#beardofkamenev

[skeleton-richard]

Hello there! Do you by any chance have an English translation of Charles d'Orleans' "France, iadis on te souloit nommer"? I'm doing... a thing.

I do!

The Complaint for France (Co3, pp. 191-194)

France, in times past you were wont To be called in every land the treasure of manners. For every man could find in you Virtue, honor, loyalty, nobility, Learning, reason, courtliness, prowess. Foreigners one and all hastened to your banner. And now I see, to my dismay, You enduring many a grievous ill, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

Do you truly know whence comes this ill? Do you see why you are in distress? I intend to tell you, and so fulfill my duty toward you, Listen to me and you do wisdom. Your great arrogance, gluttony, sloth, 15 Greed, maintained without justice, And desire for rich living, which you possess aplenty, Have moved God to punish you, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

Yet do not despair, For God abounds with mercy. Go to Him and beg His grace, For long ago He made you a promise That if you would but make Humility your spokesman, He would be very happy to heal you. Put all your trust in Him, who was Eager to die on the cross for you and all others, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

Remember how He ordained that you Should cry out "Montjoy" in happiness, And that on your shield of blue you should bear Three lily flowers all of gold, and to strengthen Your courage, He sent you what was exalted, The oriflamme, which gave you the power to Rule your enemies. Don't forget these grand gifts it pleased Him to enrich you with, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

And even more, it was His wish to send By a dove, full of simplicity, The unction with which you anoint your kings So dignity might take root within them, And He thought to share with you, more than With others, His rich store of precious and holy relics. All the world acknowledges this. Be certain He does not intend to fail you, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

The Court of Rome acknowledges you As its right arm, for often you have delivered it From distress, and to make this manifest The popes have you sit, not among the crowd, But at their right, so Justice might never lack. And so you should weep hard and moan When you displease God, Who has furthered you In every way, the One you should love, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

What champions Christendom used to Find in you! I have no need to spell it out: Charlemagne, Roland, and Oliver Are the proof. So l pass over such things. And Louis, king and saint, who often Beat down the violence of the Saracens While he lived, showing prowess in hardship. The chronicles make this clear and do not lie, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble! And so, France, please take counsel, And regain the path of right living. Take pains to amend all your misdeeds By having sung and said many a mass For the souls of those who suffered the bitterness Of a hard death in order to serve you. Be mindful of their faithfulness. They spared nothing to keep you safe, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble! God's arms open to embrace you, Ready to forget your sinful life. Ask for pardon; Our Lady will surely come To your aid, the princess so very powerful, Whom you call upon and think your mistress. The saints as well will come to your assistance, Whose bodies find their resting place in you. Slumber no longer in your sinfulness, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

And I, Charles, duke of Orleans, was pleased To Compose these verses in the time of my youth; Before one and all I acknowledge That as a prisoner I wrote them, this I confess, Praying to God, that before old age falls upon me, A time of peace might everywhere come to pass, As is the desire of my heart, And I see all your ills soon end, Kingdom of France so Christian and noble!

From Poetry of Charles d’Orleans and his Circle: A Critical Edition of BnF MS. fr. 25458, Charles d’Orleans’s Personal Manuscript, ed. John Fox and Mary-Jo Arn (2010), translation by R. Barton Palmer.

[richmond-rex]

⭐ A Traitor's Courage pwetty pweese :3 ⭐

Well, this one was a surprise! I’ll talk about some of my thoughts about the writing process under the cut 🌹🌹

send in a ⭐ to ask for the “director’s commentary” on one of my stories 

The first thing about A Traitor’s Courage is that I wanted to write a story where the relationship between Henry and his uncle Jasper was on the forefront (though some aspects of Henry & Margaret’s relationship also crept in). There is an absurd lack of stories depicting their relationship — in fact, I was the one to create the Henry VII of England & Jasper Tudor tag on ao3 — and since I knew a friend who also liked those two I decided to dedicate the story to her. 

This lack of emphasis on Henry VII’s familial relationships bothers me for a lot of reasons, but especially because of the Ricardian belief (corroborrated by Philippa Gregory and her fans) that the Tudors as a family never suffered losses during the Wars of the Roses and that the crown just fell on Henry’s lap without any emotional or physical scars. Considering the Henry was kept away from the few people in his family who had survived up to 1461, his infancy is an incredibly sad one. I think not many people realise (or know) that he was given to his father’s killers, ffs! The ones who also happened to be his uncle’s enemies.

So the first point was to address some issues: how would Henry have grown in a family that had his own uncle as an enemy? What kind of things did they tell him about his uncle? The fact that William Herbert took Henry to a siege against his uncle incenses me to no end!! Also, what kind of hardships would Henry have suffered under the Herberts? We know that he was honourably educated (and apparently a great student) but he still told Commines that since the age of five he had been kept like a prisoner — the fact is that Henry felt like a prisoner among the Herberts for some reason. I wanted to emphasise his sense of loneliness and his longing for his mother (who apparently he could communicate with in some way) and the conflicting views he might have had about his uncle until he got to meet Jasper.

If we take everything into consideration, I do think that Henry grew into a suspicious person since quite early in his life (not just only after his exile in Brittany) so the main challenge in this fic would to depict the process of him learning to trust his uncle whom he had not seen in almost ten years (and likely didn’t have many memories about). And we do know that Henry grew to trust him! His letter patents creating him a duke.... wah! Jasper and Henry were the father and son that each other didn’t have and no one can convince me otherwise! Their relationship truly makes me emotional! 💔💔

So well, that was the motivating idea behind the story but it wasn’t so easy to execute. I learnt that I shouldn’t try to encompass three years in the same one-shot (or chapter) because I like delving into the emotional aspect of things, so in a fic like that the historical side suffers a bit because of it — the emotional side suffers too, as those moments necessarily get rushed in the process. So I don’t think I would write a fic like that again, no, but it was a nice (and difficult) exercise.

Thank you so much for asking me about that story! I’m not particularly satisfied with that one because I don’t think I truly did justice to them (or to my idea) but it was a starting point and everyone has to start from somewhere, innit 🤍❤️️x 

[glorianas]

beardofkamenev replied to your photo: i read this headline and blacked out for 5 minutes

LMAO

i like how examples of margaret being ‘ambitious’ just include....marrying men of similar rank and being a lady in waiting because she was a noble lady and related to the king...so that was like, uh, expected

[thecatsaesthetics]

You know what, after listening to that Jasper Tudor podcast, I'm actually lowkey hoping someone out there writes a crack!fic on Jasper Tudor/Margaret of Anjou

LOL, I understand. Honestly, I don’t see anything happening between them (Margaret actually seems to be devoted to Henry VI from what I’ve read) but in terms of fiction, it would make more sense for Jasper to have fallen for Margaret of Anjou then Margaret Beaufort. 

Fiction writers don’t seem to invest much time in discovering much about Jasper and where his loyalties were, and who he spent his time with. From the way, the podcast put it actually seems he didn’t spend much time with Henry VII either. Probably why Henry was such a solidarity figure. 

[isabelofwraithmarsh]

Is the Fourth Branch of the Mabinogion the best branch? Y/Y

Yes

[isabelofwraithmarsh]

Ugly portrait discourse, Irish mythology, and being fluent in Middle Welsh hahaha

AESRETRYTJ “Fluent” is a VERY big word in my case (it’s more “Spend several hours crying over a sentence with several dictionaries near me before realizing that I used the wrong meaning of the word ‘heb’, which I generally leave to my Welshicist friends”), but I’ll take it! (Just don’t tell my Middle Welsh prof asdfgshfae)

The other two though.....yeah. Yeah. That’s. The Brand™. I never thought lleuein y delw hagr would be my brand. But here we are.