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How to Bathe like a Champ in Tudor England
Living in Tudor England and bathing did not go hand in hand. While bathing was still seen as a social status, as the wealthier you were the cleaner you were, it would still make you nauseous to think about the methods that were employed.It is of no wonder that the people who lived in Elizabethan England were afraid of water. Looking back it is easy to see that dumping your waste into the Thames and then bathing in it is not safe. People became sick and diseased from bathing this way and the onl [...]
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Gráinne Ní Mháille or Grace O’Malley
In honor of Talk Like a Pirate Day, I decided to dedicate today’s post to one of the best. Grace O’Malley was a queen, a pirate and all around bad ass. She went toe to toe with Queen Elizabeth I and won. Not many people did that. Gráinne, or Grace as it was Anglicized, was born in 1530 on the west coast of Ireland to Owen O’Malley, a wealthy trader, seafarer and chieftain. Legend says that as a teenager she begged her father to let her serve with him aboard his ships. He told her no saying her hair would get caught in the rigging. The next day, she showed…
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William Tyndale
William Tyndale’s early life is somewhat of a mystery. Born in Gloucestershire sometime between 1491 and 1494, the exact date and location of his birth is unknown. There are no documents relating to him, until he received his Bachelor’s Degree at Magdalen Hall at Oxford University in 1512, when he would have been in his late teens. In the Oxford registers he uses the surname of Hychyns, which has lead historians to believe his family may have branched into two, either side of the Severn river, one side taking the Tyndale surname, the other Hychyns or Hutchins. In 1515 he was ordained as a priest in London, and he received…
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Elizabeth Tudor- the early years
In chess, the pawn is the most expendable piece on the board. It can be put out into danger and thrown away on the slightest whim. However, if the pawn withstands the dangers of the board and makes it across, it becomes a queen- the most powerful piece in the game. Elizabeth Tudor was born into the Royal Family of England, a pawn. Not the hoped for prince her father had moved heaven and earth for, but another daughter. A disappointment to both parents. Nevertheless, King Henry VIII and his new wife Anne Boleyn put a brave face on it. They added an ‘s’ to the birth announcements and threw…
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Margaret Pole
On May 28th 1541 Lady Margaret Pole Countess of Salisbury was taken from the Tower, where she had been held without trial and executed on the orders of Henry VIII. Her beheading was a botch job, carried out by a novice headsman and taking eleven blows, not helped by the fact that Margaret allegedly didn’t go quietly, refusing to put her head meekly on the block! Her crime? She had the wrong blood flowing through her veins, her Uncles were Richard III and Edward IV, and her father George Duke of Clarence, so her mere existence fed Henry VIII’s paranoia regarding his father’s tenuous claim to the throne. She followed…
