Hotspur: Henry Percy - Medieval Rebel

by Andrew W. Boardman

Immortalized by Shakespeare in Henry IV, Part I, Henry Percy, nicknamed "Hotspur", is among the best known of all his warlike characters. As the young, honourable but impatient rebel soldier whose chivalrous exploits on the battlefield end in disaster at Shrewsbury in 1403, Hotspur is the archetypal a character of such tragic and dramatic significance that even his well-known nickname has passed from history into legend. But who was the historical Henry Percy, and why did his rise to fame bring him into direct confrontation with his king? This work tells the story of the real Henry Percy and his overbearing family and how the survival of a great northern dynasty led to open rebellion and ultimately military failure.

Genres: British Literature, Biography, History

240 pages, Hardcover

First published December 4, 2003

Reviews

[Lisa · Rating 2 out of 5]

Anyone who has seen or read William Shakespeare’s Henry IV Part 1 will remember Henry ‘Hotspur’ Percy, the fiery medieval rebel and foil to Prince Hal. But the historical Hotspur differs from Shakespeare’s version notably (he was actually older than Henry IV and certainly not of Henry V’s generation) and has become something of a legend himself, albeit on a lesser scale. Andrew W. Boardman’s “military biography” aims to focus on the historical Hotspur, pulling him from the shadows of his own legend and Shakespeare’s.

I sought out Hotspur: Henry Percy, Medieval Rebel because while I am interested in Hotspur and have lapped up every novel I’ve found that features him and vastly enjoy Shakespeare’s take on him, I haven’t read a lot about him or his family in a historical context. So this seemed to be perfectly targeted at what I really wanted: a book solely about Hotspur that would allow me to ‘discover’ the historical Hotspur for myself.

Sadly, I didn’t find this book very enjoyable. For a start, I think the fact that this isn’t a conventional biography made it a disappointment – Boardman is largely focused on Hotspur’s military career and less attention is given to exploring his life when he’s not armoured. Little attention, for instance, is given to his marriage beyond noting that his wife, Elizabeth Mortimer, carried within her the Mortimer claim to the throne and this may have motivated Hotspur to rebel against Henry IV with the intention of placing Edward Mortimer on the throne. Boardman also sometimes discusses aspects of Hotspur’s personality, describing as ‘hyperactive’ or talking about his ‘overbearing’ father, but he doesn’t really take the time to show why he describes Hotspur this way.

It's hard to put my finger on what precisely bugged me about the construction of the book. Boardman is clearly enthusiastic about his subject and, on a sentence-to-sentence basis, his writing is clear and readable. I wondered at first whether it felt like each chapter had been constructed independently of each other and they didn’t lead into each other as well as they should but that isn’t quite right. Boardman did seem to take a meandering approach to his discussion, starting his chapter on the actual Battle of Shrewsbury by talking about the debates where the battle was held and the spat between 1950s military historians over the matter before getting to the meat of the battle itself. I really wondered whether every chapter needed at least one discussion about the Shakespearian/legendary Hotspur being different from the historical Hotspur. This is an important topic to discuss but to me it would have been better touched on in the introduction/preface before being discussed in detail in the conclusion, or being given its own chapter.

Boardman seems intent to separating Hotspur from the legends about him and yet, I came away feeling that instead, he had just created another legendary Hotspur. Perhaps more grounded in the historical record and undeniably flawed but still a larger-than-life, heroic, romantic figure.

I also caught a couple of typos (1339 instead of 1399, Henry IV instead of Henry V) which are understandable (I typo all the time) but still annoying to come across.

I’m not sure I feel this is worth reading. I think there’s good information in it but I found it hard to parse and I feel that Boardman’s Hotspur is just as much cloaked in legend as Shakespeare’s, though perhaps more historically accurate. I also don’t feel it really came close to introducing me to the “real” (i.e. historical) Hotspur.

[Mercedes Rochelle · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is an extremely well-written book about one of those enigmatic heroes who was so well depicted by Shakespeare that we’ll never entirely shake loose from the vision he gave us. I think the author has done a remarkable job trying to remove fact from fiction, considering that historical Northumberland is pretty much a foreign country to us. We see Hotspur as a personification of the ideal knight as understood by his contemporaries, rather than an anomaly: “Thousands of dead, pillaged lands, war crimes against civilian populations and a number of other ‘unchivalrous’ deeds give us cause to question the medieval knight’s habitual need to prove himself through violent action; but this is exactly what it meant to live and breathe the code in a world where, like today, it was perfectly acceptable to destroy a country’s infrastructure and dismiss civilian deaths as collateral damage. In the medieval world, this WAS chivalry in its purest form…” It was Hotspur’s motivation to be the best, most chivalrous knight in the world and he pushed himself to extremes in order to achieve his goals. Naturally restless, he craved action and preferred dangerous assignments to boring garrison duty. And apparently he was very good at his job, which is why the Scots gave him his nickname.

We get a good feeling for what life was like on the marches between England and Scotland, and how violence and raiding was a part of life they understood all too well. The Percies were a law unto themselves, and ruled the north almost as kings; only a man born and raised in such an environment could control the tempestuous Scots. In this book, plenty of attention was given to Hotspur’s impetuous father, Henry Percy 1st Earl of Northumberland as well as his uncle, Thomas Percy—warrior, diplomat and politician—who served as Richard II’s Steward of the Household before deserting to Bolingbroke. Both men were influential in Hotspur’s life. His father, to all appearances, was autocratic and kept young Hotspur under his thumb for much of his son’s adult life. Chafing under his father’s harsh authority could have been one of the reasons Hotspur broke away on occasion and made his own decisions—often with disastrous results. His uncle Thomas was more puzzling; his decision to rebel against Henry IV at Shrewsbury has never been satisfactorily explained. Even the king was caught by surprise, so successful were his pursuits up to that point. Apparently Thomas was a family man first and foremost and supported Hotspur to the end, even as Earl Henry mysteriously failed to show up at the fatal battle of Shrewsbury. In the end, Hotspur was defined by the predatory age he lived in, “Cradled in war, and trained in all respects to deal with local border raiding, his main obligation was to hold by force that which his ancestors had previously won.” It is a fascinating story about a character out of legend.

[Ella · Rating 3 out of 5]

Wasn’t impressed with the writing, which often skirts around interesting historical tidbits and comes back to them in a disjointed way. I’m very glad I read Helen Castor’s The Eagle and the Hart first. Still, an interesting read.

[Martin Marais · Rating 4 out of 5]

A very interesting insight into the life and times of Henry 'Hotspur' Percy. I would recommend this book to anyone who wishes to get a good overview of the subject without getting bogged down in the minutiae.