Last night I watched Episode 1 of Monarchy with David Starkey. It is a series about the British monarchy from Anglo-Saxon times through the Restoration. Why did I watch this?
1. I am a nerd (maybe even a super-nerd, according to my youngest sister).
2. I find the subject of the history of England’s monarchy interesting (see #1).
3. My husband was out of town.
The episode I watched began with the Anglo-Saxon incursions after the fall of the Roman empire. No mention of King Arthur, alas, but I guess I don’t need to feed my obsession with things Arthurian. Instead Starkey focused on the Anglo-Saxon rulers, of which there were many overlords of separate small kingdoms, but no one ruler over all the island. In the late 800s, the Danes (“Vikings”) swept over England, wiping out all but one of these small kingdoms, which was Wessex under the rule of Alfred. Alfred and his successors eventually reclaimed the land taken by the Danes and established the first unified kingdom. For anyone who wants to read more about this period in history, I recommend Bernard Cornwell’s Saxon Chronicles (fiction). His series focuses on a young warrior, Uhtred, who is English but captured and fostered by the Danes. What I like about this series is how Cornwell shows sympathy with both sides of the conflict between Dane and English. (By the way, for King Arthur fans, Cornwell also has an excellent series beginning with The Winter King.)
I knew virtually nothing about the next periods of English history, during which the Danes returned and defeated Ethelred (the Unready), to take control of the kingdom in the early 11th century. The interesting note here is that Ethelred’s widow, Emma, who was of Norman blood (seems Ethelred had tried to pacify the Normans when he saw his kingdom in danger from both Normans and Danes), knew a thing or two about politics and power. After Ethelred’s death, she married the Danish conqueror, Canute. Two of Emma’s sons and two of her stepsons ended up as kings of England in the turmoil following Canute’s death. Her great-nephew, William the Conqueror, achieved the Norman conquest in 1066. I don’t know of any fiction about Emma. I’ll have to look into that.
After Starkey’s overview of the Norman conquest came some discussion of the Norman assimilation (or lack of it), and King Henry I’s cathedral- and castle-building. I started to doze here—not Starkey’s fault!
The last bit was on the anarchy following the death of Henry I, and the civil war between King Stephen and Queen Matilda (also known as Maude), in the early 12th century. This civil war is the backdrop for Ellis Peters’ terrific mystery series featuring Brother Cadfael, the crusader-turned-monk. I highly recommend this series for history buffs; for me the history trumps the mystery. Of course Brother Cadfael is an endearing, enduring character (played by Derek Jacobi in the PBS Mystery versions); but my favorite character is the Sheriff Hugh Beringar (read One Corpse Too Many, The Virgin in the Ice, and Dead Man’s Ransom to find out why).
Tonight: The medieval monarchs (my nerdiness is not sated yet).
Arthur of Albion by John Matthews, illustrated by Pavel Tatarnikov. This is an oversized picture-book aimed for the middle-grade audience, but clearly appropriate for adults like myself, who suffer an Arthurian literature obsession (and who like beautiful things). The endpapers are gold. The art is fabulous. There is a poster-sized fold-out map of “Albion” (England), with a legend detailing the locations of key Arthurian events and places.
