#we are woodville

[wonder-worker]

Thinking about Elizabeth Woodville as a gothic heroine is making me go insane. She entered the story by overturning existing social structures, provoking both ire and fascination. She married into a dynasty doomed to eat itself alive. She was repeatedly associated with the supernatural, both in terms of love and death. Her life was shaped entirely by uncanny repetitions - two marriages, two widowhoods, two depositions, two flights to sanctuary, two ultimate reclamations, all paralleling and ricocheting off each other. Her plight after 1483 exposed the true rot at the heart of the monarchy - the trappings of royalty pulled away to reveal nothing, a never-ending cycle of betrayal and war, the price of power being the (literal) blood of children. She lived past the end of her family name, she lived past the end of her myth. She ended her life in a deeply anomalous position, half-in and half-out of royal society. She was both a haunting tragedy and the ultimate survivor who was finally free.

[britneyshakespeare]

if i were george duke of clarence and you were my assassin you would really feel something while i'm pleading for my life right? if i were george duke of clarence imprisoned on my brother the king's suspicion and my other brother richard duke of gloucester sent you to murder me for rich reward, you would at least think of not killing me right? you'd hesitate forsooth? which of you if you were a prince's son being pent from liberty as i am now if two such murderers as yourselves came to you would not entreat for life? a begging prince what beggar pities not?

[persephones-journey]

No writing smut today. I am going to try and finish this book.

But not going to lie, I am angry reading it.

I love Elizabeth Woodville and the history of the War of the Roses. And I am all about reading books written by different historians to get different perspectives.

This guy though… He’s definitely Team Richard III thus making me roll my eyes.

Elizabeth and Edward were married. She was crowned queen.

Richard III killed his nephews for the throne. Period.

Calling Elizabeth Edward’s mistress is not going to rewrite history. Didn’t work out well for Dick the Third…

[fideidefenswhore]

How do we know that COA was offered her daughter made bona fides and kept princess? When was this?

It was an offer made by Henry alongside Campeggio when he was there before the trial, that her acceptance of the offer meant the trial could be foregone ....

We (Wolsey and Campeggio) are agreed in opinion to test the mind of the Queen, and to persuade her to consent to the separation, and to enter the profession of some religion. For this purpose his Lordship promised me the assistance of himself and all the prelates of the kingdom, and the favor of the King, and that the Queen shall have any honorable conditions which she demands, retain her station as Queen*, and not lose anything except "l'uso della persona del Re," which he (Wolsey) says she has lost for many years; allowing her her dowry, rents, ornaments, and assignments for her support, and many other things; especially that the succession of the kingdom for the present shall be established in her daughter, by the ordinance and consent of all the estates, in case there should never be any legitimate male heir. 

....(although, actually I don't exactly remember, that might have just been one stage of the offer...another might have been that her absence from the trial would ensure a result in Henry's favor; as we know she refused to attend after her speech and it did not, so whether or not that was true...Campeggio had a decretal comission to declare the marriage valid or invalid at Blackfriars and didn't, so in some sense they both got played, although Catherine only in hindsight...ironically, she would later vehemently complain about the severe injustice of the delay in any resolution, but she was the one that had interceded for that delay**, demanding the case only be tried in Rome). Even her counsel at the time, before becoming as contumacious as he did (Bishop Fisher), advised her to take this 'deal', as it were. Off the cuff, I don't remember every reference made to it, Chapuys some months later does also mention (very conditional) 'offers' made to her, but the dispatch is frustratingly vague:

Meanwhile the Queen is daily assailed by people making her all manner of offers, if she will only consent to the divorce; but she remains as firm as ever [...]

In 1533 Chapuys reports Catherine as having said she was willing to take the 'offer' made to her by the King's council three years ago, that then she had thought it was a feint to induce her to accept demotion, but she would accept it now. He does not specify what this offer was, I remember I went back to the sources of when Henry's council visited and argued with her and it was not clear then, either, but I always wondered if that was what she was alluding to. If so it was too late at that point; Henry had decided that the issue of any union that contravened divine law was irrevocably illegitimate (although technically, he would not manage to garner Parliamentary assent for this notion until three years later, he only managed it by implication in 1534), and he believed that was what it was.

Often apologia of Catherine's stance in the late 1520s has been, why should she have even considered that inducement, how was it even presented as an 'offer', even if the papacy had annulled the marriage, Mary would be bona fides regardless, etc. It was presented as an offer, inducement, compromise of sorts because in England that was not the legal precedent (ie, an offer made on behalf of her daughter that was not guaranteed otherwise):

"[Henry VIII] now argued she would would be barred by illegitimacy. This contention puzzled continental contemporaries because elsewhere in western Europe those children born to couples who in good faith believed themselves validly married were treated as legitimate. Nevertheless, Henry was right. After a period of some uncertainty, by the late fourteenth century England had opted out of the bona fides principle. As Sir John Baker notes, 'succession problems were usually debated in legal terms and in accordance with the common law canons of inheritance.' A successful challenge to his marriage would thus automatically bastardise Mary and leave Henry no direct heir... [although] Mary could have been legitimated by statute." - JF Hadwin, The Journal of Ecclesiastical History

*One assumes this meant only a ceremonial title of some sort, ie Dowager Queen of England, as her sister-in-law was still referred to as Queen of France.

**Probably not anticipating resolution would not take place for another four years, but...still.

[une-sanz-pluis]

In episode five of Heroine City, Lynsey Shaw is joined by Dr Euan Roger, lead curator at The National Archives, to discuss the fascinating Eleanor Cobham, Duchess of Gloucester. A sad tale of love magic, witchcraft and treason, Eleanor was imprisoned for the rest of her life and her marriage to Humphrey, Duke of Gloucester annulled after she was accused of using witchcraft 'in a treasonous way' and tricking him into marriage with 'love magic.'

[allwaswell16]

A One Direction fic rec of fics in which one of the main pairing is their brother's/sister's best friend as requested in this ask. If you enjoy the fics, please leave kudos and comments for the writers! You can find my other fic recs here. Happy reading!

- Louis / Harry -

💋 Bloodline by banana_louis

(E, 177k, fluff) Louis doesn't know how to feel when his best friend, Liam, finds out about a brother that he never knew, who was placed for adoption before he was born and is bursting into his life at twenty-four years old.

💋 Want You More Than A by TheCellarDoor / @donotdialnine

(M, 77k, high school) Falling in love with your step-brother’s best friend is a disaster enough. When he happens to be the boy everyone loves and you’re a nerd who wears sweater vests and cries during rom-coms, it takes it to a whole new level.

💋 late nights and good intentions by princelouisau

(E, 71k, historical) a Victorian era au where Louis pines for his overprotective older brother’s very charming best friend.

💋 teenage dreams in a teenage circus by orphan_account

(E, 50k, high school) The last few months of sixth form bring about a lot of changes, however. Gemma refuses to let anything stop her from getting into her top-pick uni, Perrie second-guesses what makes her special, and Louis breaks the most common of friend codes: he falls for his best mate's little brother.

💋 We Got The World Shaking by FutureMrsHaroldStyles

(M, 39k, omegaverse) the one where Harry goes into heat at his best friend Lottie's birthday party and her big brother helps him out.

💋 Lies & Liability by 4ureyesonly28 / @evilovesyou

(M, 34k, historical) Harry Styles has only three wishes when he leaves River Dane Manor to go to Town for his first season

💋 Baby, What a Big Surprise by kiwikero / @icanhazzalou

(E, 33k, high school) the one where shy, quiet Harry has no idea he's a carrier, and a one night stand with the most popular boy in school shows him just how wrong he was.

💋 With the Rising Sun by Tomlinsontoes / @pianolouis

(M, 33k, NYC) Somehow he got roped into his sister's brilliant idea of getting her college best friend to help him branch out and meet people.

💋 It's Been So Long by elsi_bee / @elsi-bee

(T, 31k, friends to lovers) Harry Styles' first crush was one of his sister's best friends, a certain someone named Louis Tomlinson. And Louis? He just vaguely remembers Gemma's younger brother from back in the day. A lot can change in ten years.

💋 Pillow Talk by @fallinglikethis

(E, 25k, sexuality crisis) When Harry starts having confusing feelings for a male classmate, his sister's best friend, Louis, helps him figure himself out. Cue lots of kissing, sex, and falling in love.

💋 and i don't care it's obvious by @alwaysxlarrie

(T, 20k, uni) However, his issue was that no one had ever created a guide that one could follow in regards to what to do or how to feel when your crush was your sister's best friend.

💋 i don't wanna be your friend, i wanna kiss your neck by pinkgelpen

(E, 19k, omegaverse) Harry is a hopelessly romantic omega and Louis is his sister's best friend

💋 I'll Be Your Light by mightaswellll

(M, 17k, roommates) Harry Styles always had a crush on his sister's best friend Louis Tomlinson. Moving in with them should be a good way to get over it, right?

💋 Won’t Let You Down by noellehenry / @noellehenry-original

(M, 15k, small town) Suddenly he’s the owner of a farm and B&B, gets involved in illegal trading of unlabeled bottles and has to deal with his everlasting crush on his sister Gemma’s best friend, who has returned to Woodville…

💋 What do you mean he's coming? by MediaWhore / @mediawhorefics

(G, 15k, famous/not famous) Now, not only does he have less than two weeks left to find something moving and inspirational to say, but Gemma just confided in him that her old childhood best friend is going to be in attendance.

💋 show you the stars in the daylight by bruisedhoney

(E, 13k, size kink) the one where Louis has a type and at sixteen and scrawy, it's definitely not his best friend's little brother Harry...ten years later, he changes his mind.

💋 Dirty Little Secret by therogueskimo / @bravetemptation

(M, 10k, secret relationship) the one where Harry and Louis fall in love, but can’t figure out how to tell Gemma. That is, until Harry gets pregnant, and they don’t have much of a choice.

💋 Here We Come A-Wassailing by @lululawrence

(NR, 8k, Christmas) It was cold, they would be outside in said cold, and he only wanted to stay warm and comfortable in the house. At least his best friend Gemma and her family are part of the caroling crew.

💋 Giving Me Excitations by @juliusschmidt

(M, 6k, vacation) Gemma's BFF Louis joins the family on a beach weekend. Harry likes him so much.

💋 harder to hide than i thought by dangerbears

(NR, 6k, high school) louis's best friend's little brother suddenly got very attractive.

💋 now i'm tracin' all my steps to you by @alwaysxlarrie

(T, 5k, omegaverse) Of all the things Harry was prepared for this summer, Louis Tomlinson and his wonderful, wonderful scent isn't one of them. It probably shouldn't be as shocking as it is that it makes Harry want to nest. 

💋 Tell Me That You've Got Me by @lululawrence

(NR, 2k, neighbors)  the one where Harry was always Louis' best friend's younger brother...until they grow up and once innocent forms of affection come to mean a little bit more.

💋 All This Time by @allwaswell16

(T, 1k, omegaverse) Louis Tomlinson had been best friends with flower shop owner Gemma Styles for years. It wasn't until she suggested he date her alpha brother that he ever thought of Harry that way.

- Rare Pairs -

💋 That Dimpled Smile by Phillipa19

(E, 47k, Zayn/Harry & Marcel/Louis) When Harry's best mate Louis shows an interest in his nerdy little brother, Harry isn't prepared to let him near. But it's hard for Harry to keep track of those two when he has enough trouble trying to figure out what the hell is going on with him and Zayn and their secretive relationship.

[liviasdrusillas]

" tell me, how shall we find the strength to bear the wrongs people do us? "

elizabeth woodville in every episode // 1.07 - poison and malmsey

[georgescitadel]

Historical figures that have served as inspiration for the women in ASOIAF - George R.R. Martin interview

Interviewer: What women through history have inspired and helped you on your way to creating these female characters that we love?

George: There are some very interesting queens in both English and French history who have, at least partially, inspired the characters in Game of Thrones. Many people have observed that Game of Thrones is based, in part, on the Wars of the Roses and that is certainly true, although I don't do a one-for-one translation. If you go and say “This character is based on that character” you're gonna be partly right, but also partly wrong, because I like to mix and match and throw a few twists, making the characters my own. Certainly, the wife of Edward IV, Elizabeth Woodville, was one of the most interesting queens in English history. She was the mother of the princes in the tower and married secretly. She was a Lancastrian, but she married the Yorkist claimant secretly and that produced all sorts of trouble, and she was in the middle of all that stuff with Richard III. She was fascinating! On the other side, the Lancastrian queen, Margaret of Anjou: she was pretty amazing and definitely hardcore! She was married to the idiot king, Henry VI, and she basically had to command her side after some of the leading Lancastrian supporters were killed in the early parts of the war. If you go back a hundred years before, Isabella, the wife of king Edward II, the She-Wolf of France, she was a pretty amazing one too. She basically got rid of her husband, imprisoned him, and allegedly had him killed by having a hot poker thrust up his ass while he was in captivity and then she and her lover took over and ran the kingdom until her son Edward III rose up against his own mother and imprisoned her. All of this stuff, I play with it, but I can't claim to really have invented any of it. There are some things in history that are just as violent and twisted and bizarre and amazing as anything in my books.

- George R.R. Martin, Supanova Expo

[bstag]

What do you feel about the house of york

I feel like it's a medieval dynasty that one a war. That's about it.

I also think that Richard Duke of York was nothing more than a jealous cousin that saw the perfect opportunity to climb the ladder and took it, justly paying the price. Edward IV's anger over his and his brother's death is understandable and so were his actions. Too bad that he didn't saw that the Duke of York's ruthless ambitions had trickled down to his sons Richard and George before they tried it with him. I think the Woodvilles were overtly greedy and took too much of the hand that fed them making the nobility hate them, and they also paid for it. I mean, arranging prestige marriages for every single Woodville? I get it, one of them was the Queen, but come on now, they clearly overplayed.

On the whole, I find this representation of the Yorks as this typical Good HeirsTM that took their rightful place on the throne and stepped up through harsh times that persists so much to this day lame and reductive. The truth of the matter is, they were never more just and GoodTM than the Lancasters. The Lancasters successfully organized a coup and sat the throne, the Yorks did the same, demonizing Henry VI and Queen Margaret of Anjou through propaganda as a freak and an overly ambitious femme fatale respectively, while casting their teenage son as a cruel bastard. All for defending fiercely what was by right theirs (we have Shakespeare to blame for that as well).

[lady-corrine]

…And therewithall she said unto the child: ‘Farewell, my own sweet son, God send you good keeping, let me kiss you once yet ere you go, for God knoweth when we shall kiss together again. And therewith she kissed him, and blessed him, turned her back and wept and went her way, leaving the child weeping as fast.

Elizabeth: England’s slandered Queen, Arlene Okerlund // Fire and Blood, George R.R. Martin

...the king made answer, as his men tore Rhaenyra from her son’s arms. Some accounts say it was Ser Alfred Broome who had hold of her arm, others name the two Toms, Tanglebeard the father and Tangletongue the son. Ser Marston Waters stood witness as well, clad in a white cloak, for King Aegon had named him to his Kingsguard for his valor.

*Elizabeth Woodville and Rhaenyra Targaryen being parted from their last sons, inspired by this post.

[wonder-worker]

I've been thinking about the tragedy of Elizabeth Woodville living to see the end of her family name.

I don't mean her family with her husband, which lived on through her daughter and grandson. I mean her own.

Her sisters died, one by one, many of them after 1485. When Elizabeth died, only Katherine was left, and she would die before the turn of the century as well.

All her brothers died, too. Lewis died in childhood. John was executed. Anthony was murdered. Lionel died suddenly in the peak of Richard's reign, unable to see his niece become queen. Edward perished at war. Richard died in grieving peace. For all the violence and judgement the family endured, it was "an accident of biology" that ended their line: none of the brothers left heirs, and the Woodville name was extinguished. We know the family was aware of this. We know they mourned it, too:

“Buy a bell to be a tenor at Grafton to the bells now there, for a remembrance of the last of my blood.”

Elizabeth lived through the deposition and death of her young sons, and lived to see the end of her own family name. It must have been such a haunting loss, on both sides.

[ffb6c1lover]

Clothing colour symbolism in The White Queen

So. I was looking at this image and wondering why Richard stands out so much in terms of colour and what it might mean, which led me down a rabbit hole. I discovered that there's one too many coincidences to be casual.

So, here's my theory about each character and what their clothing says about them and their motives.

Richard Duke of Gloucester

Richard, throughout the first episodes of the show, is mostly seen wearing either blue or Edward's trademark colours (cream, white). Blue signifies loyalty, a trademark of Richard ("Loyaulté me lie") and that loyalty is to Edward.

After Edward's death, he is seen wearing a darker shade of blue (blue + black = loyalty and grief). He is wearing full black after the deaths of Edward his son and of Anne.

Edward IV

Edward wears mostly cream or beige. It could be interpreted as white (purity), in some cases even as yellow (generosity). I haven't found much about cream: maybe it was normal nobility clothing, even though the most common association with nobility is royal purple.

The most interesting thing about his outfits is when other characters match him to show their loyalty to him, most notably Elizabeth and Richard, but also George after his betrayal of Warwick.

Sometimes, him and Elizabeth alternate, with one scene where one is wearing cream and the other light blue and viceversa, which may represent their loyalty to each other. I think, but I am not sure, that the one who is wearing cream is the main focus of the scene, whereas the blue-wearer is showing their support. But I don't remember the context of the scenes, so this is just conjecture.

His colours are always light though, be it yellow or blue.

George Duke of Clarence

I would have expected George to wear a lot of green, considering it is the colour of envy, so I was quite surprised when I realised he didn't so much (he still does sometimes, though). I had noticed, however, that in his introduction scene, while both his brothers are wearing cream/beige (matching), he stands out with orange clothes.

What does orange represent? "Worthwhile ambition". Checks out.

He sheds the orange definitively by the time he joins Edward's side again (as shown in the top picture) and he wears progressively lighter clothing, possibly showing his redemption? By the time of Isabelle's death and his own, he is only wearing a white chemise. He is visibly wearing the chemise under black clothes (grief) at the masked party.

But, do you know who wears a lot of green?

Richard Earl of Warwick

Do I need to explain this one? He envies both Edward and the Woodvilles for the power they hold.

He wears some yellow, which represents generosity, so long as he is keeping up friendly appearances and up until his betrayal of Edward. He does not, however, wear white, because the last thing he wants is peace. He is just acting like it for what he thinks is Edward's sake.

Queen Elizabeth

White is the colour of peace (in the first scene she is trying to make peace with Edward). We also see specks of blue (loyalty), probably to her dead husband.

However, she is most often seen wearing yellow (generosity), most notably at her coronation, white (purity) and light blue (loyalty). Much like Richard, she often matches with Edward.

Queen Anne

Anne is quite funny. She changes colours quite a lot, sometimes matching Richard, her sister or her father, other times not matching anyone else.

I think it shows her loyalty is to the people she loves and not to loyalty itself, unlike her husband. However, she is also ambitious and follows her own agenda, but she's always careful not to step on any toes.

She is loyal, generous, reliable and sometimes envious, which all shows in her clothing throughout the show.

Literal Queen.

Margaret Beaufort

Say what you want about her, but I am in love. Her strength of character is incredible and she is so funny, but this is unrelated to the post.

Black = the colour of grief. Her character arc is loss and gain, but the latter only comes into play in the literal last minute of the show. So loss of everything and subsequent grief.

Red = the colour of martyrdom. She is the most pious and self-sacrificial character in the whole show.

Blue = undying loyalty to the House of Lancaster, despite the risk it poses to her life and that of the people around her.

Jacquetta Woodville

Blue all the way down. Her loyalty is not to a house, or to a King, but to her daughter.

Isabelle Neville, Duchess of Clarence

Lots of green, like her dad, but mostly in a lighter shade, showcasing innocence.

She is also quite envious of Elizabeth, but not to the point of starting a war about it, so less envious (therefore, less green) than her father.

In her case, green might even represent youth.

Anthony Woodville

Brown, the colour of honesty, stability and reliability.

He is not afraid to speak his mind to Elizabeth ("your marriage was fake"), but he is also her rock throughout the show.

[edmundhoward]

hever castle is gonna hever castle

we actually don't know if a consort using st edward's crown was an uncommon practice as we don't have enough recorded evidence of what regalia was used for solo coronations of consorts. elizabeth woodville and elizabeth of york ALSO used the sceptre of st edward for example iirc …….. but i am sure a for profit historical site with a commercial interest in popularly & easily digestible narrative history abt the most popular queen consort took care to fact check that claim 🥴

[vickyvicarious]

Beetle Bracket

The substack is over now, it's time to be honest. None of us truly needed The Beetle in our lives. And do you know what we need even less? That's right:

The Beetle Sexyman* Bracket!

*gender, species, and probably even sexiness-neutral

That said, let's subject ourselves to this anyway.

There will be a grand total of five rounds, at the end of which the burning question will finally be answered: who is sexiest in Richard Marsh's The Beetle?

The Beetle Bracket is complete! See below for our final competitor's trophies, and below the cut for number breakdowns/writeups of each round.

Round One Breakdown

In the exact opposite of a shocking twist, Mr. Lindon was absolutely demolished by Train. Out of 130 votes, he got only 0.8%, compared to Train's whopping 90%. Excluding em-dash votes, that adds up to 117 for votes for Train and a measly 1 for Mr. Lindon.

Perhaps the biggest challenge this round was telling the contestants apart (at least in the wonderful accompanying art). However, people pulled through for Edwards, deeming that his ability to survive Sydney is the sexier quality. Out of 55 votes, Edwards won with 52.7%, compared to Peter's 27.3%. Excluding em-dash votes, that's 29 votes for Edwards, and 15 for Peter.

Brick Guy aimed his stones at the voters' hearts, it seems! Out of 58 votes, he won handily with 87.9%, while Mrs. Henderson netted a mere 5.2%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 51 votes for Brick Guy, and 3 for Mrs. Henderson.

Another easy victory! The Flirty Constable was confirmed far sexier than Louisa Coleman, who could only disapprove out her window. Out of 47 votes, he got 83%, against Louisa Coleman's 8.5%. Excluding em-dash votes, that's 38 votes for Brick Guy, and 4 for Louisa Coleman.

We always knew this would be the real nail-biter of Round One, and it didn't disappoint! The vote was the closest by far, and both contestants exchanged the winning spot multiple times, but in the end Cat narrowly eked out a win... true to life, at least in my experience of cat vs. carpet battles. Out of 152 votes, Cat won with 44.7%, against Carpet's 42.1%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 68 votes for Cat, and 64 for Carpet.

One last gimme to finish us off this round. Out of 65 votes, Glove Seller won with 80%, Matthews trailing at 15.4%. Excluding em-dash votes, that adds up to 52 votes for Glove Seller, and 10 for Matthews.

Round Two Breakdown

Look, he's no Superman - Robert Holt stood no chance against this runaway Train, it seems. Out of 102 votes, it barreled to victory with 58.8% against Bobert's 31.4%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 60 votes for the train, and 32 for Holt.

Nearly everyone agrees that No One is sexier than Augustus Champnell! No, not like that. I mean, the detective is significantly less sexy than the mere concept of no one at all. Out of 64 votes, No One handily won with 81.3% against Augustus's 9.4%. Excluding em-dash votes, that is 52 votes for No One, and 6 for Augustus Champnell.

Marjorie Lindon may have three men canonically head-over-heels for her, but neither Edwards nor Tumblr count among those numbers - though this was the closest match this round. Out of 41 votes, he quickly defeated her with 48.8% against her 31.7%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 20 votes for Edwards and 13 for Marjorie.

Percy Woodville doesn't want to fight - but luckily the voters were willing to do so for him! Out of 43 votes, he took 58.1%, compared to Brick Guy's 30.2%. Excluding em-dash votes, that becomes 25 votes for Percy, and 13 for Brick Guy.

The Beetle has many mystical abilities. Chief of these, it seems, is being literally the only main character to survive their first round in the sexyman contest! Speaks to the (lack of) sexiness in Marsh's writing, I suppose. Out of 104 votes, The Beetle won easily with 66.3%, while the Flirty Policeman only had 13.5%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 69 votes for Theb (nice), and 14 for the policeman.

He survived it twice, thanks to Edwards and The Beetle (more worthy competitors according to this round), but the third time seems to have been the charm. Sydney Atherton was absolutely slaughtered by Atherton's Magic Vapour! Out of 47 votes, the murdergas got 72.3% compared to Sydney's 17%. Excluding em-dash votes, that adds up to 34 votes for the vapour, and only 8 for its creator.

The Cat is no longer just lurking outside Paul Lessingham's house in hopes of pets and food. Oh no, it's shaping up to be a fierce competitor indeed! Out of 58 votes, it won easily with 58.6%, versus Paul's 29.3%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 34 votes for our favorite feline, and only 17 for the erstwhile statesman.

Glove Seller took an early lead, and Dora Grayling simply never caught up. Honestly, she'd probably be fine with it, she only cares about Sydney anyway. Out of 74 votes, Glove Seller easily won with 47.3%, Dora only getting 33.8%. Excluding em-dash votes, that equals 35 for Glove Seller, and 25 for Dora.

Round Three Breakdown

In any other sexyman bracket this matchup might not have meant so much, but I think we all understand these were some top contenders who both deserve our respect. Still, only one could continue on... and with the narrowest margin of victory in the entire bracket thus far, that turned out to be the Train! Out of 56 votes, it won with 46.4% against No One's 41.1%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 26 votes for Train, and 23 for No One. (Cat vs. Carpet had a difference of 4 votes, being the second-closest match. I'm loving that the fiercest battles are the ones with no people involved.)

Percy Woodville's charms carried the day once again, this time with a rather dramatic lead. I'm sure he's much more surprised than we are. Out of 38 votes, he had 78.9%, leaving Edwards in the dust with 10.5%. Excluding em-dash votes, that adds up to 30 votes for Percy, and 4 for Edwards.

Perhaps it's The Beetle's sheer unbridled charisma, perhaps it's the fact that the vapour has 'Atherton' in the name... Either way, this round was a slam dunk for our favorite coleoptera, proving that at least in this case canon was onto something. Out of 83 votes, The Beetle took 72.3% while Atherton's Magic Vapour could only muster up 13.3%. Excluding em-dash votes, that equals 60 for Theb, and just 11 for the vapour.

Well, it had a good run... but in the end the Cat just didn't know what to do in the face of that many gloves, just like everyone else Glove Seller has come up against. (It's fine, I'm officially declaring that she adopted it. These matches only end in death when the loser sucks.) Out of 52 votes, Glove Seller won with 53.8% versus Cat's 40.4%. Excluding em-dash votes, that would be 28 for Glove Seller, and 21 for the kitty.

Round Four Breakdown

He put up a good fight, and managed to close the initial gap somewhat, but in the end Percy just didn't have the requisite sexiness to defeat the mighty Train. Out of 63 votes, it won with 60.3%, against Percy's 28.6%. Excluding em-dash votes, that equals 38 votes for Train, and 18 for Percy.

Glove Seller may be many things (to us; she is admittedly very few things in canon), but apparently those do not include immunity to The Beetle. Winning with their narrowest margin yet, they still easily took over half of all votes! Out of 47 votes, Theb won with 63.8% versus Glove Seller's 23.4%. Excluding em-dash votes, that makes 30 votes for the Beetle, and 11 for Glove Seller.

As per vast majority vote, there will now be a third-place match next round. Apologies to the three of you who didn't want it, feel free to seek out your nearest hypnotist bugperson and ask them to erase the memories of whatever the results may be from your mind.

Final Round Breakdown

It seems that we are all the Train fiends today. At least for this one particular train. Out of 128 votes, it took the win with a solid 56.3%, against The Beetle's 31.3%. Excluding em-dash votes, that adds up to 72 votes for Train, and 40 for the Beetle. It seems some things are just meant to be. Theb will simply have to fly away with the silver, for now...

While the finale results were accurate to canon, that's not the case for third place! Percy Woodville made one final effort and overtook Glove Seller's early lead. Out of 57 votes, he won with 47.4%, against Glove Seller's 31.6%. Excluding em-dash votes, that equals 27 votes for Percy and 18 for Glove Seller. Honestly, I think she'd be proud of him, and if my official stance means anything to you, then you should know that Glove Wins (aka Persally aka this ship) is beetle bracket canon in my heart.

[heartofstanding]

Seeing your views on Margaret of Anjou, I was told that Margaret of Anjou was firm, brave, but too radical, revengeful to the enemy and extreme political measures, which led to her failure. I want to know your views on the reasons for her failure?

Hi, sorry this took so long! I've been busy and this got very long. The short answer to all three, however, is that she had a shit-ton of bad luck.

The slightly extended version of is:

The Treaty of Tours which brought her to England had terrible terms for the English and thus terribly unpopular. As the face of the treaty, she was unfairly blamed for.

England was losing the Hundred Years War, badly. Her marriage was meant to bring peace but the only peace to be gained was through defeat and capitulation. Margaret was blamed for failing to live up to unrealistic expectations.

There was something of a succession crisis, the long wait for Margaret to conceive and give birth to an heir did nothing to easeit and only added to her unpopularity.

The long wait for an heir meant there was fertile ground for rumours and gossip, specifically the idea that she was an adulteress and Edward of Lancaster a bastard.

Henry VI's sudden mental breakdown, (probable) limited recovery and imprisonment left Margaret as the figurehead of Lancastrian rule and resistance. It made her the target for Yorkist propaganda attacks.

Following the Battle of Towton, the Lancastrians were in a weak position to negotiate with potential allies, meaning they made great concessions that were then seized upon by Yorkists to turn the general public against the Lancastrian side.

Severe weather hampered the Lancastrians on at least three occasions: Towton, Barnet and Margaret's return to England in 1471.

She lost. Yorkist rule continued to denigrate her and the Tudors weren't interested in challenging that idea.

Want more detail?

The Problem of Determining Personality

To start with, we don't know a whole lot about Margaret's personality. We don't know a whole lot about any medieval individual's personality, the evidence simply isn't there to tell us about their personal thoughts beyond brief flashes of insight. It's a fraught issue, as Rosemary Horrox points out, with reference to Margaret herself.

We also have to contend with the layers and layers of propagandistic narratives. Again, this is true for almost every figure in medieval history (cf. A. J. Pollard on Elizabeth Woodville). When we shift through the Lancastrian, French, Yorkist, Tudor and more narratives about Margaret, how do we know which one is telling the truth? The virago Yorkist writers derided is unlikely to be the true Margaret but that doesn't mean that the tireless heroine of French writers is the "true Margaret" either. Both images are stereotypes, both come from biased sources. Nor does acknowledging that the image of Margaret as the virago was a propagandistic creation that served Yorkist interests mean that Margaret must have been the exact opposite and she was really sugar, spice and all things nice.

These type of stereotypes are attractive to historians and historical fiction writers alike. They're simple but dramatic. They work well with other stereotyped figures, with "accepted" versions of history that are accepted because they've been repeated so often that they now seem true even if the evidence isn't there or doesn't tell us the things we think we know. It produces a simple, coherent narrative which confirms our own biases. The image of Margaret as radical, revenge-seeking and extreme is often tied to the narrative of Richard, Duke of York as a noble, hard-working and good man who was forced to rebel against his king (who is not rightful king, of course, because that's York) due to the plots and schemes of Margaret and her cronies. Margaret's inability and unwillingness to acknowledge and accept York's greatness becomes the reason for her defeat. She's just too petty and self-serving. She brings it upon herself. She could have been safe - but she unfairly and evilly attacked York and he was simply forced by her actions to rebel.

I don't find that view of York convincing. I don't find that view of Margaret convincing. It's too simplistic, too much of a children's tale where the good guys are so good and the bad guys so bad that the bad guy forces the good guy into any acts that are morally dubious. There's more than a little misogyny in it too, blaming a woman for the actions of a man.

"The Bad Queen" and Queenship

Margaret has long been seen as the "bad queen", a woman who abjectly failed as queenship and was the reason why the Wars of the Roses broke out. I've already discussed some of the issues with that view but I want to talk about a couple of other points.

One: the Lancastrians lost, which cemented Margaret's reputation. As Katherine J. Lewis has pointed out, if the Lancastrians had been successful, Margaret would have likely been celebrated for her bravery and steadfast loyalty that saw the restoration of her husband and son. Instead, they lost and the Yorkist narrative about her became the norm.

Two: Margaret appears to have behaved as a conventional queen for as long as possible. She did not arrive in England and immediately begin she-wolfing it up and instead tried to behave in a way that lived up to gender expectations, even when she was forced to move beyond them (cf. Helen Maurer's comment here).

Three: when we talk about the ideals of queenship, we have to realise that while these were kind of a job description, they were subjective and often based in misogynistic "ideals" of womanhood. e.g. "motherhood" reduces the queen to her reproductive ability and this was something she had little to no control over. An infertile queen is often deemed to have "failed" at the "most vital" aspect of queenship by modern historians and commentators (for an alternate view, see Kristen Geaman on Anne of Bohemia) but very rarely is there an acknowledgement of how misogynistic this standard is.

Margaret was not a popular queen before the Wars of the Roses began. She became queen in a situation where she was set up to inevitably fail. She arrived in England to pageants hailing her as a bringer of peace, as the figure to end the war with France, but the terms of the treaty that included her marriage contract ensured that any benefits she could bring were minimal. There was a short, 21-month peace, a paltry dowry, the outlay of considerable expense to bring her to England, and her father had little to no influence with Charles VII of France to be able to help any future negotiations.

Another factor was that the surrender of Maine and Anjou came to be widely associated with her marriage. It wasn't an official condition of the marriage but it does appear to have been promised at the same time. It was disastrously unpopular in England and it very likely inflamed tensions within the nobility. Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset held large amounts of territory in Maine and Anjou and was made Lieutenant of France to make up for these losses, which offended his predecessor in the role, Richard, Duke of York. It has been argued, though I'm not convinced, that York continuing in the role would have at least maintained, if not improved, the English position in France instead of the massive decline that followed.

None of this was Margaret's fault. She was 14 years old when her marriage was negotiated. She had no role in negotiations beyond the symbolic. There is also some thought that the English side was hamstrung by Henry VI's instructions to make a peace at any and all cost. We don't know how she felt about marrying Henry or about the surrender of Maine and Anjou beyond speculation based on preconceived ideas of what she was "like". We don't know what she was really like to guess how she felt about these things. And even if she was in favour of the surrender of Maine and Anjou, she was still a teenager when it happened. Are we really saying that a bunch of experienced adult men fell over themselves to do exactly what a teenage girl wanted even though it was disastrously bad for England?

Margaret had basically walked into a scenario where she had very little chance of being the peace-bringer she was expected to be and her popularity suffered as a result. She wasn't the one making choices - at best, she might have influenced others to make choices, but most of the problems with France that she was blamed for began before she set foot in England.

The Succession Crisis

Margaret also walked into a succession crisis.

Typically, the succession crisis tends to be talked about as occurring from after the death of Henry's last paternal uncle and his heir, Humphrey Duke of Gloucester, in 1447 but I would suggest that there was an underlying anxiety about the succession that predated Gloucester's death. Since 1435, Henry VI's one and only heir had been his ageing and childless uncle Gloucester (before 1435, Gloucester's elder brother, also childless, had been the heir), who was not terribly popular with Henry and his court. On one hand, Henry and his favourites did not want Gloucester to become king because they disliked him and his policies. From another perspective, Gloucester was getting on in years, childless, unmarried and possibly in poor health, so if he became king, he wouldn't be expected to reign long and if he managed to produce an heir before his death, the chance are this heir would still be in single digits when he succeeded the throne. If there was no child, the question of the succession was wide open. As it was, Gloucester died two years after Margaret's arrival and there was no longer a clear heir.

I know that you're probably thinking, "York, though. It's York." Well, yes and no. York probably had the claim with the least complications. He was Henry's closest male relative who had not descended through the female line or through a legitimised bastard line. But there were were two other lines that had viable claims to the throne: Somerset and Exeter.

Exeter's claim derived from from Elizabeth of Lancaster, the daughter of John of Gaunt and his first wife, Blanche of Lancaster, making her the full sister of Henry IV. Somerset's claim was derived from John Beaufort, Earl of Somerset who was the eldest son of Gaunt and his third wife, Katherine Swynford. The Beauforts had been born bastards but legitimised by both the Pope and by Richard II. This legitimisation did not contain any clauses barring them the throne (this was done under Letters Patent in Henry IV's reign), quite possibly because Richard appears to have chronically avoided making any pronouncements on the succession and quite possibly because the there was little reason to imagine the Beauforts in contention for the throne.

Somerset was probably Henry's preferred heir. Since Exeter derived his claim through the female line, naming him heir meant that the female line counted in the succession and if it did, York had a better claim to the throne than Exeter and Henry, as he was descended from Lionel of Antwerp (Gaunt's elder brother) through the female line. It risked exposing the weakness at the centre of the Lancastrian claim to the throne which would in turn would reveal the reigns of Henry's father and grandfather were illegitimate. York seems to have never been particularly close to Henry; as Michael Bennett pointed out about Richard II (who, like Henry, faced a similarly uncertain and difficult succession), it's hard to love your winding cloth. But Somerset was a favourite, a Lancastrian from a cadet line and Henry's closest living paternal relative who was of legitimate birth.

These competing claims and the uncertainty about who would succeed caused anxiety. If Henry died childless, who would become king? How would these claims be settled? Would there be civil war and strife? What would it mean if the Lancastrian dynasty came to an end and a new one began?

So it's easy to imagine the pressure on Margaret to conceive and bear a child was almost certainly immediate on her arrival to England. Bearing a child would help ease these anxieties considerably, continuing the Lancastrian dynasty, putting to rest any civil discord caused by competing claim and ensuring a peaceful succession. In view of the unpopularity of the marriage to Margaret, it would also be seen as having a legitimising the marriage.

The Long Wait For An Heir

Unfortunately, that didn't happen. It was eight years between Margaret's arrival in England and the birth of Edward of Lancaster.

We don't know why it took so long. There's speculation of course - a delay in consummating the marriage due to Margaret's youth, the stress and pressure of the situation, Henry being too pious for sex, Margaret undergoing rigorous fasting as part of religious devotion, Henry requiring a sex coach, Henry being the medieval equivalent of asexual and/or sex repulsed, or there being some subfertility issue. There's no real evidence, one way or the other.

Henry VI's sexuality and piety are one of those sort of myths of the Wars of the Roses, embedded in the narrative as a "truth" but lacking contemporary evidence (as Bertram Wolffe points out, there is little direct, contemporary evidence for Henry's piety, most appears in retrospect as part of an explanation for his failed kingship and part propaganda for the (Tudor-sponsored) efforts to canonise him as a saint). The evidence of a sex coach is based a historian failing to understand how a medieval king's bedrooms worked and going, "we don't know that these people in attendance on the king at night in his bedroom left when he had sex with his wife so... sex coach? Please buy my book!" We don't know that there was a delay in consummation or that Margaret was considered too young for sex (for comparison's sake, Henry's grandmother, Mary de Bohun, conceived her first son - Henry V - around her 15th birthday). Margaret herself complained of poor health caused by rigorous fasting during times of "many sufferings and tribulations" but we don't know that she was fasting throughout these early years. We don't have anything like medical records for Margaret (or Henry) to know how she tried to manage this childlessness.

But we generally don't know why a medieval couple was childless. Where we do have evidence, it's often speculative (e.g. Kristen Geaman's work on Anne of Bohemia suggests Anne suffered at least one miscarriage based on a letter she dictated).

What we do know is that Henry and Margaret never attempted to promote the image of having a chaste marriage, even though it would have provided a bulwark against criticism of their childless state - they were choosing the holy, pious option. The birth of Edward of Lancaster and Henry VI's joyous reaction to the news of Margaret's pregnancy also suggest that they were trying for a baby. I think this suggests there was some kind of uncontrollable issue, possibly medical, causing their childlessness than it being a deliberate choice to assign "blame" for. It was, in short, just bad luck.

The long wait for an heir meant the anxieties around the succession and continuation of the Lancastrian were not quickly eased. In some ways, they might have been exacerbated. Before his marriage to Margaret, there was no reason to believe that Henry would struggle to have children when he married (or at least, there is no evidence this was the case). Once married, though, Henry's continued childlessness began to appear to be an issue that couldn't be easily or quickly resolved, perhaps even being a permanent issue.

We know, too, that their childlessness was used to criticise them from as early as 1446, and Margaret was the chief target of this criticism. An example of this comes from 1448, where one felon in Canterbury gaol accused his neighbour in the isle of Thanet of saying:

oure quene was non abyl to be Quene of Inglond but and he were a pere of or a lord of this ream he woulde be on thaym that shuld hepe putte her doun for because that sche bereth no child and because that we have pryns in this land

There does seem to have been some view that in marrying Margaret, Henry had betrayed his promise to marry a daughter of the Count of Armagnac and the lack of children from their marriage could be seen as a sign of God's disapproval. It would have added to the unpopularity Margaret was already facing.

While the news of Margaret's pregnancy does seem to have been greeted with joy, the long wait for such news had exposed Margaret to ample criticism and hatred. It made it easy for the allegations of Margaret's adultery and Edward of Lancaster's illegitimacy to take root. It meant that when Henry VI had his breakdown, there was no son who could serve even nominally as a regent for him and the question of who was to govern while Henry was incapable exposed the conflicts between York and Henry and York and Somerset.

Conflict with York

A lot of the conflict between York and Lancaster began with York's quarrel with Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset. Somerset was considered a favourite of Henry VI and Margaret but we don't know how much Margaret was responsible for his position in comparison to Henry or how much York's quarrel with him was really him quarrelling with the crown without openly doing so and risking a charge of treason. It does seem likely, imo, that Margaret had sympathies with Somerset given her husband evidently trusted him, but we don't know if that's true and even if it is, it was Henry VI who ostensibly promoted Somerset.

Despite the retrospective reading we put on the events leading up to the outbreak of war with the First Battle of St. Albans, we lack surviving evidence for Margaret and York being in direct hostility to each other. As Helen Maurer says:

If there is no concrete evidence of hostility between Margaret prior to the crisis of 1453-54, there is some indication that they were on reasonably good terms. York's recent biographer, P.A. Johnson goes so far to characterise Margaret as a 'politically neutral figure', whose attitude prior to January 1454 was 'if anything sympathetic to York'.

There is no evidence that York opposed Margaret's marriage to Henry. We have evidence of Margaret intervening in a property dispute in York's favour and giving York and his servants' generous New Year's gifts. The gifts to his servants in 1453 were of the same value as she gave the to the servants of Somerset and Cardinal Kemp so there was no deliberate slight there. In 1447, they were higher than the gifts she gave the Duke of Gloucester's servants (although alienated from Henry VI, Gloucester did outrank York so you'd expect his servants to get the more valuable gifts), the archbishop of Canterbury and duchesses of Bedford and Buckingham. Maurer speculates this was to reassure York in the face of his appointment to the lieutenancy of Ireland. We also have evidence of an outwardly cordial relationship between Margaret and Cecily in the early 1450s. It is not enough to suggest Margaret and Cecily were friends or what they really felt about each other but it does suggest they were both invested in keeping up at least the facade of cordiality.

The relationship between Margaret and York did sour some point. It's impossible to know what was the fatal blow was or who was the first to turn hostile. It may have been Margaret's attempt to claim the regency when Henry VI suffered his breakdown, it may have been York's imprisonment of Somerset during his protectorship, it may have been when York lost the protectorship, it may have been the rumours of York's involvement in William de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk's murder in 1450.

Maurer notes that Margaret probably viewed the First Battle of St. Albans as an alarming attack on Henry's royal authority by York. She would not be wrong to do so. York may have felt justified and may have been justified in taking action to remove the individual he saw as a threat to his own authority - Somerset - but he raised his banners and fought a battle against his king. A battle where the king, Margaret's husband, had been injured. Regardless of whether or not York was "justified" or whether or not Henry pardoned him, his behaviour was, actually, treasonous (and it is likely he was only pardoned because Henry felt forced into it).

We can argue about the semantics and justifications for York's behaviour but it doesn't really matter when it comes to Margaret's reaction. York had raised an army against his sovereign and fought against his sovereign's own forces in a battle where his sovereign was wounded in the neck. There is no world in which Margaret would not see York as a threat to her family after this. If we argue that York was justified in this action because he perceived (correctly or not) that Somerset was a threat to him, then we must also accept that Margaret had every justification in viewing York as a threat to her family.

I tend to get the feeling that by 1456, Margaret and York were both in the same position. They were at a point where they viewed each other as a threat to the safety of their position and family. Whether one was more justified than the other is impossible to say. It's likely, though, that York held considerably more responsibility that the myth of him as the noble-hearted man forced to rebel to save himself.

The Problem of Henry VI

Another factor in "who do we blame for the Wars of the Roses" is Henry VI himself. We don't know when he began ruling in his own right and what periods, if any, he was unable to rule beyond the breakdown of 1453-54. We don't really know if the criticisms of his favourites, i.e. Suffolk and Somerset, were really criticisms of individuals who were ruling for him or if they were more in line with the attacks on the favourites of Edward II and Richard II. In the case of Richard II, the Lords Appellant maintained the image of loyally serving Richard while purging his household, threatening him with deposition, executing his friends, and placing themselves in positions of power by claiming that they were merely rescuing the king from the influence and bad advice of his evil councillors. This doesn't mean they didn't also have a grudge against the king's favourites, that their attack on them didn't really matter (after all, they killed a lot of them), but by focusing on the favourites, they maintained the image of loyalty to the king which helped them sidestep a charge of treason (though they also forced Richard to pardon them) and maintain popular support.

All of that is just to say that this may very well have been the case with Henry VI. York's attacks on Somerset (and maybe Suffolk, since he was rumoured to be involved in Suffolk's downfall and murder) may have simply been an attack on Somerset, perhaps justified or not, but York may have also been using Somerset as a proxy for Henry.

If he did, his quarrel could, at its core, actually be with Henry. It also raises the possibility that, after Somerset's death at the First Battle of St Albans, Margaret was simply the last one standing between York and Henry and so became the proxy for his attacks on Henry. This only intensified once York gained custody of Henry, and Margaret, with Edward of Lancaster, was out of reach and leading Lancastrian resistance.

We know that Tudor efforts to rehabilitate and canonise Henry tended to place more blame onto Margaret to absolve Henry of blame. All of this means that in terms of "how responsible, really, was Margaret for the policy decisions that alienated York?", we simply don't know. She may have served as a receptacle for blame (though personally I think she was more involved than not) or been the prime actor but we can't negate the possibility that some of the things she was blamed for were actually Henry's fault.

On the subject of Henry's mental illness... obviously, neither he or anyone else are to blame for it. Certainly, no one wakes up and goes "I know, now I shall have a deliberating mental illness that will ruin the kingdom, I totally want and will this to happen". But it did make things... very difficult. The medieval monarchy just wasn't set up to deal with a king with a severe, incapacitating mental illness (this was also the case with Charles VI of France). It tended to aggravate factionalism as nobles jostled against each other for power and influence. It placed the queen in an unenviable position of trying to protect her family and govern for the king while also appearing politically neutral, above factionalism and still living up to the ideals of queenship and only wielding soft power. Even if Margaret had managed to be appointed as regent for Henry, the case of Isabeau of Bavaria who had been regent for Charles VI suggests she wouldn't have fared much better.

On top of that, Henry's breakdown came at a bad time. He was unable to recognise Edward of Lancaster as his son upon his birth, which may well have provided some of the initial fodder for the rumours of Edward's illegitimacy. Once again: none of this was Henry's fault but it all had an impact on how much Margaret was viewed and blamed for Lancastrian failures.

Military Defeat

Margaret was widely regarded as the head of the Lancastrians and very likely this was true during the times when Henry VI was unable to rule (i.e. due to mental illness or breakdown, during his imprisonment by Edward IV). However, she was not a military commander and there is no evidence she ever donned armour or was present at any battle (we know she was in Scotland at the Battle of Wakefield, not personally overseeing any indignities heaped on Richard, Duke of York's corpse, for example). When she was travelling with the army when a battle took place, she probably stayed nearby in reasonably secure locations, such as a castle or abbey, a short distance away from the battlefield.

Responsibility for the Lancastrians' military defeats should be laid at the feet of those who actually commanded the Lancastrian forces, not Margaret. We don't know if the Lancastrians had better commanders to say that was Margaret's fault for not appointing better ones (and given the position was often granted to those of high rank, this seems likely - to appoint a man of greater ability but lesser rank risked disaster, as the narratives about the French defeat at Agincourt tells us). This is something more down to misfortune than any choice Margaret could have made. We know that Margaret had wanted to return to France following the news of the Earl of Warwick's defeat and death at the Battle of Barnet but was overruled or convinced otherwise by other Lancastrians. Had she gotten her way, the Lancastrians may never have gotten another chance (or at least a better chance) to challenge Edward IV but they probably would have survived.

There were also elements of bad luck in the Lancastrians' military defeats. The Lancastrian forces at Towton were blinded by the snow and their arrows ineffective against the wind. At Barnet, a heavy fog caused confusion amongst the troops. Storms delayed Margaret and Edward of Lancaster's return to England in 1471; had they arrived earlier they might have been able to take a better position or unite with Jasper Tudor's forces and won the Battle of Tewkesbury. Had the weather been against Edward IV and the Yorkist forces at Towton or at Barnet, had Edward IV's return been delayed by storms - well, the Lancastrians might have won.

This isn't to say that nothing was Margaret's fault. Margaret's delay at returning to England during the readeption was also partially credited to her own mistrust of the situation (a fair if ultimately fatal judgement, given the risk involved to her son and Warwick's untrustworthiness as an ally). The delay meant that Warwick struggled to muster forces under his own authority to deal with Yorkist resistance. This situation wasn't all her fault, though. Her delay was also caused by Louis XII of France, who had refused to let her leave until he got guarantees from Warwick about English support against Burgundy and the storms mentioned above. Another factor is that Warwick was simply reaping what he had sowed - very few Lancastrians had reason to trust the man who had been the chief ally of York against Henry VI, who had put Edward IV on the throne, then attempted to crown George, Duke of Clarence before allying himself with Margaret. He also seems to have been heavily involved in the creation and promotion of the stories slandering Margaret and her son.

We should also be wary of suggesting, as B. M. Cron does, that Margaret of Anjou was partly to blame for her son's defeat and death at Tewkesbury because she didn't let him fight in battle before Tewkesbury. For a start, Lancastrian hopes rested on Edward's survival. He was the viable alternative to Yorkist rule, the figure around whom opposition could gather, and the future of the dynasty. Putting him at risk was a very bad decision. His death meant the end of Lancastrian hopes.

Secondly, Tewkesbury was the first major battle he was actually of an age to fight at. Was he supposed to fight at Towton when he was 8? Hedgeley Moor or Hexham when he was 11? Thirdly, from the few accounts of his time in exile, we know he was military-minded and dedicated to martial exercises so it seems he was prepared as much as was safely possible. Finally, it is unclear whether Edward engaged in the battle proper or whether he was killed attempting to escape when it became clear the Lancastrians had lost.

Summing Up

In short, there were a lot of factors in Margaret's failure and a lot of them compounded on other. Her initial unpopularity only grew as the the English position in France weakened and as the years went by with no sign of an heir. As unrest broke out and Henry was incapable of responding or ruling, Margaret became the de facto head of the Lancastrian court and the focal point for anger at the way things were being governed. Yorkist and later Tudor propaganda built on all these factors, depicting her as the central flaw in Lancastrian rule, the one reason for its failure.

We simply don't know what Margaret was really like. The image of her as a radical, extreme figure bent on revenge fits into narratives that imagines Richard, Duke of York was faultless in his actions, that she had pushed him to an extreme and he reacted in order to save his own life. The idea that Margaret could have felt similarly threatened by York's actions is never once considered, yet she had every reason to fear him.

Do I think Margaret was entirely the innocent in the Wars of the Roses? No. Of course not. But she probably was at fault for far less than is typically attributed to her.

[asha-mage]

Lesbian Rand AU?

[Send me a potential AU and I'll answer with five things from that story!]

Oh boy, here we go-

A lot depends on the setup. A big part of Rand's character is reckoning with the failures of his past life and the foundation of a lot the interesting ways Jordan interrogates the gender binary is built on the idea that those mistakes are a remix of Paradise Lost/The Fall. LTT is at both at once Eve and Lucifer. Eve in that he acts without the consent or permission of his other half (Latra Posae Decume- the Adam of this version) and runs of on his own in defiance of her will. Lucifier in that in his pride, he believes he can match or surpass the Creator, by attempting to Seal the Bore with only saidin. As a result, paradise is lost- the AoL is destroyed in the breaking by LTT's sin, an entire Age results where all men take the blame to a greater or lesser extent, for the original sin of one man. Of course, Jordan isn't just running with this premise as simple fact- he's interrogating the idea of original sin, salvation, and redemption and raising inherent and complicating questions. Does it make a difference that LTT's intentions where pure and genuine? That he didn't know and couldn't have predicted the consequences of his actions? How does Rand suffering for LTT's do any justice to those who suffered and died in the Breaking? Is chasing the splendor of an Age that could shatter so easily even a worthwhile endeavor, or should the focus be on letting go of the past and building something new? Does that mean forgetting and forgiving and is that fair?

All this to say is that, I think for a Lesbian Rand AU to work the story would probably need a reversed gender dynamic to the one that is present in the books- which I don't know that I could ever write both because it would veer very uncomfortably close to the most misogynistic elements of our own historical societies, and probably have to exceed them in brutality to work (something I'm not very good at, since a lot of my world building energy is usually directed at reshaping and re interpenetrating those historical societies through more queer and equitable lenses), and because a lot of what I connect to in Rand's story has a lot to do with the specifically queer male reading of it. That said if I could or would do that, I think it could also work very effectively as a queer female reading in the same thematic ways.

Rand and male channelers in general in the WoT verse already fulfill a lot of the tropes commonly associated with medieval witches- individuals tainted by an otherworldly power that is poorly understood and inherently transgressive to the gender roles of their society, as well as threat to the established social order (to put it mildly). It's not hard to translate that to a theoretically tainted saidar and the feelings of a resulting broken world onto a theoretical female Dragon. Rand in this context fulfills a pretty familiar role- Joan of Arc, Himiko of Yamatai, Elizabeth Woodvile, etc- savior and hero to some, witch and monster to others.

My brain of course goes to female Mat to be Rand's love interest in this AU- trickster and guile heroine. Mat's specific brand is easy to imagine transcending into a female character in a strict patriarchy, both because Mat's role in the series is already pretty gender transgressive (as befits a trickster shapeshifting archetype), and because it's easy to imagine again that simmering homoerotic temptation Mat and Rand's relationship inherently invokes, but gender flipped: Mat representing a liberation a refusal of the traditional gender roles that Rand can't quite decide if she truly wants or only wants because she was raised to want them. Rand specifically being homosexual rather then my bisexual head canon means that, I would probably air on the side of it being compulsory heterosexuality/heteronormativity- and genuinely wanting the life of adventure and liberty offered by Mat's promises of running away together.

I could also see Min (again as her Gender Weird makes her surprisingly easy to translate into a traditional patriarchy without loosing core elements of her character) as Rand's love interest- again in largely the same role as the series. Someone who Rand could just be....herself around, who couldn't overawed or terrified or brow beaten into seeing a monster, but rather just a person- a woman sacred and overwhelmed and being crushed by the expectations of a savior, and all the fears of being a monster. Conversely I don't know that either Avihenda or Elayne's relationships would still function the same- not without flipping their genders as well which defeats the idea of the premise. A few extra thoughts (since 1 and 2 are basically just big disclaimers)-

While I find the idea of Lesbian Rand having to learn from Short Gay Ball of Anger Uncle Moiraine very funny conceptually (Moiraine is already a pretty strong riff of mentor characters like Obi Wan and Gandfalf, but genderflipped, and I find the idea flipping that back but keeping the more unique aspects of Moiraine's character to be interesting), I also can't help but find the idea of Moiraine as an older, slightly rattled/mad, female wilder Moiraine with the same motivation as in the series just as intriguing as a mentor figure to Lesbian Rand. It would give the entire series a very different vibe, but that's just a natural outcome of the premise as well. I once said Moiraine is a woman who, if she had be born into a patriarchy would have easily been burned as a witch- but the truth is, the idea of Moiraine as a witch to clever to burn, a witch who is surviving the curse of her power, and struggling to see the savior who may yet be able to reverse that curse and save their world...their is an Appeal There.

It's scary conversely, how easy it is to fit the Aes Sedai in general into a gender flipped Randland, and I think speaks to how effectively Jordan wrote them and their institutional flaws. Mired in traditions, secure in their power, comfortable in ordering the world to their will- a mix between the Catholic Church and an order of magi, angry and resistant to reform and change that alters the base of their power, presided over by ancient and yet ageless cabals of entrenched elders. The scene, easily one of my favorites, in the series, in Fal Dara, is almost sickeningly easy to imagine with the genders flipped- a young woman still bright eyed and scarred of what she is and what she is capable of, with three thousand years of tales of women going mad from power, declaring themselves the Dragon falsely in greed and lust for power and leaving the world to suffer for it, walking into a a room with three ancient wizards who tell her that this is her fate, to be this messiah and destroyer both, it hits sharply and exactly the right way.

Again, I don't know that I would do it, and I find what Jordan is doing with gender and sexuality already in the Wot Books inherently more interesting and....less....I don't know sticky? But it's a fun thought exercise.