Sharon Kay Penman's Blog, page 21

A president and his dog

Below is the post I put up on my Facebook pages. Unfortunately, I cannot share a photo here, but you can click onto the link to see Sully's final vigil for the former president.

We all know—and most of us regret—how polarized our country has become, with politics too often seeming like a blood-sport. But we still share certain bedrock values, among them a belief in compassion and courage, and I think we can agree that George H.W. Bush showed both in the course of his long and eventful life. Here is a very touching photo of Sully, the former president’s service dog, keeping watch by his coffin. To the credit of the Bush family, they are returning Sully to America’s VetDogs, the organization that trained him, so that he may continue to help veterans in need. For anyone looking for a worthy cause to support, VetDogs is an excellent choice. For so many servicemen and women struggling with their ghosts and memories, a service dog like Sully can make a great difference.
https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/n...

What does Queen Catherine of Braganza have in common with Mark Twain?

I checked with June Hall McCash, author of the new novel about Marie of Champagne, Eleanor’s Daughter, and she assured me that the book will soon be available both as an e-book and in soft cover; it is currently being offered as a hardback. I was pleased to hear this, for I prefer e-books for my pleasure reading, both for the convenience and the option of increasing the font size, a definite plus for aging eyes! Below is a catch-up Today in History post for I fell far behind thanks to my squabbles with the Deadline Dragon.
All of the people I write about took the day off on November 30th. But there were two non-medieval deaths worth mentioning. On November 30, 1705, Catherine of Braganza, the much put-upon queen of Charles II, died. I always felt sympathy for Catherine. Deeply pious, this convent-bred bride was never at home in England, distrusted for her Catholic faith and scorned for her inability to give Charles an heir. Charles, of course, was probably the greatest womanizer ever to sit on the English throne; sorry to deny you the laurels, Edward IV. (And yes, Henry I sired over 21 illegitimate children, but I think he cared only about the sex; the women were merely the means to an end. Whereas I think Charles and Edward genuinely liked the ladies.) Catherine had to accept the presence at his court of her husband’s favorites, which had to be painful as well as humiliating, for she seems to have developed real feeling for the charming, lusty, and good-humored man she’d married. Charles became fond of her, too, not enough to “stay faithful to his marriage bed,” as they phrased it in the MA, but enough to try to protect her from the hostility of his more rabidly anti-Catholic subjects; he also intervened whenever a royal mistress was too disrespectful of his long-suffering queen. He refused to put her aside even after it became obvious she would never give him an heir, in kindly contrast to Henry Bluebeard Tudor. Of course it could be argued that in sparing Catherine’s feelings, he did his country no favors, for England would surely have been better off without the kingship of his inept, idiot brother, James. Catherine survived Charles by twenty years, remaining in England instead of returning to Portugal. She is said to have been the one who introduced tea drinking to the British public, thus inadvertently contributing to the causes of the American Revolution—remember the Boston Tea Party, people? The New York City borough of Queens is named after her, as she was the queen at the time of its founding—or so says Wikipedia.
And on November 30th, 1910, the man I consider the greatest American writer, Mark Twain, died. His last years were filled with sorrow and bitterness and I think he was probably glad to go. RIP, Mark. I think you would be pleased to know that you are just as esteemed in our time as you were in your own.

Eleanor's Daughter

I hope all of my Facebook friends and readers who live in Alaska came through their earthquake safely. I’ve experienced earthquakes when I lived in California, but never one of such magnitude; the first of the two registered a 7 on the Richter Scale.
I have good news for fans of Eleanor of Aquitaine and her family. June Hall McCash’s new novel, Eleanor’s Daughter, has just been published. The major character is Eleanor’s eldest daughter, Marie of Champagne. I’ve always found Marie to be both intriguing and sympathetic and I was able to give her a few scenes in Devil’s Brood, but I thought she deserved more than that brief time on center stage. So I was delighted when I learned from June that she was working on a novel about Marie. Although I’ve not been able to read it yet, I am sure she has done Marie justice and I wanted to spread the word to my fellow Eleanor aficionados. Here is the Amazon link.
https://smile.amazon.com/Eleanors-Dau...

Two unhappy medieval queens

Since I can count upon Rania to post historical happenings for today’s date, I can indulge myself by looking back at a date I missed earlier in the month. This gives me a chance to snipe at two of my least favorite kings—the Tudor Bluebeard and the hard-hearted Philippe Capet.

November 14, 1501 was the date of the wedding of the young Tudor prince, Arthur, and his Spanish bride, Katherine of Aragon. She would soon be a widow and many years later, her second husband, Arthur’s brother, Henry, would attempt to use this marriage to rid himself of a wife he no longer wanted, suddenly discovering that she (gasp!) had been married to his brother, and citing his own interpretation of Leviticus to argue that his marriage to Katherine was accursed. He must have been greatly surprised when his hither-to docile and dutiful wife balked, insisting that the marriage to Arthur was never consummated and she came to Henry’s bed a virgin. The sad story of what followed is very well known, of course, for although the Tudor dynasty ruled for little more than a hundred years, they managed to capture the imagination of historians, screen-writers, novelists, and the general public. This has always been hard for me to understand when the Plantagenets were just as colorful and most of them were more likable than the Tudor usurpers. (Excluding Elizabeth, of course, whom I call the only good Tudor.)

Henry’s abusive treatment of Katherine was eerily similar in some ways to the way the French king, Philippe Capet, treated his unwanted wife, the Danish princess Ingeborg. Ingeborg endured twenty years of imprisonment, deprivation, psychological torture, and general misery as Philippe sought desperately to end their marriage. He disavowed her the day after their wedding night, had his tame bishops declare the marriage null and void based upon a forged chart showing consanguinity. That did not impress the Popes, either the timid Celestine or the strong-willed Innocent III, and Philippe’s next ploy was to claim that the marriage had not been consummated because Ingeborg had cast a spell upon him. Temporary impotence caused by sorcery was a recognized ground for dissolution of a marriage, but Innocent was not buying this, either, and the impasse dragged on. In 1212, Philippe came up with my personal favorite of his arguments. He finally admitted the marriage had been consummated—which Ingeborg had been insisting all along—but claimed there had been no insemination. (I bet I am not the only one who remembers a claim of smoking pot but “not inhaling.”) Innocent’s response to this was priceless. He told Philippe to spare him “insanities of this kind.” Philippe caved in the following year and released Ingeborg from confinement, although they never lived together as husband and wife. Ingeborg’s story actually had a happier ending than Catherine of Aragon’s, for she outlived Philippe by thirteen years, devoting herself to good works and acts of piety, while being kindly treated by Philippe’s son and grandson. Henry VIII, took a different tack, of course, when he could not browbeat the Pope into getting his own way; he simply started his own Church.

A woman to rival Eleanor of Aquitaine

I hope all of you Thanksgiving travelers are now safely home. Here is my Today in History post.
Historically, the 27th of November was the date of death in 1198 of one of the most interesting and courageous medieval women, Constance de Hauteville, Queen of Sicily in her own right, unhappy wife and happy widow of the royal sociopath, Heinrich von Hohenstaufen, and mother of the Holy Roman Emperor Frederic II, one of the most colorful and controversial rulers of the MA. Constance had a remarkably eventful life—nearly being killed in a Salerno riot, captured and turned over to her husband’s rival, Tancred, only to escape as she was being taken under guard to Rome. She is most famous for getting pregnant for the first time at age 40 and then arranging to invite all of the local matrons to watch her give birth after learning that Heinrich’s enemies were claiming her pregnancy was a hoax. She also involved herself in a rebellion against her despot husband, horrified by the cruelty he was inflicting upon her Sicilian subjects, and likely would have been punished far worse than Henry punished Eleanor if not for an opportunist mosquito who chose that time to give Heinrich the malaria that claimed his life. (It has also been suggested he was poisoned, but while that is certainly plausible, historians tend to accept the malaria story) Constance at once kicked all the Germans out of Sicily and took the reins of power on behalf of her three year old son. Sadly, she outlived Heinrich by little more than a year, spending her last months in a desperate attempt to safeguard Frederick’s inheritance. She is the star of my first (and probably last) short story, A Queen in Exile, which appeared in George RR Martin’s anthology, Dangerous Women. She also made appearances in both Lionheart and A King’s Ransom. Here is my depiction of her death in Ransom, pages 567-568
* * *
Constance de Hauteville had celebrated her forty-fourth birthday on All Soul’s Day, but she knew it would be her last. She was dying. She’d been ill for months, and not even the doctors of the famed medical school in Salerno had been able to offer either hope or relief from the pain. She’d been very bitter at first, for she’d had little more than a year of freedom, a year to rule Sicily, to rid her kingdom of the Germans, to have her son with her—a privilege that Heinrich hade denied her, for he’d given Friedrich into the care of the Duchess of Spoleto soon after his birth. One year, one month, and twenty-seven days to have been a queen, a mother, and, God be praised, a widow. Not enough time. Not nearly enough.
She’d faced it as she’d faced every crisis in her life, without flinching, without self-pity or panic. What mattered was her son, still a month shy of his fourth birthday. She’d done all she could. She’d exiled Markward von Annweiler, who’d been made Duke of Ravenna and Romagna by Heinrich. In May, she’d had Friedrich crowned as King of Sicily, letting Otto and Heinrich’s brother Philip fight over the imperial crown. And she’d turned to the only man powerful enough to protect her son, the new Pope, Innocent III. In her last will and testament, she’d named Innocent as Friedrich’s guardian until he came of age. Now, in what she knew to be her last hours, she could only pray that it would be enough, that her son would be kept safe, his rights defended by the Church, and that he would not forget her too quickly.
* * *

Eleanor's granddaughter

I hope those of you who have been traveling home after the holiday were spared the worst of those devastating storms wreaking havoc in so much of the country. We were spared the snow here but there was so much rain that many of the roads were flooded. Thankfully, my fellow NJ residents seem to have heeded that warning: Turn around; don’t drown.
November 26th, 1252 was the date of death at age 64 of Blanche of Castile, daughter of Alfonso and Leonora, and therefore granddaughter of our Henry and Eleanor. After Richard’s death, Eleanor traveled to Castile to bring back one of her granddaughters to marry the son of the French king Philippe. She chose Blanche, then Blanca, over her elder sister, Urraca, supposedly because the latter’s name was too “foreign.” But that was definitely an excuse, a means of saving the elder girl’s pride, for it was common for a young bride to change a foreign name to one more familiar to her new subjects. Eleanor’s other granddaughter Richenza became known as Matilda after she was raised at Henry’s court. In my books, however, I kept her as Richenza, for I already had too many Matildas; what I wouldn’t have given to rename a few of the Henrys and Williams! Blanche became Queen of France and after her husband’s death, she acted as regent for her son, the future St Louis. She was clearly a woman of ability and courage and ambition, but she’s never been a favorite of mine. She was also the Mother-in-law from Hell, making life difficult for Louis and his young queen Marguerite, who was one of the four famous sisters of Provence, all of whom wed kings. But she deserves credit for all she did to secure her son’s throne. And in all honesty, Eleanor was not a warm and loving mother-in-law, either.

Sinking of the White Ship

I hope all of my American readers and friends had a lovely Thanksgiving and that those of you who are traveling will get home safely. There is a nasty storm looming, though, so take care.
November 25, 1120 was a date of momentous significance, for the sinking of the White Ship and the loss of Henry I’s only legitimate son set in motion events that would lead to civil war and the eventual accession to the English throne of the first king of the Plantagenet dynasty, Henry II. Imagine how different English and French history would have been if the White Ship had not gone down on that frigid November night. (Just the thought of being denied the Plantagenets to write about gives me a shiver.) Over three hundred men and women died when the White Ship struck a rock in Barfleur Harbor, most of them highborn. Here is a passage from that scene in Saints, page 22, as the only survivor, a butcher’s apprentice from Rouen who had clung to the ship’s yardarm during that long, icy night, waits to die.
* * *
When he heard the voices, muffled and distorted in the fog, Berold felt a weary wonderment that his ordeal was over, that God’s good angels were coming for him at last. But they came not in winged chariots as the priests had taught. Instead, they glided out of the fog in a small fishing craft, its hull painted yellow and black, its single sail as bright as blood.
Berold tried to yell; it emerged as a hoarse croak. But they’d already seen him, were dipping their oars into the sea. And then they were alongside, and one of the men had nimbly scrambled out onto the mast, was cutting him loose, and Berold realized that for him, salvation had come in the unlikely guise of three Breton fishermen. He had been spared to bear witness, to tell the world that the White Ship had gone down off Barfleur Point, with the loss of the English king’s son and all aboard, save only a butcher’s lad from Rouen.
* * *
The accepted story is that the crew were drunk, having shared some of the wine on board as they awaited the arrival of the young prince, William, who was carousing with friends in a wharfside tavern. But one historian later made an intriguing suggestion, speculating that it might have been murder. I tend to be very skeptical of conspiracy theories, especially when there is no way of proving them. The obvious suspect would have been the king’s nephew, Stephen, who was supposed to sail on the White Ship and changed his mind at the eleventh hour. From what we know of Stephen, though, he would not have been ruthless enough, or crafty enough, to pull off a mass murder of this magnitude.. But the historian, Victoria Chandler, had a much more interesting—and more plausible—suspect than Stephen in mind. She suggested that attention should be paid to Ranulf de Mechelin, a major character in Saints, whose checkered career indicates he would have been quite capable of such a monstrous crime and without losing a night’s sleep over the three hundred people who died when the White Ship sank. He also had a compelling motive; his uncle was a passenger on the White Ship and his death enabled Ranulf to claim the earldom of Chester. I am not convinced this was the case, but the story set forth in the the following link definitely makes interesting reading. http://www.medievalists.net/2013/05/2...
November 25th was also the date of a significant battle in the Holy Land, when in 1177, the sixteen year old Baldwin IV, known to history as the Leper King, soundly defeated Saladin at the battle of Montgisard, which rated several chapters in The Land Beyond the Sea.
And on November 25, 1487, Henry Tudor finally got around to having his wife, Elizabeth of York, crowned as his queen.

The king and the actress

I hope that all of my American Facebook friends and readers have a peaceful Thanksgiving, with safe travels and no political arguments at the dinner table. For my Facebook friends who do not celebrate Thanksgiving, I am sorry you are missing out on a such a special holiday. 😊 Below is a historical post that I meant to put up last week.
November 14, 1687 is the death date for one of my favorite historical figures, Restoration actress and long-time mistress of Charles II, Nell Gwynn. Charles was obviously very attached to Nell, for their liaison lasted from 1668 until his death in 1685. They had two sons, one of whom died young; the older boy was made a duke by Charles, who was always generous to his mistresses and illegitimate children. Nell was said to be pretty, charming, and witty. Her most quoted quip came when her carriage was stopped by a mob who thought it contained Charles’s unpopular, aristocratic French mistress, who was Catholic at a time when Catholicism was a trigger point in English society. Not at all daunted by the turmoil, Nell stuck her head out the carriage window and called out, “Good people, I am the Protestant whore!” On his deathbed, Charles famously told his brother James, “Let not poor Nelly starve.” James was not the most admirable of men, but he did honor Charles’s request, paying Nell’s debts and giving her a pension. Sadly, she survived Charles by only two years. She suffered a stroke in March of 1687 and had several others that incapacitated her before her death on November 14th of that year; her most recent biographer thinks she’d contracted syphilis. . She was only thirty-seven. Not surprisingly, she has been popular with Hollywood and writers over the years. I highly recommend Exit the Actress by Priya Parmar, a very well researched and highly enjoyable account of Nell’s life. I was glad when Priya did not take the readers to Nell’s deathbed; I would rather think of her in her prime, bedazzling audiences and the king.

Save a book!

I see my orthopedist next week and hope I’ll be able to resume regular Facebook posts afterwards. In the meantime, I wanted to drop by for a quick Hi and to share something that made me laugh. Unfortunately I cannot post it here the way I do on Facebook, so I'll just have to relay the message:

A BOOK DIES EVERY TIME YOU WATCH A REALITY SHOW

An amazing rescue

I am sorry to have dropped off the radar screen again. But my rogue knee has shattered our tenuous truce and declared outright war, which has kept me off the computer.
I hope all of my California friends and readers are coping with the Hellstorm fires and dangerous air pollution that have ravaged your state. Those who want to help the fire victims can donate to the Red Cross. I cannot even imagine an ordeal like this, especially one that is on-going.
As always in tragedies, we get to see human nature at its best. Here is one such story, about a 93 year old woman trapped in the path of the Camp Fire. Even more amazing than her rescue is what her rescuer did after getting her to safety.
https://www.cnn.com/2018/11/17/us/cam...