Anne Neville's first marriage - consummation issue

Since we discussed Richard's divorce clause and the papal dispensation dated 22 April 1472 that tackled the issue of Richard and Anne's further third dregree of affinity following her previous marriage to Edward of Lancaster, I was wondering if that dispensation, in its wording, possibly implied that the marriage with Edward had indeed been consummated, since no issue of non consummation, as in the case of Catherine of Aragorn, seems to have been raised.

If I remember correctly, some historians including Kendall doubted Anne's first marriage had been consummated on the ground that a non consummation issue would have made it easier for Margaret of Anjou to have the marriage annulled (together with the issue of Edward's and Anne's dispensation coming from the Patriarch of Jerusalem and not the Pope) in case Warwick lost hold of the realm or relationships degenerated.

I was wondering if Marie or others had approached this issue before and what their thoughts were. Thank you for your attention. Mac

Mac wrote

"Since we discussed Richard's divorce clause and the papal dispensation dated 22 April 1472 that tackled the issue of Richard and Anne's further third dregree of affinity following her previous marriage to Edward of Lancaster, I was wondering if that dispensation, in its wording, possibly implied that the marriage with Edward had indeed been consummated, since no issue of non consummation, as in the case of Catherine of Aragorn, seems to have been raised.

If I remember correctly, some historians including Kendall doubted Anne's first marriage had been consummated on the ground that a non consummation issue would have made it easier for Margaret of Anjou to have the marriage annulled (together with the issue of Edward's and Anne's dispensation coming from the Patriarch of Jerusalem and not the Pope) in case Warwick lost hold of the realm or relationships degenerated.

I was wondering if Marie or others had approached this issue before and what their thoughts were. Thank you for your attention. Mac"

Marie here:

Hi Mac,

Yes, I have thought about this one. I haven't addressed it specifically because historians had pretty much moved on from denying that the marriage was consummated anyway. As far as I can recall, the non-consummation theory was really historians taking time to come to terms with the full implications of the evidence of the wedding, when it was finally discovered. I have an idea - but I would need to check - that the solemn betrothal at Angers was known about at one time but not the wedding itself, and that on the basis of this incomplete information historians rationalised that Margaret would not have allowed the marriage to take place until Warwick had finally defeated Edward. So when the marriage turned up they had egg on their faces (just as with Richard's dispensation, you might say) and protested that Margaret surely wouldn't have let the union be consummated.

As time went on, the accepted view on this changed. After all, there are so many references to Anne as Prince Edward's widow, and Warwick did put Henry VI back on the throne pretty quickly, and until 1471 no one suspected that Burgundy was going to give Edward an army to come back to England with, so the December marriage was held at a time when Margaret would have believed the job done.

Anyhow, that's background. According to the rules back then, it was indeed sex rather than marriage that created affinity, i.e.a non-marital liaison would bring you into affinity with your partner's relations just as much as a marriage would. A union which had been publicly announced, but not consummated, required a different sort of dispensation, for a breach of 'public honesty'; this wasn't nearly so serious and wasn't what they call a diriment impediment - i.e. not getting the dispensation wouldn't actually invalidate the marriage. It would be unusual for a couple to exchange words of present consent and then not consummate, so the usual example of a 'public honesty' situation is where there had been a solemn betrothal (i.e. exchange of words consent in the future tense) but one party died before the marriage could be completed. So I have a very slight niggle in that the situation under scrutiny here was a complete marriage. Medieval theologians had slightly complicated matters by deciding that it was the promise, rather than sex, that made the marriage, so there could be no divorce for non-consummation except where consummation had proved to be physically impossible. I'm not sure whether theologians had ever specifically addressed the question of whether affinity could be produced by a full marriage that had not been consummated, but I think the answer would probably be that it couldn't because the idea behind affinity was that a couple became 'one flesh' when they had intercourse.

So anyway, yes, as I read it this dispensation is indeed further evidence that Anne's marriage to Edward of Lancaster was consummated.

Mac wrote

"Since we discussed Richard's divorce clause and the papal dispensation dated 22 April 1472 that tackled the issue of Richard and Anne's further third dregree of affinity following her previous marriage to Edward of Lancaster, I was wondering if that dispensation, in its wording, possibly implied that the marriage with Edward had indeed been consummated, since no issue of non consummation, as in the case of Catherine of Aragorn, seems to have been raised.

If I remember correctly, some historians including Kendall doubted Anne's first marriage had been consummated on the ground that a non consummation issue would have made it easier for Margaret of Anjou to have the marriage annulled (together with the issue of Edward's and Anne's dispensation coming from the Patriarch of Jerusalem and not the Pope) in case Warwick lost hold of the realm or relationships degenerated.

I was wondering if Marie or others had approached this issue before and what their thoughts were. Thank you for your attention. Mac"

Marie here:

Hi Mac,

Yes, I have thought about this one. I haven't addressed it specifically because historians had pretty much moved on from denying that the marriage was consummated anyway. As far as I can recall, the non-consummation theory was really historians taking time to come to terms with the full implications of the evidence of the wedding, when it was finally discovered. I have an idea - but I would need to check - that the solemn betrothal at Angers was known about at one time but not the wedding itself, and that on the basis of this incomplete information historians rationalised that Margaret would not have allowed the marriage to take place until Warwick had finally defeated Edward. So when the marriage turned up they had egg on their faces (just as with Richard's dispensation, you might say) and protested that Margaret surely wouldn't have let the union be consummated.

As time went on, the accepted view on this changed. After all, there are so many references to Anne as Prince Edward's widow, and Warwick did put Henry VI back on the throne pretty quickly, and until 1471 no one suspected that Burgundy was going to give Edward an army to come back to England with, so the December marriage was held at a time when Margaret would have believed the job done.

Anyhow, that's background. According to the rules back then, it was indeed sex rather than marriage that created affinity, i.e.a non-marital liaison would bring you into affinity with your partner's relations just as much as a marriage would. A union which had been publicly announced, but not consummated, required a different sort of dispensation, for a breach of 'public honesty'; this wasn't nearly so serious and wasn't what they call a diriment impediment - i.e. not getting the dispensation wouldn't actually invalidate the marriage. It would be unusual for a couple to exchange words of present consent and then not consummate, so the usual example of a 'public honesty' situation is where there had been a solemn betrothal (i.e. exchange of words consent in the future tense) but one party died before the marriage could be completed. So I have a very slight niggle in that the situation under scrutiny here was a complete marriage. Medieval theologians had slightly complicated matters by deciding that it was the promise, rather than sex, that made the marriage, so there could be no divorce for non-consummation except where consummation had proved to be physically impossible. I'm not sure whether theologians had ever specifically addressed the question of whether affinity could be produced by a full marriage that had not been consummated, but I think the answer would probably be that it couldn't because the idea behind affinity was that a couple became 'one flesh' when they had intercourse.

So anyway, yes, as I read it this dispensation is indeed further evidence that Anne's marriage to Edward of Lancaster was consummated.

Maria wrote:

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Maria wrote:

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Nico wrote:

"If there had to be something preventing consummation such as impotence to get an annulment/dispensation for another marriage, then would it be the case that you couldn't get one if the marriage was not consummated, but it was because it was the choice of one or both partners (perhaps in the case where the couple was young - like Anne Neville and Edward of Lancaster, or an arranged marriage where they were not attracted to each other?)"

Marie:

Well, of course there could be other grounds than non-consummation for an annulment - such as you suddenly discovered you and your spouse were second cousins, or if one or both parties had been forced to marry against their will. But if you wanted to get an annulment *on grounds of non-consummation* alone, then, yes, it had to be incapable of consummation. The idea was that in exchanging the words of promise the couple had committed themselves to marriage and that included a commitment to a sexual relationship.

The examples you give actually touch on the issue of consent. If a couple had been married as children they had the right to change their minds when they reached puberty. If a person of any age had gone through with the wedding ceremony only because of outside pressure, and then refused to consummate, then they could get an annulment on the grounds of force - not non-consummation. There is an example of this in the Harrington family. In those circumstances, if the person allowed the marriage to be consummated without any show of resistance, then a Church court would generally take the view that the marriage had been consensual but they had simply changed their mind later, so no annulment.

to go back to Maria's example, it sounds as though Enrique was being clever, allowing that he had been unable to do it with his wife but claiming that he was not otherwise impotent. This isn't something the Church courts normally considered a possibility, strangely enough. That would also explain the witchcraft idea. It would be important for him if he wished to marry again to convince the Church court that he was not impotent per se. I suspect that had he not been a king he would not have got away with it.

Thank you for your comments Marie.

Why do you think the dispensation was issued by the Patriarch of Jerusalem and not the Pope? Could this be used as an excuse to obtain an annullment, a way out of an undesiderable allegiance for Margaret of Anjou as some historians have suggested?

You also said that evidence for Anne and Edward's wedding emerged later that the evidence related to the betrothal ceremony. Is it confirmed that the wedding took place on December 13th in Amboise? Thanks again for sharing your knowledge. Mac

Mac wrote:

"Why do you think the dispensation was issued by the Patriarch of Jerusalem and not the Pope? Could this be used as an excuse to obtain an annullment, a way out of an undesiderable allegiance for Margaret of Anjou as some historians have suggested?

You also said that evidence for Anne and Edward's wedding emerged later that the evidence related to the betrothal ceremony. Is it confirmed that the wedding took place on December 13th in Amboise? Thanks again for sharing your knowledge."

Hi Mac,

You've forced me to recheck my notes, and also my copy of Calmette & Perinelle's "Louis XI et l'Angleterre", which I didn't have when I made said notes and which is the best single source.

Now, it's often said the couple were betrothed at Angers Cathedral on 25th July 1470, but according to C&P this was the date of the marriage treaty. I can check if you like to see if there's another source for the betrothal, but I've always felt a bit uneasy about it because it wasn't normal to have a solemn betrothal followed by a church wedding - the betrothal was simply a wedding vow taken in the future tense, and became a complete marriage on consummation. But I can dig deeper. Anyway, that is that.

There actually was a papal dispensation. This was issued by the Papal Penitentiary the same as Richard and Anne's 1472 dispensation, and it was found by Peter D. Clarke at the same time (published 2005). This covered all the impediments of relationship, and was issued on 17 August 1470.

Checking C&P, the evidence for the patriarchal dispensation and the December marriage come from a single payment made by the French crown in December 1470 to a priest who had used his own money to:

1) pay a man to ride from Amboise to Honfleur to the Patriarch 'for a vicariate for the dispensation for the said Prince of Wales to marry the said daughter of the Earl of Warwick'

2) pay the Vicar of Bayeux to celebrate said marriage.

Now, I believe this second dispensation from the Patriarch (who just happened to be the Bishop of Bayeux) was probably for permission for the couple to marry during Advent - Advent and Lent being forbidden periods.

It was always known that there was a papal dispensation because we had a letter written by the Pope in April 1471 reminding Louis that he had provided the necessary dispensation, but it was suspected that he had issued this on the back of the Patriarch's dispensation.

According to Calmette & Perinelle, the Patriarch/ Bishop of Bayeux crossed over to England at the end of November, so I guess that explains the request for him to appoint a vicar, and the marriage being celebrated by the Vicar of Bayeux.

I think that there was no thought of future annulment - that is just too complicated. The Pope did from time to time authorise other individuals to issue certain types of dispensation, and the Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem is just the sort of person who may have had this authority.

Gotta go. Hope this does the job.

Marie

Nico wrote:

Marie:

Slight confusion here. The principle of what you say is right, but the ages aren't. Children could marry provisionally from the age of seven, but had the right to reject the marriage when they reached puberty/ years of discretion. The Church took these, for general purposes, as being 12 for a girl and 14 for a boy. But in England it was normal practice for couple not to consummate until the girl had reached fourteen. At 14 and 17, Anne and Edward were perfectly old enough to consummate their marriage by the standards of the time.

Nico wrote:

Since it seems that this was taken fairly seriously, what happened with Margaret Beaufort? Why would her mother have let her go and live with Edmund Tudor, who essentially raped her? Why would he - and the mother - risk social disapproval in this way? Was there action her mother could have taken against Edmund for doing this?

Hi Mac,

Finally there. There turned out to be a lot of relevant primary source material available online, and now I can see pretty much exactly what was going on.

The solemn betrothal in Angers Cathedral on 25th July is yet another myth arising from historians' lack of understanding of medieval marriage law!

What happened is that Warwick and Queen Margaret had finally reached an agreement on all the matters at stake, including the marriage, and on 25th July Warwick and Louis swore oaths to QM on the True Cross in Angers Cathedral, the oaths including the agreed terms for the marriage. This seems to be all that happened, and of course this would not have constituted a solemn betrothal of the two young people - they could only do that themselves.

It's still common for historians to bandy the word 'betrothal' about quite carelessly when they are just talking about marriage treaties or agreements between two sets of parents.

Louis immediately sent a messenger to Lyon, where his ambassador Guillaume Cousinot was talking to papal ambassadors, to ask them for a dispensation. They must have sent straight on to Rome, as the dispensation was issued by the Papal Penitentiary there on 17 August.

The deal sworn on the True Cross was that Anne would join QM's household, and the marriage would be 'perfected' as soon as Warwick had won most of England for King Henry and he was again recognised as king. Those criteria had certainly been met by December.

Marie

Mac wrote:

"So Edward and Anne only took part to one ceremony, their wedding. Is date and place confirmed as December 13th 1470 in Amboise?"

Marie replies:

Good question. Louis, Queen Margaret and the happy couple were all at Amboise, so the venue seems certain. The payment to the Vicarof Bayeux mentions December as the month. After that it gets awkward.

Calmette & Perinelle date the wedding to "about the 13th" but admit the date is not precisely known. They then state as fact that they all set off on the 14th, making for the coast under guise of a wedding party; the source for this seems to be a letter that Louis wrote on the 13th saying the Queen of England and the Countess of Warwick would be going tomorrow, but oddly they don't actually cite this source. The sources they do cite make it slightly less certain that they really set off as early as the 14th, because on the 17th Louis paid one of his esquires to travel with the Countess of Warwick. They had gone by the 19th because the Milanese Ambassador at Amboise wrote home on that day to say they had all left 'to the unspeakable satisfaction and content of his said Majesty.'

C & P's suggested date of 13th seems to be based on the assumption that they would have set off immediately after the wedding (and that they set off on the 14th), but it doesn't look right to me for two reasons:-

1) Louis wrote two long letters on the 13th, which I would have thought unlikely on a day when he was supposed to be hosting a great wedding;

2) A letter written by the Milanese Ambassador at Louis' court on 5th December indicates that Louis had made his goodbyes to them some days before that, but had changed his mind and was now letting them stay till the ambassadors he had sent to England had come back with their report. "It is thought that they will leave immediately the reply arrives."

So perhaps the marriage took place right at the beginning of December?

It's been a very interesting, if slightly time-consuming, diversion!

.

Nico wrote:

"I'm pleased someone else has wondered about Margaret Beaufort's age."

Marie:

Me too. Sometimes you think you must be going mad when nobody else seems to see the same thing.

Nico wrote:

"It also seems that historians have settled on the 1443 date, because of a reference her father wrote about the wardship of his unborn child, which is assumed to be Margaret. However, he could have been concerned about the wardship because he was hoping this child would be a boy, who would have been his heir, and assumed Margaret would be cared for by her mother. He also left later than expected for his ill fated campaign to France, which may have been due to a disaster like the loss of that child."

Marie:

I agree. The child due in 1443 could easily have died, but the knowledge that a baby was expected at that time could equally easily have confused some of the witnesses at the inquisitions post mortem. I can understand, you see, why Margaret's guardians and the king might have been happy to knowingly pretend she was older than she was in order to allow her to inherit early, but I find it hard to believe they would have taken the pretence to such extremes. The bottom line is, she was being treated throughout her childhood as though she had been born in early 1441 rather than May 1443. For instance, her child marriage to Suffolk is said to have taken place between 28 Jan and 7 Feb 1450, at which time she ought, according to the Church rules, have been at least seven years old unless Suffolk had obtained a specific dispensation from this requirement, and I've not seen any evidence that he had. Also, he told parliament he had only thought of marrying Margaret to his son after the death of his other ward, Anne Beauchamp, in 1449, which seems to suggest that had it not been for Anne Beauchamp the marriage might have taken place even earlier.

Again, it was late February 1453 when she was allowed to decide whether to stick with the Suffolk marriage or take Edmund Tudor instead. This would normally take place when the girl reached nubile years - i.e. round about 12. The marriage to Tudor was consummated two years later.

It all fits perfectly with a birth year of 1441, If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck and quacks like a duck, then it probably is a duck????

Except, at least by the end of her life, it had become accepted fact that she was born in 1443. Not only the entry in her prayer book, but in the oration he gave at her funeral Bishop Fisher claimed she was not yet nine years old when asked to decide between John de la Pole and Edmund Tudor. There's also a Latin sermon supposed to have been given by Fisher in 1507 in which he says she was not quite 14 years old when she gave birth to Henry.

It's a real conundrum, but as she got older could have had a hand in a deception that made her out to be younger than she actually was.

Carol wrote:

Wasn't Richard of Shrewsbury only four when his father had him married to Anne Mowbray? If the legal age for xhild marriages was seven, that marriage was invalid/illegal, as was the granting to little Richard of the dukedom of Norfolk (which, of course, rightfully belonged to Lord Howard or Viscount Berkeley in any case).

Marie:

Yes, indeed he was under the minimum age. But Edward IV got a papal dispensation to allow it. The whole thing was legalised robbery start to finish, actually. A special Act of Parliament was also pushed through to ensure that the prince got to keep the Norfolk lands even if Anne Mowbray died without giving him children or before the marriage was actually consummated. But legalised it all was.

Nico wrote:

"That is interesting about the dispensation [for Margaret Beaufort & John de la Pole], all the notes on it I can find say that the dispensation granted in 1450 was for consanguinity (and even this seems like an oversight, which is less likely if the knew Margaret was too young.) Also, it is odd that she would be asked about the marriage repudiation if she was wasn't even 10, but in the run up to her 12th birthday, it would make sense.

Marie replies on this:

I've just found the dispensation in the Papal Registers online. It was issued retrospectively for their consanguinity, of which they claim to have been in ignorance at the time of the marriage. By the time the dispensation was issued Margaret would have been turned seven even if born 31 May 1443, but if she had actually married before her seventh birthday there should also have been a retrospective dispensation for that, and there isn't. There is no doubt the marriage took place before 31st May 1450, so the de la Poles do seem to have been treating her as though older than is now accepted (and older than she herself seems to have claimed later in her life).

This is the text of the dispensation. Date was 18th August 1450:-

"To John, duke of Suffolk (Soutfolchie) and Margaret [his wife], daughter of the late John, duke of Somerset, of the dioceses of Salisbury and Norwich. Dispensation, at their recent petitioncontaining that they formerly contracted marriage per verba legitime de presenti in ignorance that they were related in the fourth and fourth degrees of kindred; and that if a divorce (duersortium; rectius divortium) were made between them grave dissensions and scandals would probably be stirred up between their parents and friendsto remain in the said marriage, notwithstanding the said impediment. The pope hereby decrees their offspring, if any, and that to be born legitimate. Etsi coniunctis copule (rectius copula) in quarto consanguinitatis gradu sit sacris canonibus interdicta."