This beautiful effigy caught my eye on a trip to Westminster Abbey, as everyone filed past in search of those of more famous royals.

Frances Brandon was the daughter of Charles Brandon Duke of Suffolk and his wife Mary Tudor, the former Queen of France. Charles and Mary embarked on an initially secret relationship after the death of her husband Louis XII of France, marrying in private, without telling Mary’s brother, Henry VIII. On their return to England Henry was said to have been enraged when he found out, but softened after they paid a hefty fine for their audacity. He even threw them another wedding celebration after he calmed down.

As one of their daughters, she was a granddaughter of Henry VII, and cousin to Henry VIII's children Mary, Elizabeth and Edward. She married Henry Grey, Marquis of Dorset, who was later created Duke of Suffolk by Edward IV. Their daughter was Lady Jane Grey, the queen who ruled for nine days before being imprisoned by Mary I and later beheaded at the Tower of London. Losing her husband and daughter through the succession crisis after Edward VI's death, Frances would have felt huge grief and adversity in the early years of Mary I's reign. But the Greys’ fate wasn’t really any of their fault. Edward IV, close to death in his teens, decided to sidestep his half-sisters Mary and Elizabeth in the succession and wrote an order that the throne would instead pass to the heirs of Frances Brandon, in other words: Jane. It was even said that when the messenger arrived to tell Jane that she was now queen, she replied to say she didn’t even want the title but would take it out of respect of God's wishes.

After Mary’s successful coup and her accession to the throne, Frances lived quietly – a good idea for a woman with a bloodline so close to the throne. She married a second time, to Adrian Stock, a groom she knew from her household. She was not the only woman of her time to look for a humbler way of life in the fractious Tudor court of the 1540s and 1550s. Both Anne Seymour, Duchess of Somerset and Catherine Willoughby, Duchess of Suffolk married men from their households after their first marriages ended.

Frances died in November 1559, and her second husband erected the tomb we see at Westminster today. Elizabeth I, Frances' cousin, issued a warrant that arms were to be borne at Frances' funeral, an act seen as a public nod and show of respect to her royal status. Frances’ effigy shows her lying with her head propped up on a cushion, wearing a cloak finished in ermine. Around her neck is a small ruff and she wears a coronet on her head. It is reasonable to imagine, like many of the other effigies of the period, that it might convey how Frances looked in life, with its strikingly individual features. She has hair tucked under a headdress, a rounded nose and care has been taken to carve a small double chin. Although speculative, I think that a family likeness can be seen when compared with portraits of other Tudors, particularly her uncle Henry VIII and cousin Mary I.

Interested in Tudor history? You might also like my second book, Power Couples of the Tudor Era, published by Pen and Sword Books, which explores the contributions couples made to their own times as well as how they influenced our own. Order your copy here. 

https://www.westminster-abbey.org/abbey-commemorations/commemorations/frances-brandon-duchess-of-suffolk

Westminster Abbey 

One of the more famous monuments in Gloucester Cathedral is that of Robert Curthose, Duke of Normandy. He was the eldest son of William the Conqueror, his brothers William (surnamed Rufus) and the youngest, Henry. On William's death in 1087 he envisioned that two brothers would each rule either England or Normandy and Henry preside over his own estates. As it turned out, William became King of England and was killed while out hunting in the New Forest, and Robert Curthose was challenged and imprisoned by the underdog Henry. Henry I assumed the throne, and on capturing Curthose, kept him imprisoned for around thirty years, while he took over affairs of both Normandy and England. Robert Curthose died at Cardiff Castle in 1134 and it was said that he specially chose Gloucester Cathedral as the place of his burial.

The effigy of the unfortunate duke was installed shortly after his death, made out of wood. He is represented in armour with crossed legs and wears a coronet. The effigy is also painted in primary colours. During the 1600s, during the English Civil War, it was taken apart, but rescued, and carefully replaced in its position in the later part of the century. The spurs on the figure are not thought to be original, but added in the seventeenth century, the earlier Norman spurs having been stolen or lost by then. 

Robert Curthose's nickname means 'short trousers' and probably refers to the fashions he wore. He married a wealthy heiress named Sybil, and took part in the Crusades in the Holy Land. On Sybil's death he became a widower, and he was then captured by his younger brother. The writer Henry Spence-Jones related the belief in the nineteenth century that Henry had actually blinded his brother, a claim that can't now be verified. Charles Wendell David suggested that it may have been Henry's punishment for Robert's repeated conspiracies to escape captivity and make his own bid for the crown. Despite all this drama and his status, Robert is quite an overlooked figure of history, although Charles Wendell David did manage to publish a book about him, with almost 300 pages - 201 of them of Robert's story.. 

If you stand and look at Robert's effigy today, remember his dramatic story. He had a dazzling start to life, as eldest son of the Conqueror king, but ended it with family fighting, grief and decades of imprisonment. One writer believed that he died on hunger strike, so tired of his long years alone. Robert Curthose today is a symbol of the chaotic struggle for power, and brutal treatment of those who wielded it, in the early medieval and Norman periods.

Interested in medieval history? Forgotten Women of the Wars of the Roses explores the roles of women from all sectors of fifteenth century society and the impact they had on the Wars of the Roses conflict. Order your copy here. 

I've also written Power Couples of the Renaissance. It features relationship dynamics that went against accepted norms of the period and power-hungry couples who ruled, fought and spread the patronage of art, science and culture across the globe during one of the most tumultuous periods of history. Find it on the Pen and Sword Books website. 

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Sources

Charles Wendell David, Robert Curthose Duke of Normandy. Havard University Press, 1920.

Henry Spence-Jones, The Dean's Handbook to Gloucester Cathedral, 1913.

In early 1628 the Cornishman Peter Mundy stepped off a wooden plank from the bow of his ship and into the warm heat of Shah Jahan's India, or as it was then, Hindustan. Mundy was a merchant and royal servant appointed to act on behalf of the East India Trading Company, visiting the country to support administration and trade between the nations. Mundy's presence here was therefore one of the links between Charles I's England and this far-away exotic land, where spices and other goods were bought and sold. Mundy was highly observant, and recorded a lot of interesting facts about his journeys around India and we can learn a lot about what it was like to travel here in the early 1600s. 

Shah Jahan had three wives, although it is usually agreed that his favourite was Mumtaz Mahal. As a young prince he made marriages for dynastic or political reasons, but it was with Mumtaz that he had most of his children. She also accompanied him at public ceremonies and travelled with him during military campaigns. On one occasion she angrily urged him to go to war after one of her maids was abducted by a group of foreigners.

Shah Jahan and his Peacock Throne, Public Domain via Metropolitan Museum

The couple lived in an opulent court and were carried in chairs mounted on top of jewelled elephants. They threw coins to crowds and drank from cups made of jade. They also glittered in diamonds and wore intricate fabrics that conveyed their power and wealth. Money for the couple seemed to be in abundant supply, and Shah Jahan's throne, where he received ambassadors and the public, was especially magnificently decorated.

In March 1632, Mundy made a note in his diary, recording Shah Jahan's 'Peacock Throne':

'At this time in Agra, the king sitteth out upon his throne... of which every king hath his own, there being one now making for this, that by computation cannot be worth less than 4 Courourees of rupees. Every Courouree is 100 Lack and every Lack is 100,000 which, in our money is four millions and three hundred thousand pounds sterling. All of pure gold, curiously engraven, enamelled and set with diamonds, rubies, emeralds, sapphires, etc. Precious stones, taken out of the treasury. I saw the king sitteth out nine days under mighty high, rich and stately pavilions of Cloth of Gold, etc. with his Amrawes or Lords about him, al making the greatest shows of magnificence and mirth they can, in feasting, presenting, recreating, with several shows and pastimes and dancing wenches, fighting of elephants etc.'

In fact, the Peacock Throne was said to have been worth around one and a quarter million sterling in 1632. The sight of Shah Jahan seated among this magnificence would have conveyed an important message of power, wealth and resources. From other sources we know that he sat on a large seat with cushions, and that there was a jewelled canopy above his head which was supported by emerald-studded pillars. Three steps took him to his seat, which acted as a stage where peacock sculptures looked down at him from the top of each column, decorated with rubies, garnets, diamonds, emeralds and pearls. The history of Shah Jahan's reign, the Badsah-nama by Abdul Hamid Lori, stated that it took craftspeople seven years to complete the throne. No wonder it became an object of legend, and so eagerly eyed by Mundy.

Find out more about Shah Jahan and Mumtaz Mahal in my book Power Couples of the Renaissance. It features relationship dynamics that went against accepted norms of the period and power-hungry couples who ruled, fought and spread the patronage of art, science and culture across the globe during one of the most tumultuous periods of history. Find it on the Pen and Sword Books website. 

The Saxon legend of Melangell is haunting and beautiful, and not often told. The first I ever heard of the saint was after some people I knew visited Pennant Melangell in Wales. At the village's church, as curious ghost hunters, they left a tape recorder recording during their visit. When they played it back, they claimed to have heard the unmistakable whisper of 'Melangell' crackling out from the machine's speakers, which they had not heard while inside the church. Whether you believe in this or not, the legend of this impressive woman is thick with strength, resistance and faith.

Photo by Natalia Sobolivska on Unsplash

Melangell was the daughter of an Irish king. Despite choosing to remain unmarried for life, she was promised as a bride by her father to a member of his nobility. Running away, she lived on the lands near Pennant Melangell for fifteen years without being discovered. However in 604AD a man named Brochwel Yscythrog, Prince of Powys and owner of the lands, was hunting nearby when he followed the path of a darting hare and found Melangell in a thicket of brambles. With her was the hare he had been chasing, sheltering under her gown, but staring back at him, unafraid of his dogs. Brochwel was shocked to see Melangell so devoutly at prayer and living on his estate by herself, and even more shocked when his dogs refused to snatch the animal from her. They talked, and Melangell told him all about her story and why she had chosen to live in the countryside in secret, to escape her fate. The prince, sympathetic to her, granted her some property of her own and instructed her to build an abbey, so that others could find sanctuary in the same way that she had. She founded the nearby church, and the village was named Pennant Melangell in her honour. Dying in her eighties, she is buried in the church, which quickly became a shrine to her memory throughout the medieval period. She also seems to have gained wider fame later on. The eighteenth-century writer Thomas Pennant remembered being shown the actual bed Melangell slept in while living on Brochwel's land, 'in the cleft of a neighbouring rock'. 

St Melangell's Church, via Wikimedia Commons by Rosser1954, CC BY 4.0

Sadly, any trace of Melangell's tomb or any of the decorations which once were laid there have been removed. However medieval carvings at the church record the legend, including depictions of hares as well as Melangell herself. She is also known as St Monacella. Pennant revealed that in the 1600s, locals were too afraid to hunt for hares in the parish because of her spiritual influence, and in the 1700s, they believed that if any hare was chased, a shout  of 'God and St Monacella be with thee' would save its life. Descriptions of the fifteenth-century carvings were recorded in the nineteenth century by a local reverend, and include Melangell standing with a foliated crozier and a veiled headdress in her capacity as abbess at the church here. He also took care to note that she is depicted larger than the prince and the huntsman, signifying a heightened importance, as she sits on a red cushion.

A tale of early Christianity, women's strength and strong resistance to the ideals and expectations of the time, Melangell's story is one we should remember. It is a tantalising view of a Saxon-era legend, but also reveals the fifteenth-century residents that put their hopes on the saint, depicting her and her assertiveness inside their church. 

Liked this? You might also like: The Welsh Legend of Nelferch, 10 British Castles to Visit by Train and The Warrior Women of the Wars of the Roses.

You might also like my book Forgotten Women of the Wars of the Roses, published by Pen and Sword. 

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Source: Archaeologica Cambrensis, Volume 3, London, 1847