In Henry V as Warlord, acclaimed historian Desmond Seward sweeps away the myths and idolatry of Henry V to reveal a cruel, intolerant bigot who thirsted for victory at any cost. Seward shows the ruthlessness of the man who called himself "the scourge of God" when reproached for a massacre; exploi...
Seward would do anything just to demonstrate Richard was indeed the Shakesperian monster of the tradition.The point here is not whether or not he murdered the princes in the tower. The point is: even if he did it (I'm personally sure he didn't tough) is it enough to mark him as evil, to make him ...
To understand the Wars of the Roses and Henry VIII's obsession with France, we must look back at the Hundred Years War. At least that is what Desmond Seward believes and he is right. The source of the conflict he points out doesn't stem out merely from Edward III's claim to the French throne on a...
Michael Angelo da Caravaggio (1571-1610) had an amazingly colorful and adventurous career, full of dramatic contrasts. He was a religious artist who used prostitutes and castrati as his models; a mystic with a police record; the favorite of Cardinals and the Pope's portrait painter, who committed...
The military religious orders emerged during the Crusades as Christendom's stormtroopers in the savage conflict with Islam. Some of them still exist today, devoted to charitable works. The Monks of War is the first general history of these orders to have appeared since the eighteenth century. The...
I agree with those who think Goodreads should offer half stars. My main problem with this pretty interesting book is what Seward gets wrong at the offset: the unaccountable blossoming of the south of France as a fountain of chivalry and appreciation of women. This is a standard attitude of Weste...
From 1853 to 1870 Eugenie de Montijo was the world's most powerful woman. Empress of the French, she shared the Second Empire with her husband, Napoleon III, so impressing the Prussian Chancellor Bismarck that he called her 'the only man in Paris'. In the first biography of her for many years, De...
This is a re read for me, It was one of my Nan's favourites some twenty or even thirty years ago. Each King is given a section and it follows through on their upbringing, marriages, affairs, children, battles etc. along with enlightening examples of everyday events and anecdotes, lots of interest...
a dismal fight Betwixt the stout Lord Talbot and the French. King Henry VI Is this the scourge of France? Is this the Talbot, so much fear’d abroad, That with his name the mothers still their babes? I see report is fabulous and false. King Henry VITalbot’s expedition to Guyenne of 1452—1453 was a...
. . to an eminence which was the wonder and dread of all neighbouring nations. Lord Macaulay1 In 999 a Plantagenet forebear, Count Fulk the Black of Anjou, had his young wife, Elisabeth of Vendôme, burned alive in her wedding dress in the marketplace at his capital of Angers, in front of the cath...
1328—1340 Dare he command a fealty in me? Tell him the Crown that he usurps is mine, And where he sets his foot he ought to kneel. ‘Tis not a petty Dukedom that I claim, But all the whole dominions of the realm; Which if with grudging he refuse to yield I’ll take away those borrowed plumes of his...
But roars of laughter and back-slapping were a good way of concealing his real thoughts. Among these was a lasting obsession with murdering Edmund de la Pole’s brother Richard. Frustratingly, royal agents found that they were pursuing a very elusive quarry indeed. This obscure cousin frightened t...