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| | | From: ForeverAmber (Original Message) | Sent: 6/22/2002 6:52 PM |
Much as I  my Richard III, it has occurred to me that there is ANOTHER Plantagenet uncle who can be equally vilified. I am referring to John, of course, & the disappearance of Arthur of Brittany after Richard I's death. Arthur, being the son of Geoffrey, the brother in birth order BETWEEN Richard & John, had better claim to the throne, but just like the Princes in the Tower, he was too young to enforce it. Unlike the princes, it was generally accepted that John would succeed Richard I. Arthur's response was to besiege his grandmother, Eleanor of Aquitaine! So John put him away & he was never seen or heard from again, though as we have learned in the Royal Book of Records, Arthur's sister Eleanor was held captive for 39 years. So what happened to Arthur, & why isn't history as rude about it as it is about my Richard????  |
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I think you're dead right about John, and I suspect the reasoning behind the vilification of Richard while John gets off without a mention is: a) John had so many other things to mark him out as a bad king and b) Arthur was a right little snot, and various people were probably secretly glad to get rid of him - he certainly was not an innocent little boy. Lady Grace. |
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3 years this thread has been lollygagging....nobody cares about poor innocent lil Arthur!  |
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| On this one, I say John did the dastardly deed! Judy |
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Would the times have anything to do with why Richard III was so villified for his supposed murder of his nephews while John wasn't? Was mudering ones relatives for the crown looked at any differently in the 12th century then in the 15th??? |
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Ironically, John was succeeded by his minor son, Henry III....whereas Richard III was succeeded by Henry VII, a master of the spin.  Any guy who would predate his reign from the day before Bosworth just so he could accuse everyone who fought for Richard of treason & grab their estates for the crown....I say Henry VII had a fabulous propaganda machine to vilify Richard with, while Henry III was a 9 year old boy succeeding his father with no reason to slam him after he was dead. John got slammed enough when he was alive LOL This is almost a parallel situation to the accession of Richard II, except that Arthur didn't quite make it to the throne....the Black Prince was the expected heir in RIIs case & he died of probably cancer shortly before Edward III did. Geoffrey of Brittany's death was totally unexpected, he was killed in a tournament in the prime of his life. Geoffrey would most likely have been Richard Is heir had he lived. RI named Arthur his heir after Geoffrey's death, in keeping with primogeniture, but Constance of Brittany refused to allow Arthur into RIs keeping to be educated & trained as the heir to the throne. RI made several overtures to Constance on Arthur's behalf & was rebuffed. Finally he gave up & switched his allegiance to John instead of Arthur. So there was that this was the wish of the preceding monarch to have John, not Arthur, succeed him as well, whereas Edward IV certainly expected his eldest son to sit on the throne after him, not his brother RIII. Plus, as Lady Grace so eloquently puts it, Arthur was a right little snot ROFL At one point he was even beseiging his own grandma, Eleanor of Aquitaine, at Mirabeau. Unlike Edward V, he was not brought up in the belief that he would succeed, nor was he trained for it; Constance sorta let him run amuck after Geoffrey died. And nobody says anything either regarding Henry IIIs treatment of Arthur's sister, Eleanor "the Pearl of Brittany", whom he held in captivity until she died & refused to allow to marry. Apparently Isabella d'Angouleme didn't raise no fools...ok she did acuz HIII was sorta stupid LOL, but in the dynastic regard here he glommed onto the closest rival with a better claim & kept his eye on her. |
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And you know, when Arthur up & disappeared everyone pretty much knew John was behind it...seems like no one even missed the poor lil snot ROFL Interesting that in the 16 years of John's tumultuous reign, no pretenders ever came forward claiming to be Arthur, either, unlike with Henry VII & his pretender problems. |
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