Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
2010-12-18 16:42:51
On the subject of the story of the "princes" being buried under the stairs, for a long time I have wondered if at least part of that story is intended to resonate with feelings that belonged to that era.
To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
Katy
To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
Katy
Re: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LON
2010-12-18 16:50:56
"I think we should throw throw the book at him, Sir" (Sid James in Carry on Jack)
(Captain) Kenneth Williams takes the Manual of Naval Discipline and throws it at Albert Poopdecker (Bernard Cribbins).
----- Original Message -----
From: oregon_katy
To:
Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 4:42 PM
Subject: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
On the subject of the story of the "princes" being buried under the stairs, for a long time I have wondered if at least part of that story is intended to resonate with feelings that belonged to that era.
To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
Katy
(Captain) Kenneth Williams takes the Manual of Naval Discipline and throws it at Albert Poopdecker (Bernard Cribbins).
----- Original Message -----
From: oregon_katy
To:
Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 4:42 PM
Subject: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
On the subject of the story of the "princes" being buried under the stairs, for a long time I have wondered if at least part of that story is intended to resonate with feelings that belonged to that era.
To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
Katy
Re: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LON
2010-12-18 17:03:11
Sid wasn't in Lack
Paul
On 18 Dec 2010, at 16:50, Stephen Lark wrote:
> "I think we should throw throw the book at him, Sir" (Sid James in Carry on Jack)
> (Captain) Kenneth Williams takes the Manual of Naval Discipline and throws it at Albert Poopdecker (Bernard Cribbins).
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: oregon_katy
> To:
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 4:42 PM
> Subject: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
>
>
>
> On the subject of the story of the "princes" being buried under the stairs, for a long time I have wondered if at least part of that story is intended to resonate with feelings that belonged to that era.
> To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
>
> There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
>
> That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
>
> And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
>
> There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
> trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
>
> Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
>
> Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
>
> There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
>
> I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
>
> And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
>
> Katy
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
Paul
On 18 Dec 2010, at 16:50, Stephen Lark wrote:
> "I think we should throw throw the book at him, Sir" (Sid James in Carry on Jack)
> (Captain) Kenneth Williams takes the Manual of Naval Discipline and throws it at Albert Poopdecker (Bernard Cribbins).
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: oregon_katy
> To:
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 4:42 PM
> Subject: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
>
>
>
> On the subject of the story of the "princes" being buried under the stairs, for a long time I have wondered if at least part of that story is intended to resonate with feelings that belonged to that era.
> To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
>
> There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
>
> That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
>
> And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
>
> There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
> trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
>
> Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
>
> Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
>
> There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
>
> I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
>
> And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
>
> Katy
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
Re: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LON
2010-12-18 17:10:49
Donald Houston was the First Officer:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carry_On_Jack
----- Original Message -----
From: Paul Trevor Bale
To:
Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 5:03 PM
Subject: Re: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
Sid wasn't in Lack
Paul
On 18 Dec 2010, at 16:50, Stephen Lark wrote:
> "I think we should throw throw the book at him, Sir" (Sid James in Carry on Jack)
> (Captain) Kenneth Williams takes the Manual of Naval Discipline and throws it at Albert Poopdecker (Bernard Cribbins).
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: oregon_katy
> To:
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 4:42 PM
> Subject: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
>
>
>
> On the subject of the story of the "princes" being buried under the stairs, for a long time I have wondered if at least part of that story is intended to resonate with feelings that belonged to that era.
> To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
>
> There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
>
> That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
>
> And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
>
> There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
> trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
>
> Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
>
> Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
>
> There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
>
> I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
>
> And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
>
> Katy
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carry_On_Jack
----- Original Message -----
From: Paul Trevor Bale
To:
Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 5:03 PM
Subject: Re: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
Sid wasn't in Lack
Paul
On 18 Dec 2010, at 16:50, Stephen Lark wrote:
> "I think we should throw throw the book at him, Sir" (Sid James in Carry on Jack)
> (Captain) Kenneth Williams takes the Manual of Naval Discipline and throws it at Albert Poopdecker (Bernard Cribbins).
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: oregon_katy
> To:
> Sent: Saturday, December 18, 2010 4:42 PM
> Subject: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LONG)
>
>
>
> On the subject of the story of the "princes" being buried under the stairs, for a long time I have wondered if at least part of that story is intended to resonate with feelings that belonged to that era.
> To give a subconscious validation, so people would nod and feel like that must be true, it feels so familiar.
>
> There are themes and memes that crop up over and over in folklore, eventually become shorthand figures of speech, and sometimes linger on in a language after the original allusion has been forgotten and the meaning lost. An example is the phrase "by hook or by crook." These days people almost invariably use it to mean "by any means necessary."
>
> That's about the opposite of the original meaning, which referred to the only legal way to harvest standing wood for firewood from royal forests -- pulling it down by means of a woodsman's hook or a shepherd's crook. Since only dead trees and limbs could be broken and felled that way, forbidding axes and cutting instruments meant the live trees were protected. So actually "by hook or by crook" means going by the book.
>
> And from there we could wander to discussing what book and what does going by it mean, but let's not.
>
> There are many superstitions about stairs, and tracing them and
> trying to understand how they originated can get you lost in research, let me tell you. My son-in-law's sister got interested in some particular folktale years ago, and ended up with a PhD in folklore and a professorship.
>
> Apparently there is or was something inherently mysterious and spooky about stairs. Maybe it's because they are a human invention and do not occur in nature. (I know, you can climb cliff via toeholds and so on, but we're talking about actual flights of steps here.) Maybe there's an element of daring to presume, of taking oneself up above the level of the ground into the altitudes reserved for gods and angels. Maybe it's because they are dangerous -- construction is tricky, proportions must be just right, stability and load-bearing capability are vital calculations, and falls down stairs have changed history and are a staple in fiction.
>
> Passing another person on the stairs is bad luck. One often meets ghosts on stairs, it seems, and ghosts have a particular propensity for going noisily up and down stairs in the middle of the night.
>
> There is also the business of disturbing the dead by walking on a grave. In folksongs ghosts come back and complain about this, as well as too much weeping and lamenting over over their burial places. It disturbs their rest.
>
> I couldn't find a specific reference, but I wonder if burying someone under stairs might not be a way of keeping them from finding eternal rest, and of the dead therefore continuing to vex the living, which might be a distant, prehistoric spooky tingle More intended in his tale of the boys being buried under a flight of stairs.
>
> And then there is the echo of Cinderella in the story of Anne Neville being hidden away, dressed as a kitchen maid, while the prince -- well, the duke -- frantically searched for her, but that's another discussion.
>
> Katy
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> ------------------------------------
>
> Yahoo! Groups Links
>
>
>
Re: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LON
2010-12-18 18:50:46
These superstitions are fascinating indeed. Related to the stair myth
may well be the belief in the Great Chain of Being that had pervaded
life for hundreds of years. It was preached from the pulpit ad finitum
during the Middle Ages. The Chain descended from God through the nine
orders of angels to mankind (part man/part angel), and then from
mankind through various orders of animals to inanimate objects. The
closer you were to God, the higher was your level on the chain; the
closer you were to earth , the closer you were to the abode of the Devil
which was believed to exist below the earth. Further, in his Essay on
Man, Alexander Pope articulated the idea that to each link on the Chain,
God reveals enough knowledge to enable the occupant of that link to
thrive. I think this idea is also fairly old. To strive for greater
knowledge than that allowed to your link was to impinge upon the
prerogatives of higher levels on the Chain, especially God's
prerogative...a deadly sin indeed. To tie this idea to the stair rhyme,
If you ascend a stair, and meet a man who isn't there, it might mean
that you've gone further than is good for you. Some things are not yours
to know or to speculate upon.
There is another related chain descending from the 'mankind link': king
down to peasant. Again, you are given enough knowledge to function at
your allotted level. If you are not a king (God's Annointed), you do
not presume to impinge upon his prerogative. The king has greater
knowledge than you do, and it is not yours to speculate on what the king
does. Richard III would not have been the only king to have had this
idea instilled into him. His predecessor, Richard II, certainly had a
clear idea of how it worked, and acted accordingly. A corollary of this
belief was that, even if the king did 'bad' things, the king was not to
be overthrown or disobeyed. The result of such disobedience or overthrow
would be chaos, war, death, etc. The validity of this belief was
certainly borne out by experience in the Wars of the Roses and other
social unrest.
To tie this idea to our Richard, it might be instructive to read Titulus
Regis in light of the Great Chain of Being. This document basically
establishes Richard's right to rule. I believe that it was not only a
propaganda document, but that it also contained Richard's unequivocal
beliefs about the validity of his claim to the throne. I believe that
Richard was a literalist when it came to religion and the teachings of
the Church (such as the Great Chain of Being). Further, I believe he was
convinced that his worldview was the correct worldview (sorry for using
a 20th century concept in an early renaissance setting) as ordained by
God. This means that any action he took, was correct, not only for him,
but for the commonwealth as well. To me, it is likely he was convinced
that what England needed was a return to legitimacy, justice and
stability. Any measure taken to achieve this end was good, whether or
not others saw his actions as 'good' or 'bad'. And like his predecessors
and successors, his actions were not to be judged by his 'lessers'.
I'm not saying I think he had his nephews killed. I don't know whether
he did or not. I'm simply saying that I believe he felt the need to get
the realm 'back on track', no matter what it took to do so, and that he
saw himself as the only legitimate agent for getting the job done. In
the belief that England needed a strong guiding hand, he was certainly
correct. The country had been a political hell-hole for thirty-to-forty
years, and the situation could not continue.
may well be the belief in the Great Chain of Being that had pervaded
life for hundreds of years. It was preached from the pulpit ad finitum
during the Middle Ages. The Chain descended from God through the nine
orders of angels to mankind (part man/part angel), and then from
mankind through various orders of animals to inanimate objects. The
closer you were to God, the higher was your level on the chain; the
closer you were to earth , the closer you were to the abode of the Devil
which was believed to exist below the earth. Further, in his Essay on
Man, Alexander Pope articulated the idea that to each link on the Chain,
God reveals enough knowledge to enable the occupant of that link to
thrive. I think this idea is also fairly old. To strive for greater
knowledge than that allowed to your link was to impinge upon the
prerogatives of higher levels on the Chain, especially God's
prerogative...a deadly sin indeed. To tie this idea to the stair rhyme,
If you ascend a stair, and meet a man who isn't there, it might mean
that you've gone further than is good for you. Some things are not yours
to know or to speculate upon.
There is another related chain descending from the 'mankind link': king
down to peasant. Again, you are given enough knowledge to function at
your allotted level. If you are not a king (God's Annointed), you do
not presume to impinge upon his prerogative. The king has greater
knowledge than you do, and it is not yours to speculate on what the king
does. Richard III would not have been the only king to have had this
idea instilled into him. His predecessor, Richard II, certainly had a
clear idea of how it worked, and acted accordingly. A corollary of this
belief was that, even if the king did 'bad' things, the king was not to
be overthrown or disobeyed. The result of such disobedience or overthrow
would be chaos, war, death, etc. The validity of this belief was
certainly borne out by experience in the Wars of the Roses and other
social unrest.
To tie this idea to our Richard, it might be instructive to read Titulus
Regis in light of the Great Chain of Being. This document basically
establishes Richard's right to rule. I believe that it was not only a
propaganda document, but that it also contained Richard's unequivocal
beliefs about the validity of his claim to the throne. I believe that
Richard was a literalist when it came to religion and the teachings of
the Church (such as the Great Chain of Being). Further, I believe he was
convinced that his worldview was the correct worldview (sorry for using
a 20th century concept in an early renaissance setting) as ordained by
God. This means that any action he took, was correct, not only for him,
but for the commonwealth as well. To me, it is likely he was convinced
that what England needed was a return to legitimacy, justice and
stability. Any measure taken to achieve this end was good, whether or
not others saw his actions as 'good' or 'bad'. And like his predecessors
and successors, his actions were not to be judged by his 'lessers'.
I'm not saying I think he had his nephews killed. I don't know whether
he did or not. I'm simply saying that I believe he felt the need to get
the realm 'back on track', no matter what it took to do so, and that he
saw himself as the only legitimate agent for getting the job done. In
the belief that England needed a strong guiding hand, he was certainly
correct. The country had been a political hell-hole for thirty-to-forty
years, and the situation could not continue.
Re: Last night upon the stair, I met a man who wasn't there... ( LON
2010-12-19 22:36:59
Hi Bill,
I think the problem here is that medieval notions of kingship were not totally straightforward. In different circumstances, different aspects of political philosophy might be emphasised. The notion that people had to obey even bad kings, and what they did in obedience to a bad ruler was not their concern, came largely from the Bible. But in some ways it sat uneasily with Christianity because it appeared to condone sinful behaviour in kings and their subjects and absolve people of responsibility for their own actions. Hence the medieval Church fathers faced two ways on this question. For instance, John of Salisbury in his Policraticus, after extolling the king's position as "a kind of likeness on earth of the divine majesty" who could do no wrong and whom it was absolutely essential and beneficial to obey, quickly back-pedalled:-
"For myself, I am satisfied and persuaded that loyal shoulders should uphold the power of the ruler; and not only do I submit to his power patiently, but with pleasure, so long as it is exercised in subjection to God and follows His ordinances. But on the other hand if it resists and opposes the divine commandments, and wishes to make me share in its war against God; then with unrestrained voice I answer back that God must be preferred before any man on earth. Therefore inferiors should cleave and cohere to their superiors, and all the limbs should be in subjection to the head; but always and only on condition that religion is kept inviolate."
If you were a link in the chain of being, then at whatever level you sat you had a proper function for the good of the whole. A very common image at this period in England was that of the body politic – all the body parts, higher and lower, had a function, and not only should they not interfere in the functions of higher organs and members, but ALL should perform their own function properly, for the common good.
Now, just which bits of the Church's teaching on kingship any particular ruler concerned himself about most would depend largely on his personality. It's a bit like the Protestant doctrination of predestination. It could make the "saved" behave either very arrogantly and harshly, or very very well indeed, depending on how the seed took root in the personality in question; and the stress of worrying whether, despite being a convinced Protestant, one was actually one of the elect could, at the other extreme, lead to mental breakdown (`salvation anxiety').
Now, to take Edward IV, for instance, early in his reign he made use of much propaganda about the commonweal, but by the mid 1470s, when he was feeling more secure on his throne but was growing unpopular and increasingly harsh, he was emphasising the Old Testament retribution that awaited those disobeying their king. For Richard II, as you say, the whole idea went to his head and he understood his rights and exalted position far more clearly than his duties. I suppose you might say that the response of a king to this sort of philosophy would depend largely on his level of narcissism.
Now, how did Richard III see his role as king? I agree that documents such as Titulus Regius make it very clear that he was wholly confident of his right to be king, and saw himself as called to that position by God. But did that mean he thought he could do anything, no matter how bad, to maintain that position (and, granted, the peace that went with it), and no one had the right to question him? It can't be assumed.
Firstly, Richard may have been confident of his right to the throne, but he may have believed that God had called him not for his own benefit but for a purpose, to do better than his immediate predecessors. Also, he must have realised not everybody shared his confidence in his hereditary right. He would have to earn that, and that would mean ruling as God would want his chosen agent to rule. I think if we look at the record we can see that this is exactly how Richard was thinking.
The speech Bishop Russell had prepared for Edward V's parliament, and then gave to the assembly that recognised Richard as king:-
"declared and announced the reasons for summoning the aforesaid parliament, taking as his theme: 'In the body there are many limbs, but not all have the same function'. (fn. 30) In which words he gravely and very astutely explained the fealty which subjects of the king and the functions individual members owe to the principal member, asserting that there are three kinds of body, namely the natural, the aggregate and the politic, and going on to suggest that one coin, the tenth, (fn. 31) had been lost from the most precious fabric of the body politic of England and that to hunt for it and find it would require the king and all the lords spiritual and temporal to be very assiduous and diligent during this parliament; concluding that after the finding of the tenth coin, which signifies perfection, our body politic of England would endure gloriously and for a long time, healthy, safe and free from all damage or injury; the king, the great men of the realm and the commons eternally cherishing peace outward and inward and the author of that peace."
Just two days after he became king Richard wrote to the archbishops:-
" Whereas the radiance of the Eternal King, through whom all kings reign and princes have dominion, the ray of his light and glory in many and divers ways shines upon all his creatures and marks out those who share in his goodness; and whereas we, who under his providential design rule and govern his people, endeavour by high grace to conform our will and acts to His will, we have deemed it right, consider it fit by natural and prudent reason, to walk in His ways and, insofar as it is granted to us from above, to mark His footsteps."
Also, Richard was actually unusually prone to feel the need to explain himself to the masses. Take the speech he gave denying the plan to marry Elizabeth of York, in which he even described how heartbroken he was at his wife's death.
And then there is the little matter of the Northfield outside York, which Richard wanted donated to St Nicholas' hospital. The field was common land, but only in the winter months, and Richard therefore saw it as "a little thing unto" the folk of York and didn't believed it would be missed. The city council - ever anxious to please him - agreed to his request - this was in the spring of 1484.
Come the next autumn, however, the ordinary folk of York, finding this usual bit of winter grazing enclosed, rioted. When he heard about this, Richard sent a messenger to the city. He told the Mayor and Council off for allowing the disorder. But he also had a message for the commons. He told them off too, for trying to seize the Northfield back by main force. But he didn;t say 'this is my will, and you disobey me at your peril.' Instead, he told them they should have put their case properly to the Mayor. And he opened his address to the commonalty by insisting that he "hath been as glad and well-willed that ye, and every of you, should have and enjoy peaceably as well all and every parcel of common pasture as every other thing to you of right appertaining, due or of ancient time accustomed, as ever was any prince that reigned upon you."
The folk of York were evidently encouraged by this message to believe that Richard regretted his action and would support the return of the field to common use, and they immediately drew up a bill of complaint and marched it round to the Mayor; he, however, after briefly perusing it, rejected it out of hand.
In the end, it was Richard himself who stepped in and cancelled the grant of the Northfield to St Nicholas' Hospital "at the behest of the residents of York".
Not to belabour the point too much more, I see Richard as a man with a mission to restore the kingdom to peace and prosperity by ruling in accordance with God's will. Hence, perhaps, the emphasis on sexual morality, and hence his willingness to change his mind when he thought he was in the wrong. This drive also shows itself in the general good rule and concern for his ordinary subjects that is characteristic of him as king. I don't think the end justified the means within that sort of political dynamic. It was, perhaps, in many ways a big practical weakness.
IMO, killing the Princes would not fit well with Richard III's view of kingship. The single biggest bogeyman in the medieval canon was probably King Herod – a king who had sought to protect his position by killing innocent children, and was definitely disapproved of by the Almighty. This is why the belief that Richard murdered the Princes was such a PR disaster for him – it made him a Herod figure; it seemed to confirm him as a tyrant who had breached the divine order in seizing the throne.
Actually, was it not Michael K. Jones who first put forward the idea that Richard may have murdered the Princes to purge the royal bloodline so that legitimate rule could be restored? To my mind this is way off the mark for medieval Christian thinking (even though there may have been many narcissistic rulers around who, basking in all that reflected divine glory, had lost the plot and would have done it). In fact, it reminds me more of 20th century eugenics, Nazi ideology and all that.
Marie
--- In , Bill Barber <bbarber@...> wrote:
>
> These superstitions are fascinating indeed. Related to the stair myth
> may well be the belief in the Great Chain of Being that had pervaded
> life for hundreds of years. It was preached from the pulpit ad finitum
> during the Middle Ages. The Chain descended from God through the nine
> orders of angels to mankind (part man/part angel), and then from
> mankind through various orders of animals to inanimate objects. The
> closer you were to God, the higher was your level on the chain; the
> closer you were to earth , the closer you were to the abode of the Devil
> which was believed to exist below the earth. Further, in his Essay on
> Man, Alexander Pope articulated the idea that to each link on the Chain,
> God reveals enough knowledge to enable the occupant of that link to
> thrive. I think this idea is also fairly old. To strive for greater
> knowledge than that allowed to your link was to impinge upon the
> prerogatives of higher levels on the Chain, especially God's
> prerogative...a deadly sin indeed. To tie this idea to the stair rhyme,
> If you ascend a stair, and meet a man who isn't there, it might mean
> that you've gone further than is good for you. Some things are not yours
> to know or to speculate upon.
>
> There is another related chain descending from the 'mankind link': king
> down to peasant. Again, you are given enough knowledge to function at
> your allotted level. If you are not a king (God's Annointed), you do
> not presume to impinge upon his prerogative. The king has greater
> knowledge than you do, and it is not yours to speculate on what the king
> does. Richard III would not have been the only king to have had this
> idea instilled into him. His predecessor, Richard II, certainly had a
> clear idea of how it worked, and acted accordingly. A corollary of this
> belief was that, even if the king did 'bad' things, the king was not to
> be overthrown or disobeyed. The result of such disobedience or overthrow
> would be chaos, war, death, etc. The validity of this belief was
> certainly borne out by experience in the Wars of the Roses and other
> social unrest.
>
> To tie this idea to our Richard, it might be instructive to read Titulus
> Regis in light of the Great Chain of Being. This document basically
> establishes Richard's right to rule. I believe that it was not only a
> propaganda document, but that it also contained Richard's unequivocal
> beliefs about the validity of his claim to the throne. I believe that
> Richard was a literalist when it came to religion and the teachings of
> the Church (such as the Great Chain of Being). Further, I believe he was
> convinced that his worldview was the correct worldview (sorry for using
> a 20th century concept in an early renaissance setting) as ordained by
> God. This means that any action he took, was correct, not only for him,
> but for the commonwealth as well. To me, it is likely he was convinced
> that what England needed was a return to legitimacy, justice and
> stability. Any measure taken to achieve this end was good, whether or
> not others saw his actions as 'good' or 'bad'. And like his predecessors
> and successors, his actions were not to be judged by his 'lessers'.
>
> I'm not saying I think he had his nephews killed. I don't know whether
> he did or not. I'm simply saying that I believe he felt the need to get
> the realm 'back on track', no matter what it took to do so, and that he
> saw himself as the only legitimate agent for getting the job done. In
> the belief that England needed a strong guiding hand, he was certainly
> correct. The country had been a political hell-hole for thirty-to-forty
> years, and the situation could not continue.
>
I think the problem here is that medieval notions of kingship were not totally straightforward. In different circumstances, different aspects of political philosophy might be emphasised. The notion that people had to obey even bad kings, and what they did in obedience to a bad ruler was not their concern, came largely from the Bible. But in some ways it sat uneasily with Christianity because it appeared to condone sinful behaviour in kings and their subjects and absolve people of responsibility for their own actions. Hence the medieval Church fathers faced two ways on this question. For instance, John of Salisbury in his Policraticus, after extolling the king's position as "a kind of likeness on earth of the divine majesty" who could do no wrong and whom it was absolutely essential and beneficial to obey, quickly back-pedalled:-
"For myself, I am satisfied and persuaded that loyal shoulders should uphold the power of the ruler; and not only do I submit to his power patiently, but with pleasure, so long as it is exercised in subjection to God and follows His ordinances. But on the other hand if it resists and opposes the divine commandments, and wishes to make me share in its war against God; then with unrestrained voice I answer back that God must be preferred before any man on earth. Therefore inferiors should cleave and cohere to their superiors, and all the limbs should be in subjection to the head; but always and only on condition that religion is kept inviolate."
If you were a link in the chain of being, then at whatever level you sat you had a proper function for the good of the whole. A very common image at this period in England was that of the body politic – all the body parts, higher and lower, had a function, and not only should they not interfere in the functions of higher organs and members, but ALL should perform their own function properly, for the common good.
Now, just which bits of the Church's teaching on kingship any particular ruler concerned himself about most would depend largely on his personality. It's a bit like the Protestant doctrination of predestination. It could make the "saved" behave either very arrogantly and harshly, or very very well indeed, depending on how the seed took root in the personality in question; and the stress of worrying whether, despite being a convinced Protestant, one was actually one of the elect could, at the other extreme, lead to mental breakdown (`salvation anxiety').
Now, to take Edward IV, for instance, early in his reign he made use of much propaganda about the commonweal, but by the mid 1470s, when he was feeling more secure on his throne but was growing unpopular and increasingly harsh, he was emphasising the Old Testament retribution that awaited those disobeying their king. For Richard II, as you say, the whole idea went to his head and he understood his rights and exalted position far more clearly than his duties. I suppose you might say that the response of a king to this sort of philosophy would depend largely on his level of narcissism.
Now, how did Richard III see his role as king? I agree that documents such as Titulus Regius make it very clear that he was wholly confident of his right to be king, and saw himself as called to that position by God. But did that mean he thought he could do anything, no matter how bad, to maintain that position (and, granted, the peace that went with it), and no one had the right to question him? It can't be assumed.
Firstly, Richard may have been confident of his right to the throne, but he may have believed that God had called him not for his own benefit but for a purpose, to do better than his immediate predecessors. Also, he must have realised not everybody shared his confidence in his hereditary right. He would have to earn that, and that would mean ruling as God would want his chosen agent to rule. I think if we look at the record we can see that this is exactly how Richard was thinking.
The speech Bishop Russell had prepared for Edward V's parliament, and then gave to the assembly that recognised Richard as king:-
"declared and announced the reasons for summoning the aforesaid parliament, taking as his theme: 'In the body there are many limbs, but not all have the same function'. (fn. 30) In which words he gravely and very astutely explained the fealty which subjects of the king and the functions individual members owe to the principal member, asserting that there are three kinds of body, namely the natural, the aggregate and the politic, and going on to suggest that one coin, the tenth, (fn. 31) had been lost from the most precious fabric of the body politic of England and that to hunt for it and find it would require the king and all the lords spiritual and temporal to be very assiduous and diligent during this parliament; concluding that after the finding of the tenth coin, which signifies perfection, our body politic of England would endure gloriously and for a long time, healthy, safe and free from all damage or injury; the king, the great men of the realm and the commons eternally cherishing peace outward and inward and the author of that peace."
Just two days after he became king Richard wrote to the archbishops:-
" Whereas the radiance of the Eternal King, through whom all kings reign and princes have dominion, the ray of his light and glory in many and divers ways shines upon all his creatures and marks out those who share in his goodness; and whereas we, who under his providential design rule and govern his people, endeavour by high grace to conform our will and acts to His will, we have deemed it right, consider it fit by natural and prudent reason, to walk in His ways and, insofar as it is granted to us from above, to mark His footsteps."
Also, Richard was actually unusually prone to feel the need to explain himself to the masses. Take the speech he gave denying the plan to marry Elizabeth of York, in which he even described how heartbroken he was at his wife's death.
And then there is the little matter of the Northfield outside York, which Richard wanted donated to St Nicholas' hospital. The field was common land, but only in the winter months, and Richard therefore saw it as "a little thing unto" the folk of York and didn't believed it would be missed. The city council - ever anxious to please him - agreed to his request - this was in the spring of 1484.
Come the next autumn, however, the ordinary folk of York, finding this usual bit of winter grazing enclosed, rioted. When he heard about this, Richard sent a messenger to the city. He told the Mayor and Council off for allowing the disorder. But he also had a message for the commons. He told them off too, for trying to seize the Northfield back by main force. But he didn;t say 'this is my will, and you disobey me at your peril.' Instead, he told them they should have put their case properly to the Mayor. And he opened his address to the commonalty by insisting that he "hath been as glad and well-willed that ye, and every of you, should have and enjoy peaceably as well all and every parcel of common pasture as every other thing to you of right appertaining, due or of ancient time accustomed, as ever was any prince that reigned upon you."
The folk of York were evidently encouraged by this message to believe that Richard regretted his action and would support the return of the field to common use, and they immediately drew up a bill of complaint and marched it round to the Mayor; he, however, after briefly perusing it, rejected it out of hand.
In the end, it was Richard himself who stepped in and cancelled the grant of the Northfield to St Nicholas' Hospital "at the behest of the residents of York".
Not to belabour the point too much more, I see Richard as a man with a mission to restore the kingdom to peace and prosperity by ruling in accordance with God's will. Hence, perhaps, the emphasis on sexual morality, and hence his willingness to change his mind when he thought he was in the wrong. This drive also shows itself in the general good rule and concern for his ordinary subjects that is characteristic of him as king. I don't think the end justified the means within that sort of political dynamic. It was, perhaps, in many ways a big practical weakness.
IMO, killing the Princes would not fit well with Richard III's view of kingship. The single biggest bogeyman in the medieval canon was probably King Herod – a king who had sought to protect his position by killing innocent children, and was definitely disapproved of by the Almighty. This is why the belief that Richard murdered the Princes was such a PR disaster for him – it made him a Herod figure; it seemed to confirm him as a tyrant who had breached the divine order in seizing the throne.
Actually, was it not Michael K. Jones who first put forward the idea that Richard may have murdered the Princes to purge the royal bloodline so that legitimate rule could be restored? To my mind this is way off the mark for medieval Christian thinking (even though there may have been many narcissistic rulers around who, basking in all that reflected divine glory, had lost the plot and would have done it). In fact, it reminds me more of 20th century eugenics, Nazi ideology and all that.
Marie
--- In , Bill Barber <bbarber@...> wrote:
>
> These superstitions are fascinating indeed. Related to the stair myth
> may well be the belief in the Great Chain of Being that had pervaded
> life for hundreds of years. It was preached from the pulpit ad finitum
> during the Middle Ages. The Chain descended from God through the nine
> orders of angels to mankind (part man/part angel), and then from
> mankind through various orders of animals to inanimate objects. The
> closer you were to God, the higher was your level on the chain; the
> closer you were to earth , the closer you were to the abode of the Devil
> which was believed to exist below the earth. Further, in his Essay on
> Man, Alexander Pope articulated the idea that to each link on the Chain,
> God reveals enough knowledge to enable the occupant of that link to
> thrive. I think this idea is also fairly old. To strive for greater
> knowledge than that allowed to your link was to impinge upon the
> prerogatives of higher levels on the Chain, especially God's
> prerogative...a deadly sin indeed. To tie this idea to the stair rhyme,
> If you ascend a stair, and meet a man who isn't there, it might mean
> that you've gone further than is good for you. Some things are not yours
> to know or to speculate upon.
>
> There is another related chain descending from the 'mankind link': king
> down to peasant. Again, you are given enough knowledge to function at
> your allotted level. If you are not a king (God's Annointed), you do
> not presume to impinge upon his prerogative. The king has greater
> knowledge than you do, and it is not yours to speculate on what the king
> does. Richard III would not have been the only king to have had this
> idea instilled into him. His predecessor, Richard II, certainly had a
> clear idea of how it worked, and acted accordingly. A corollary of this
> belief was that, even if the king did 'bad' things, the king was not to
> be overthrown or disobeyed. The result of such disobedience or overthrow
> would be chaos, war, death, etc. The validity of this belief was
> certainly borne out by experience in the Wars of the Roses and other
> social unrest.
>
> To tie this idea to our Richard, it might be instructive to read Titulus
> Regis in light of the Great Chain of Being. This document basically
> establishes Richard's right to rule. I believe that it was not only a
> propaganda document, but that it also contained Richard's unequivocal
> beliefs about the validity of his claim to the throne. I believe that
> Richard was a literalist when it came to religion and the teachings of
> the Church (such as the Great Chain of Being). Further, I believe he was
> convinced that his worldview was the correct worldview (sorry for using
> a 20th century concept in an early renaissance setting) as ordained by
> God. This means that any action he took, was correct, not only for him,
> but for the commonwealth as well. To me, it is likely he was convinced
> that what England needed was a return to legitimacy, justice and
> stability. Any measure taken to achieve this end was good, whether or
> not others saw his actions as 'good' or 'bad'. And like his predecessors
> and successors, his actions were not to be judged by his 'lessers'.
>
> I'm not saying I think he had his nephews killed. I don't know whether
> he did or not. I'm simply saying that I believe he felt the need to get
> the realm 'back on track', no matter what it took to do so, and that he
> saw himself as the only legitimate agent for getting the job done. In
> the belief that England needed a strong guiding hand, he was certainly
> correct. The country had been a political hell-hole for thirty-to-forty
> years, and the situation could not continue.
>
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