Category: Litreture

Josephine Tey

25/6/2020

Elizabeth Macintosh, known to many a Ricardian as Josephine Tey was born on the 13th February in 1952.

An extremely private person, known to hate the press and who gave few interviews, Elizabeth Macintosh was the author of detective novels. In the 1930's Macintosh wrote under the pseudonym of Gordon Daviot, however, her mysteries, including her most famous, The Daughter of Time, was published in 1951.

Six of her post war novels written under the pseudonym of Josephine Tey feature, as their main character, one Inspector Alan Grant who appears in the aforementioned The Daughter of Time. Grant is laid up in hospital with a broken leg, to keep himself occupied he reads about Richard III and decides to prove that he was innocent of the murder of the Princes in the Tower.

It was from her book Miss Pym Disposes that Tey got the idea for her novel. One of her characters, Miss Lux, a medical lecturer who dislikes the theatre calls Shakespeare's Richard III a "criminal libel on a fine man, a blatant piece of political propaganda, and an extremely silly play" it is this idea that she argued in The Daughter of Time.

The story of Richard as a murderer of innocents, states Grant is a 'very superior, first growth, dyed-in-the-wool Tonypandy,' a reference to lies and half-truths taken as correct that continues unabated and unchallenged.

A crime novel A Daughter of Time is, but it's a thought-provoking one none the less, its reasoning shouldn't be limited to Richard III's story either.

Elizabeth Macintosh's funeral took place two days before the state funeral of George VI, it was attended by her friends Dame Edith Evans and John Gielgud who played the Richard of Bordeaux in Tey's play of the same name.

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Beunans Meriasek : Cornish Play

17/6/2020

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In 1497, Henry Tudor, who took the crown of England from Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485, began to levy taxes on the Cornish people to pay for his wars in Scotland. This lead to what history calls the Cornish Rebellion of June that year.

The rebellion began with voices of unrest in the village of St Keverne where Michael Joseph An Gof and Thomas Flamank spoke out about these taxes and what they thought the people of Cornwall should do about it. The rebellion ended on the 28th June with the execution of James Tuchet, Baron Audley who lead the rebels to London.

At that time, and written in the Cornish language was a miracle play called Beunans Meriasek, it's theme was about the struggle between good and evil. In this play, evil is represented by King Teudar.

It's likely the Cornish were using this play to criticise the king in a subtler way than that of violence.

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Edgar Allan Poe: The Raven

7/10/2015

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"Nevermore"

The Raven by Edger Allan Poe is a poem about internal conflict.

Poe writes early in his poem that the man of his tale has been trying to achieve "surcease of sorrow for the lost Lenore" to
forget about her by burying himself in old books.

He is interrupted in his efforts by a knock on the door, on opening it he only finds:

"darkness there and nothing more."

He whispers into the darkness the name of his love "Lenore" but all he hears in return is the echo of his own voice
repeating her name. Only just returning to his book he hears again another tapping, this time it is at his window.

Flinging open the window in flys a:

"stately Raven, the bird of ill-omen"

On entering the room the raven perches on the bust of a Greek goddess.
Staring for a while the man asks the Raven for his name, surprisingly the bird answers," Nevermore."

Poe goes on explain that the man considers the Raven has brought him bad news.

"Startled at the stillness broken by reply so aptly spoken,
`Doubtless,' said I, `what it utters is its only stock and store,
Caught from some unhappy master whom unmerciful disaster
Followed fast and followed faster till his songs one burden bore -
Till the dirges of his hope that melancholy burden bore
Of "Never-nevermore."

The man becomes interested in what the Raven actually means by Nevermore and proceeds to asks of the bird questions
such as

"Is there balm in Gilead?" - "Nevermore."
Can Lenore be found in paradise? - "Nevermore."
"Take thy form from off my door!" - "Nevermore."

in the hope that the bird will bring an end to his sorrows.

Getting no answer but Nevermore, the man at realises that he is defeated and with this understands that he will never deal
with the loss of Lenore, this one thought is represented by the Raven who does not move from the statue and continues
to croak the single word "Nevermore."

A pointless conversation and the conflict between desire to forget and desire to remember drives the man insane.

"And my soul from out that shadow that lies floating on the floor
Shall be lifted - nevermore!"

Wonderfully Gothic....Great stuff!

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Sir Ralph de Blancminster of Bien Amie

10/4/2015

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The ballad, that you can read at the end of this blog was written by Reverend Stephen Hawker, was published in 1867, and is the story of a crusading knight known as Ralph de Blanchminster of the manor Bien Amie in the County of Cornwall.

Ralph, whose tale in the ballad, is not fictitious but based on the true story of Reginald Blanchminster, a devoted husband and father, abandoned for another man by Isabel his adulterous wife.

I am adding, along with Hawkers ballad, an excerpt from my ongoing research into the "Blanchminster of Binamy" the story of my medieval maternal ancestors who were prominent in England from 1086 to 1289.

Ralph's real name was Reginald, he was the Blanchminster heir, born around the middle of the thirteenth century.

Reginald Blanchminster was the brother of my 20th great grandmother, both have a very very special place in my heart.

Islam had spread as far as France by 732, and by 1095 the Saracens had refused to allow the Christians to continue their pilgrimages to the Holy City. The Christian world considered this as an act of aggression, so it was inevitable that warfare between the civilisation of Christianity and Islam followed. Having left Isabel and Ralph behind Reginald probably arrived in Palestine shortly after Prince Edward and joined others to relieve the Christian forces in Acre, but by the time they had arrived in Tunis he found the French king had signed a peace treaty just before his death and Edward's crusading army was forced to return to Sicily to wait the arrival of the forces of the French kings successor Phillip III. Phillip never arrived and Edward and his troops continued to Acre alone finally landing at on the 9th May 1271. Jerusalem had fallen in 1244 and Acre was now the centre of the Christianity. Reginald and his fellow crusaders, although they were an important addition to the garrison at Acre, stood little chance against the Muslim superior forces and they would have soon realised that their position was increasingly desperate, by the middle of 1272 they had seen the Cypriot army join forces against them. Reginald was either killed outright in one of the many battles with Muslim forces but as the aforementioned Hawker suggests he was fatally wounded. Before we go on to reveal the real reason of Sir Reginald Blanchminster’s sad death in Syria we must read the Reverend Hawker’s ballad entitled Sir Ralph de Blancminster of Bien Amie......."

".........In Hawkers ballad we see the fictitious Bertha as a young woman who was already resolved of the fact that her husband will not return to Binamie with his life, she states “Time trieth troth” or “time tests faith” She goes on to give Reginald a time frame and a ultimatum stating “three years let the severing seas divide” and “a warrior must rest in Bertha's bed”. Obviously undeterred by these words from his wife, he cries a sad farewell to his turreted castle and riding into the distance shouts "Thou too farewell my chosen bride" Hawker then goes onto suggest in the verse “The Treachery” that Bertha had not kept her side of the bargain. In a wilful betrayal of fidelity, Bertha becomes an adulterous wife fleeing Ralph’s manor of Binamie on the call of one Sir Rupert! The Cornish messenger tells the dying Ralph of three dark omens in a kindly effort to break the new of Bertha's betrayal but the astute Ralph asks “Say on the woe thy looks betide” to which the poor page has to reply “Master, the Lady Bertha s fled the hall."

Reginald’s wife in Hawkers ballad is named Bertha, in fact she was Isabel, a woman who we know little about. At this point Reginald had been married only a few years and between 1262 and 1265 Isabel had given Reginald a son who they named Ralph. During the next five years Reginald became increasingly unhappy and his family think that this was due to the discontent he felt on having heard of the decision of the young prince Edward and Edmund of Cornwall leaving on a crusade to the Holy Land, but we now know is that this could not be further from the truth. At prayer and his frequent times spent alone he struggled with his conscience, asking himself whether he should he remain at his Cornish manor or if he should take up the cross himself. Ralph’s decision to journey to the Holy Land would have been either duty or religious sentiment. Of course both of these would have undoubtedly influenced him as it had done large masses of people who enthusiastically set out for the east to meet the Muslims in battle. Finally with his mind made up Reginald set forth in 1270 to join Prince Edward and the Earl of Cornwall on crusade.

Hawkers ballad is of the sentimental kind, very popular in the late nineteenth century, he has romanticised the tale of a hero knight and his young wife fleeing to the arms of her waiting lover, in fact Hawker was not too far from the truth.
The Sir Rupert in the ballad was one John Allet.

According to an entry for him in the Cornish Fleet of Fines it is stated

Ralph Blanchminster * She was the widow of Sir Reginald Blanchminster, and her marriage with John de Aleth had been secretly performed. ...

in a manuscript dated 1284 it states

John Allet in Kenwyn and Isabella his wife hold the Isle of Scilly and hold there all kinds of pleas of the Crown throughout their jurisdiction and make indictments of felonies.

The aforementioned * entry of Reginald’s fathers death in the Episcopal Register of Exeter we find the entry of the death of Reginald and along side it, probably written at the same time, is an entry regarding Isabel Blanchminster. The purpose of this entry regarding Reginald’s widow in this register is to record the sentence of excommunication pronounced against her for her adultery with Allett. We can assume that Isabel began an affair with Sir John Allet soon after the birth of Ralph and this was the real reason that induced Reginald to take up the cross. How poor Reginald came to know of this infidelity is not known, betrayed and rejected his journey to the Holy Land must have been a sorrowful one. Away on crusade and supposing him dead Isabel and Allet married in secret. The effect all this had on their son is not known but the news of this adulteress marriage and excommunication must have been a major scandal at the time. The Allets must have been keen to stay on good terms with Reginald’s sister Margery, for we know that the two families were still in contact by 1290 as John Allet witnessed a gift of land on the 9th June.

After this date both Isabel and Allett fade into obscurity.

And now for Hawker's Ballard

The Vow

Hush! Tis a tale of elder time
Caught from an old barbaric rhyme
How the fierce Sir Ralph, of the haughty hand
Harnessed him for our Savious land.
“Time trieth troth” the lady said
“And a warrior must rest in Berthas bed.
Three year let the severing seas divide,
And strike thou for Christ and they trusting bride”
So he buckled on the beamy blade
That Gaspar of Spanish Leon made
Whose hilted cross is the awful sigh
It must burn or the Lord and his tarnished shrine.

The Adieu

“Now a long farewell tall Stratton Tower
Dark Bude, thy fatal sea
And God thee speed in hall and bower
My manor of Bien amie.
“Thou, too, farewell my chosen bride,
Thou Rose of Rou-tor land
Though all on earth were false beside
I trust thy plighted hand.
“Dark seas amy swlll, and temests lower,
And surging bellows foam,
The cresset of they bridal bower
Shall guide the wander home.
“On! For the cross in Jesu’s land,
When Syrian armies flee;
One thought hall thrill my lifted hand,
I strike for God and thee”

The Battle
Hark! How the brattling trumpets blare,
Lo! The red banner flaunt the air,
And see, his good sword girded on
The stern Sir Ralph to the wars has gone.
Hurrah! For the Syrian dastards flee
Charge! Charge! Ye Western chivalry
Sweet is the strife for God’s renown,
The Cross is up and the Crescent down.
The weary seeks his tent
For good Sir Ralph is pale and spent
Five wounds he reaped in the field of fame
Five in his blessed masters name.
The solemn Leech looks sad and grim
As he binds and sooths each gory limb
And the solemn Priest must chant and prey.
Lest the soul un-houseled pass away.

The Treachery

A sound of horse hoofs on the sand
And lo! A page from Cornish lands
Tidings,” he said as he bent the knee
“Tidings, my lord, from Bien amie”
“The owl shrieked thrice from the warder’s tower
The crown-rose wither in her bower
Thy good grey foal, at event fed,
Lay in the sunrise stark and dead”
“Dark omens three!” the sick man cried
“Say on the woe thy looks betide”
“Master! At bold Sir Rupert’s call,
Thy lady Bertha fled the hall

The Scroll
Bring me,” he said “that scribe of fame,
Symeon el Siddekah his name
With parchment skin, and pen in hand
I would devise my Cornish land.
“Seven goodly manors, fair and wide,
Stretch from the sea to Tamar side,
And Bien amie, my hall and tower,
Nestles beneath tall Stratton Tower
“All these I render to my God,
By seal and signe, knife and sod
I give and grant to Church and poor
In franc-almoign for evermore
“Choose ye seven men among the just,
And bid them hold my lands in truse:
On Micheal’s morn, and Mary’s Day,
To deal the dole, and watch and pray.
“Then bear me coldly o’er the deep,
Mid my own people I would sleep
Their hearts shall melt, their prayers will breathe,
Where he who loved them rests beneath.
“Mould me in stone as here I lie,
My face upturned to Syria’s sky
Carve ye this good sword at my side
And write the legend, “True and tried”
“Let mass be said, and requiem sung;
And that sweet chime I loved be rung,
The sounds along the northern wall,
Shall thrill me like a trumpet call”
Thus said he, and the set of sun
The bold Crusader’s race was run.
Seek ye his ruined hall and tower
Then stand beneath tall Stratton Tower

The Mort Main
Now the Demon had watched for the warrior’s soul
Mid the din of war where blood streams roll
He had waited long on the dabbled sands,
Ere the Priest had cleansed the gory hand
Then as he heard the stately dole,
Wherewith Sir Ralph had soothed his soul
The unclean spirit turned away,
With a baffled glare of grim dismay.
But when he caught those words of trust,
That sevenfold choice among the just,
“Ho! Ho! Cried the fiend with a mock at heaven
“I have lost but one, I shall win my seven.”

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Going, Going : Was Philip Larkin Right?

2/1/2015

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In the north of Cornwall, not far from the sea stood Binamy Castle, a mid fourteenth century moated castle the remains of which can be seen on what is known as Binamy Farm. Binamy Castle has had a place in my heart many many years, sadly the foundations of this once fine medieval building and the site on which it stood will soon be surrounded by a large housing estate.

Talk of the destruction of our countryside and its heritage has been a big issue for years, and still is. Philip Larkin wrote of it in his 1972 poem Going, going, which I read last evening.

Larkin's penultimate verse reads:

And that will be England gone,
The shadows, the meadows, the lanes,
The guildhalls, the carved choirs.
There'll be books; it will linger on
In galleries; but all that remains
For us will be concrete and tyres.

Scotney Castle

Larkin's poem has a hard hitting environmental message that rings to true for me, not only in its historical sense but in also in real time, I have watched houses springing up around me where there was once an apple orchard, large oak trees and a stream.

Larkin's was commissioned by the Department of the Environment to write a poem to feature in their report ‘How Do You Want To Live?’ His work was used but edited, and lines taken out as controversial or offensive but he later published it if full. His poem smacks of fatalism, it can be said that it is as much about growing old as it is about the environmental issues. Was Larkin right, of course he was, but has any action been taken to prevent or at least control this destructive disease, this creeping concrete? Has the words of this fine Poet Laureate made a difference.

I don't think so!

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Byard's Leap: A Story of a Witch and a Blind Horse.

4/9/2014

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Eugene Delacroix's horse leaping over a gate.

Just the other evening I watched yet another film telling the story of Snow White. The ever lovely Snow White has changed over the years, no longer is she the rosy cheeked innocent of my day, but a self confident, sword carrying, feisty teenager. Snow White’s father’s new bedfellow hasn't changed much either, her disguise is still a stunning medieval beauty, but like Snow White, her alter ego has changed. Now she is beautiful in her ugliness, no longer the horrible hag with the wart on the end of her hooked nose, or a cackling, hand ringing gorgon, that frightened the little eight year old girl that was me.

A hunchbacked hag is how most of us imagine a witch. She is always ugly, a woman with a bent walking stick and black cat using sorcery or casting spells on anyone who gets in her way. In my home county of Lincolnshire we have no witches today, or if we do I’ve never seen one! But in days gone by there were those who are said to have ridden on broomsticks, flying around causing havoc among the fenland living folk. Of course, the aforementioned Lincolnshire folk told tall tales of such women, these stories and songs have passed into popular culture. Ethel Rudkin of Willoughton in Lincolnshire was a dedicated collector of folklore ephemera which she was collecting in the mid 1920’s and 1930’s she was an expert in this field. Her book Lincolnshire Folklore was self published in 1936, the information in it taken directly from the people in the villages of Lincolnshire. Of witches she writes

“In the presence of a witch, so she shall be powerless against you, clench both your fists with the thumbs inside and under fingers”

“If you pluck straw from the thatch of a witches house and hold it in your hand she cannot harm you”

Maybe this is where the saying clutching at straws originates?

Map showing the re-alignment of the A17. Photo Credit National Library of Scotland

On a sunny day out two summers ago my husband and I stopped at a lovely little cafe for a cup of tea at the village of Byard’s Leap and found, to my amazement, that it was the site of the origins of a local legend about a wicked witch and a horse. Byard’s Leap is a civil parish in North Kesteven on the B6403 on the north side of the A17 and one of seven districts in the County of Lincolnshire. Within this tiny hamlet there are a number of different legends one is the story of a horse named Byard.

Living in a small area of trees and bushes, in times gone by called a spinney, was a witch called Old Meg. Meg lived in her home on Ermine Street at a place called High Dyke. Her evilness caused all the crops to wither and the local farm animals to die. Fortunately, living in the same area was a soldier and a hero who was willing to come to the villagers aid by telling everyone he would kill her with his sword by plunging it into her wicked heart. Not having a horse of his own he went in search of a suitable mount and passing by a pond he saw a few horses drinking, throwing a stone into the water he picked the horse who had the quickest reaction. The said horse was known as Blind Byard. Soon our hero and Byard were off in search of the wicked witch. Eventually they found Meg, she was summoned to leave her home by our hero but she refused on the grounds that she was eating her dinner, “Come back another day” she croaked! The soldier duly waited unknowing that Meg had snuck out the back door and was creeping up behind, she sank her long yellow nails into the rump of poor Byard who was so shocked he ran and leaped over sixty feet in distance.

Byard leaps from the horseshoe over the trees in the far distance.

Meg chased Byard, but the soldier soon gained control of his horse by the time they reached the village pond, turning, and with one swipe he thrust his sword right into her heart where she fell into the pond and drowned.

Today, we can still see the spot were Blind Byard landed after Meg sunk her talons into him. The site is marked by four horseshoes and a commemorative stone.

The spot were Blind Byard landed.

What a wonderful story! Of course a story is all it is, an embellished tale of a poor old lady that no one liked very much, who was a scapegoat for the villagers problems and who was probably banished by the Lord of the Manor from the saddle of his brown bay! However, as with most stories there is no smoke without fire.

Bayard is in general folklore a ‘magic horse’ usually a Bay which is renowned for its spirit and has the ability to adjust its size according to the size of its rider. Bayard appears in many medieval romances and first appeared as belonging to one Renaud de Montauban in a twelfth century tale. This horse was able to carry Renaud and his three brothers and hold a decent conversation in French at the same time! Later in the story Bayard is punished for some misdemeanour by having a large stone tied around his neck, but Bayard is strong enough to smash the stone and escapes to live in a mystical wood.

Renaud and his three brothers.

Bayard can also be found in Geoffrey Chaucer's work Troilus and Criseyde as a talking dancing horse, and in 1286 he appears again in The Canterbury Tales and then again as a blind foolish horse in the Yeoman’s Tale, where it states

"Though you search afar, you shall never find it; Be you as bold as Bayard the blind, that blunders forth and perceives no peril.”

Byard from the History of France by M. Guizot.

Sounds a bit like Byard from Lincolnshire doesn't it?

By the time of the thirteenth century Bayard had come to represent the exploits and daring do’s of any remarkable horse and no longer is associated with magic, in fact from the end of the thirteenth century Bayard is now often found as a fool of a horse in English literature.

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The Medieval Messenger

12/3/2013

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Want a laugh and become super intelligent at the same time? Well here's the book for you.

This blog really isn't a blog as such, its more of an advert for a funny little book my husband surprised me with on our
holiday last year. Its really for children and is intended to ignite a passion for history. Now if I'd been given it as a young
child I may, no, would, have started loving history even earlier and may have been at this very moment a lecturer of
Medieval History at Cambridge (some hope)

The Medieval Messenger, is a thirty two page book designed in the style of a tabloid newspaper, and covers major events
that took place during the medieval period. Its covers these events in form of news articles, features, adverts, spot the difference, personal adds all the things you would expect .

As you can see the front page covers the arrival of the Black Death and goes on to talk about it in depth on page thirteen,
and on page twenty two it runs a story "What's new in the Spanish Inquisition" We met the man who knows.

Effigies of the Great, on page 6, invite you to pick your choice of prominent people, from popes, kings, famous warriors
(no Visigoth's, Vandals or Barbarians) and have them carved in stone to impress your visitors.

My favourite however is:

No War Is Complete Without ELKHORN'S SAFETY VISORS.
How many times have you had your nose chopped off and thought "I wish I'd had one of those"

Don't take my word for it, its great for kids, a quick read for an adult and is dead funny.

Published by Usboure, at £5.99 ISBN 978-0-7460-6898-4

2016 Update: You can get it on new on Amazon for £2.63 or used for £0.01p

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Josephine Tey

Beunans Meriasek : Cornish Play

Edgar Allan Poe: The Raven

Sir Ralph de Blancminster of Bien Amie

Going, Going : Was Philip Larkin Right?

Byard's Leap: A Story of a Witch and a Blind Horse.

The Medieval Messenger

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