Regent Queen Katherine and the Battle of Flodden

Today is the 507th anniversary of the English defeat of the Scottish army led by King James IV of Scotland on Flodden Field. Among those killed among the Scots on September 9, 1513 were:

·         James IV, king of Scotland—Henry VIII’s brother-in-law (Margaret Tudor)

·         George Douglas, Scottish nobleman

·         William Douglas of Glenbervie, Scottish nobleman

·         William Graham, 1st Earl of Montrose, Scottish politician

·         George Hepburn, Scottish bishop—uncle of Adam Hepburn the Earl of Bothwell and brother of Adam Hepburn of Craggis

·         Adam Hepburn, 2nd Earl of Bothwell, Scottish politician, Lord High Admiral of Scotland

·         Adam Hepburn of Craggis, Scottish nobleman

·         David Kennedy, 1st Earl of Cassilis, Scottish soldier

·         Alexander Lauder of Blyth, Scottish politician

·         Alexander Stewart, Scottish archbishop—James IV’s illegitimate son who had studied with Erasmus

·         Matthew Stewart, 2nd Earl of Lennox, Scottish politician

Those losses, and thousands more, inspired a lament, "Flowers of the Forest".

But Henry VIII was not in England to lead his troops near Branxton in Northumberland--he was in France and had left his Queen, Katherine of Aragon as Regent. She had to respond to King James IV's declaration of war. Thomas Howard, the 2nd Duke of Norfolk, his sons Thomas (future 3rd Duke) and Edmund, Thomas Dacre, 2nd Baron Dacre, and Edward Stanley, lst Baron Monteagle led the English troops into battle. This website provides details of the battle and why the English defeated the Scots.

Catherine, whom historian John Edwards argues may have been Henry VIII's greatest Queen or consort in this BBC History Magazine article (registration required), sent Henry VIII a letter about the victory, carefully according him all the glory, and offering her prayers and humble service:

My Lord Howard hath sent me a letter open to your Grace, within one of mine, by the which you shall see at length the great Victory that our Lord hath sent your subjects in your absence; and for this cause there is no need herein to trouble your Grace with long writing, but, to my thinking, this battle hath been to your Grace and all your realm the greatest honor that could be, and more than you should win all the crown of France; thanked be God of it, and I am sure your Grace forgetteth not to do this, which shall be cause to send you many more such great victories, as I trust he shall do. My husband, for hastiness, with Rougecross I could not send your Grace the piece of the King of Scots coat which John Glynn now brings. In this your Grace shall see how I keep my promise, sending you for your banners a king’s coat. I thought to send himself unto you, but our Englishmens’ hearts would not suffer it. It should have been better for him to have been in peace than have this reward. All that God sends is for the best.

My Lord of Surrey, my Henry, would fain know your pleasure in the burying of the King of Scots’ body, for he has written to me so. With the next messenger your Grace’s pleasure may be herein known. And with this I make an end, praying God to send you home shortly, for without this no joy here can be accomplished; and for the same I pray, and now go to Our Lady of Walsingham that I promised so long ago to see. At Woburn the 16th of September.

I send your Grace herein a bill found in a Scotsman’s purse of such things as the French King sent to the said King of Scots to make war against you, beseeching you to send Mathew hither as soon as this messenger comes to bring me tidings from your Grace.

Your humble wife and true servant, Katharine.

Catherine was pregnant at the time of her Regency and the battle; on September 17, 1513, she delivered a baby boy, who died soon after birth.

As John Edwards comments in the article linked above:

Looking back from a distance of 500 years, the battle of Flodden can be regarded as a high point in Catherine’s life. Here was a queen who, almost from the day she arrived in England, had been a favourite of the English people. Here was a woman whose keen intellect had impressed some of the sharpest minds in 16th-century Europe. And now to these accomplishments could be added a display of grit, initiative and no little skill in the midst of a national emergency.

But as well as being a moment of triumph, the autumn of 1513 was also a high point for Catherine’s marriage. Though she couldn’t have known it at the time, it marked the start of a long decline – one that, by 1533, had led to acrimony, the annulment of her marriage and a long exile into the margins of history. So where did it all go wrong for Henry’s first, and arguably greatest, queen?

As readers of this blog--and Tudor history--know, hundreds of books and articles have been written to answer that question either with regret or satisfaction.

The Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary: from East to West

Today is the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary in the Roman and Eastern Catholic Church, called the Feast of the Nativity of the
Theotokos (the God-bearer) in the East, including in the Orthodox Churches. In fact, this birthday feast originated in the East in the 6th century and did not come to the Western Church until sometime in the 7th century, not becoming more common in the 8th.

The date for her birth was chosen because it is at the beginning of the Liturgical Year in the East (the Liturgical Year in the West begins with the First Sunday of Advent).  In this case, "East" means both Eastern-Rite (or Byzantine) Catholic AND Orthodox.

Since her birth is celebrated on September 8, her Immaculate Conception is celebrated on December 8--nine months before her birth. In the Eastern-Rite Catholic Church the Feast of the Conception of the Mother of God is celebrated on December 8, and has been for centuries. As the Byzantine Catholic Archeparchy of Pittsburgh explains:

Already at the beginning of the liturgical year, on September 8th, we celebrate the Feast of the Nativity of the Mother of God, since Mary’s birth signalled “the beginning of our salvation” (cf. Stich era of Utia). In connection with Mary’s birth, since the eighth century, we celebrate the Feast of the Conception of the Mother of God, recently referred to as the Immaculate Conception (cf. Byzantine Leaflet Series, n. 36).

Saint Augustine of Hippo rejoiced on the Feast of the Nativity the Blessed Virgin Mary according to this blog:

On today’s feast of the Blessed Virgin Mary, St. Augustine writes in the old Divine Office: “Dearly beloved brethren, the day for which we have longed, the Feast-day of the Blessed and venerable and Ever-Virgin Mary, that day is come. Let our land laugh and sing with merriment, bathed in the glory of this great Virgin’s rising. She is the flower of the fields on which the priceless lily of the valleys hath blossomed. This is she whose delivery changed the nature that we draw from our first parents, and cleansed away their offense.” . . .

Father David Nix explains why Saint Augustine says that Mary's birth "changed the nature that we draw from our first parents":

The birthday of Mary is in some way the birthday of a new humanity since Jesus got His humanity from her and since we are adopted into his family through baptism. The waters of St. Anne breaking were in some since a prefigurement of the waters of our baptism, our new family. These graces of new life do not originate in Mary, but they flow through her, as Christ came through her once. When we are baptized, we are divinized by God Himself transforming us into tabernacles of the Blessed Trinity. But we also enter a new humanity that Jesus took from Mary, even though He—God— created her most perfect soul, celebrated on the Immaculate Conception (8th of December.) But 9 months later, we have the full flowering of this conception on her birthday, on the 8th of September, today.

Saint Andrew of Crete (8th century) offers a similar meditation here.

More about the Feast of the Nativity of the Theotokos from the Orthodox Church in America website here.

Image Source (Public Domain): 12-century German Nativity of Mary with her father, Joachim wearing a Jewish hat

Elizabeth I's Birthday Today; the Blessed Virgin Mary's Tomorrow

Elizabeth Tudor, Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII's daughter and future Queen of England, Ireland, and Wales, was born on September 7, 1533--the day before the Feast of the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary. Professor Helen Hackett of  University College London wrote Virgin Mother, Maiden Queen: Elizabeth I and the Cult of the Virgin Mary, published by Palgrave Macmillan in 1995. I admit I cannot afford to buy the book but she deals with the common statement I've often read that Elizabeth's Virgin Queen identity was used to replace veneration of the Blessed Virgin Mary--even to replacing the celebration of the Mother of God's Nativity on September 8 with the celebration of the Queen's birthday.

According to the publisher:

Was Elizabeth I worshipped by her subjects? Many twentieth-century scholars have suggested that the Virgin Queen was a cult-figure who replaced the Virgin Mary. But how could this be in a Protestant state officially opposed to idolatry? Helen Hackett examines these issues through readings of a wide variety of Elizabethan texts. She traces some of the cross-currents in Elizabethan culture, and considers both Elizabeth and the Virgin Mary in terms of the history of representations of gender, sexuality and power.

From the reviews I've read, Hackett makes a distinction between secular and religious images. When Elizabeth the Queen was depicted in the Pelican portrait by Nicholas Hilliard (above) the imagery of the mother pelican who fed her young from her breast could have a religious meaning (the Queen as the mother and not just the governor of the Church of England) but could also symbolize her maternal, though virginal, care for her country and her subjects. 

Reading the introduction to the book in a preview, however, I was stunned by Richard Topcliffe's twisted view of the Mother of God--he says that her milk is poison to those who drink it (those Catholics who venerate her image and honor her as the Mother of God)--and while he calls her "our Lady" he considers the religious image a horrific idol. Queen Elizabeth orders the beautiful image of Our Lady cast into the fire, just as she casts her host at Euston Hall into jail in August 1578 during her progress through Suffolk and Norfolk. Her host at Euston Hall was Edward Rookwood and he was a recusant Catholic.

Matthew Lyon describes his arrest on his blog:

There was politics behind the choice of East Anglia for Elizabeth’s summer progress in 1578. During the course of the summer, Elizabeth stayed twice with Philip Howard, Earl of Surrey – heir of the foolish traitor Thomas Howard, fourth duke of Norfolk – just turned 21 that June. Kenninghall, Norkolk’s (sic) great palace, had been shuttered since his execution in June 1572. It was reopened now – restored to life – for the queen’s visit, a symbolic restoration. Surrey spent lavishly in pursuit of Elizabeth’s favour: her visits to Kenninghall and another mansion in Norwich were said to have left him £10,000 in debt.

It was no doubt for the benefit of adherents to Norfolk’s former cause that the government stage-managed the humiliation and arrest of a young catholic gentleman named Edward Rookwood as the court made its way from Bury to Kenninghall. Being entertained at Euston, his family’s house, on Saturday August 9th, Elizabeth received Rookwood and gave him her hand to kiss. It was discovered – a piece of theatre – that Rookwood had been “excommunicated for papistry” and he was called before Sussex, the lord chamberlain, who demanded of him “how he durst presume to attempt [the queen’s] real presence, he, unfit to accompany any Christian person”. Rookwood was ordered out of his own house and, further, committed to the town prison in Norwich.

By the way, Philip Howard, the Earl of Surrey, was the future Saint Philip Howard.

What a guest--invite yourself to a house you know is owed by a recusant Catholic, mock his hospitality, arrest him, send him off to prison, and then stay at his house and destroy his property! Rookwood died in jail in 1598.

But back to Helen Hackett's view of this comparison between the Mother of God and the Queen of England, this blog has some comments summarizing an article by Hackett (“Rediscovering shock: Elizabeth I and the cult of the Virgin Mary.” Critical Quarterly 35: 30-42. Web. 12 June 2014.):

Elizabeth’s court deliberately appropriated Marian iconography in order to promote their cause, Queen Elizabeth I. The “Virgin Mary was simply a convenient female symbol to be appropriated and made use of by the Elizabethan regime, just as all symbols are available for appropriation in the circulation of power between ruler and ruled.” (33-34). Not only that, but they also tarnished the image of the Virgin Mary to the people. They destroyed her image both literally, through public burnings, and through word of mouth. They pit the Virgin Queen and the Virgin Mary against each other, in favor of the Queen. Elizabeth represented the English Church and the Protestant English nation and was, therefore, the image of the one true faith. The Virgin Mary, on the other hand, was seen as a false icon, a seductive distraction from the true, the direct worship of God. The image of a nurturing mother was used to further this, Elizabeth was shown as the nurturing mother of the entire nation, working hard to keep her people happy and safe. The Virgin Mary was presented as poisonous, the “milk” she gave was deadly to those who took it. . . .

Holy Mary, Mother of God, pray for us sinners, now and at the hour of our death. Amen.

More about the Nativity of the Blessed Virgin Mary tomorrow.

Sir Robert Dudley, RIP--and His Second Wife

Sixty-one years and two days after his father, Queen Elizabeth's favorite Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester died (September 4, 1588), Sir Robert Dudley, his illegitimate son died on September 6, 1649 outside Florence, Italy. His mother, Douglas or Douglass Howard Sheffield Stafford, had supported him with written testimony in a Star Chamber trial early in King James I's reign that she and Robert Dudley had been married before he married Lettice Knollys in 1578, thus claiming that Sir Robert Dudley was Leicester's legitimate heir. The Star Chamber ruled against him and he and Elizabeth Southwell left England for Italy in 1605.

Part of the reason his father's marital issues had been so confusing is that as Elizabeth I's favorite Leicester had feared her anger if he did marry again after Amy Robsart died in 1560, found dead on September 8. He told Douglas that he could not marry her because of this fear, yet he acknowledged their son and Sir Robert was with Leicester at Tilbury preparing for the Spanish Armada to land in 1588 before he died.

Sir Robert's mistress, Elizabeth Southwell disguised herself as a page and they converted to Catholicism, received a dispensation from the Pope and were married; Robert and Elizabeth had thirteen children. Elizabeth died in 1631 after the birth of their last child so Robert survived her for 18 years. They were both interred in San Pancrazio in Florence.

Elizabeth Southwell, a former lady-in-waiting to Elizabeth I, is perhaps more interesting, although Sir Robert was an explorer and writer. Her version of Queen Elizabeth's death has been part of the story of that queen through the centuries, source of the famous line that "must" is not a word to use to princes and other details of her death:

Written or dictated in April 1607 by Elizabeth Southwell (1584–1631), a maid of honor who attended the Queen during her final illness, this detailed account weaves political, medical, magical, and theological observations into a haunting narrative that culminates with the explosion of Elizabeth’s corpse during her wake. Southwell’s manuscript is preserved in the Jesuit Archives in London among the papers of the English Jesuit Robert Persons, who used “the greatest part of the sayd narration, though not all” in a lengthy refutation of the Oath of Allegiance.1 A manuscript copy of Persons’s redaction of Southwell’s manuscript, labeled “strange and incredible particulars,” is transcribed in John Nichols’s Progresses and Public Processions of Queen Elizabeth, the source from which Southwell was most often cited by twentieth-century historians.

Almost all of Chapter Three (quoted above), "Some Strange Eruption to Our State: Elizabeth Southwell’s Manuscript Account of the Death of Queen Elizabeth" from Catherine Loomis' book The Death of Elizabeth I: Remembering and Reconstructing the Virgin Queen from Palgrave Macmillan may be found in the book preview on Amazon.com (search for Elizabeth Southwell).

Loomis seems to accept most of Elizabeth Southwell's eyewitness account--and she was a cousin of Saint Robert Southwell--but analyses how Father Robert Persons, SJ used it against the memory of Elizabeth I in various ways. She refers to Sir Robert Dudley and Elizabeth Southwell as "recusants" but I think they had acknowledged Elizabeth I's supremacy while in England and probably James I's before they left for Italy and became Catholic.

James I refused to recognize Dudley as Leicester's heir and gave his titles to other courtiers in England; Charles I awarded Dudley's English/Anglican wife the title of Duchess of Dudley in 1644 and recognized Dudley's legitimacy but did not restore his lands or titles. Dudley served Duke Ferdinand of Tuscany as a naval advisor.

Sadly, the church in which Robert and Elizabeth were buried is no longer a church--it's a museum. There a funeral chapel, still consecrated for Catholic worship, inside the museum, but Robert and Elizabeth's tombs are not included in the Rucellai family sepulchre.

More Kaufman on Augustine and More

As a quick follow-up to my review of Peter Iver Kaufman's Incorrectly Political: Augustine and Thomas More, I wanted to let you know that there's more.

The University of Richmond Scholarship Repository provides links to many articles by the same author, including several on Saint Augustine and Saint Thomas More.

There's an essay on "Augustine's Dystopia", for example, from Augustine's City of God: A Critical Guide, 55-74. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2012 and one on "Augustine and Corruption".

In addition to several articles on Thomas More, including one on Margaret Roper and the famous Alington Letter on conscience and "Good Company" and a response to Wolf Hall ("Dis-Manteling More"), Kaufman has also written articles on various issues in Elizabethan England and on Shakespeare's plays.

Enjoy browsing. I have not explored beyond Kaufman's works yet, but according to the website:

The University of Richmond's Scholarship Repository brings together and provides open access to the intellectual content of its faculty, students and many centers and programs. The repository includes a broad spectrum of materials and formats, including written scholarship by faculty and students.

UR Scholarship Repository is an open-access compliant institutional repository, with content freely accessible to the world and searchable via Google Scholar and other search engines.

All current and emeritus faculty and staff can deposit their work in this repository into their communities (their home departments) by contacting their respective library. Published and unpublished works of current and emeritus faculty and staff may be uploaded into the repository. Images, video and audio may be uploaded as well.

Book Review: Incorrectly Political: Augustine and Thomas More

I readily admit that political philosophy or Christian political philosophy have not been great interests of mine. Except for reading Plato's Dialogues and excerpts from the Republic in philosophy classes or Cicero's works in rhetoric classes in college, I haven't delved much into the field. I have read Thomas More's Utopia but not Augustine's City of God. A small group of friends and I have been reading The Consolation of Philosophy, so I've dipped into Boethius's thoughts about philosophers and good men getting involved in government--and Robert R. Reilly's recent book about the founding of the USA has been a big influence on me lately.

While exploring Thomas More's philosophy, wondering if his interest in the New Learning had led him to Nominalism, I noted that he had given lectures on the City of God circa 1501 and thus found this book, Incorrectly Political: Augustine and Thomas More by Peter Iver Kaufman.

Incorrectly Political, a copy of which I purchased--a remainder I presume because of the price--was published by the University of Notre Dame Press in 2007:

Peter Iver Kaufman explains how and why we have failed to appreciate Augustine’s and More’s profound political pessimism and thereby reintroduces readers to two of the Christian tradition’s most enigmatic yet influential figures. Each knew that government was useful—yet always deceitful. And each wrote a classic widely read to this day, Augustine’s City of God and More’s Utopia, as well as abundant correspondence and polemical tracts to explain why government on earth might be used, though never meaningfully improved.

You may read a sample of it here, via the University of Richmond Scholarship Repository.

The Table of Contents (including subheads):

Acknowledgements

Introduction

1. Augustine, Ambrose, and Ambition

• Christianity?
• Ambrose and Power
• A Word Peddler's New Purpose
• The Bishop Looks Back
• The Crisis at Calama

2. Limitations

• Augustine's Court
• "In the Face of Evil Days"
• "The Enemies of Grace"

3. Using Government: Augustine and the Donatists

• Secession
• Protection and Correction: Augustine and the Failure of Argument
• Thugs
• That the Government Should Be Used

4. Used But Not Improved: Augustine's "City of God"

• Martyrs
• "Love Not the World"
• Libido Dominandi
• "Mark the Contrasts"
• Other "Beginnings" with Different Ends

5. Thomas More: At Work in the World

• Becoming Useful
• Ambitions and Illusions
• More, Pico, and Erasmus

6. Utopia?

• Hythloday on Power and Integrity
• Wordplay
• Social Control
• Omnia Omnium
• Genuine Justice, Nowhere and Never

7. Crisis

• Promotion and Commotion
• "The Comon Knowen Catholyke Fayth" and the Church
• "Divisions"
• Henry VIII's Matrimonial Matter and God's "Greate Cause"
• Discomfort
• Politics in "This Time of Teares"
• Endgame

Conclusion

Notes

Index

As described in the blurb, Kaufman's main point is that both Saint Augustine of Hippo and Saint Thomas More acknowledged that public affairs, government administration, and participation in the government and the courts were dangerous, but necessary, to the individual and the community. Saint Augustine served as the bishop of Hippo when the Emperor Theodosius reigned; Roman government was still mixed up with Roman pagan religion even though Catholicism had become the official religion of the State. Pagan rites and feasts were still part of the public life of the Empire and Augustine warned Catholics serving in public office not to participate in those pagan leftovers. But Augustine also wanted the government to defend Catholic teaching, helping him deal with the Pelagian and Donatist heretics--especially to defend Catholic churches the Donatists attacked because they did not accept the succession of the bishops or the ordinations of the priests by those bishops--who were dividing Catholics in his diocese. As a parallel to Saint Thomas More centuries later, Kaufman notes that Saint Augustine's written apologetics for Catholic teaching on grace and forgiveness needed the backing of the State: persuasion only went so far.

There are other parallels between Augustine and More: both were judges--Augustine in his episcopal court; More as Chancellor; both had some ambition to make their mark in the world--Augustine as a rhetorician; More as a lawyer and an official; both indicate ambivalence regarding their active, public lives: Augustine in his long process of conversion and his desire for a contemplative, monastic life; More through his comments to family and friends, his discernment of a religious vocation, and his pattern of meditation, prayer, and asceticism (the famous hair shirt).

As noted above, I've never read the City of God so cannot judge Kaufman's summary and explication of that great work. On the one hand, Augustine wanted to defend Catholics from the pagan attacks that Christianity had weakened Rome leading to its sacking by Alaric and on the other, he wanted to remind Catholics that this world was not their true home. Heaven is their/our true home: however much we participate in this world to try to make it better for others and ourselves, to try to defend true Catholic teaching, etc., we must realize that we should "Love Not the World."

With the chapters on Thomas More, I'm on more familiar ground. In addition to Augustine and More, Kaufman cites both Saint Ambrose of Milan and Erasmus of Rotterdam because of their influences on these two great men. Saint Ambrose because of his (somewhat distant) example; Erasmus because of how he encouraged and supported More's humanistic studies, organizing praise for More's Utopia among other humanists for example (16th century blurbs for that book!). Kaufman sometimes questions Erasmus' analysis of More, however, as when he casts doubts on the Erasmian interpretation of More's discernment of religious life--a misunderstanding that would only increase as More fought heresy and accepted martyrdom. Kaufman takes a nice swipe at Richard Marius, who presented an image of More as a repressed sexual neurotic in his 1983 biography of More when he notes that even though no trace of More's carefully presented lectures on the City of God has survived, Marius knows what influence Augustine had on More's decision to get married!

Describing More's rise in England's public affairs and Henry VIII's court, Kaufman also addresses More's realism about his vulnerability in such positions, like the famous comment to his son-in-law Roper that Henry VIII would have More's head cut off if it would gain the king a castle in France. In both the chapter on Utopia and the chapter on More's last years in Henry VIII's service and then in the Tower, Kaufman emphasizes that More was warning both the international humanist community and the English religious community that things are not as they seemed. Some of the improvements and advancements Erasmus and his followers wanted could only come through great community control and loss of individual freedom. The religious changes urged by Martin Luther and his followers in England and abroad (the supposed moderate Germain, the socially concerned Fish, and the Bible translating Tyndale) would lead to social upheavals that Henry VIII had not imagined and would not approve. More held on to hoping for Henry's understanding of these dangers even after he'd left the king's service and until his imprisonment in the Tower of London. Then he determined as he told Cromwell (and his daughter Meg in the letter he sent her describing one of his interrogations in the Tower) that he would leave off involvement in worldly affairs and think only of the Passion of Jesus Christ and his own preparation for death. Before that he wrote extensive and sometimes exhaustive attacks on Lutheran ideas, Fish's proposals, etc--and he applied the heresy laws of England as Chancellor, trusting for a time that he had Henry's consent and support (silence: Henry never told him to stop: consent).

I found interesting that Kaufman quotes More in 16th century English but does not cite Augustine in 4th/5th century Latin! One of the blurbs for this book in 2007 mentioned its timeliness in view of world affairs at that time; I might also say that it's timely for me to read this book in an election year. As a Catholic Christian, my devotion and assent to Church teaching influences the way I evaluate candidates and especially what they can or should and what they can't or shouldn't do while in office representing me. Augustine and More are still good guides for understanding the limitations and the necessity of government and public administration. 

Cromwell's Great Bible Switch

Historian Eyal Poleg, author of the forthcoming A Material History of the Bible, England 1200-1553 (September 13 in the USA from Oxford University Press), describes some changes he and another researcher found in the title page of two specially prepared, hand-colored editions of Henry VIII's The Great Bible commissioned by Thomas Cromwell in 1538. Cromwell's role in the dissemination of this English translation changed from the edition prepared for use in churches throughout England and these two special copies, one of which Cromwell presented to Henry VIII:

In the original black-and-white design, Cromwell is affiliated with distributing the Bible to the laity – his coat of arms is in the middle of the page, below the figure whose features resemble Cromwell, handing the Bible (inscribed verbum dei, or “the Word of God”) to lay nobility. He mirrors Cranmer’s image, on the other side of the page, distributing a similar book to the clergy. This accorded with Cromwell’s central role in lay administration, as with his reformed leaning and his support for the printing of the Great Bible. In this image, then, Cromwell is on the level below the King and positioned in the middle of the page.

In the painted version of the title page, on the other hand, Cromwell is moved up a level and transformed into the person receiving the book from Henry’s left hand. This serves two purposes. It enhances the affinity between Cromwell and Henry, placing them next to each other. It also renders Cromwell in a more passive position, receiving the book from Henry rather than actively distributing it. Given Henry’s ambivalence towards the lay readership, this was a much less hazardous position. The careful and extensive modifications of the title page demonstrate Cromwell’s political prowess and his ability to read the political map and manipulate the visual image accordingly.

As the article continues, Poleg discusses other images in the presentation title pages, including the addition of Jane Seymour instructing children who exclaim "Vivat Rex!" and Richard Rich, Speaker of the House of Commons and Chancellor of the Court of Augmentations at the time.

Please read the rest at the well-illustrated article on MERCATORNET. 

One question I have is if Cromwell had commissioned these presentation Bibles, wouldn't his face have been there from the beginning, as part of the commissioned design? 

Whose face is under Cromwell's? Was Rich at the top with Henry? Whom else would Cromwell have depicted at Henry VIII's left hand? Was Cromwell originally on the second level handing the Bible to the laity?

Poleg and the article's co-author Paola Ricciardi promise: "We plan to publish our research results in full later this year."

This Morning: Saints Jones and Wall

Just a reminder that I'll be on the Son Rise Morning Show at about 7:50 a.m. Eastern/6:50 a.m. Central to continue our series on the 40 Martyrs of England and Wales. Anna Mitchell and I will discuss Saints John Jones and John Wall.

Please listen live here on the Sacred Heart Radio website; the podcast will be archived here; the segment will be repeated on Friday next week during the EWTN hour of the Son Rise Morning Show (from 6:00 to 7:00 a.m. Eastern/5:00 to 6:00 a.m. Central).

And please note that next Monday we'll be taking a day off for Labor Day! We'll continue the series on September 14.

Although Saints Jones and Wall are the only Franciscans among the 40 Martyrs of England and Wales, there are several Blessed Franciscan martyrs: Blessed John Forest during the reign of Henry VIII, Blessed Thomas Palaser during Elizabeth I's reign, and Blesseds Thomas Bullaker, Henry Heath, Francis Bell and John Woodcock in the Commonwealth Interregnum of 1642 to 1646. As the Order of Friars Minor in Great Britain website reminds us: "Several other Friars died in prison and many more suffered periods of imprisonment in serving the Catholic population of England during the penal years."

Olivier's "Henry V" and the Tres Riches Heures

Tomorrow, August 31, will be the 598th anniversary of King Henry V's death at the Château de Vincennes east of Paris. His death came suddenly during his 1421-1422 campaign in France, having captured Drieux and Meaux.

Last week Turner Classic Movies broadcast Laurence Olivier's 1944 film of Shakespeare's Henry V, which I had never seen before. From the openly panorama of London with the transition to inside the Globe Theatre to the battle scenes filmed in Ireland, the conceit of Olivier's design of the movie was a great adaptation of the the Chorus' appeal to the audience:

. . . Can this cockpit hold
The vasty fields of France? Or may we cram
Within this wooden O the very casques
That did affright the air at Agincourt?
O pardon! since a crooked figure may
Attest in little place a million,
And let us, ciphers to this great accompt,
On your imaginary forces work.
Suppose within the girdle of these walls
Are now confin’d two mighty monarchies,
Whose high upreared and abutting fronts
The perilous narrow ocean parts asunder;
Piece out our imperfections with your thoughts.
Into a thousand parts divide one man,
And make imaginary puissance.
Think, when we talk of horses, that you see them
Printing their proud hoofs i’ th’ receiving earth.
For ’tis your thoughts that now must deck our kings,
Carry them here and there, jumping o’er times,
Turning the accomplishment of many years
Into an hour-glass: for the which supply,
Admit me Chorus to this history;
Who prologue-like your humble patience pray,
Gently to hear, kindly to judge, our play.

We're seeing on the scene what the Chorus wants the audience in the Globe to see in their imaginations, creating images in their minds. The gorgeous technicolor with all the reds, blues, greens, and golds (the Criterion website posts a trailer) was thrilling and added to the cinematic verisimilitude of the imaginary play: we don't have to use our imaginations because it's been put before us on the screen. Even though I've enjoyed the soundtrack to Kenneth Branagh's 1989 version for years, I know that Sir William Walton's work is considered classic. There are two suites from the film's score, one arranged by Sir Malcolm Sargent and the other by Muir Mathieson. I recognized the French folk song tune adapted by Canteloube, "Baïlèro".

But what I enjoyed most about the film was Olivier's use of Les Tres Riches Heures du Duc de Berry for the scenes in France. For example, in Act V, Scene I, Gower, Pistol, and Lewellen are in the English camp and Pistol is in a lean-to warming himself by the fire just as in the wintry scene for the month of February. The use of the colors, the interior settings, clothing, and landscape from the beautifully decorated Breviary created for John, the Duke of Berry, himself a minor character in the play, added to the storytelling magic of the film.

Although the battle scenes are not as naturalistic as those in Kenneth Branagh's film, they contrast greatly with the those Tres Riches Heures scenes. One way that Branagh's film and Doyle's score, in my opinion, surpasses Olivier and Walton is Doyle's Non Nobis Domine at the end of the battle of Agincourt. Walton's setting of Psalm 151:1 is a quick transition to the next scene but Doyle's builds to a beautiful choral and orchestral and cinematic climax.

But Olivier's Henry V, made during World War II, is a beautiful film and was a great achievement at its time--when you consider that the animation at the beginning of the film was not created digitally as it would be now! Perhaps a computer would create some more faked realistic movement of the flags, birds, and trees, but I believed that I was seeing London in 1600 with Shakespeare sitting on a stool in the Globe, ready with his manuscript to prompt a line and give some stage direction.

I hope to see it again soon.

Preview: Two Franciscan Martyrs of the Forty

We've been going through the 40 Martyrs of England and Wales chronologically in our series on the Son Rise Morning Show but on Monday, August 31, we'll deviate a little from that order because these two Franciscan martyrs are honored together on their order's sanctoral calendar each July 12 (with several blessed martyrs and other confessors of the order in England). In the list of the 40 Martyrs of England and Wales, they are known by their aliases as missionaries in England: Saints John Jones and John Wall. Among Franciscans, they are also known as Saint Godfrey or Geoffrey Maurice Jones and Saint Joachim of St Anna. (Anna Mitchell ought to appreciate that!)

You'll have to remember that the religious orders in England were suppressed by Henry VIII, some briefly restored during Mary I's reign, and those suppressed again by Elizabeth I.

The first of these two saints, Godfrey Maurice Jones (alias John Jones) began his religious life as a Franciscan during Mary I's reign and was martyred during Elizabeth I's. Born in Wales (thus one of the six Welsh martyrs among the 40), he joined the Franciscans in England during the reign of Mary I, then went into exile, completed his novitiate, was ordained and returned to England as a missionary priest:

Towards 1590 John was sent to the friary of Ara Coeli in Rome, the general headquarters of the Order. From there he wished to return to England to take part in the mission to care for faithful Catholics, who risked their livelihoods and often their lives to sustain their missionary priests. The priests themselves were subject to the gruesome death of hanging, drawing and quartering as traitors for the simple fact of exercising their priesthood. John begged an audience with the Pope and Clement VIII embraced him, gave him a solemn blessing and told him: “Go, because I believe you to be a true son of Saint Francis. Pray to God for me and for his holy Church."

In England John Jones exercised an heroic hidden ministry, animating the Catholic faith among recusants and prudently seeking to reconcile those who had submitted to Elizabeth's Church of England. The existence of a missionary priest in England was one of frequent moves, constant vigilance and continued flight from Elizabeth's vigilant secret services, supervised by William Cecil and Francis Walsingham.

And here's that man again, Richard Topcliffe:

Despite his care, John Jones was caught in late 1595 or early 1596 by Richard Topcliffe, who nurtured a cruel hatred for the Catholic faith and was sanctioned by the Queen to maintain a private torture chamber in his house for the Catholic priests he apprehended. John Jones was accused of being a spy and sent to the notorious Clink prison, from which we derive the expression “being in clink”. There he languished for nigh on two years awaiting trial. In prison Jones continued his ministry and converted many, including Saint John Rigby, who was himself martyred two years after John Jones (on 21st June 1600).

On 3rd July 1598 John Jones was finally brought to trial for having exercised his ministry as a Catholic priest in England. He was sentenced to hanging, drawing and quartering at Saint Thomas Watering, but was meanwhile imprisoned at Marshalsea prison. The Jesuit Henry Garnet recounts in a letter that on 12th July 1598 John was tied to a trellis and dragged to the place of his torment. He was held there for an hour before execution during which time Topcliffe harangued the crowd with his supposed crimes. Garnet recounts that the crowd was touched more by John's prayers than by the calumnies of his torturer and executioner. His remains were hung up on the road between Newington and Lambeth.

He shares his feast with a Popish Plot Martyr, St. John Wall. This website (Roman Catholic Saints) uses his name in religion (and St. John Jones's) to tell his story:

John Wall, in religion Father Joachim of St Anna, was the fourth son of Anthony Wall of Chingle (Singleton) Hall, Lancashire. He was born in 1620, and when very young, was sent to the English College at Douai. From there he proceeded to Rome, where he was raised to the priesthood in 1648. Several years later he returned to Douai and was clothed in the habit of St Francis in the convent of St Bonaventure. He made his solemn profession on January 1, 1652. So great was the estimation in which he was held by his brethren, that within a few months he was elected vicar of the convent, and soon after, master of novices.

In 1656 Father Joachim of St Anna joined the English mission, and for 12 years he labored on Worcestershire under the names of Francis Johnson or Webb, winning souls even more by his example than by his words. At Harvington to this day the memory of Blessed Father Johnson is cherished, and stories of his heroic zeal are recounted by the descendants of those who were privileged to know and love the glorious martyr.

Some of the charges raised against Father Wall when he was captured, were that he had said Mass, heard confessions, and received converts into the Church. He was accidentally found, in December 1678, at the house of a friend, Mr Finch of Rushock, and carried off by the sheriff's officer. He was committed to Worchester (sic) jail, and lay captive for five months, enduring patiently all the loneliness, suffering, and horrors of prison life, which at that time were scarcely less dreadful than death itself.

The Franciscan website makes his entanglement with the Popish Plot clear:

He remained there for 22 years ministering to the Catholics of the area. In 1678 he went to London to meet the Jesuit Claude de la Colombière, and the two spoke together of their desire for martyrdom. The context of this meeting was the renewed persecution that was unleashed in the wake of the incriminating lies of Titus Oates and his invented Catholic plot against King Charles II. 

Returning from this encounter, John was staying with a friend in Rushock Court. There he was mistaken for one of the so-called plotters, Francis Johnson, and arrested. . . . .

Back to the Roman Catholic Saints website:

One of Father Wall's brethren in religion, Father William Levison, has the privilege of seeing the martyr for the space of four or five hours on the day before his execution. Father William tells us:

"I heard his confession and communicated him, to his great joy and satisfaction. While in prison he carried himself like a true servant of his crucified Master, thirsting after nothing more than the shedding of his blood for the love of his God, which he performed with a courage and cheerfulness becoming a valiant soldier of Christ, to the great edification of all the Catholics, and admiration of all the Protestants."

Father Wall's martyrdom took place on Red Hill, overlooking the city of Worcester, on August 22, 1679. His head was kept in the convent at Douai until the French Revolution broke out and the community fled to England. What became of it, then, is not known.

Saint John Jones, pray for us!

Saint John Wall, pray for us!

Top image credit: Used by permission of the webmaster: A stained glass depiction of Franciscan Saints above the high altar [at the former Chilworth Friary of the Holy Ghost]: at the extreme left is Blessed John Jones, at the extreme right Blessed John Wall (also known as Joachim of St Anne), both of whom are now canonised Saints.