Sharon Kay Penman's Blog, page 91

Lionheart in Cyprus and Anne Boleyn gets her crown

By June 1st, 1191, Richard Coeur de Lion had complete control of Cyprus. His fury at the way Isaac Comnenus had maltreated his men and threatened his sister and betrothed was real enough, but as soon as he’d glanced at a map, he’d seen what a valuable supply base the island would be for the Kingdom of Jerusalem, just a day’s sail away from the Syrian coast. He gave the self-proclaimed emperor enough rope to hang himself, and Isaac obliged by sneaking away in the night after agreeing to the terms Richard had demanded of him. In this scene from Lionheart, Berengaria, now Richard’s wife, is puzzled by how calm he is after getting word that Isaac had disavowed their pact and he explains why Cyprus is of such strategic importance to Outremer.
Pages 255-256
“But…but why did you agree to make peace with Isaac, then?”
“Because it seemed like I might get what I wanted without having to fight for it. He agreed to swear fealty to me and pledged his full support to recapture Jerusalem. If he honored the terms, we’d have gotten a thousand men, the promise of Cypriot harvests, and money I could put toward the cost of the campaign. Naturally, I trusted him about as much as I’d trust a viper, so I demanded his daughter as a hostage and the surrender of his castles. If he’d kept faith, I’d have been satisfied with that.”
“Did you think he would keep faith?”
He smiled without answering and went to the door to admit his squires. (Omission)
His squires had assisted Richard with his hauberk and he was buckling his scabbard. Berengaria was still trying to come to terms with this new knowledge, that Richard had been two steps ahead of the Cypriot emperor from the very first. If Isaac were not such a monster, she might have felt a twinge of pity for him. But she did not doubt he deserved whatever Richard had in mind for him, and now that it had been explained to her, she could see that holding Cyprus would be very beneficial to the Holy Land. Yet how could Richard spare the time to defeat Isaac when they were awaiting him at the siege of Acre?
(Omission)
“What of the men at Acre, Richard? Will they not be upset by this delay?”
“It will not take that long.”
“How long would it take to conquer an entire country?” She’d not realized she’d spoken the words aloud, not until Richard paused on his way to the door.
“Well,” he said, “I wagered Andre that we could do it in a fortnight” And then he was gone, leaving her alone in their marriage bed, a bride of four days, staring at that closing door.
* * *
When it came to military matters, Richard was usually right, and that proved to be the case, too, in Cyprus. The Cypriots were delighted to be rid of Isaac and Richard agreed to issue a charter confirming the laws and rights as they’d been in the days before Isaac had usurped the throne, but of course he exacted a high price for this privilege, imposing a steep levy upon their goods to help finance the crusade; like most medieval kings, Richard was very good at squeezing money from people. He sold Cyprus to the Templars and later bestowed it upon Guy de Lusignan to get him out of Outremer and pave the way for Conrad of Montferrat’s kingship. Guy didn’t live long enough to enjoy his new possession, but his older brother Amaury made the most of it, getting Richard’s nemesis, Heinrich von Hohenstaufen, to recognize him as the Cypriot king. Amaury would use Cyprus as a stepping stone to a far more prestigious crown, that of Jerusalem itself, but the de Lusignan family continued to rule the island long after the kingdom of Jerusalem was only a memory. And if you think the Angevins had a colorful history, you should read what the de Lusignans got up to on Cyprus!
Also on June 1st, this time in 1533, Anne Boleyn was crowned as England’s queen. I wonder if she felt that her race had been won as the crown was placed upon her head. Or did she perhaps have any forebodings for the future? Anyone who totally trusted Henry had to be one of God’s great fools, and Anne was not a fool. But she was insecure and arrogant, a dangerous combination for a woman wed to a man now convinced that his will and God’s Will were one and the same. My own feeling is that the only one of Henry’s six wives to be truly happy on her wedding day was Katherine of Aragon, for I think she loved her golden young prince and would never have believed it had she been told what a monster he would later become. I think the BBC production, The Six Wives of Henry VIII, has stood the test of time and remains the most compelling and convincing account of his sad and sordid marital history. It will be interesting to see what the BBC does with the upcoming series based on Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall and Bringing up the Bodies.

The Duchess of York and Lady Stanley

Two women of great interest to students of the Wars of the Roses are associated with this last day of May.
May 31st, 1495 was the date of death for Cecily Neville, Duchess of York and mother to the two Yorkist kings. Anne Easter Smith has written a novel about this austere, resolute woman, Queen by Right.
And lastly, on May 31st in 1443, Margaret Beaufort was born, no cause for celebration for any Yorkists, of course. She is a character in Brian Wainwright’s wonderfully clever spoof, The Adventures of Alianore Audley

For my British readers

I wanted to let my British readers know that today is the last day to buy the Kindle edition of Prince of Darkness on Amazon.co.UK at the bargain price of 99 pence.
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Prince-Darkne...

A martyred saint, the red queen, and the enigmatic Jane Seymour

May 30th 1431 was the date upon which Joan of Arc was burnt at the stake. I’ve never known quite what to make of Joan, but I have always felt great sympathy for her as this has to be one of the very worst ways to die. She would later be canonized as a saint, but that would not have been much consolation to her on the day of her death.
May 30th, 1445 was the day upon which Marguerite d’Anjou was crowned Queen of England. Given how unhappily her life turned out, this wasn’t a lucky day for her, either.
And May 30th, 1536 was the day of the marriage of Henry VIII and victim—er, wife--Jane Seymour. Henry, always a class act, had waited all of ten days after the murder of wife #2 to wed Jane. Wouldn’t it be fascinating to know what she really felt about Henry and her marriage? Was she a willing partner in her ambitious family’s schemes to snare a king? Was she merely a pawn who obeyed because she felt she could do nothing else? Was she at all afraid to marry a man who’d treated his first two wives so badly? Or was she like Anne Boleyn, so eager for a crown that she had tunnel vision? We know that Anne of Cleaves and Katherine Parr were not willing wives, but we can only speculate about Jane.

A young shepherd in peril

My friend Christopher Gortner sent me this plea for a young white shepherd named Alex, whose time is running out at the San Bernadino, CA animal shelter. Sadly, Echo White Shepherd Rescue does not have a CA branch. Can my fellow animal lovers share this post? The more people who know of Alex’s plight, the better chance he has of being rescued. I still remember how close Tristan came to catastrophe; he was pulled from a high kill shelter on his very last day by Joan Alexander, whom I came to call Tris’s Echo Angel.
Even if you're not on Facebook, as I know many of my Goodreads readers are not, I would think you could still access this?
https://www.facebook.com/298927593559...

Maya Angelou

I feel as if a star has been extinguished, leaving a black hole where there was a shimmering light. http://www.washingtonpost.com/enterta...

Another of history's What Ifs, and a Wolf Hall mini-series

On May 28th, 1265, Edward, eldest son and heir of King Henry III, was able to escape from the comfortable custody of his cousin, Harry de Montfort; Edward and Henry had been held since Simon de Montfort’s victory at the battle of Lewes a year earlier. Edward’s ruse was a clever one; he lured Harry and his guards into a horse race and when their horses were tired, he then leaped onto a fresh mount and galloped off to freedom. He benefited greatly from Harry’s trusting nature; this was the second time that Harry had taken his word of honor as gospel, only to be double-crossed. History was dramatically changed by Edward’s escape. Had he remained under Simon’s control, there would have been no battle at Evesham two months later.
Many of you may have already heard about this, but I only learned recently that Wolf Hall is being filmed as a six part BBC mini-series.

King John, a martyred countess, and a fun Game of Thrones quiz

On the medieval historical front, May 27, 1199 was the day when John finally got his wish and was crowned King of England, the first and last monarch to bear the name John, which may be seen in itself as a commentary on his reign. And on May 27, 1541, Henry VIII committed one of his most appalling judicial murders, executing Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, on a trumped-up charge of treason. The accounts of the beheading of the frail, sixty-eight year old woman, his cousin, George of Clarence’s daughter, and one of the last surviving members of the Plantagenet dynasty, are already well known, so I’ll leave it at that, feeling that dwelling upon them would be a grim way to begin the day.
And since we Game of Thrones addicts were denied our fix on Sunday, here is a fun quiz for my women readers. I approached it thinking, “ABC—anyone but Cersei!” But I turned out to be Margaery Tyrell, which is cool since the wonderful Natalie Dormer has breathed such life into her character for the HBO series. Neither Margaery nor Tywin had made much of an impression on me in the books, but Natalie and Charles Dance have been absolutely amazing on-screen.
http://www.medievalists.net/2014/05/2...

The furry three muskateers

Happy Memorial Day And here is a video sure to make my fellow animal lovers smile.

http://www.today.com/pets/they-teach-...

Richard III's final resting place

I hope all my American friends and readers are having a wonderful Memorial Day, with special good wishes to vets and their families.
After reading this article about Leicester’s plans for Richard III, several things struck me. Leicester is going all out to make Richard’s reburial a memorable event and I can’t help wondering if York would have shown as much enthusiasm. But it sounds as if all of the wrangling over Richard is going to cost British taxpayers a lot of money and that is a shame.
I am very pleased, though, that after five centuries, Richard will be getting a proper funeral and a final resting place worthy of the last Plantagenet king. I am not superstitious, but it seems almost miraculous to me that his lost grave was found for there was such a narrow window of opportunity to prove that the bones were indeed his. If it had happened a decade or two earlier, DNA technology would not have advanced to the point that a positive identification could be made, and if it happened twenty years down the line, there may not have been any descendants to test for their DNA, as the two individuals whose lineage was traced back seventeen generations to Richard’s sister are no longer young and neither have children.
Rest in peace, Richard, and even if you would have preferred York to Leicester had you been consulted, at least you are not buried near any of the Tudors or that Shakespeare chap.
http://www.leicestermercury.co.uk/VIC...