Boleyn said

Olga said

By the way I think this topic was formerly about Katherine of Aragon…and now Sharon is doing some catch-up reading on the WOTR. We do go on don’t we?

It’s all good through Olga at least with little twists like this, it’s shows that we are actually paying attention, and that our brains are working. Well some of us anyway.. I’m convinced that at times my mind doesn’t just wonder, sometimes it’s buggers off completely… LOL.

I agree Sharon, compared with what happened in the Wars of the Roses, the Tudors look like an episode of the Simpsons.
In fact even before E4 and H6 squabbles, the hassle of R2,H4 and H5 make the Wars of the Roses look like a episode of the Brady Bunch.

It funny really that all those reigns before H7 put the tin hat on at Bosworth all helped shaped the way the Tudors ran their game show.
If Lizzy had had children it would have been interesting to see how the Tudor game show would still be running. At least we can be sure the the losers wouldn’t get their heads chopped off, they would at least go home with a booby prize, Hmm now what would that be I wonder?
One of H8 old socks, that I could tolerate but I draw the line at a pair of his used underpants.

Cookie recipes? I am sure we can get there
I had thought I wasn’t going to start my WOTR reading until next year but I had a big block of Richard III reading to do, and I have gone from there. I’m still working through biographies and haven’t read any of the general histories or military books yet, it’s going to take me another year or two and then I have to keep going backwards All the way to the Anglo-Saxons. For some reason lots of people I know learned about the English monarchy in school here, but I completely missed out. A couple of years ago I barely knew anything about it and now I have about six billion books on my reading pile.

Jasmine said
So it is possible to make a case for the Woodvilles getting rid of E4. I am not yet convinced of it, but given all the speculation and assumptions made about people’s motives during this period, it is a theory worth considering.

The problem is Carson is completely contradicting herself. First she accuses EW of using witchcraft to keep Edward in a sexual thrall, then she claims that EW was worried Edward would tire of her sexually. So if we are to take her witchcraft accusation seriously then we would have to assume that EW would continue to use witchcraft to keep Edward under her influence, therefore there is no way she should have been worried that he would be getting tired of her. Unless we have to stray here and start wondering if perhaps some of the twigs were falling out of her broomstick.

Olga said

Cookie recipes? I am sure we can get there
I had thought I wasn’t going to start my WOTR reading until next year but I had a big block of Richard III reading to do, and I have gone from there. I’m still working through biographies and haven’t read any of the general histories or military books yet, it’s going to take me another year or two and then I have to keep going backwards All the way to the Anglo-Saxons. For some reason lots of people I know learned about the English monarchy in school here, but I completely missed out. A couple of years ago I barely knew anything about it and now I have about six billion books on my reading pile.

Jasmine said
So it is possible to make a case for the Woodvilles getting rid of E4. I am not yet convinced of it, but given all the speculation and assumptions made about people’s motives during this period, it is a theory worth considering.

The problem is Carson is completely contradicting herself. First she accuses EW of using witchcraft to keep Edward in a sexual thrall, then she claims that EW was worried Edward would tire of her sexually. So if we are to take her witchcraft accusation seriously then we would have to assume that EW would continue to use witchcraft to keep Edward under her influence, therefore there is no way she should have been worried that he would be getting tired of her. Unless we have to stray here and start wondering if perhaps some of the twigs were falling out of her broomstick.

I have serious issues to do with any of the accusations that were made for Witchcraft.. A lot of these accusations seemed to be based around some potion or remedy that these woman had tried to cure someone with. If they worked everyone was happy but if they failed the woman must be a witch and has murdered the person by means of witchcraft.
Woman from the highest to the lowest in the land would have been taught either by their mothers or grandmothers the art of healing, using herbs etc, as I’ve already mentioned.
If you look back in history apart from the Salem hysteria, (which by the way I believe was caused through Ergot poisoning) very few of the accused witches (loosesly worded) were actually accused by woman. It was men who generally accused them, and a lot of the accused woman were in fact midwives, or had been involved in childbirth cases. The men who accused them were doctors, who were perhaps jealous that a woman should be doing the job that they had been trained for, so to speak.
For many who couldn’t afford the services of a doctor, seeking out the local cunning woman was their only way of recieving treatment that they needed, and yes mistakes did happen where certain potions or herbal remedies backfired and killed the person, but didn’t doctors (male) make those mistakes as well.
I was reading today that poor Queen Anne’s child William, who died at the age of 11 in 1700 was given all sorts of strange remedies that the doctors thought were good for him. He was a sickly lad, and suffered from hydrophalis among other things, the hydrophalis issue the doctor dealt with by trepanning, which must have been awful for the boy as there was no anacestic for a start, so the pain of having a hole drilled in his head doesn’t bear thinking about. The doctor also used to give him a concoction make from some thing called Jesuits bark, a rudementary form of Quinine, which made the lad extremely sick, so in affect the doctor was giving him a poison, and yet nothing was said about this form of treatment it was just excepted.
But what would have happened if a woman had given him this course of treatment? Would she have been declaimed and shammed as a witch? I rather think she would to be honest.
Anyway the point I’m trying to make (in my usual long winded cackhanded manner) that none of these woman accused were witches, they were woman who were taught the art of healing using herbs. Woman were the ones who dealt with any illnesses within the household from the servants to her children and her husband.

Little bit of Trivia (again) from my warped mind.. It was said that when King Eddy Tudor was dying the doctors were a little desperate to save his life, so desperate in fact, that they tried every form of medicine they could to save him, to be honest it was probably their pills and potions which helped kill him. Anyway one of the rememdies they tried was trying 2 freshly caught fish to his feet and leaving them there to rot, the idea being that as they rotted away they would draw out Eddy’s illness and it would rot away along with the fish..The smell must have been horrendous. To the older members of court it must have seemed as if Lard arse had come back to haunt them.
Again Charles the 2nd feared no better the poor bloke was literely tortured to death. He had leeches applied to him, had hot cups applied to him, and lord alone knows what else. LOL He had a boil on his bum so I have heard so they put a leech on it, didn’t do any good however he just sat on it and squashed it..

Olga said

Jasmine said
So it is possible to make a case for the Woodvilles getting rid of E4. I am not yet convinced of it, but given all the speculation and assumptions made about people’s motives during this period, it is a theory worth considering.

The problem is Carson is completely contradicting herself. First she accuses EW of using witchcraft to keep Edward in a sexual thrall, then she claims that EW was worried Edward would tire of her sexually. So if we are to take her witchcraft accusation seriously then we would have to assume that EW would continue to use witchcraft to keep Edward under her influence, therefore there is no way she should have been worried that he would be getting tired of her. Unless we have to stray here and start wondering if perhaps some of the twigs were falling out of her broomstick.

I think you misunderstand Carson and her work. Her task for the book was to examine in as much detail as possible all the elements which came together in the reigns of E4 and R3, look at all the sources both contemporary and later, and try to ascertain what exactly was historical fact and what was later embellishment. She is not saying EW was a witch who cast spells. She is looking at contemporary accounts.

There were certainly contemporary rumours that both EW and her mother used witchcraft. This was also something which had been used in the past in relation to women who were out of the ordinary or achieved out of the ordinary things. If you think about the circumstances of E4’s marriage – here was a vigorous young man, recently come to kingship, secretly marrying not only a commoner, but a widow several years older than he, from a Lancastrian family and already with two part grown sons – people looked for an explanation and EW casting a spell on him seemed to the Medieval mind a rational explanation.

The fact that EW spent the next few years promoting her large family of siblings into every noble house which had an unmarried heir/heiress to lots of land and property, thus alienating the existing aristocracy, to the detriment of her husband’s control on the kingdom, was also thought to be a product of sorcery.

Ultimately, of course, EW’s power and influence came from the king and what he allowed her to do. If she thought she was in danger of losing that, perhaps the coming to power of her son, with her brother as Protector and her own influence protected, might have been a course of action she might have considered.

Whether Richard would have lived or not as Lord Protector is a moot point – look back at previous Lords Protector – how many of them survived to live a long and healthy life?

When Richard heard of the death of his brother – did he go rushing down to London with a great army at his back? No he did not. He ordered a Memorial service at York, and set off for London with 500 members of his household dressed in mourning, intending to meet up with the new king so they could enter London together.

Rivers, on the other hand, left Ludlow with around 2000 men and cartloads of arms. He had already made arrangements for his nephew Dorset to take on his role as Constable of the Tower (something Rivers had no power to do). Instead of waiting for Richard with E5, he sent Edward off ahead. When Richard arrived, they had a dinner. Buckingham joined them. Then something happened to change things.

Unfortunately we don’t have all the documentary evidence to know exactly what it was, but it resulted in Rivers, Grey and Vaughan being arrested and sent to Pontefract, where they were put on trial with Northumberland as judge, were found guilty and executed later.

With regard to your view of Carson’s work, it is not shared by many. Her book is well researched and she looks at all the evidence. She doesn’t seek to deify Richard by slandering others – she looks at the evidence and weighs it up.

It is interesting that people who are traditionalist in their approach to Richard III tend to always dismiss anything which looks at the events of his life and times which could be interpreted in a different way – they are always quick to believe suspect sources and even where it is proved that Richard did something of merit, always say that is ‘proof’ of his duplicitous nature. For example, there is now evidence that he provided a chapel for both sides of the war dead from one of the battles of WOTR – even this is regarded by some as having a hidden purpose.

Richard was a Medieval prince with all the virtues and failings that position implied. He was neither whiter than white, nor blacker than black. After 500 plus years, surely it is time to take a more balanced view, not only of him, but all the other players at the time?

No, I was merely commenting on what traditionalists tend to do – but if the cap fits…….

Boleyn said

<

Boleyn said
It was men who generally accused them, and a lot of the accused woman were in fact midwives, or had been involved in childbirth cases. The men who accused them were doctors, who were perhaps jealous that a woman should be doing the job that they had been trained for, so to speak.

Don’t forget that witchcraft could bring a charge of execution Although that generally didn’t happen to noblewomen, not until Henry VIII’s reign.

This is true, Anne B was accused of witchcraft, but as in the same way as Jaquetta was no matter how hard Lard arse tried to get his little weasels to get those charges to stick, he couldn’t. All that happened is tha he just made himself look a bigger prat thatn he already was.
Accusations of witchcraft against woman ws just a quick and convientant way of blackening a woman’s reputation and getting them out of the way.
If my lousy memory serves, Anne was accused of bewitching Lard Arse and seducing him whilst he was uder her spell, She was also accused of bringing about K.O.A’s death by casting a spell over her.
The general method of execution for witches was burning at the stake, hanged or being strangled to death by a blacksmith, and the body to be buried at crossroads. I think it was believed that at crossroads, your were buried under the sign of the cross which would be the closest to being buried in a churchyard since the accused witch was excommuncated, and that the cross would prevent your soul from seeking out revenge on the living. It’s something like that I think.
The other advantage of calling a nobel woman witch etc, was that by doing so the rest of the family would be tainted with the sin too. If a nobel man was wanting to get his hands on his nobel neighbours land, accuse his wife of witchcraft, get her convicted and executed and the nobel neighbour and his family will be run out of town almost, Q.E.D Land for sale, and it would be brought at a knockdown price because no one would want to buy land where the Nobel’s wife practised her witchcraft arts.

Sharon said

Anyanka said

Thread drift happens. Strange that non of our threads have ever got into cookie recipe exchanges yet…

Cookie recipes…Sorry no….but I did see that Claire put up a recipe for Hippocras on the Advent Calendar and it looks delicious!

heads off to look at that…..

Olga said

Boleyn said
Accusations of witchcraft against woman ws just a quick and convientant way of blackening a woman’s reputation and getting them out of the way.
If my lousy memory serves, Anne was accused of bewitching Lard Arse and seducing him whilst he was uder her spell, She was also accused of bringing about K.O.A’s death by casting a spell over her.

I think Henry’s witchcraft accusation was fairly vague, off the top of my head. He may have been indicating he was “under her spell” as in seduced, not literally. But the poison accusations he made, he told Fitzroy that Anne was planning on poisoning him and Mary. I believe he was carrying a little book around and reading his woes aloud Katherine had a black spot on her heart which started the poisoning accusations.

Yes I think this black spot K.O.A’s heart had was blown out of all proportion, I’ve read that when the doctor cut open her heart he found at it’s centre a hard lump. Why would he need to cut it open anyway? she was dead end of. What did it matter what she died of.
I tend to agree with the witchcraft accusation, it was a pathetic shot in the dark, and to be honest, just made Lard arse look like a laughing stock. The “under her spell” bit again was probably again blown out of all proportion, and was taken too literely. Maybe he said it as a a kind of hint to his weasels, to find evidence or invent it of witchcraft. Lard arse was very good at playing “the woe is me, poor bleeding Martyr, sad sack of **** storyline. Then crying to Jane or whoever else was handy “Wah Wah nobody loves me, etc”
I’ve said it before but he would make a fantastic shakespearean actor.