Henry Carey, the only son of William Carey and his wife, Mary Boleyn Carey, was born on 4 March 1526. Although he has been rumored to have been the illegitimate son of King Henry VIII, the baby was most likely William Carey’s biological son. Several excellent historians, such as Eric Ives, note that Mary was… Read more Henry Carey, 1st Baron Hunsdon
On 3 March 1284 King Edward I, Longshanks, enacted the Statute of Rhuddlan, also known as the Statute of Wales. The statute is named for Rhuddlan Castle, one of the new fortifications Edward built to quell any potential Welsh resistance. This statute turned the formerly independent kingdoms of Wales into the English Principality of North… Read more The Statute of Rhuddlan
Gruffydd ap Llywelyn Fawr was the firstborn son of the Prince of Gwynedd, Llywelyn Fawr (Llywelyn the Great) and a mistress, Tangwystl Goch ferch Llywarch from Rhos. Under Welsh law, Gruffydd was just as eligible to inherit his father’s lands and title as any ‘legitimate’ son, but Llywelyn Fawr’s need for an alliance with King… Read more The Death of Gruffydd ap Llywelyn Fawr
Prince Adolphus, the 10th child and 7th son of George III and Queen Charlotte, was born in Westminster on February 24, 1774. As you can see from the above portrait, the little guy was a cutie when he was a child. George III and Charlotte were, in spite of the problems they had with their… Read more Happy Birthday, Obscure Georgian Prince!
Edward Seymour, a man born to a mere country “sir”, became the Duke of Somerset on 17 February 1547 by a combination of ruthlessness, mendacity, ambition, and the good luck to have a sister whom King Henry VIII had wanted to boink. Jane Seymour died less than two weeks after the birth of the king’s… Read more The New Duke of Somerset
Valentine’s Day has been celebrated a lot longer than many people realize, but it wasn’t until the ideas of courtly love started to spread in the Middle Ages that the holiday become more about flirtations than fertility. Part of the romance of Valentine’s Day was the belief that the 14th of February was day when… Read more Saint Valentine’s Day
The medieval and premodern monarchs who held onto their thrones were the ones who were appallingly ruthless. Kindness was not rewarded, and the nice guys almost always lost their crown. Even when their reigns were otherwise good for the country, or renown contextually for tolerance and progressive thinking, dark deeds still needed doing and there… Read more Tudors and the Death of Their Rival Cousins
I’m currently reading a fascinating book, written by Matthew Champion, about church graffiti of the medieval period. It is all kinds of interesting, not only for the information about witch marks and symbology, but also for the various cultural/historical asides it contains. For example, he explained the medieval – nay, pre-Christian – roots behind the shape of… Read more From Little Acorns Mighty Oaks Grow
On 30 January 1607 the Bristol Channel experienced a sudden influx of flood water, which scientists and historians believe was either a severe storm surge or may even have been the result of a tsunami. The flooding effected several hundred miles of coast along both the Welsh and English sides of the channel, inflicting severe… Read more A British Tsunami? The Great Flood of 1607
On 29 January 1801 a baby girl was born, ostensibly the posthumous and orphaned offspring of a seaman by the surname of Thompson, in reality she was the daughter of Lady Hamilton and her lover, war hero Admiral Horatio Nelson. Admiral Nelson and Lady Hamilton were, in public, the babies Godparents who adopted her after… Read more Horatia Nelson