Historical Characters, Including Frederick the Great, Discussion Post 39

[cahn]

Last post, along with the usual 18th-century suspects, included the Ottonians; changing ideas of conception and women's sexual pleasure; Isabella of Parma (the one who fell in love, and vice versa, with her husband's sister); Henry IV and Bertha (and Henry's second wife divorcing him for "unspeakable sexual acts"). (Okay, Isabella of Parma was 18th century.)

Comments

Re: Sixteenth-century question about proposing

[selenak]

English people saw Italians as gross and willing to marry their daughters off that young

On that note, and going off on a tangent, while royal marriages aren't normal marriages, it's still worth pointing out what the History of the Germans podcast has reminded me of: Maude, daughter of English king Henry I (and mother of future Henry II via her second married) was sent off as a child to marry Emperor Henry V, and while he didn't immediately marry her (but had her living as his intended at his court), he did marry her when she was eleven. As Dirk said, let's hope he waited a few more years for the marriage consummation. (We wouldn't know, because they had no kids.) On the not royal but related to royals front and closer to Shakespeare's own time, there's Margaret Beaufort, who gets married to Edmund Tudor at age 12, and he does consumate the marriage, because she gets pregnant immediately with future Henry VII and gives birth at age 13. Margaret Beaufort will, decades later, insist that her granddaughter Margaret when married (in absentia) to the Scottish King at a similar age will remain home at the English court for a few more years. Also, while Edmund Tudor died very early and Margaret Beaufort got married two more times (including to that Lord Stanley who together with his brother had a role top lay at Bosworth Fields), she won't have another child, and in fact supposedly took a vow to remain sexless (making the marriages purely political arrangements).

In terms of rl examples, there's also whatever Thomas Seymour did with teenage Elizabeth when she lived with him and Catherine Parr at Chelsea; Elizabeth was twelve verging on 13 when her father died and 15 when Catherine Parr died. Now, Catherine Parr undoubtedly loved Thomas Seymour, whom she had wanted to marry before Henry VIII more or less drafted her as his last wife. But Thomas Seymour, after Henry's death, asked the Council whether he could marry either Elizabeth or Mary, and only when that immediately was shot down did he marry Catherine (who didn't know he'd considered alternatives). And of course Thomas Seymour tried to marry Elizabeth again after Catherine's death.

Then we have Henry VIII's bff Charles Brandon, Duke of Sussex, whose last wife started out as his ward, intended for his son (from his previous marriage), only then he reconsidered and married 14 years old Catherine and her great dowry (yes, another Kate) himself once a widower.

But sure, Elizabethans, it's the Italians who are gross...

Re: Sixteenth-century question about proposing

[mildred_of_midgard]

Yeah, we talked about that, and she had a lot to say about the differences between what the royals/nobles did and what their subjects thought about what they did, and whether said subjects protested and/or took precautions to keep it from happening to their own daughters.

Because yeah, I can (and did, upthread) name a bunch of skeevy noble and royal marriages for political purposes off the top of my head from all periods across all of Europe, but what the lower classes thought about it is pretty far outside my area, so I am taking recessional's word on it.

there's also whatever Thomas Seymour did with teenage Elizabeth when she lived with him

But this kind of thing happens even in our day, there being a huge difference between what happens irl and what you will have your good guys proudly state is a good idea in a play.