Mistress Of The Monarchy

Author : Alison Weir
Publisher : Ballantine Books
ISBN 13 : 0345453247
Total Pages : 450 pages
Book Rating : 4.42/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Mistress of the Monarchy written by Alison Weir and published by Ballantine Books. This book was released on 2010-01-05 with total page 450 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Acclaimed author Alison Weir brings to life the extraordinary tale of Katherine Swynford, a royal mistress who became one of the most crucial figures in the history of Great Britain. Born in the mid-fourteenth century, Katherine de Roët was only twelve when she married Hugh Swynford, an impoverished knight. But her story had truly begun two years earlier, when she was appointed governess to the household of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster and fourth son of King Edward III. Widowed at twenty-one, Katherine became John's mistress and then, after many twists of fortune, his bride in a scandalous marriage. Mistress of the Monarchy reveals a woman ahead of her time—making her own choices, flouting convention, and taking control of her own destiny. Indeed, without Katherine Swynford, the course of English history, perhaps even the world, would have been very different.

Author : Alison Weir
Publisher : Random House
ISBN 13 : 1446449076
Total Pages : 384 pages
Book Rating : 4.73/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Katherine Swynford written by Alison Weir and published by Random House. This book was released on 2011-03-28 with total page 384 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Weir combines high drama with high passion while involving us in the domestic life of a most remarkable woman in an equally remarkable book' Scotland on Sunday The first full-length biography of an extraordinary love affair between one of the most important men of English History and a thoroughly modern woman. Katherine Swynford was first the mistress, and later the wife, of John of Gaunt, the Duke of Lancaster. Her charismatic lover was one of the most powerful princes of the fourteenth century and Katherine was renowned for her beauty and regarded as enigmatic, intriguing and even dangerous by some of her contemporaries. In this impressive book, Alison Weir has triumphantly rescued Katherine from the footnotes of history, highlighting her key dynastic position within the English monarchy. She was the mother of the Beaufort, then the ancestress of the Yorkist kings, the Tudors, the Stuarts and every other sovereign since - a prodigious legacy that has shaped the history of Britain.

Author : Anne Easter Smith
Publisher : Simon and Schuster
ISBN 13 : 1451648634
Total Pages : 512 pages
Book Rating : 4.38/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Royal Mistress written by Anne Easter Smith and published by Simon and Schuster. This book was released on 2013-05-07 with total page 512 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: From the author of A Rose for the Crown and Daughter of York comes another engrossing historical novel of the York family in the Wars of the Roses, telling the fascinating story of the rise and fall of the final and favorite mistress of Edward IV. Jane Lambert, the quick-witted and alluring daughter of a silk merchant, is twenty-two and still unmarried. When Jane’s father finally finds her a match, she’s married off to the dull, older silk merchant William Shore. Marriage doesn’t stop Jane from flirtation, however, and when the king’s chamberlain, Will Hastings, comes to her husband’s shop, Will knows King Edward will find her irresistible. Edward IV has everything: power, majestic bearing, superior military leadership, a sensual nature, and charisma. And with Jane as his mistress, he also finds true happiness. But when his hedonistic tendencies get in the way of being the strong leader England needs, his life, as well as those of Jane and Will Hastings, hangs in the balance. Jane must rely on her talents to survive as the new monarch, Richard III, bent on reforming his brother’s licentious court, ascends the throne. This dramatic tale has been an inspiration to poets and playwrights for five hundred years, and, as told through the unique perspective of a woman plucked from obscurity and thrust into a life of notoriety, Royal Mistress is sure to enthrall today’s historical fiction lovers as well.

Author :
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781448732784
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.86/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Mistress of the Monarchy written by and published by . This book was released on 2010 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Author : Anya Seton
Publisher : Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
ISBN 13 : 0544222881
Total Pages : 609 pages
Book Rating : 4.85/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Katherine written by Anya Seton and published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt. This book was released on 2013 with total page 609 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: John of Gaunt and Katherine Swynford, Chaucer's sister-in-law, fall in love in the 14th century.

Author : Tracy Adams
Publisher : Penn State Press
ISBN 13 : 0271086440
Total Pages : 249 pages
Book Rating : 4.46/5 ( download)

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Download or read book The Creation of the French Royal Mistress written by Tracy Adams and published by Penn State Press. This book was released on 2020-03-24 with total page 249 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Kings throughout medieval and early modern Europe had extraconjugal sexual partners. Only in France, however, did the royal mistress become a quasi-institutionalized political position. This study explores the emergence and development of the position of French royal mistress through detailed portraits of nine of its most significant incumbents: Agnès Sorel, Anne de Pisseleu d’Heilly, Diane de Poitiers, Gabrielle d’Estrées, Françoise Louise de La Baume Le Blanc, Françoise Athénaïs de Rochechouart de Mortemart, Françoise d’Aubigné, Jeanne-Antoinette Poisson, and Jeanne Bécu. Beginning in the fifteenth century, key structures converged to create a space at court for the royal mistress. The first was an idea of gender already in place: that while women were legally inferior to men, they were men’s equals in competence. Because of their legal subordinacy, queens were considered to be the safest regents for their husbands, and, subsequently, the royal mistress was the surest counterpoint to the royal favorite. Second, the Renaissance was a period during which people began to experience space as theatrical. This shift to a theatrical world opened up new ways of imagining political guile, which came to be positively associated with the royal mistress. Still, the role had to be activated by an intelligent, charismatic woman associated with a king who sought women as advisors. The fascinating particulars of each case are covered in the chapters of this book. Thoroughly researched and compellingly narrated, this important study explains why the tradition of a politically powerful royal mistress materialized at the French court, but nowhere else in Europe. It will appeal to anyone interested in the history of the French monarchy, women and royalty, and gender studies.

Author : Sarah Gristwood
Publisher : Random House
ISBN 13 : 0553816179
Total Pages : 575 pages
Book Rating : 4.74/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Bird of Paradise written by Sarah Gristwood and published by Random House. This book was released on 2007 with total page 575 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Few women's lives have described such an arc as that of Mary Robinson. She began her career as an actress, became a royal mistress and blackmailer, and ended it just two decades later as a Romantic poet. This biography explores Georgian England during a period of extreme political, social and cultural upheaval through the life of this woman.

Author : Leslie Carroll
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 1440634777
Total Pages : 472 pages
Book Rating : 4.72/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Royal Affairs written by Leslie Carroll and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2008-06-03 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A funny, raucous, and delightfully dirty history of 1,000 years of bedroom-hopping secrets and scandals of Britain's royals. Insatiable kings, lecherous queens, kissing cousins, and wanton consorts-history has never been so much fun. Royal unions have always been the stuff of scintillating gossip, from the passionate Plantagenets to Henry VIII's alarming head count of wives and mistresses, to the Sapphic crushes of Mary and Anne Stuart right on up through the scandal-blighted coupling of Prince Charles and Princess Diana. Thrown into loveless, arranged marriages for political and economic gain, many royals were driven to indulge their pleasures outside the marital bed, engaging in delicious flirtations, lurid love letters, and rampant sex with voluptuous and willing partners. This nearly pathological lust made for some of the most titillating scandals in Great Britain's history. Hardly harmless, these affairs have disrupted dynastic alliances, endangered lives, and most of all, fed the salacious curiosity of the public for centuries. Royal Affairs will satiate that curiosity by bringing this arousing history alive.

Author : Tom Quinn
Publisher : Biteback Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1785901532
Total Pages : 223 pages
Book Rating : 4.39/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Mrs Keppel written by Tom Quinn and published by Biteback Publishing. This book was released on 2016-09-20 with total page 223 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: For Alice Keppel, it was all about appearances. Her precepts were those of the English upper classes: discretion, manners and charm. Nothing else mattered - especially when it came to her infamous affair with King Edward VII. As the King's favourite mistress up until his death in 1910, Alice held significant influence at court and over Edward himself. But it wasn't just Edward she courted: throughout her life, Alice enthusiastically embarked on affairs with bankers, MPs, peers - anybody who could elevate her standing and pay the right price. She was a shrewd courtesan, and her charisma and voracity ensured her both power and money, combined as they were with an aptitude for manipulation. Drawing on a range of sources, including salacious first-hand eyewitness accounts, bestselling author Tom Quinn paints an extraordinary picture of the Edwardian aristocracy, and traces the lives of royal mistresses down to Alice's great-granddaughter, the current Duchess of Cornwall. Both intriguing and astonishing, this is an unadulterated glimpse into a hidden world of scandal, decadence and debauchery.

Author : Susanna de Vries
Publisher : Pirgos Press
ISBN 13 : 1742982697
Total Pages : 380 pages
Book Rating : 4.94/5 ( download)

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Download or read book Royal Mistresses of the House of Hanover-Windsor written by Susanna de Vries and published by Pirgos Press. This book was released on 2018-10-01 with total page 380 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The genuine love match between Prince William and Kate Middleton has rekindled enthusiasm for the British monarchy. In the past, young princes reluctantly entered into arranged marriages and took mistresses. Perdita Robinson, a famous actress, was enticed from the stage with promises of money to live with the fickle Prince of Wales, who turned her and her child onto the street. Perdita fought back, won a financial settlement and became a pioneer of women's writing. Edward VII's most fascinating mistresses were aristocrats' wives like the multi-talented unconventional Lady Jennie Churchill, mother of Winston, and the headstrong heiress, Daisy, Countess of Warwick, mother of one of Edward's love children. Beautiful Alice Keppel became the love of Edward's life and was the great-grandmother of Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, yet another royal mistress. Edward's grandson, Edward VIII suffered an attack of mumps that left him physically and mentally immature. He implored Mrs Freda Dudley Ward to elope but she refused. Another mistress, Lady Thelma Furness, star of Hollywood's silent screen, introduced Edward to the domineering Wallis Simpson who insisted the impotent king seek psychiatric help. In order that Wallis could look like a queen the Duke of Windsor lavished her with jewels and forgave her infidelities in this most intriguing of all royal stories.