It's the first time in a few insanely convoluted, stressful weeks that I have some leisure to engage in reading again, and what is the first thing I stumble upon? One of the absolutely most insane couple of stanzas from a Jacobite poem including not one, but three alleged affairs between the Earl of Shrewsbury and Queen Mary II, the future Queen Anne and a bishop and King William III and Hans Willem Bentinck. ...And did I mention the mpreg.
In a Court full of vice may Shrewsbury lay Molly on,
Whilst Nanny enjoys her episcopal stallion
And Billy with Benting does play the Italian
We beseech thee to hear us
’Mist such blessed pairs, succession prevails,
and if Nan of Denmark or Dutch Molly fails
May pregnant Mynheer spawn a true Prince of Wales
We beseech thee to hear us.
From: A Litany for the Reducing of Ireland, in Cameron, Poems on Affairs of State, p. 219–22, p. 221.
It becomes ever more clear to me as to why Bentinck (a man who had had two wives, 10 children and was very vocal about what he thought of male same sex relations in his letters to William), at the height of those Jacobite publications, wanted some space from the court.
I first encountered this excerpt from a much longer poem in an article called From the Body of the King to the Body of the Nation: Sovereignty, Sodomy, and the English Revolution of 1688, published last year in the journal Modern Intellectiual History, and can be read here for free.
While certainly an interesting read, I am always a bit saddened that all discussions of the relationship between Hans Willem Bentinck and William III tend to inevitably circle back to, or at least imply, the old dispute as to whether there was or wasn't a romantic or sexual relationship between the two, when ample contemporary evidence, including personal letters, makes it clear there was with all the likelihood we can ascertain today, none. Instead, it would be interesting to for once see someone examine their close relationship, which doesn't want to fit into any one mould, apart from the allegations of a sexual affair, which only ever crops up in negative contemporarily, and in highly political contexts. There seems to have been a wealth of trust and nuance as to how they viewed each other that is visible in their letters, which sadly is hardly ever being addressed, even today.
Still, this was another one of these cases where the past surprises - indeed, I know I should know better. People have always been people, but I certainly was not expecting... this.
As another amusing side note, in another Jacobite poem, William III is described as having "the head of a goose", and... this time, I have to say I see what the Jacobites are seeing:
Same glaring stare, same Nose. Will both hiss at and bite you, probably (goose picture bravely taken by Wikipedia user Assianir, who hopefully still has all their fingers attached to their hands).
