The Legacy of the Amazons

http://archive.constantcontact.com/fs080/1101600634271/archive/1110289466820.html

The onslaught of the patriarchy sometime around 5000 years ago, must have caught the feminine-guided centers of civilization pretty much unaware and totally unprepared. Who among these peaceful, progressive, weaponless peoples could have imagined the swashbucklers from hell, slashing their blades, flashing their gods forcefully in all directions, like cutting winds, frigid enough to freeze the soul? When the cultures clashed, the Goddess did not just roll over and die. She put up a damn good fight. She sized up the situation and proclaimed, like Dolores Ibarruri, "La Pasionara," the anti-Franco folk heroine of the Spanish Civil War (the Pilar character in For Whom the Bell Tolls), "It is better to die on your feet than to live on your knees!" She took a deep breath of air, of water, of fire, of earth, and pronounced, like any native North American brave on the way to battle, "Today is a good day to die." She rolled up her sleeves, tied back Her hair, stuck out Her tits and proposed, "Make my day!" She learned to ride horseback and to brandish an axe. She armed her priestesses and defended Herself as best She could. But when the bloody battle was done, She was deposed, denied, denounced, and deflowered. Desecrated, decimated, defamed, and defeated. She was not, however, definitively conquered. She gathered her strengths, Her endurance, Her resourcefulness and resolve, and She joined the underground where She became a guerilla soldier. My life is in flames. He made me walk through the brambles on the mountain. He stripped me of the crown correct for a high priestess. He gave me a dagger and a sword, and said: 'Turn them against your own body. They are made for you.' - From "Inanna and the Arunna" a poem by Enheduanna, Sumerian woman poet ca. 2300 BC The prehistoric battle between the matrilineal and patrilineal perspectives has been mythologically preserved in the widespread legends of the Amazons, a presumably fictitious matriarchal race of women warriors devoted to the Mediterranean Great Mother Goddess known variously as Artemis, Gaea, Thea, Hera, Demeter, Diana. The Amazons seem to have occupied a time and place just at the cusp of the widespread changeover from a Goddess-centered, Earth-oriented, circular spirituality to the male-dominated worship of a hierarchical and abstract father sky god. These warrior women exhibited characteristics of both traditions and were an interesting amalgam of the old and new world orders. They were led by queens, prayed to a divine mother and worshipped the female principle. They tilled fields, hunted, and befriended animals. They were cultured and practiced the graceful arts. They also knew and used arms, did battle, and sought vengeance.    The Amazons were said to have ruled large areas of North Africa, Anatolia and Asia Minor. They founded such great centers of civilization of the ancient world as Ephesus, Smyrna, Cymes, Samothrace, Myrine, Paphos, Lesbos, and Cyrene. Libya, that is, the entire ancient North African region save for Egypt, was also Amazon territory according to Herodotus. Revealing their fear and hatred, the Greeks describe the Amazons as women-only societies of barbaric and blood-thirsty Goddess-worshipping hunters in their mythology. They were said to kill and offer as a sacrifice any man who wandered uninvited into their community. They did, though, voluntarily consort with men from neighboring tribes once a year when they hosted their annual mass impregnation party. The Amazons were the priestess/guardians of the Moon Goddess, lunar handmaidens accompanying Her on Her monthly circle promenade round the sky. They built a shrine at Ephesus devoted to the many-breasted Artemis, friend of the wild animals, the huntress who ventures forth in the moonlight to combat evil. This Amazon sanctuary was destroyed by barbarians in the 7th century BC.    Northern Europe also had Amazon-like female Viking warriors and leaders. The  German city of Ulm, named for the grove of sacred elms, ulmae, the preferred sanctuary of the Goddess Artemis/Diana, was ruled by Amazons until the age of Alexander the Great.      In another tale, a woman, known only as the Red Maiden, commanded a fleet of Norwegian sailing vessels that invaded Ireland and destroyed most of Ulster in the 10th century AD. Olga, another warrior queen and the first Russian Orthodox saint, was an early ruler of Kiev. Women fought in Ireland's army until the church disallowed it in the 7th century. But it wasn't until the 17th century that Irish brides, the daughters of daughters of these early female vets, discontinued the fashion of including a knife in the waistband of their wedding costumes. Tacitus relates that when, in the year 61 AD, the Romans invaded the Druid island of Mona, meaning "Moon," they were expelled by an army that included "women dressed in black, slashing swords and screeching like Furies." At the same time, the ancient Celtic Queen Boudicca organized a general uprising by tens of thousands of men and women from several different early British tribes in a rebellion against the heavy-handed occupation forces of the Roman Empire. Boudicca's armies succeeded in capturing London, Colchester and St. Albans before the peasant insurrection was lost. The result of her efforts and subsequent death was, while not freedom, a more lenient Roman regime.        The Chinese tell of a "Women's Kingdom," with a lavish and unapproachable capital that is located by a distant sea. As Ch'iu Chin, a Chinese poet from the 19th century puts it: How many beautiful women have been heroines? There were the noble and famous women generals Ch'in Liang-yü and Shen Yün-yin. Though tears stained their dresses Their hearts were full of blood. The wild strokes of their swords Whistled like dragons and sobbed with pain.    Sir Walter Raleigh, described the culture and customs of a group of alleged Amazons discovered in 16th century Guyana. These female fighters purportedly spent, just as their mythical foremothers had, a moon-long period every year in festivals of wine-soaked revelry and ribaldry, mating with the chosen few men allowed entrance to their compound.   Africa has quite an Amazon tradition. In the 8th century AD, Arab explorers came upon the great and sophisticated civilization of ancient Ghana flourishing south of the Sahara. This huge area of west and central Africa was ruled by a dynasty of queens until the middle of the 11th century when Islam was introduced to the seven allied Hausa states, Some 700 years later, another queen, Amina of Hausaland, emerged as the greatest ruler ever. During her 37-year rulefrom 1536 to 1573, she created an extensive empire, founded cities and led fierce armies of 20,000 horse soldiers into battle. Her exploits are still celebrated in popular song. In 1900, the 50 year-old Queen Nana (Queen Mother) Yaa Asantewaa of the Ashanti Empire (now part of Ghana), led an army of women and men against the British in a last ditch attempt to rout them from their lands. She raised her troops by exhorting, "... Is it true that the bravery of the Asante is no more? I cannot believe it... if you the men of Asante will not go forward, then we will. We the women will. I shall call upon my fellow women. We will fight the white men. We will fight till the last of us falls in the battlefields." Probably the most famous woman in African history is Queen Nzinga Mbande who ruled Angola for 30-some years in the mid 1600s. In 1621, she negotiated with the Portuguese for the preservation of Angolan independence while seated on the back of a kneeling servant, as the colonialists had not provided a chair for her. Years later, Nzinga refused to return runaway slaves to the Portuguese, thus bringing down their colonial wrath. Nzinga, with her females officers, negotiated tribal alliances and formed a vast army which, in true guerrilla fashion, harassed the Portuguese to exhaustion from all sides while avoiding direct confrontation. I am Queen Nzinga. I am Queen Amina. I am Harriet Tubman. I am Mbuya Nehanda. And Behold! I've been pushed! Down! To the ground! With only my bare hands To use as a cup. But I have fought many wars, Plus untold battles, AND I ALWAYS PULL MYSELF BACK UP." - Nilene O,A. Foxworth, 20th century American poet It is time to take on the warrior woman persona. Time to become sturdy and centered, peaceful, resourceful rainbow warriors who can and will face a challenge and attend to what needs to be done. Time to strengthen and train our bodies, our minds, and our spirits.     May we steel ourselves to our task. Set our sights straight. Take aim. Take loving action. Turn ourselves into true Amazons - the faithfully devoted and fiercely protective adoring daughters of Mother Earth, Mama Moon. If the first woman God ever made was strong enough to turn the world upside down, all alone these together ought to be able to turn it rightside up again.    - Harriet Tubman

Women as Warrior

African Warrior Women

According to Greek accounts, the earliest Amazons came from Libya (then a name for most of North Africa). They wore red leather and carried crescent-shaped shields. It was these Libyan Amazons, they said, who later founded cities and temples in the Aegean and Anatolia.

At a much later period, the Amazons of Dahomey were crack all-female troops, all female, who also served as royal bodyguards. They were also priestesses and wore crescent moon crowns.

The Hausa had a number of warrior queens, notably Amina of Zau Zau. A woman named Bazao-Turunku led warriors and founded a town south of Zaria.

Nupe women warriors called Isadshi-Koseshi fought as fiercely as the men, opposing invasions of the Fulbe conquerers who raided the Nupe for cattles and slaves, especially women.

JAMAICA

Nyabinghi, the "hidden queen" fought to free Africans from English slavery and rule. Also called Queen Muhmusa or Tahtahme, she inspired the Nyabinghi underpinnings of Rastafarianism.
Nanny of the Maroons was born in Ghana, and folk history says that she came to Jamaica with the express purpose of becoming a high priestess and leader of her people, never having been a slave. She was an obeah-woman who led the eastern Maroons based in Moreton, and forged an alliance with another group led by Cudjoe. (The name Maroons comes from the Spanishcimarron,meaning "gone back to the wild.")

The Jamaican Maroons were the first people to force the English to sign a treaty with their subjects, on March 1, 1738. The lands conceded in this treaty formed a base for the Maroon's independent survival. One of these communities was named Nannytown after the female Ghanaian leader. Maroon country was so feared by the English that it became known as the "Land of Look-Behind."

(Queen Nanny is discussed in the Rebel Shamans presentation.)

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WOMEN BEAT BACK SLAVECATCHERS

In the summer of 1848, eight or ten people made it across the Ohio river in their northward flight from slavery. The slave catchers tracked them into town, but the bounty they were after turned out to be elusive:
"The women began to gather from adjoining houses until the Amazons were about equal to the [slave-hunters]-- the former with shovels, tongs, washboards and rolling pins; the latter with revolvers, sword-canes and bowie-knives. Finally the beseigers decamped, leaving the Amazons in possession of the field, amid the jeers and loud huzzahs of the crowd."
--Report from The North Star, an African-American paper out of Cincinnati, August 11, 1848. (For more, see Dorothy Sterling's book Speak Out In Thunder Tones.)

GHANA

"If you the men of Ashanti will not go forward, then we will. We the women will. I shall call upon you my fellow women. We will fight the white men. We will fight until the last of us falls in the battlefield."
---Ya Asantewa, an Ashanti queen who led the resistence to British colonial rule in Ghana. She succeeded in the short run, but the Ashanti were heavily outgunned.

THE "WAR OF THE WOMEN"
The Aba rebellion in southeastern Nigeria grew out of a traditional female rite of the Igbo. People were outraged at the colonial government's plan to tax women, "the trees that bear fruit." In protest, Ibo women bound their heads with ferns, painted their faces with ash, put on loincloths and carried sacred sticks with palm frond wreaths. Thousands marched on the District Office, dancing, singing protests, and demanding the cap of office of the colonial chief Okugo. When he approached one woman to count her goats and sheep, she had retorted, "Was mother counted?"
This protest spread into a vast regional insurrection. The Ibo women's councils mobilized demonstrations in three provinces, turning out over 2,000,000 protesters. The British District Officer at Bende wrote, "The trouble spread in the 2nd week of December to Aba, an important trading center on the railway. Here there converged some 10,000 women, scantily clothed, girdled with green leaves, carrying sticks. Singing angry songs against the chiefs and the court messengers, the women proceeded to attack and loot the European trading shops, stores, and Barclay's Bank, and to break into the prison and release the prisoners."
Elsewhere women protestors burned down the hated British "Native Courts" and cut telegraph wires, throwing officials into panic. The colonials fired on the female protesters, killing more than fifty and wounding more. Marches continued sporadically into 1930. These mass actions became known as the Aba Rebellion of 1929, or The War of the Women. It was one of the most significant anti-colonial revolts in Africa of that day.
Diola women led similar protests against French attempts to exact a tribute from their rice harvest in Senegal, an event dramatized by filmmaker Ousmane Sembene.

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If you want to know who I am
I am daughter of Angola, of Kêto and Nagô
I don't fear blows because I am a warrior
Inside of samba I was born
I raised myself, I transformed myself, and
no one will lower my banner, O, O, O.
I am a warrior woman daughter of Ogun and Yansâ

---Song from an album by Brazilian singer Clara Nuñes

Rain Queens of the Lovedu

Dzugudini, a grand-daughter of "the famous ruler Monomatapa," was the founding Rain Queen of the Lovedu. Her royal father was angry that she bore a child out of wedlock. Oral tradition says her mother taught her the art of rain-making and gave her rain charms and sacred beads. Then she fled south with some supporters. They settled peacefully among the Sotho. In the early 1800s, a leadership crisis was resolved by accession of the first Mujaji, a Rain Queen with both political and ceremonial power. Chiefs presented her with wives. She had no military, but even the Zulu king Shaka paid her tribute because of her rain power. Her successors have less authority, but still preside over womanhood initiations and other important rituals.

 

SWAZI

The queen is called by honorific titles such as "Mother of the Country" and Indlovukati, "Lady Elephant." She is a powerful rain maker, guardian of the royal clan's sacred objects, and addresses the ancestors on behalf of the Swazi nation. She has the power to give sanctuary to persons condemned by the king's court. Her village is the capital of the country, where troops are quartered.

 

HAUSA

Many powerful queens are remembered in Hausa tradition. Among the Kotoko, the Gumsu was the female heir of the land, associated with the morning star, mother of all stars. She lived in the southern part of the palace and performed functions associated with the south, was the head of the country's women and played a leading part in the seven year rites for its welfare. The Kotoko government was based on a delicate balance of male/female, right/left, north/south. Among the Kanuri, the Gumsu retained her authority in Muslim times. Diwan records recount that the Gumsu Fasama became angry at her son, Sultan Biri ibn Dunama, for executing a thief, rather than cutting off his hands as the Koran decreed. "Accordingly his mother put Biri in prison, and he submitted to the punishment for a whole year.

THE FLIGHT OF MARGARET OF ANJOU

http://www.museusoaresdosreis.pt/en-GB/collections/painting/highlights_painting/ContentDetail.aspx?id=414


Francisco Vieira, “O Portuense” (1765-1805) 
Oil on canvas 
126 x 102 cm 
Inv. 23 Pin CMP/ MNSR 

Edmund Beaufort, Duke of Somerset (c. 1406–1455)

http://warsoftheroses.devhub.com/blog/532740-edmund-beaufort-duke-of-somerset-c-14061455/

August 22, 2010

Henry VI and His Queen, Margaret of Anjou

Through his quarrel with Richard PLANTAGENET, duke of York, Edmund Beaufort, second duke of Somerset, helped initiate the political conflicts that eventually escalated into the WARS OF THE ROSES.

Edmund Beaufort was a younger son of John Beaufort, earl of Somerset (d. 1409), eldest of the legitimated children of John of Gaunt, duke of Lancaster (1340–1399), by his mistress Katherine Swynford (d. 1403). As a branch of the house of LANCASTER, the BEAUFORT FAMILY held a claim to the Crown that could possibly rival the claim of the house of YORK. Beaufort succeeded his elder brother John as earl of Somerset in 1444 and as duke of Somerset in 1448. He served in FRANCE from the 1420s, recapturing Harfleur in 1440 and relieving CALAIS in 1442. In 1446, he succeeded York as lieutenant of France, but his failure to hold Normandy against French assaults, though not entirely his fault, earned him great unpopularity.

In 1450, anger over the defeats in France sparked JACK CADE’S REBELLION, which in turn led to the overthrow and murder of HENRYVI’s chief minister, William de la POLE, duke of Suffolk. Despite his unpopularity and his military failures, Somerset enjoyed Henry’s confidence and assumed leadership of the royal government. York, angered by Somerset’s appointment to the French governorship and believing him to be ambitious for the throne, attacked the duke as an obstacle to needed reforms and as a traitor responsible for the loss of France.

Holding few lands of his own, Somerset was staunchly loyal to Henry VI, upon whom he depended for favor and office. The king frustrated all York’s attempts to remove Somerset from power until 1453, when the onset of Henry’s mental illness initiated York’s FIRST PROTECTORATE and allowed the duke to commit Somerset to the TOWER OF LONDON. Released immediately upon Henry’s recovery in early 1455, Somerset was acquitted of all charges and restored to office. Fearing perhaps that Somerset meant to destroy him, York and his noble allies, Richard NEVILLE, earl of Salisbury, and his son Richard NEVILLE, earl of Warwick, took arms against the COURT. After failing to achieve Somerset’s surrender, York and his allies attacked a royal party at the Battle of ST.ALBANS in May 1455. The battle ended when York’s forces slew Somerset. Considering his father’s death a murder, Henry BEAUFORT, third duke of Somerset, intensified his family’s rivalry with the house of York, thereby ensuring the continuance of civil strife.

Further Reading: Allmand,C.T., Lancastrian Normandy, 1415–1450 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1983);“Edmund Beaufort,” in Michael Hicks, Who’s Who in Late Medieval England (London: Shepheard- Walwyn, 1991), pp. 285–287; Griffiths, Ralph A., The Reign of King Henry VI (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981); Storey,R. L., The End of the House of Lancaster, 2d ed. (Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: Sutton Publishing, 1999);Wolffe, Bertram, Henry VI (London: Eyre Methuen, 1981).

Was Edward of Westminster Really the Son of Henry VI? (1453)

Margaret of Anjou (1430 - 1482) was the queen consort of England's Henry VI of England (1421 - 1471). Henry's father, Henry V, died when the son was only nine months old. Henry VI was raised with considerable influence of his regents. Even before Margaret, at 15, married Henry in 1445, there were rumors he'd been afflicted with bouts of mental instability. Henry's mother, Catherine of Valois, was the daughter of Charles VI of France, known to have struggled with insanity. (Henry also inherited the crown of France through his mother when he was eleven months old, when that grandfather died; he never ruled France as the throne was taken by Charles VII Valois in 1429.)

Even after he assumed power, Henry seemed mostly interested in religion and statecraft, not in his wife. Margaret did not become pregnant until 1453. About that time, Henry slipped into a serious mental breakdown, and was unaware of what was happening, including the birth of his son, Edward, in October 1453. When he came out of the breakdown, he acknowledged paternity of his son, and had him invested as Prince of Wales in 1454.

However, there were rumors that, given the long period before the queen became pregnant, and his insanity around the time of conception, the son had a different father. Two men were the primary suspects of being the real father:

• Edmund Beaufort, second (or first) Duke of Somerset (1406 - 1455). He was a younger son of John Beaufort, whose parents were John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster, and Katherine Swynford. He was a cousin of Henry VI, and a favorite of Henry. Edmund Beaufort had considerable power from 1451 through 1453, when the king's insanity made him vulnerable; the king was imprisoned in the Tower of London, released only when he recovered his wits. Edmund Beaufort was killed in 1455 at the First Battle of St. Albans, known as the first battle of the Wars of the Roses. The rumor of his adultery with the queen may have been part of a campaign during the king's insanity to destroy his reputation and reduce his power. His marriage in the early 1430s was unlicensed, and had to be later pardoned (1438), so he was already the subject of marital scandal. His wife, Eleanor Beauchamp, lived until 1467.
• James Butler, fifth Earl of Ormond and first Earl of Wiltshire (1420 - 1461). He was a strong supporter of the Lancastrians in the Wars of the Roses, and was an advisor to the young Prince of Wales, his alleged illegitimate son. When the York party prevailed at the Battle of Towton, Butler was beheaded. Butler was married in 1458 to the daughter of Eleanor Beauchamp and Edmund Beaufort, the latter being the other suspect in Margaret's alleged adultery.

As with other accusations of infidelity and illegitimacy, these were leveled by those who had an interest in destroying the reputation of the prince and his claim to the throne, and countered by those who had the contrary interest. Few have taken these claims seriously, however.

The Legend of Queen Margaret of Anjou at Mucklestone

The latin inscription from the stained glass window in Mucklestone church.The inscription translates as: Inscription to beautify God's House and to commemorate the Battle of Bloreheath Alice Chetwode in grateful memory of God's gifts to her prosperity and happiness has dedicated this window

http://www.bloreheath.org/pictures.php?pi=312&ref=mucklestone

A colourful legend exists regarding the location of Queen Margaret of Anjou during the battle. The King's wife was the driving force behind the formation of the Lancastrian army which intercepted the Yorkists, and hence triggered the battle. The Queen was known to be in the area prior to the battle, at Eccleshall castle which is eight miles south east of Blore Heath. The legend states that Margaret and her son Prince Henry, actually watched the defeat of her forces from the tower of St Mary's church in Mucklestone, which lies one mile (as the crow files) to the north east of Blore Heath. The legend also proclaims that once she had seen the defeat of her troops she ordered the blacksmith, one William Skelhorn, to reverse her horses shoes to disguise her escape, before having the poor smith executed to preserve his silence.

	For many years, the presence of Margaret at Mucklestone was dismissed as the battlefield could not be seen from the top of the tower. However, records have been found which indicate that the church once had a steeple which could have overlooked the battlefield, so the legend persists.

An anvil found in the smithy, believed to have been owned by Skelhorn, now lies in the church yard at Mucklestone to commemorate this legend. Also, a stained glass window in the church depicts Margaret of Anjou.

So is the legend true? Some have maintained that it would have been too risky for the Queen to venture to Mucklestone, as this would have been behind Yorkist lines. However, dense woodland separated Mucklestone from the Yorkists at Blore Heath, and Margaret was in a Lancastrian area. Her presence at Mucklestone would indeed have been risky but not impossible. It is also possible that she got lost en route to Blore Heath, and therefore emerged from the Bishops wood at Mucklestone.

It has also been noted that Margaret was very short-sighted, which would obviously prevent her from being able to see the action from as far as Mucklestone. However, Margaret is known to have previously used one of her aides to relate information to her from the vantage point of a steeple.

John Millar Watt

http://www.illustrationartgallery.com/acatalog/info_MillarWattMagsMH.html

Margaret of Anjou - Queen of England (Original) (Signed)

(Ref: MillarWattMagsMH)

Artist: John Millar Watt
Medium: Watercolour on Board
Size: 15" x 11" (375mm x 270mm)
Date: 1967
Signature: Signed by Artist

This is the Signed original Watercolour painting by John Millar Watt.

Margaret of Anjou was the French-born Queen of Henry VI and a major player on the Lancastrian side of the Wars of the Roses. When her husband began to suffer from a mental illness, Margaret took control. Her conflicts with the Yorkist branch of the Plantaganets led to their open rebellion and the instalment of Edward IV on the throne.

Margaret fought to regain her husband's throne, which she briefly succeeded in doing from late 1470 to early 1471. She was captured after the Lancastrian defeat at the battle of Tewksbury and released into exile in Anjou, France where she died in 1482.

Millar Watt's highly romantic scene shows Queen Margaret, her son the future Edward IV and what looks to be a Barbary Pirate. The signed painting was published in Princess Tina issue 46.

Queen Margaret of Anjou

Character Analysis

The widow of Henry VI, one-time vigorous prosecutor of the Lancastrian cause, has survived into old age as a kind of Fury voicing curses and horrible prophecies. In her speeches, so highly rhetorical and formalistic, the major theme of the play receives repeated emphasis. She lives to see, and practically to gloat over, the fulfillment of one curse, one prophecy, after another. It is she who makes understandable why — in accordance with that mathematical scheme of justice which she constantly dwells upon — Queen Elizabeth, the Duchess of York, and even the little princes should suffer.

http://www.cliffsnotes.com/literature/r/richard-iii/character-analysis/queen-margaret-of-anjou

Margaret of Anjou, book review

Mhttp://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/355argaret of Anjou: Queenship and Power

Book:

Margaret of Anjou: Queenship and Power in Late Medieval England
Helen Maurer
Woodbridge, Boydell Press, 2003, ISBN: 851159273X; 240pp.; Price: £29.95

Reviewer:

Dr Joanna Laynesmith
NA

Citation:

Dr Joanna Laynesmith, review of Margaret of Anjou: Queenship and Power in Late Medieval England, (review no. 355)
URL: http://www.history.ac.uk/reviews/review/355
Date accessed: 17 May, 2013

Margaret of Anjou, unlike most medieval queens, has been the subject of many biographies over the centuries but Helen E. Maurer's feminist approach to the queen's political life offers a substantially new presentation of Henry VI's queen. It is a scholarly but very accessible work that challenges traditional interpretations of the Wars of the Roses and makes a valuable contribution to understandings of queenship in the later medieval period.

In the past two decades there has been a significant surge in interest in the study of medieval queenship. The role of intercession, the limitations of female authority, the potential for informal power, and perceptions of the ideal queen are all persistent themes of this scholarship upon which Maurer has drawn. Maurer argues effectively that Margaret has hitherto been judged according to masculine standards, judgements that fail to take into account the limitations placed upon her actions by her gender. The principal thesis of the book is that Margaret's response to the failure of her king's authority and the need to exercise some form of power on behalf of the Lancastrian dynasty was striking, not because it transgressed gender expectations, but for the extent to which the queen endeavoured to live up to them.

The book is essentially chronological in structure, divided into four sections - 'Expectations', 'Mediations', 'The Crisis of Kingship' and 'Queen's Rule?'. The introduction discusses medieval perceptions of the frailty of women, arguing that although women were denied authority, they were often allowed considerable power because they were encouraged to act as intercessors and as representatives of their menfolk. Maurer argues that queens often wielded less effective power than women a little lower in the social scale because as queens they were expected to be exemplars of ideal feminine behaviour, 'more visible and hence more vulnerable to judgement than other women'.(p. 12) However, her sources for this assessment, primarily Christine de Pizan's Book of the Treasure of the City of Ladies, are all French and Maurer does not address the implications of the significant differences in French and English queenship in the fifteenth century. Moreover, a more cultural-historical analysis, assessing the pageantry of Margaret's first arrival in London and her 1456 arrival in Coventry, as well as the traditional rituals of coronation and childbirth and her legal status, would suggest that the expectations on English queens were more complex than Maurer's thesis allows - not merely higher than for other women but distinctly different. As L. O. Fradenburg has argued, there is a 'plasticity of gender in the field of sovereignty' that this book does not really address.(1)Nonetheless, Maurer's conclusion that Margaret's role in the Wars of the Roses cannot be understood without examining the limitations placed upon her by her gender is well-argued and sustained throughout the book.

Part One deals with the negotiations surrounding Margaret's arrival in England, the contentious surrender of Maine, and her motherhood. In contrast to most recent political historians of this period, Maurer argues that Margaret's role in the surrender of Maine was significant but that her actions reflect her commitment to the traditional queenly role of mediator and should not be seen as diplomatic meddling. The chapter on motherhood does not consider the practicalities of the role but discusses contemporary concerns about her initial failure to produce an heir and later allegations that Prince Edward was either a changeling or a bastard. The latter, Maurer argues, are closely connected with political events and reflect the complexities of Margaret's position as a woman being drawn into politics. The allegations either denied the queen's ability to 'do what a proper woman would do' - that is, produce children - or intimated that she had 'transgressed the boundaries of her proper place' through an extra-marital affair. In each case the allegations were also a commentary upon Margaret's political behaviour.

Part Two begins with a chapter on 'Business-as-Usual', which is primarily an assessment of the queen's surviving letters. Maurer convincingly rejects the assertions of earlier biographers that these are apolitical, contending that many involve mediation and intervention with political implications. While the original editor of these letters, Cecil Monro, asserted that many of the queen's attempts at intercession failed, Maurer argues that what is more important is that over half were written in response to an appeal to Margaret, which implies that the initiators expected Margaret's intervention to be effective. Maurer's very interesting analysis concludes that the one area in which action seemed to be more often entirely at Margaret's initiative was that of clerical preferment and that the things she was asked to do were not gender-specific. Maurer also shows that the letters reveal 'female networking within the system of intermediaries' (p. 60), who included in their number the duchesses of York and Somerset.

The next chapter is a study of Cade's Rebellion, focussing largely upon Margaret's role in the issuing of a pardon to the rebels. Maurer argues that this was an instance of Margaret's personal political influence, aimed both at undermining rebel unity and presenting herself as the ideal intermediary queen tempering the king's justice. Although Maurer admits to the complexities of the practice of intercession in which the queen's name might be invoked merely to allow the king to save face, her arguments are a little unsatisfactory here. She does not fully examine how this model works when, as on this occasion, the king had fled the scene. Nor does she address the fact that no contemporary chronicler seems to have been aware of the queen's supposed role at this point: which leaves the question of whom the language of Margaret's intercession was intended to impress unanswered.

Part Three examines the period 1453-6, characterized as the 'political education of Margaret of Anjou'. Maurer argues that the enmity between Margaret and the duke of York has been habitually assumed to have been of long duration, but that the evidence of the queen's relations with York prior to the first battle of St Albans indicates that this was not the case. Maurer's important study of Margaret's gift-giving indicates that the queen was careful to signal that she favoured Somerset and York equally in the early 1450s and that Somerset only began to rise in her favour after he had increased his influence with the king. Maurer argues persuasively that this calls for a reevaluation of events following Henry VI's mental collapse in 1453. In the light of Margaret Howell's recent work on Eleanor of Provence (2), Maurer suggests that Margaret's bid for regency was not as novel as has usually been argued. She depicts Margaret attempting to create a royal centre of authority that would offer greater stability than either York or Somerset could do, but contends that it was the limitations of her gender that told against Margaret: wives could only act on their husbands' behalf, as Eleanor of Provence had done in Henry III's absence, if the husband was 'cognizant and capable of the authority and will that are to be represented'. (quoted on p. 109) Tellingly, the post of Protector, which was established in 1454 (as it had been for Henry VI's minority), assumed a military role that inevitably prevented a woman from occupying the position whereas a regency would have had less exclusive implications.

Margaret seems to have accepted York's protectorate and Maurer observes that there is no evidence that she was responsible either for Somerset's release or York's exclusion from power on Henry VI's recovery. Maurer argues that after the protectorate, Margaret's role as representative of her dynasty had become redundant and that she stepped back out of the political frame. However, following the first battle of St Albans, Maurer asserts that the queen must have perceived York and his associates as a threat to her husband's authority and that the enmity began at this time, possibly increased by a sense of betrayal following her earlier efforts to signal friendship.

Part Four, the longest section of the book, examines the final years of Lancastrian kingship and Margaret's efforts to exercise power in her family's interest despite her lack of formal authority. In a fascinating exploration of the workings of power, Maurer asserts that Margaret's approach was always to represent herself 'as subordinate and adjunct while asserting the king's authority', but that such a position was inevitably short-term, because it 'denied her a more lasting authority and made her vulnerable to charges of transgression when the extent and nature of her activities attracted notice'. (p. 127) Maurer argues here that Margaret was instrumental in undermining York's second protectorate but, having driven him from power, was once again without a role herself and therefore retreated from the centre of power by moving out to her midland estates. However, with Henry's arrival in the Midlands later in the year, she was able to begin to exercise indirect rule on her family's behalf, influencing the replacement of the Keeper of the Privy Seal, the Treasurer and the Chancellor and being given institutional influence through her son's newly-appointed council. Maurer suggests that by appealing always to the authority of her husband or son to obscure the extent of her actual power, Margaret was able to push at the 'porous boundaries' of 'right order'. (p. 139)

Maurer contends that the gap between the image and reality of Margaret's power was especially evident in the rituals associated with her arrival and departure from Coventry on occasions in 1456 and 1457. In September 1456 the queen was greeted by a series of pageants that referred to her in the context of traditional ideals of womanhood: the Virgin Mary, a queen served by chivalric heroes, and her name saint, Margaret. For Maurer this indicates Margaret's self-association with acceptable power relationships. However, as she mentions briefly in a footnote, the king himself was already present in Coventry and he had not been so welcomed. Maurer does not address the implications of this unprecedented situation or the prominence in the pageant scripts of themes and images of kingship, that again suggest a more complex notion of gender and sovereignty than Maurer allows. Her analysis of Margaret's controversial departure from Coventry following the 1457 council is, however, more convincing.

Maurer argues that Margaret's aims in the later 1450s were twofold - to exercise practical power drawing on and reasserting the king's authority and to nullify the threat posed by York and the Nevilles, drawing them back into the Lancastrian polity. The second aspect is explored in a fascinating chapter, focussing primarily upon the Loveday procession of 1458, which has usually been dismissed as 'a fairly silly exercise'. (p. 151) This, Maurer asserts persuasively, was significant and meaningful at the time, despite its ultimate failure. Because Margaret, as a woman with no official political role, could not be party to the formal settlement of recompense for St Albans, the Loveday procession was a crucial opportunity to involve her in the demonstrations of reconciliation that both she and the king desired. The occasion did imply some 'mixed and murky' degree of role reversal between king and queen in terms of prayer and intercession, although it did not challenge the king as source of authority. Initially it strengthened Margaret's position because York acknowledged her informal exercise of power.

In analysing 'The Road to War' which followed the failed reconciliation attempts, Maurer challenges the accuracy of the single source, Benet's Chronicle, which claims Margaret advised a great council at Coventry to indict the Yorkist lords in the summer of 1459 - thereby highlighting the difficulties involved in judging Margaret's actual role in events from the primarily Yorkist accounts that survive. Maurer maintains that, following Henry VI's captivity after the battle of Northampton, Margaret at last emerged as the publicly-acknowledged leader of the Lancastrian party, but that there is no way of knowing if she was responsible for the earl of Northumberland's decision to raise the army that was ultimately to defeat York at Wakefield during her absence in Scotland. Maurer suggests that, although Margaret rightly recognised the need to act immediately to capitalise upon the Lancastrian victory, being forced to travel south in winter probably made provisioning difficult, thereby leading to the pillaging which so damaged her army's reputation and her own. After victory at the second battle of St Albans, Maurer asserts that Margaret was again without a public role and stepped out of the political frame. This point is perhaps debatable since the City of London's decision to send three ladies to negotiate suggests that they still considered Margaret to be the central decision-maker. Various explanations for the failure after St Albans are mentioned but none explicitly favoured. Maurer argues that the attainder against Margaret in the first Yorkist parliament identified her as their principal opponent, using gender-determined language to depict her crimes: 'a "contrary" woman, guilty of sexual transgression and of faithless - female? - mutability'. (p. 202)

The conclusion deals very briefly with the last two decades of Margaret's life, rehearsing the generally-accepted version of events up to 1471. The sources for her fate after 1471 are contradictory and unclear, but Maurer opts for the interpretation that a brief period of confinement was followed by four years in the custody of Alice Chaucer, duchess of Suffolk, prior to her return to France, 'ransomed' by Louis XI.

There is much more that might be said about Margaret's queenship. The management of her household and her properties or her religious interests, for instance, are scarcely mentioned but have considerable political significance. However, the narrow focus of this book enables Maurer to tell a very readable and engaging story and to concentrate the reader's attention on the central arguments of the limitations of Margaret's power and the circumspection of her behaviour. This makes it a book that will be appreciated by both general readers and scholars alike. Such a significant (and long overdue) reappraisal of one of the key figures of the Wars of the Roses must be welcomed by all historians of both fifteenth-century politics and gender studies in the later middle ages.

Notes

1. L. O. Fradenburg, 'Introduction: Rethinking Queenship', in Fradenburg ed., Women and Sovereignty. Conference Papers (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1992), pp. 1-13.Back to (1)
2. M. Howell, Eleanor of Provence: Queenship in Thirteenth-Century England (Oxford: Blackwell, 1998).Back to (2)