 |
|
Reply
| | | From: Greensleeves (Original Message) | Sent: 11/28/2002 12:08 PM |
TDIH states that today in 1499, Edward, Earl of Warwick was executed on Tower Hill, as a result of the aftermath of the Perkin Warbeck affair. The poor thing had been under lock & key for 16 years, since the age of 9, received no education or training, & finally at age 25 got this ignominious end to the male line of the Plantagenets due to Tudor paranoia. From all accounts, & I don't know if it's because of the lack of care or because he was genuinely "slow", this last Plantagenet sprig was zero threat to the Tudor throne. I wonder how Elizabeth of York felt to have yet another of her family sacrificed on the altar of Tudor ambition? I find it difficult to believe she & Henry VII had anything near a "happy" marriage with all the dynastic problems that arose. Also, if the Princes in the Tower were such a threat to all parties concerned, what was the reason young Warwick was initially spared, as his claim was equally good? One has to wonder if Edward IV's boys really didn't die a natural death & it was hushed up in a panic! |
|
 First
Previous
2-3 of 3
Next
Last
|
Reply
| |
They probably died of upper respiratory infections from all those nasty Tower draughts!!! But hmm, how DID Henry manage to convince Elizabeth that this unnecessary execution was a good thing? I wonder if maybe Elizabeth wondered whether Perkin Warbeck really WAS her younger brother? |
|
Reply
| |
Historians are clear that Edward, Earl of Warwick was mentally slow, but he still was a threat to the Tudor dynasty, if not personally, then genetically. Please don't forget that England just come out of the Wars of the Roses, where anyone with a remote claim to the throne had every reason to hope they could secure the throne. H7 is an example. Edward's claim was better than H7's and even a slow "Prince of the Blood," in that day and age, could have married and begat more Plantagenets. Although the Yorks were a very tightly knit family, Edward's father was the exception. George, Duke of Clarence, was insidiously unreliable and continuosly scamming to usurp the throne from his brother. Further, Elizabeth of York was fully aware of the role that a woman was supposed to take in her world, which was very different than today's world. Additionally, Edward was slow. Due to the highly superstitious nature of people in that era and their lack of medical knowledge, maybe they felt Edward's seed was tainted. At any rate, because of all this I really doubt that Elizabeth felt anything deeper than pity for the man. As for her marriage to H7, it was a different world back then. Even if Edward hadn't been executed, the marriage probably wouldn't have been very happy by today's standards. I am guessing it worked very well and was probably a happy marriage because both parties thought from a late midaevil point-of-view and not a Twenty-First Century point-of-view. Warwick was probably spared because his father had been attainted, he was retarded and there were more important things for H7 to be doing from 1485 to 1499. I very much support the theory that H7 had the Princes in the tower done away with because I believe that E4's pre-contract to marry Eleanor Butler was probably true, given E4's character. When R3 had E4's children declared illegitimate I believe he did it to strengthen England's government. To give his claim an added lift, H7 had to reverse that declaration. Marrying Elizabeth of York would have been dynasticly pointless unless she was a legitimate child of E4. When he did that then E5 and Richard, Duke of York became legitimate, thus a another threat to his claim. |
|
|
Free Forum Hosting
Important Announcement
