this, for a documentary- preferably BBC production- discussing all the blatant mistakes in Mel Gibson's version of the events. I would be the first to watch:-) My in-laws have just returned from Scotland with heads full of Gibson's story. They've been told- at the feet of Robert Bruce- about William Wallace and 'a wonderful film, which is a must-watch if you want to learn more about the man':-)

Kasia Ogrodnik

Kathryn Warner said...

Thank you, Kasia - it's really lovely to see you again too! Hope all is well with you and Henry! :) I think that's a perfect title for a documentary, and I love the idea of that. :) But ohhhh dear at what your in-laws were told! :/

Anonymous said...

To make things even worse, yesterday- by pure chance, I suppose- my mother-in-law came across Braveheart on Polish TV. Still under Scottish spell, she called to share 'the news'. We were supposed to pay them a visit today, but I chose to stay behind and send my husband and children to listen how Isabella announced that 'son Edward the third belongs to William Wallace'.

Henry is not well, thank you :-) or rather his sribe- household knight has lost her 'Muse of fire' and has been squandering her days on waiting for Will Marshal to return from the tournament circuits of France (the aforesaid scribe-knight had no idea that, at times, Will could be as stubborn as his destrier Blancart):-)

Wish you beautiful evening,

Kasia Ogrodnik

Kathryn Warner said...

Ah yes, that lovely scene. I remember it well, unfortunately. :-) I know that a lot of people take Braveheart seriously because I get lots of blog hits searching for 'William Wallace fathered Isabella's child' or similar, but it still boggled me to see someone state it as fact like that!

Oh dear, sorry to hear that about Henry - hope Will Marshal returns soon :). I can imagine Henry was very stubborn, haha - and I love the name Blancart ;).

Thank you, you too!

Anerje said...

Welcome back! I can't believe 'Braveheart' has reared it's head again! But can't help laughing at your comments - re: your response to the 'the colonies'. Poor Edward getting stick because he doesn't lust after a 12 year-old girl!!!! Just ridiculous, isn't it? And had Piers been at the wedding, let's hope he would have burst into a Medieval chorus of the equivalent of 'It should've been me!'.

Anonymous said...

Glad that you have returned ... hope that you had a pleasant holiday. I'm curious ... has anyone spoken of Edmund Tudor as a perv for sleeping with the 13 year old Margaret Beaufort?

Elena Worsfold said...

Dear Karen, could you give the original link to a Russian forum? I will try to translate it properly - google always creates a mess.

You do have admires in magor Siberian cities as i can see from the map, the rest is mainly empty cold land :)

Have been your reader for more than a year and like it on Facebook

Elena Worsfold

Anonymous said...

@ Annonymous,

Yes, they have. Derek Wilson in his excuse of a book for spitting venom at people also claimed Margaret Beaufort was raped by her husband.

Kathryn Warner said...

Thanks, Anerje! It's really astonishing how influential Braveheart is even after so many years. :/ And yes, I can imagine Piers doing that :) :)

Thanks, Anon, and thanks to Bluffkinghal for answering the question :). I had a lovely holiday.

Elena, thanks so much for the offer! Unfortunately I can't find the page again - it came up on SiteMeter and I don't remember the address. :( I'm so glad you're reading and enjoying the blog and my Facebook page - thanks! :)

Anonymous said...

bluffkinghal:

Thanks. Which book, BTW, "Plantagenet Chronicles"?

Esther (forgot to sign last time)

Anonymous said...

Kathryn, William has returned and with him the lost Muse of Fire :-) They both have let me finish my latest text. If you are interested in the role William played in the Young King's military education (and not only) feel free to visit Henry's website. Do I sound like practicing something close to advertising? ;-)

Wish you a beautiful and eventful day,

Kasia Ogrodnik

Kathryn Warner said...

No problem at all, Kasia. ;) :) And here's the link to your site, for other readers: http://henrytheyoungking.com/ :-)

Have a wonderful day too! Hope you're having better weather than the endless dark dismal rainy days we're getting here :).

Anonymous said...

Thank you, Kathryn:-) It's not better here, in Poland. It's been raining cats and dogs for some time now, but, strange as it may seem, I do like rainy days. Good excuse to stay in and take care of the things that have been neglected due to sunny days:-)

Kasia Ogrodnik

Kathryn Warner said...

I'm really not a fan of rainy days, haha - I've had far, far too many of them in the Lake District, the wettest part of England...;-)

Anonymous said...

Kathryn, do you come from the Lake District? I'm currently reading Dorothy Wordsworth's journals. Delightful. I have to pay visit to Cartmel Priory, William Marshal's foundation, one day. William founded it in the memory of his late lord, Henry the Young King. Have you been there?

Kasia Ogrodnik

Kathryn Warner said...

Kasia, yes, I'm from the Lake District and grew up pretty close to Cartmel. :) It's a gorgeous little village, and I love the priory - here are some pics of it :) edwardthesecond.blogspot.com/2011/06/cartmel-priory.html

I've only ever been there a couple of times, which is a bit strange considering I grew up so close to it, but I suppose you generally don't often visit the tourist attractions in your home area...;-)

Kirsty Upham said...

A belated comment from a long-term reader: I share your frustration re "Braveheart"! I haven't actually seen the film, but having just started a PhD on Edward I've lost count of the number of times someone has said to me, "Ooh, is he the camp one who jumps out of the window in Braveheart?"


...Yes. Yes, that's entirely what I'm going to spend five years studying: the sexual politics of royal defenestration. ;)

Kathryn Warner said...

Hi Kirsty, and thanks for commenting! Wow, that's so great about your PhD - best of luck with the politics of defenestration! :):)