Wimborne Minster – Church of St Cuthburga (© Copyright Mike Searle and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.)

Not so far from Bloxworth (about 12 kilometres east)  is the much larger town of Wimborne Minster, and it is here in the impressive ecclesiastical building that Sir Frederick remarks on the many interesting tombs. It seems his favourite is “the beautiful monument to John Beaufort and his wife, Margaret”.

John was the grandson of John of Gaunt, and his wife was Margaret Beauchamp. “The effigies,” writes Sir Frederick, “were prepared by the direction their daughter, Lady Margaret Tudor, mother of Henry VII. The two lie side by side, he a burly fighting man in full armour, she a slender and pretty woman, in robes of state. She wears a veil under her coronet and a jewel on her breast. Their two right hands are firmly clasped together, and so natural is the action that the impression remains that it was thus they died. He has taken off his gauntlet the better to hold her hand , while the empty glove is pressed to his cuirass.”

It seems that their daughter, who – as we all know became Lady Stanley a couple of husbands down the track – was anxious to portray her parents in the best possible light. If only they were as serenely happy as portrayed in Wimborne Minster.

Bibliography:

Sir Frederick Treves, Bart. GCVO, CB, LL.D, Highways and Byways of Dorset.  Macmillan & Co. Ltd, 1906. No ISBN.

You can find a photograph of the grave here (scroll down to the bottom of the page).

She married on 11 July 1469 George of Clarence, Edward IV’s younger and Richard’s older brother.  Edward was against the marriage, so it took place in secret at Calais and was conducted by Isabel’s uncle George Neville, archbishop of York.

Isabel died on 22 December 1476, leaving behind two children, Margaret (born in 1473) and Edward (born 1475).

Both descendants were eventually executed by the Tudors.

We shall be thinking of you and hope that all is well.

God bless and Loyaulte me lie.

Bloxworth Church (© Copyright John Lamper and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence.)

Sir Frederick, after some kindly comments about the little church in the village of Bloxworth, goes on to make some not so kindly ones about one of its former rectors.

A very famous rector of Bloxworth was John Morton, Cardinal Archbishop of Canterbury in the time of Henry VII. For a prelate, he led a most adventurous life, not without the usual episodes of imprisonment in the Tower and flight to Flanders. He comforted Edward IV when that king lay dying, and was the stoutest advocate of Henry’s marriage to Elizabeth of York, whereby the red rose and the white became blended in the rose of Tudor. As Bishop of Ely he takes his part in Shakespeare’s play of Richard III, wherein occurs “the incident of the strawberries”, as described by Sir Thomas More, once a page in his household.

Describing how the Duke of Gloster [sic] had asked Morton for some strawberries from his garden at Holborn, Sir Frederick tells that the Bishop replies, ‘Gladly my lord quoth he, would God I had some better thing as ready to your pleasure’.”

Sir Frederick’s comment: “These are indeed ready words for a crafty plotter like the Bishop, who wished the Duke of Gloster [sic] to perdition, and who had no “better thing” in store for him – if he had his way – than the dungeon or the headsman’s axe.”

Bibliography:

Sir Frederick Treves, Bart. GCVO, CB, LL.D, Highways and Byways of Dorset.  Macmillan & Co. Ltd, 1906. No ISBN.

Saint Alban was the first martyr of Britain (executed in c. 304). His story has often been told, among others by the Venerable Bede.[1]  According to this, Alban was a Romano-British citizen of Verulanium, who gave shelter to a Christian priest, called Amphibalus, during a persecution of Christians.  He was so impressed by what this man had to say that Alban converted to Christianity.  When Roman soldiers came to search his house for the priest, he pretended to be him and was arrested.  During the trial he stood firm to his new faith and was beheaded.[2]  However, en route to his execution he performed several miracles like stopping the water of the river to flow and causing a spring of water on the hill, where he was beheaded (hence the street name ‘Holywell Hill’).  His original executioner converted to Christianity on the spot and the man who eventually did the deed was punished by blindness.  Unfortunately all this did not help Amphibalus, who along with some others was a few days later stoned to death.[3]

At the time we were there, the Australian Shakespeare Festival was taking place in Hobart.  Unfortunately we did not have time to visit any of the vents, but William was looking down on us from a great height all over the city, which was like running into another old friend.

Notes:

1.    “St Alban”, Catholic Encyclopedia – New Advent.  (accessed 23 May 2010)
2.    “The Story of St Alban”, The Cathedral and Abbey Church of St Alban.  (accessed 24 May 2010)
3.    “St Alban”, New Advent

Abbot’s Hall Porch, Cerne Abbey (© Copyright Chris Downer and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence)

From earliest times, Cerne Abbey, founded in AD 987, was the cornerstone around which the village grew. The Domesday Book (1087) tells there was enough cultivated land for 20 ploughs and 26 villeins. The Abbey remained the focal point of the area for over 500 years until Henry VIII’s Dissolution of the Monasteries in 1539 brought about its surrender. Most of the buildings were destroyed, but the Abbot’s Porch and the Guesthouse still remain, as does St Augustine’s Well, blessed allegedly by the saint himself. The parish today is centred on St Mary’s Church which was built in the late 13th century by the Abbey for the local people.

Guest House, Cerne Abbey (© Copyright Chris Downer and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence)

Even after the Dissolution, Cerne was a popular market town, brewing being its drawcard because of the underground water that made quality beer. London loved it and it was an early export to the Americas. The population was then 1500 and a thirsty mob they must have been as there were 14 public houses serving them. The other small industries of silk weaving, millinery and tanning must have been thirsty work too.

When the railways began to arrive in the mid 19th century, Cerne was ignored and began to dwindle into the small village it is today, delighting tourists with its remaining three pubs, cafes and shops.

Cerne Abbas Giant (© Copyright Maurice D Budden and licensed for reuse under this Creative Commons Licence)

However the real talking point for visitors is the Cerne Giant, a 50 metre naked figure carved into the chalk hillside above the village. It is owned by the National Trust and thought to be an Iron Age fertility symbol – there is evidence of an Iron Age settlement nearby – but it is surprising that the monks did nothing to efface it. There is no record of the figures existence before the 17th century.

In 1754 Dr Richard Pococke wrote:

A low ridge of hills ends to the north of the abbey, on the west side of which is a figure cut in lines by taking out the turf and showing the white chalk. It is called the giant …, a naked figure … a sort of a Pantheon figure. In the right hand he holds a knotted club, the left hand is held out and open, there being a bend in the elbow so that it seems to be Hercules, or Strength and Fidelity, but it is with such indecent circumstances as to make one conclude it was also a Priapus. It is to be supposed that this was an ancient figure of worship, and one would imagine that the people would not permit the monks to destroy it.

Twenty years later John Hutchins wrote

There is a tradition that a giant who reside hereabout in former ages, the pest and terror of the adjacent country, having made an excursion into Blackmore and regaled himself with several sheep, retired to this hill and lay down to sleep. The country people seized this opportunity, pinioned him down and killed him, and then traced the outline of the dimensions of his body to perpetuate his memory.

With such enterprise in disposing of a “weapon of destruction” by the locals, maybe the monks felt it better to leave it alone.

For members and friends of The Richard III Society, of course, Cerne Abbey is where Queen Margaret of Anjou stayed on her way to Tewkesbury where her only son, Edward of Lancaster, Prince of Wales, was to meet his death. Her husband, the ineffectual Henry VI was already in London, installed in the Tower. Margaret had come from France where she had aligned with the renegade Earl of Warwick, and had landed at Weymouth only to learn that on that day Warwick had been killed at the Battle of Barnet.

It was at Cerne that she – and Edward’s wife, Warwick’s younger daughter Anne, who was later to become Richard III’s queen – found sanctuary behind the quiet walls and in the peaceful gardens of the Abbey.

Not for long though, Margaret being Margaret marched on at the head of the Lancastrian army to meet their fate. As the Yorkists now reigned supreme, she was allowed to cross the Channel once more to France where she ended her days.

When you visit the village of Cerne Abbas, view the giant by all means, buy souvenirs in the shops and enjoy a delicious cream tea in one of the tea-rooms. But make sure you pause for a time in the remains of the lovely Abbey and remember its role in the War of the Cousins. Remember Margaret, a fiercely determined queen and ambitious but loving mother determined to give her son what she thought was rightfully his.

And remember Anne, the frail young Neville daughter, who had been forced into a Lancastrian marriage, and who needed such a place to wonder what the rest of her life would hold.

Bibliography:
Bob Crawford, From Dorset with Love, Atmosphere, 1996. ISBN0952180 3 2:  this book contains both the quotes by Dr Richard Pococke and John Hutchins.  The Hutchins quote is probably from his History of Dorset, which came out in the late 18th century. No ISBN.

Sir Frederick Treves, Bart. GCVO, CB, LL.D, Highways and Byways of Dorset,  Macmillan & Co. Ltd, 1906. No ISBN.  (Interesting author: he was famous for taking charge of the case of the Elephant Man when no-one else wanted to help, and was sergeant surgeon to King Edward VII).  His book has been a constant companion since I was eight and borrowed my grandfather’s copy, so probably Sir Frederick’s words have influenced mine.

Useful websites:
“Cerne Abbas”, Strolling Guides
“Cerne Abbas”, Wikipedia
“The Cerne Abbas Giant”, Mysterious Britain and Ireland

The 14th August meeting – and my scrabble letter talk drawing nigh – I was visited with inspiration when Kim brought home some oranges in the shopping.  Could this fruit be the basis of a talk?

My research revealed that oranges are first heard of growing wild in China and later cultivated there, from where they found their way to India. The Moors are thought to have planted oranges across North Africa in the first century AD.  Oranges were also known to the Romans, who imported the young trees to the port of Ostia.  But with the fall of Rome in the fifth century AD, the  Roman trade and cultivation of oranges died out for centuries.

Oranges were introduced into Spain and by the 13th century, orange groves could be found from Seville to Granada, and eventually, the fruit found its way to England.

Patio de los Naranjos (“Orange Tree Court”), Cathedral, (former Great Mosque), Córdoba, Spain (photo D Preis)

One source states that in medieval times, fresh fruit was viewed with some suspicion, mostly considered as being fit only for the poor.[1]  Monastic gardens, and the gardens of the aristocracy as we know from Dorothea’s talk, grew a wide range of fruit though I have not found a reference to oranges.[2] However, in the book  Noble Lovers, there is an illustration from a Flemish manuscript dating from about 1500, Roman de la Rose, entitled ‘Dreamer enters the Garden,’ which shows orange trees, centre rear.[3]

Medieval oranges were not the sweet oranges of our time. They were bittersweet – if you were to mix equal quantities of orange and lemon juice, this would be an approximation of the taste.  By the fifteenth century, although the sweet orange was making its appearance, it was not used in cookery until the following century – therefore, all the recipes from Richard’s time, would refer to bittersweet oranges.[4]

There are recipes for the candying of fruit – this was done by using honey, but by the mid-sixteenth century, sugar took over as the crystallising agent, still used today.

I must mention Johannes Bockenheim (or Buckenhen,) cook to Pope Martin V who in the 1430s, wrote an  ‘original ‘cookbook.  A feature of this book was to specify the destined consumer of a dish by social class including prostitutes as well as princes – or by nationality, even down to the provinces of a country.[5]

I would like to share with you his recipe for Orange Omelette:

Take eggs and break them, with oranges, as many as you like; squeeze their juice and add to it the eggs with sugar; then take olive oil or fat, and heat it in the pan and add the eggs.[6]

The modern version of this recipe follows the original closely, specifying 6 eggs, 2 oranges, 1 lemon and 2 tablespoons each of sugar, olive oil and salt.

So, for whom did Bockenheim feel this dish was suitable?  Ruffians and brazen harlots.  I am not suggesting that any of the present company falls into either category, but for those planning an evening of debauchery in the future, Orange Omelette, The Medieval Kitchen assures us, will provide an unusual and pleasant dessert.[7]

There is a recipe found in The Good Huswifes Handmaid for Cookerie in her kitchen, complied in 1558, for an apple and orange tart, which from reading the recipe, sounds delicious.[8]

Histoire et culture des orangers, by A Risso and A Poiteau, 1872

The food settled, what about something to drink? The original recipe for Orange Wine, admittedly from a much later period, featured in Hannah Glasse’s The Art of Cookery, published in 1747, calls for 12 pounds of the best powder-sugar, and the juice and rinds of 50 oranges, but not the white part of the rinds…

Again, there is a modern version of this recipe, beginning with 150g each of icing sugar and sugar.  Such amounts of this substance make me shudder, but perhaps the other ingredients balance this out – 12 large glasses of wine can be obtained from this recipe.[9]

I have found a few recipes in which oranges, rather than being a main ingredient, are used in sauces, such as chicken with orange sauce, and in a weak honey drink, known as Small Mead.[10]

In conclusion, oranges were not unknown in Richard’s day, and may have graced his table in various ways, such as in pies, sauces, or candied.  I would ask you to recall for a moment, Bockenheim’s classification for Orange Omelette…I think this a dish eminently suitable for Henry VII.

Notes:

1.    Middle Ages Food – Fruit
2.    Preis, Dorothea,  Medieval Gardens.  Talk given to NSW Branch, Richard III Society, 2010
3.    Owen, D. D. R., Noble Lovers.  NY Universty Press, 1973, facing page 64.  You can find the picture online here.
4.   Fruit in Medieval Europe
5.    Redon, O. et al,  The Medieval Kitchen. University of Chicago   Press, 1998, p. 185
6.    ibid.
7.    ibid., p. 115
8.    The Good Huswifes Handmaid for Cookerie in her kitchen
9.    Historical Foods, “Orange Wine Recipe”
10.    Webbed by Gregory Blount of Isenfir