Mary of Guise, Queen of France and mother of Mary Queen of Scots / vacationsscotland.biz
The name of a branch of the ducal house of Lorraine in France, it became prominent, if not menacing, during the 16th century. Claude de Lorraine was born in 1496 and created Duke in 1528 when he was thirty-two. By then he had already distinguished himself in a respectable number of (French) military conflicts, all of which he won. They included the Battle of Marignano in 1515. (more…)
Sir Richard Hawkins / thebiggeststudy.blogspot.com
Sir John and Sir Richard Hawkins or Hawkyns would have preferred to be called seamen, or navigators, or simply sailors. That is how British history books describe them. French, Dutch and especially Spanish historians prefer to say corsarios or piratas. But then most European historians describe any man (or woman) who sailed across the seven seas with a crew and attacked other shipping or a passing port – as long as they were British – as pirates or corsairs. The Spanish even call Admiral Lord Nelson a pirate, despite the awkward fact that he was a professional navy man who assaulted Spanish-held ports or Spanish ships when England was officially at war with Spain (or France for that matter). One could claim that that was his job. Hawkins however was by no means indefatigable, losing a sea battle to the Spanish at San Juan de Ulúa (more…)
The new SIS headquarters on the Embankment, London / en.wikipedia.org
Where dictators or democratically elected governments rule, they need organisations dedicated to the gathering and evaluation of information, mainly concerning the intentions of other states that may not have their best wishes at heart. These are the intelligence services, and they have been in active operation for much longer than many students think.
Some historians insist that it was Queen Elizabeth I, with her faithful Walsingham and his ring of spies, who was the first absolute ruler to insist on full intelligence gathering. This is patently untrue. (more…)
As villeins or servants of a medieval lord serfs were not actually slaves, though many writers of historical novels would have them so. Peasants they were, and by no means free. They were there to work the land of the lord (from which comes the more modern expression ‘landlord’). Serfs represented the lowest possible level of society. (more…)
Artist’s impression of part of the Battle of Trafalgar / britishbattles.com
There is a running fight, not unlike the battle of Trafalgar itself, between Spanish, British and French historians, which has continued without pause since 1805. Friendships which should have been for life have been broken because of this eminently historical conflict on the high seas. I prefer to examine the views of American historians, who should have no axe to grind, as 1805 happened a long time before US influence dominated, or at least tried to dominate the world. (more…)
Our first Duke of Burgundy was born in 1342, a son of John ‘the Good’. There were so many dukes of this region of France that the theory that each earned a nickname because it was thus easier to identify each one is probably right. As a youth he fought at Poictiers against the English, was captured along with his father, and ransomed. (more…)
This is one of the planet’s biggest and most unknown continents. It surrounds the South Pole, and lies almost entirely to the south of latitude 66º 33’ S. This is called ‘The Antarctic Circle’.
Travellers who have dared to enter this formidable area of the Earth have noted that the sun neither rises at midwinter nor sets at midsummer. At the South Pole itself the temperature is on average -50º C; this is because an excessively thick icecap covers the continent, forming a huge plateau. Strong winds invariably blow from the centre of the icecap, and it usually too cold to snow. The little snow that does fall takes hundreds of years to change into ice. The ice moves so grindingly slowly that parts of the icecap are millions of years old. (more…)
Gibraltar: contentious since 1704
The spiky old issue of Gibraltar is digging Spanish and British statesmen in the most tender part of their well-fed anatomies – what to do with Gibraltar? Ever since the signing of the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 (very nearly three hundred years ago), the two puissant old ladies have been scratching at each other’s eyes because of Gibraltar. (more…)
Young William of Orange, future William III of England / journal.carlottamanaigo.com
When James II made his Catholicism too ostentatious for seventeenth century Protestant politicians to stomach, a successful conspiracy was made to remove him from the throne he had inherited from his brother Charles II. Among the conspirators was John Duke of Marlborough, who had been raised to the dizzy heights he attained from being a country squire. Most of the raising had been done by James II. Do not put your faith in country squires who rise to become Dukes and have colossal palaces (Blenheim) built for them by ‘a grateful nation’. The conspirators then invited a Dutchman to come to Britain and become William III, which he did, albeit with some reluctance. He was a firm Protestant descending from Mary Queen of Scots, a Stewart, and was married to another Mary, Mary of England. This was considered a good enough claim by the conspirators, and so the Dutchman became King of England,Scotland and Ireland. Silly weak James went without much pushing into exile, where he stayed. (more…)
Normandy was once the home of Celtic tribes in north-western France. It was the kingdom of Clovis, founder of the Frankish empire (466 – 511). It came under Meringovian rule and was invaded and occupied by the Vikings (q.v.) in the 9th century. Rollo was the Viking leader who accepted Normandy as a fief from the King of France, which was gentlemanly of him as the French King was quite powerless to do anything else but accept the norsemen’s occupation. (more…)