From my blog...

The Death of Æthelred

Posted on April 22, 2018 by Patricia

Æthelred II, Anglo-Saxon king of England, died on 23 April, 1016. His passing was noted  in The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, in an entry that was probably written within a decade of his death:

He ended his days on St. George’s day; having held his kingdom in much tribulation and difficulty as long as his life continued.

Ethelred the Unready, Chronicle of Albion c.1220, British Library (Wikimedia Commons)

Beyond that rather bald statement, we know nothing about the final days of the man who had ruled England for 38 difficult years. What was the cause of his death? Who were the witnesses that stood at his bedside? What words, if any, did he speak before he breathed his last? Any answers to these questions must be mere conjecture—guesses built on what  we know of events in England at that time.

For example, several months before his death, in late September or early October, the king had been taken ill. That the Chronicle actually notes that he was sick that autumn of 1015 is an indication of how grave his condition must have been. Mind you, his immediate forbears were not long-lived. His father had died quite suddenly at about age 34 and his uncle at 19. His elder brother died at 16 and his grandfather at 25, but both of them were murdered so they hardly count. (It wasn’t all fun & games, being an Anglo-Saxon royal.) Nevertheless, at 47-ish, Æthelred was well past his ‘sell by’ date in comparison to his forbears, and any illness would be worrisome. It may have come upon him suddenly, for the Chronicle states that he lay sick at Cosham—a royal estate, judging from evidence in the Domesday Book, but one not previously associated with Æthelred.

As bad luck would have it, he fell sick at roughly the same time that a Danish army led by Cnut invaded England’s southwestern shires, only about fifty miles from where Æthelred lay ill in a manor that was not nearly as safe as the stone walled burhs of nearby Chichester or Winchester. Nevertheless, he stayed at Cosham, apparently too sick to do anything about the invasion beyond ordering someone else to gather a force and respond to it—assuming he was well enough to actually give that order himself.

The king’s health must have improved, though, because after Christmas we find him in London—a journey of about seventy miles from Cosham. Was he well enough to ride there, in the rain or snow of late autumn or mid-winter, or was he borne along muddy roads in a horse litter? Or did he sail to London on dangerous seas along the Sussex coast and around Kent into the Thames estuary? No matter which mode of travel he chose, it could not have been an easy journey and would have lasted at least a week, perhaps longer.

During the early part of 1016 he was recovered enough to lead the London garrison north from the city to muster with an army led by his son, Edmund. Remember, this was still winter, and although it was not as cold in the Anglo-Saxon period as it would be some 400 years later when the Thames at London froze so hard it could be crossed on foot, January was still cold, and you couldn’t count on it being dry. A sojourn with the army would likely have been miserable. Even a tent fit for a king was still a tent. Æthelred did not stay with the army long, though. He soon returned to London, not because he was sick but because, according to the Chronicle, he was afraid that someone in that great host wished him harm. Perhaps he had good reason to be afraid; or perhaps he was just paranoid. Clearly, though, he intended to stay alive. Nevertheless, by April he was dying.

So, although we do not know the exact cause of Æthelred’s death, it may have been that his health, both of mind and body, was failing in the final weeks of his life.

As to who was with him at the end, that, too, must be conjecture. His son Edmund had been campaigning in western Mercia, but suddenly he returned to London. It’s possible that he had received word of the king’s impending death and that he wished to see his father one last time, or possibly he wanted to position himself to make a bid for the throne. Perhaps both things were in his mind. In any case, it is likely that he was near his father’s bedside at the end and that his younger, twenty-something brother Edwig was with him.

Some of the king’s daughters, too, might have been witness to Æthelred’s passing although the Chronicle makes no mention of any of them being in London. Well, actually, the Chronicle does not mention them at all, ever. They were women, you know. Anyway, if the king’s daughters had gathered at the London palace to celebrate Christmas they might have remained within the safety of the city’s walls, given that a Danish army was marauding around the kingdom. Æthelred’s daughter Ælfa had been recently widowed when her husband was murdered by the Danes; did she flee to London after his death or did she barricade herself inside Bamburgh Castle in Northumbria? Her sister Edyth was the wife of a traitor who had joined the Danes. If she was still welcome at her father’s court, she may have been at the king’s side. Their sister Wulfhild was married to a powerful East Anglian lord, but she might have preferred even a bitter, wintry London to the sogginess of the fens, so she, too, may have been at the king’s bedside. Their youngest sister Mathilda would likely have remained in her convent at Wherwell, near Winchester. Nuns didn’t get out of the cloister much.

Queen Emma was very likely among the women who attended the king in his final days. Although there are some scholars who believe that Emma was in Normandy from 1013 until 1017–for she and her children had fled there in late 1013 and the king had joined them for a time–I’m not of that opinion. Emma’s properties and income were in England, so once the king had returned to England and his throne she had little reason to remain at her brother’s court in Rouen.

Certainly Emma’s eldest son, 11-year-old Edward, had returned to England and likely he would have been with his mother at the king’s side. Whether her daughter Goda and her youngest son Alfred were there or had remained behind in Normandy is anyone’s guess. The Chronicle gives us no clue.

What about the clergy? Who would have prayed at the king’s bedside? The most powerful prelate in the kingdom was Wulfstan, archbishop of York. Because York was already under Danish control it’s possible that Wulfstan had taken refuge in London with the king, especially if the king had been ailing. The Canterbury archbishop, I believe, would have been sent for if the king’s death was imminent, along with the bishops of London and Rochester, and probably some of the abbots who often attended the gatherings of the witan where charters were drawn up and laws formulated. The abbot of Peterborough, Abbot Ælfsy, was close to the queen and had accompanied her to Normandy. I’d bet money that he was in London with the queen when the king passed away. The scene may have looked something like the depiction of the death of Edward the Confessor on the Bayeux Tapestry although I’m guessing that on both occasions there would have been far more people in attendance.

Bayeux Tapestry, Death of Edward the Confessor. Image: Web Gallery of Art, public domain

Æthelred was laid to rest in St. Paul’s. The great stone church on Ludgate Hill probably rose high above every other church in the city. It had been re-built after a fire in 962 destroyed the earlier church. It had an elaborately carved wooden ceiling, and buried behind the main altar was St. Erkenwald, the 7th century bishop known as the ‘Light of London’. If you’ve ever wondered who Bishopsgate was named after, wonder no more. It was Bishop Erkenwald. Also buried in St. Paul’s at that time was the recently martyred archbishop of Canterbury, Ælfheah, who had been murdered by drunken Vikings in 1012. Æthelred would have known him well, and perhaps for a time they lay side by side near the main altar. Only for a time, though, because within a decade Æfheah’s remains would be carried in a magnificent procession to Canterbury, and in 1087 St. Paul’s would burn down once again. A new St. Paul’s rose from those ashes, and Æthelred was given an elaborate tomb there, next to St. Sebba, a 7th century king of Essex. That’s Æthelred on the right.

Sebba & Ethelred Monument, Wikimedia Commons

Alas, both tombs were lost when that church was destroyed in the Great Fire of 1666, but there is a plaque in St. Paul’s that commemorates them and many others whose monuments were lost.

Photo: Deror Avi (Wikimedia Commons)

In the days following Æthelred’s death, his eldest living son, Edmund, would be proclaimed king by all the counselors and the citizens in London. His coronation was the first to take place in nearly forty years, and despite the Danish army that was terrorizing the kingdom, there must have been an element of hope and exuberance and perhaps relief in the atmosphere of London on the day that the vigorous young king, 27 years old and nicknamed Ironside, took his place upon his father’s throne.

Edmund Ironside. Wikimedia

As for Æthelred’s final words,they went unrecorded. But given the many years that he reigned in the face of repeated Danish assaults, and given the turmoil that he left behind, he may well have expressed something akin to the words that Winston Churchill often repeated to staff during the darkest days of The Blitz: “Keep buggering on”.

Sources:
The Anglo-Saxon Chronicles,  1997, Anne Savage, trans.
Queen Emma and Queen Edith, 2001, Pauline Stafford
An Atlas of Anglo-Saxon England, 1981, David Hill
www.TheHistoryOfLondon.co.uk, Peter Stone
www.opendomesday.org

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Emma of Normandy Through Time

Posted on March 6, 2018 by Patricia
Mortuary Chest, Emma of Normandy, Winchester Cathedral

Mortuary Chest, Emma of Normandy, Winchester Cathedral (Wikimedia Commons)

Emma,
a gem more splendid through the splendors of her merits…

So begins the epigram written late in the 11th century by Godfrey, prior of Winchester, commemorating Emma, Queen of England.

Queen Emma died on 6 March, 1052, and was buried with great honor in the royal mausoleum, the Old Minster, in Winchester. Her passing was noted in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and commemorated annually by prayers at Winchester’s New Minster, at Ely Abbey and at Christ Church Canterbury. At her death she was at least 60 years old, perhaps as old as 70, and for 32 of those years she was a queen of England. She was the consort of two kings, the mother of two kings, and the great-aunt of William the Conqueror who would have had no claim to the English throne in 1066 if it hadn’t been for Queen Emma. She was wife, mother, queen, widow and dowager queen through one of the most turbulent periods in England’s history.

Although Emma does not have the name recognition today of, say, Eleanor of Aquitaine or Ann Boleyn, she was a remarkable woman and quite well known, not only in her lifetime but for centuries after her death.  Where’s the proof of that? Well, to begin with, we have two contemporary drawings of Emma – and that in itself is remarkable.

Queen Emma & King Cnut. New Minster Liber Vitae, 1031. British Library, Stowe 944, fol.6.

Queen Emma & King Cnut. New Minster Liber Vitae, 1031. British Library, Stowe 944, fol.6.

Frontispiece of Encomium Emmae Reginae. 11th c. Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

Frontispiece of Encomium Emmae Reginae. 11th c. Photo Credit: Wikimedia Commons

In addition, Emma, who was given the name of a royal Anglo-Saxon saint, Ælfgiva, upon her marriage to England’s King Æthelred, may be one of the few female figures stitched into the Bayeux Tapestry. Caveat: it is not certain that this is Emma. Scholars continue to argue passionately about the identity of the lady in the tapestry; she was important enough to be named, and apparently she was so well known at the time that anyone looking at the tapestry would have known who this Ælfgiva was and where she fit into the story. Not so those of us looking back at it from a distance of 900 years! The images surrounding  her–the monk who reaches toward her face, and the little naked man in the lower border–merely add to the mystery.

Bayeux Tapestry, AElfgyva. Image on web site of Ulrich Harsh. Public Domain. Wikimedia Commons

We are on much firmer ground some 100 years after Emma’s death when an anonymous artist depicted her in a lavishly illustrated, 12th century biography of her son, King Edward the Confessor.

Emma with her sons Edward & Alfred from The Life of Edward the Confessor, 12th c.

Emma with her sons Edward & Alfred from The Life of Edward the Confessor, 12th c.

Queen Emma presents her sons to Richard of Normandy, The Life of Edward the Confessor, 12th c., Cambridge University Library, Ee.3.59:fol4v

There are textual references to Emma, too, from the 11th century on. She appears in one of the Norse sagas, (Liðsmannaflokkr), as the chaste widow who stands upon the wall of London and watches the battle raging below her. She is mentioned in the annals of Germany and Normandy, and in the post-Conquest histories of England.

Late in her life Emma herself commissioned a book to be written about events she witnessed or which impacted her in some way. Known today as the Encomium Emmae Reginae, it was certainly read and discussed at the Anglo-Danish-Norman court where she reigned as queen mother. More than 500 years later a copy of that book was in the library of William Cecil, chief adviser to Elizabeth I, so it’s quite possible that the great Tudor queen, too, was familiar with Emma’s name and reputation.

Certainly someone in Elizabethan London knew about Emma. She appears as a character in a drama from that period titled Edmund Ironside.  It’s not a very good play, although at least one scholar thinks it may have been a very early work of Shakespeare. Whoever the author was, he knew enough about Emma to imagine her as a queen and as a grieving mother who is forced to send her children out of England for their safety.

After that, we have to fast-forward to the 1960’s to find Emma again. In his 1968 production The Ceremony of Innocence, playwright Ronald Ribman imagined Queen Emma as, well, something of a harridan. He places her opposite an agonized and irresolute King Æthelred.

A very snarky Queen Emma in A Ceremony of Innocence.

It was at about that same time that historical novelists began to set their stories in 11th century England, and Emma was cast in supporting roles. You can find her in Anya Seton’s Avalon,  Dorothy Dunnett’s King Hereafter, Helen Hollick’s I am the Chosen King, and Justin Hill’s Shieldwall. 

Scholars of medieval history, of course, have always known about Queen Emma. Many eminent historians – Alistair Campbell, Helen Damico, Simon Keynes, Eleanor Searle, and, especially Pauline Stafford (Queen Emma & Queen Edith: Queenship & Women’s Power in 11th Century England, 1997) – have looked closely at Emma’s career. Their in-depth studies led to the publication of popular biographies by Isabella Strachan (2004) and Harriet O’Brien (2005).

In 2005, though, Emma was finally given a central role in a historical novel. Helen Hollick’s A Hollow Crown was published in England in that year, and it appeared in the U.S. in 2010 as The Forever Queen. Emma was making a comeback!

FQueen

My own novel about Emma, Shadow on the Crown, was published in 2013.  It has since been translated into four languages, introducing Queen Emma to readers in Russia, Germany, Italy and even Brazil.  The sequel, The Price of Blood, was released in 2015, and it continues Emma’s story up to the year 1012. I am currently at work on the final book of the trilogy that will follow Emma into her second royal marriage and introduce her, I hope,  to an even broader audience.

Recently, Queen Emma became the subject of scientific investigation. Her skeletal remains and those of a number of early English monarchs have for some years been  undergoing examination by a team of scientists from the University of Bristol. The effort hopes to separate and identify bones that were tumbled together into mortuary chests in the 17th century, as well as to learn details about these long-dead royals. (Personally, I would love to know, at the very least, how tall Emma was and what her diet might have been.) Recently the Dean and the Chapter of the cathedral announced that the remains had been “formally dated by the Radiocarbon Accelerator Unit at the University of Oxford and that their origins are thought to be from the late Anglo-Saxon and early Norman periods, which is consistent with the historical burial records of the named individuals.” The study is on-going, and I am sure that I am not the only one anxiously awaiting further announcements about their findings.

The mortuary chests in Winchester Cathedral.

So, through the efforts of scientists, of scholars, of historians, of novelists who love history, and of readers who love historical fiction, this remarkable woman is once more garnering some name recognition as a significant figure in English history.

Shadow on the Crown, Russian edition.

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A Story in Three Parts

Posted on February 17, 2018 by Patricia

My current work in progress is the third book of a trilogy about the 11th century queen of England, Emma of Normandy.

Why write a trilogy, you may wonder. Why not put the entire story into one book? Maybe, you think, I began to write a single book, but the story just got away from me. Or was it possible that I knew it was going to be a trilogy back when I began to write it? (In 2007, if you’re wondering.)

In fact, I knew from the start that this had to be more than one book. It seemed to me that I would not only have to tell Emma’s story, but I would also have to include the very complicated history of the world she lived in and immerse readers into it. Either I was going to write more than one novel, or it was going to be so long that no one would want to publish it—not that I had any inkling, when I began, that it would ever get published.

I’d already spent several years researching Emma, the Normans, the Anglo-Saxons, the Vikings, and the history of late 10th and early 11th century England, and before I wrote a single word, there was a very big decision I had to make:

How much of Emma’s life story was I going to tell?

That was a dilemma, because Queen Emma lived well into her sixties, perhaps even into her seventies. Almost immediately I decided that I did not want to write a novel that would cover, say, fifty years, for the simple reason that I did not know how to do it, even in a trilogy, without diluting the drama that I felt was inherent in Emma’s story. One thing I did know was this:

It is drama, conflict and change –those things that we hate in our own lives—that make the imaginary world of a novel so compelling.

So in contemplating my novel, I needed to focus on the drama. I had discovered that there were two distinct periods of Emma’s life that were fraught with conflict: the 16 years of her marriage to King Æthelred of England which began when she was probably about 16, and another period of nine years when she was in her 50’s. Both periods were marked by turmoil in Emma’s life and by massive unrest and political upheaval in England.

Emma and her children fleeing from Sven Forkbeard’s conquest of England. Manuscript Miniatures Cambridge.

It was that earlier period, when Emma first arrived in England, that intrigued me the most. I wanted to explore the difficulties that she must have faced as a young, foreign queen. I wanted to write a story that would reflect the turbulent history she witnessed, explore what she must have lived through, and imagine for myself the emotions she must have experienced.

Most importantly, I wanted to present the unrest of that time, not from the viewpoint of a king or a warrior, but from the viewpoint of a woman. The men’s stories—those tales of heroes in mail with their swords and shields—have been told over and over; it is the women’s stories that have gone largely unrecorded. That was my challenge: tell the story that hasn’t been told.

In the process I have created 68 characters, most of them historical figures, including their backgrounds and detailed descriptions. I have researched and imagined 11th century England, Normandy and Denmark, including 25 different towns. I have had to envision churches, great halls, royal chambers, ships, manors, abbeys, tents and army camps—and fittingly furnish each one of them.

Sometimes historical re-enactors provide inspiration.

I have had to make up a great deal of Emma’s story due to the simple fact that there was no monk sitting on a stool in a corner of the great hall or the royal bedchamber taking notes about what the king, the queen and their retainers and attendants said to each other. Emma didn’t keep a journal. There are no letters extant from her or anyone who knew her, and even many of the annals that were kept at the time have been lost. Most of what we know was written after the people involved were already dead. It has been a difficult task to write Emma’s story—much more difficult than I first imagined. It has filled my life now for nine years, and I’m not finished yet.

I do not regret a moment of it.

Why do we read and watch and listen to stories? We have been doing these things since our ancestors first gathered around their fires in the dark or drew pictures on cave walls. Stories fascinate us. We fall into them, we fall in love with the characters we meet in them, we draw inspiration or insight from them, we experience emotions through words printed on a page.

I set myself the task of creating that emotional rush—first for myself and then for anyone else who would read what I’d written. That meant I had to whittle sixteen years of 11th century history, and sixteen years of a woman’s life along with her hopes and fears and a myriad of decisions, into manageable chunks, I had to take readers into another time and place,  introduce them to individuals with odd names they had never heard before, and occasionally fling words at them from an English language so different from our own that it is unreadable to anyone who has not made a study of it.

That meant I had to write…a trilogy. Three books, yes; but one story about a once-powerful woman who had been forgotten but who deserved to be re-introduced to the world.

Her name was Emma.

Russian language cover of Shadow on the Crown

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The Great-Sea Flood

Posted on September 28, 2017 by Patricia

Woodcut of a 1607 flood in E. Anglia

A.D. 1014 This year on the eve of St. Michael’s Day, came the great sea-flood, which spread wide over this land, and ran so far up as it never did before, overwhelming many towns, and an innumerable multitude of people. THE ANGLO-SAXON CHRONICLE

The date of this event in 1014 was 28 September. The wave described by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle swept through the English Channel, impacting England’s southern coast as well as areas of what is now the Netherlands. But the wave also moved northward along the coasts of Cornwall and Wales, rounded the northern coast of Scotland and then continued south along England’s eastern coast. We do not know if this disaster took place in the daytime or at night. We only know that it was sudden, and that those affected never saw it coming.

What could have caused such a great sea-flood? We tend to link tsunamis with earthquakes, but there is no record of any earthquake in September, 1014. We tend to associate flooding with storms, but the annals make no mention of a storm

M. Baillie, in an article published in the Journal of Quarternary Science, 2007, speculates that the 1014 tsunami recorded by chroniclers in Britain and at Quedlinburg Abbey in Saxony was caused by a meteor that landed in the North Atlantic.

In the 11th century there was no Red Cross. There was no FEMA. Who cared for those left homeless? Who buried the bodies of the dead? How long did it take for the devastated towns and villages to recover, and is it possible that some might never have recovered? Might they have simply been washed away and, eventually, forgotten?

We can only guess at the answers to those questions as we stand in awe of Mother Nature’s fury even now, one thousand years later.

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Of Runes and Repetition

Posted on September 17, 2017 by Patricia

Today I’m sharing something about my writing process. One of the difficulties that a writer faces in penning a trilogy is the problem of repetition. Frankly, it’s almost impossible to avoid when you have the same characters and the same settings in three consecutive books that tell a lengthy story. Nevertheless, it is up to the author to make each scene significantly different from any that have gone before.

In the second novel of my trilogy about Emma of Normandy, THE PRICE OF BLOOD, I created a scene in which Tyra, a gerningakona (Old Norse, meaning a woman who practices magic) casts rune sticks on the floor and tells her mistress, Elgiva, what she sees there. Here is an edited excerpt from that scene:

Elgiva sat on the floor of Catla’s bedchamber, hands clasped about her knees. Two arms’ length in front of her Tyra knelt among the rushes, frowning intently at the rune sticks scattered in the space that had been cleared between the two of them. Elgiva flicked her gaze between Tyra’s face and the rune-marked pieces of bone.

“Well?” she whispered to Tyra.

But the Sámi woman made no reply. Oblivious to everything but the rune sticks, she began to chant softly, words that Elgiva did not understand although the mere sound of them – eerie and in some strange tongue – made her flesh crawl.

She contained her impatience. Scrying the future, it seemed, could not be rushed.

Tyra had closed her eyes and was running her hands lightly across each fragment of bone, fingering them, touching whatever power emanated from the scored ivory. Then her eyes opened, focusing with such needle-like sharpness on Elgiva that she shuddered.

“Two sons,” Tyra said, in a voice so strange it seemed borrowed from some other world. “Both will grow to manhood. Both will leave this middle earth before you.”

Both will grow to manhood.

Her sons, then, would not all wither in the womb as the last child had.

Tyra had closed her eyes again, slumping against the bed frame as if she were a poppet made of rags and straw. The power that had been within her had withdrawn, and she looked haggard, her face so pale that even her lips were white. Elgiva clenched her fists with impatience, but she knew better than to press Tyra any further. The woman was exhausted and all her power fled.

For a long moment she gazed thoughtfully on that drawn and pallid face, gnawing on an idea that she had been considering ever since the first time she had seen the cunning woman’s hands play across the shards of bone with their mysterious markings. Slowly she moved her stiffened limbs, repositioning herself so that she was on her knees, mimicking the slave woman’s stance when she had been reading the runes. She leaned forward just as she’d seen Tyra do it, fingering the small, scored rods, hoping to feel some kind of power emanating from them.

She felt nothing. She sat back on her heels, and when she looked at Tyra again, the Sámi woman was eyeing her.

“You have lusted after my power for many months now, have you not? Her voice was normal again, no longer filled with magic. “Look at me. Each time I use the power, there is less of me afterward. Is that what you long for?”

I had to look at that scene again because I needed to bring the runes back and at the same time make the new scene that I wanted to include in my third book (not finished yet!) different from the one in the previous novel.

I went back to my research. First, I consulted a book on Nordic Religions by Thomas DuBois that I’d picked up on one of my trips to the Medieval Congress in Kalamazoo – a book that appealed to me as much because of its cover as its Table of Contents.

Runes, as you may know, were used by pagan Germanic peoples, not so much as a means of communication, but as a set of magical symbols associated with healing and magic. In cultures that had no written language, like that of Viking Age Scandinavia, words – and even letters – had an element of mystery about them because so few people understood them. And so they were associated in people’s minds with magic and charms that could cure or curse. For instance, a rune could be written on something, then scraped off into a cup of mead so that the drink became a healing elixir. Or runes could be carved on to something to protect it – the mast of a ship, for example, or the hilt of a sword.

I shall teach you the runes of triumph
To have on the hilt of your sword
From the Eddaic poem Sigrdrifomál

I also turned to a book by Horik Svensson that identified each rune and explained how it might be understood and interpreted.

By taking the information that I was able to glean from my research materials, adding it to the clear idea I had about what I wanted the runes to say to Tyra and Elgiva, and throwing in a dollop of pure imagination, I produced what I hope is a realistic and dramatic scene that is still quite different from the scene in the earlier book, yet builds upon it. Here, again, is an edited excerpt:

“Hagall. Nied. Othel. Tire. Elgiva mouthed the names of the few runes that she could recall and edged forward on her chair, narrowing her eyes to search the markings on the narrow, yellowed shards at her feet. After a few moments, frustrated, she thrust herself back against the cushions.

What did it matter that she knew what they were called? The bits of scored bone scattered on the floor looked to her like nothing more than kitchen refuse. She did not have Tyra’s gift and never would.

She watched her Sámi slave bend over the rune sticks, hands outstretched. Tyra’s braid of dark hair pooled into her lap, and candlelight sent shadows flickering over her thin face. The sight made Elgiva’s flesh creep and, knowing what must come next, she wrapped her shawl about her head so that it covered her ears. Tyra would start chanting soon, the sound so familiar now that Elgiva sometimes heard it in her sleep. Mournful and eerie, it turned her dreams to nightmares. She did not like it, did not want to hear it. But it was part of the ritual. If she wanted an answer to her question, it had to be endured.

When the chanting began she gritted her teeth and, eager to distance herself from it, she pushed herself to her feet and paced to the far end of the chamber, frowning at the barren state of the walls that surrounded her. This was the queen’s outer apartment, and it should have been draped with lavishly embroidered hangings. Emma, though, had taken everything of value or beauty with her when she fled. Only the large wooden bed had been left behind, and even that had been stripped of its curtains and linens…

When Tyra’s chanting sudden stopped she sat, unmoving, her head bent and drooping like a wilted blossom on a thin stalk. Her face was so grey that Elgiva feared she might faint. Moving swiftly to a bench that held a flagon of wine, she poured some of the spiced liquid into a cup and, kneeling, she placed it in Tyra’s hand. She waited while Tyra sipped some of it and a little color returned to her sallow cheeks.

“Well?” she said. “How long will it be until I can return to London?” Tyra stared at the cup in her hand, her mouth shut in a tight line. “Answer me!”

“What you desire may be beyond your reach.” The voice was Tyra’s, but it sounded strange and hollow, as if it came from the back of a cave or the bottom of a well. Tyra’s eyes still did not meet hers. She looked into the middle distance with an unfocused gaze and a face blank as stone. It was the face of prophecy, Elgiva realized, and she held her breath, waiting for it.

“The road that lies before you is strewn with difficulties – far more than just weather and time. There are malignant forces at work over which you have no control.”

Tyra’s voice – flat, dead, and empty – did not even sound human. Elgiva had to force her hands into her lap to keep from covering her ears.

But now Tyra’s eyes fixed upon her at last, and she whispered, “I cannot promise that you will ever return to London.”

Elgiva felt a chill creep along her spine. Never before had Tyra given her a reading such as this. Nor had she ever before avoided her gaze. There was something wrong here. Could it be that she was not lying, yet not speaking all the truth?

She crouched above the bones scatter on the floor and picked up the one that lay in the middle of the grouping. She held it in front of Tyra. “What does this mean?”

Tyra blanched and shook her head.

“By itself it is meaningless.”

“Perhaps,” Elgiva said. “but it is not by itself. It is at the heart of everything you have just told me. Tell me what it means!”

Tyra clenched her lips tight, and Elgiva thought she would have to slap her to get her to speak. The silence built between them, but finally Tyra’s eyes met hers and she murmured, “It means death.”

Elgiva stared at the piece of bone in her hand, then dropped it as if it had burned her.

The scene, hopefully, echoes the reading of the runes from the earlier book. Both are written from Elgiva’s point of view, but although her motives in each scene are the same – answer a question – the questions she has asked are vastly different, as are her reactions to the answers she receives. Tyra’s reticence about even giving her an answer adds conflict to the second scene that sets it apart from the first one. Both scenes, though, end on a dark note. That is meant to keep readers turning the pages!

 

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What Historical Novelists Do at a Conference

Posted on June 30, 2017 by Patricia

The historical novelist’s life is a lonely one. We spend our days at our desks, arguing with computer screens, wrestling with words, engulfed by books and files, and holding conversations with characters who never existed or who have been dead for a thousand years. Is it any wonder that, when given the chance, we throw ourselves a party?

hns1That’s what happened last week when 400 plus members of the Historical Novel Society convened in Portland for a conference. Well, we call it a conference, and in fact there are panels about writing and publishing and history, but in between the panels and the pitches there are dinners and lunches and drinking and, well, it’s a 3-day long party. And a very big party, with writers, readers, agents, editors and booksellers in one place, frequently all of them talking at once.

There was the welcome cocktail costume party, where attendees were invited to come in fancy dress and many did! Medieval kings and queens, 18th century militia, Roman goddesses, ladies in exquisite gowns from a myriad of centuries and men in elegant garb complete with hats and spats or boots and neck-cloths when called for. I must confess that I was absolutely smitten by Susan Shay as Eleanor of Aquitaine, and once I’d followed her about and finally snapped her photo I was so thrilled I didn’t even attempt to corner anyone else. Happily, other people did!

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Photo Credit: David D. Levine

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Panels held over the next two days were on a variety of topics, and it was always horribly difficult to choose among them as there were seven or eight sessions held at the same time. Here are some examples:

Inventing Convincing Medieval Heroines
Truth in Fiction
Using Modern Tools to Tell Historical Stories
Writing in Multiple Genres
Writing the Celtic World
How Well Does Your Dialogue Work?

You see what I mean?

On Friday I led an intimate session, billed as a Koffee Klatch but, alas, without coffee and cakes, on ENGLAND BEFORE THE CONQUEST, which went in an altogether different direction than I had imagined it would, which was actually delightful. Our little group of 18 was much less bloodthirsty than I had anticipated. Not much talk of swords and warriors despite our collective fascination with events in England during the Viking Ages. We discussed things like the marriages of æthelings, and touched on Alfred and Æthelred, and considered the role of Anglo-Saxon queens, especially Emma. The Brits in the room informed me that TIME TEAM is available on YouTube, and I gave a shout out to the group about THE BRITISH HISTORY PODCAST. (I’ve just watched the very first, 1994, episode of TIME TEAM, The Guerilla Base of the King. It’s all about the fort at Athelney where Alfred the Great spent a winter hiding out in 878; that’s exactly the historical event currently under discussion at THE BRITISH HISTORY PODCAST – Alfred’s guerilla war against the Danes. So, how’s that for synchronicity?) The hour flew by and, like a fool, I took no pictures and did not even turn on my bloody phone/recorder so I could provide a more in-depth report in this post. Bother.

The following day was Saturday, and we did it all again. I was on a panel titled PUTTING THE HER IN HISTORY which was the brainstorm of author Stephanie Lehmann, who moderated. Co-panelists were Rebecca Kanner, Mary Sharratt, and Nicole Evelina.

Putting the Her in History: Stephanie Lehmann, Bracewell, Rebecca Kanner, Mary Sharratt, Nicole Evelina. Photo Credit: Jessica Knauss

Putting the Her in History: Stephanie Lehmann, Bracewell, Rebecca Kanner, Mary Sharratt, Nicole Evelina. Photo Credit: Jessica Knauss

And although there are no recordings, I can tell you that my fellow panelists were passionate and eloquent about the roles of women throughout history, about the definition of POWER, and the difficulties that historical novelists face in bringing all-but-forgotten women to life.

The conference board always arranges for special guest speakers and this year was no exception. I don’t know that we’ve ever had a Pulitzer Prize winner speak to us before, but this year we did. Geraldine Brooks won the Pulitzer Prize in 2006 for her novel MARCH. She has also written the best sellers YEAR OF WONDERS, PEOPLE OF THE BOOK, and most recently, THE SECRET CHORD. I have read and loved all of these. She is a marvelous writer, an inspiring speaker, and her stories about her pre-novelist life as a journalist in war zones like Bosnia and the Middle East were hair-raising.

David Ebershoff spoke on the second day. He is the author of THE DANISH GIRL (I highly recommend it) as well as THE 19TH WIFE which I have not read yet, but I’m told it’s remarkable. It was utterly fascinating to hear him speak about Lili Elbe and her life. And it was incredibly moving to hear him describe his return to Dresden to visit her grave after the making of the film THE DANISH GIRL.

In between and after the sessions and during the meals there were conversations among old friends, among friends who knew each other only from their head shots on Facebook, and among friends newly made; there were visits to Powell’s Bookstore; there was laughter, and camaraderie, shared stories about the publishing world and the writer’s life.

For those who wished to explore the many different libations imbibed down the centuries there was a tasting session titled HOOCH THROUGH HISTORY: FROM MEAD TO MARTINIS. (An extra fee for this, and it was sold out. We are writers, after all!)

At the final banquet Australian novelist Kate Forsyth, who is a marvelous storyteller with an advanced degree in Fairy Tales, had us on the edges of our seats with her rendition of the Scottish tale, TAM LIN. (Word to the wise: Beware the fairy queen!)

Geraldine Brooks and Kate Forsyth, HNS Conference 2017

Geraldine Brooks and Kate Forsyth, HNS Conference 2017

The final event of the conference was A REGENCY MASQUERADE BALL. A wonderful trio of musicians accompanied our dance master as he led us through the steps of English Country Dances.
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The musicians were extraordinary, and it was such a treat to be able to dance to live Regency music. Off to one side of the ballroom a group from the Jane Austen Society taught the card sharks among us how to play Whist. Domino masks were handed out at the door, but I brought my own, and I have to say, it made me feel both elegant and mysterious as I danced the night away.

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Next year the party moves to Scotland!

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THE LAST KINGDOM 2, Episode 8

Posted on May 20, 2017 by Patricia

THE POWER OF LOVE

Warning: Spoilers ahead.

The final episode of The Last Kingdom, Season 2, is filled with action and conflict: King vs. ealdormen, brother vs. brother, Saxons vs Northmen. Although I’m not particularly fond of battle scenes, I have to admit that my favorite moment in this episode is when King Alfred – in the dark of night and up against a horde of howling northmen – cries “Shieldwall!”

But, back to the beginning. As Uhtred and his men ride toward Winchester Uhtred looks worried and pensive, and he is no doubt thinking of Æthelflæd and of the request that she has made that he help her flee with the Northman, Erik. It’s risky business for all of them.

Father Pyrlig, who has heard Æthelflæd’s confession, probably knows that she’s in love with her captor. As he rides beside Uhtred he pointedly muses – and I am quoting him word-for-word because it is so important:

What binds a man to a land? You have a poor wretch toiling in the fields, burning in summer and shivering in winter. He works all day every day for nothing more than a loaf of bread and a pot to piss in. His children die of disease, his wife dies giving him children, yet when that land is threatened, something stirs. It can only be love. ‘Tis a powerful thing. Would you not agree, Lord Uhtred? From wretch to warrior, love gives a man strength, often at the cost of his mind.

It is love that underlies this episode – a father’s love for his child, a leader’s love for his land and people, a man’s love for a woman.

The story begins, though, with lust: for silver, for fame, for power. Uhtred and his companions inform Alfred that the Northmen want 3000 pounds of silver and 500 pounds of gold to ransom Æthelflæd.

Alfred, with less than a month to make the first payment, has three options.

Option One: Ignore the ransom demand. Outcome: The king’s daughter will be paraded, probably naked, before mocking crowds; men will pay to use her. It would mean humiliation for her, for the king, for Wessex. But Alfred loves his daughter too much to abandon her to that, nor will he allow that humiliation to be the story of his reign.

Option Two: Lead an army against Sigefrid and Erik.
Outcome: the brothers will kill the king’s daughter. This is the option that Ealdorman Odda would choose. Fight, dammit, and never mind what happens to the girl. Odda, who was badly wounded fighting the Danes at Cynuit, sacrificed his own, traitorous son for Wessex, and Alfred, he thinks, should sacrifice his daughter. Let her be a martyr for Wessex. After all, Odda claims, Alfred still has his son Edward. But Odda is speaking from the perspective of a man who has nothing left to lose, and Alfred has a very great deal to lose if he makes the wrong decision.

Option Three: Pay the ransom. Outcome: the Danes will use the silver and gold to bring more Northmen to Wessex who will unite and destroy Alfred’s kingdom. As Æthelwold observes, the Saxons will pay for the swords that will kill them.

All of the choices are bad, but Alfred gambles that if he pays, God will help him find a way to beat the Northmen when the time comes, despite their vast numbers. This is not, on the face of it, a bad plan. He has paid tribute to the Northmen before to buy an alliance (with Guthrum) or to buy himself time to prepare for war. Odda, though, continues to demand that the king attack now, and Alfred struggles with misgivings, not at all certain that he has made the right decision. Finally, though, he is frustrated by Odda’s refusal to accept the decision he has made. He tells the old man that his injury and his love for wine have robbed him of any value and that he no longer serves a purpose.  Odda must leave Winchester.

There are times when Alfred’s insistence on obedience is a weakness; it will not allow him to bend when sometimes bending is the only solution to a problem. It happens here, with Odda, and it happens a lot with Uhtred. We have seen it before, and we will see it again. Alfred told us in Season 1 that he is no saint. This is a reminder.

Meantime, Odda is convinced that Alfred is wrong, and despite Uhtred’s pleas that he do nothing – for Uhtred alone knows that if Æthelflæd gets away, no ransom need be paid – Odda has already sent for the Devonshire fyrd. If Alfred won’t lead his warriors against the Danes, Odda will. When Alfred finds out – because Odda sends Father Pyrlig to tell him – Alfred gathers his warriors and sets out to try to stop Odda, playing right into Odda’s hands because they all meet near the Northmen’s fortress at Benfleet.

I’ve told my men that we are here on your orders, lord, Odda tells Alfred. Now that you’ve marched an army to the Northmen’s door, they will not believe that you’re not here to fight. And he’s right.

Unknown to the king and Odda, though, inside the fortress Erik and Æthelflæd have been planning their getaway, and Uhtred has arrived in secret to help. But Sigefrid and Hæsten have become suspicious of Erik’s too obvious affection for his prisoner and they have taken steps to make sure that their prize doesn’t escape.

Erik’s plan goes awry, and when brother is pitted against brother, it’s up to Uhtred to improvise the rescue of Æthelflæd, which he does brilliantly. They are pursued, of course, and under a night sky lit by flames, a Northman maddened by grief and howling for vengeance rallies his men against the Saxons – for death and glory. And Alfred the king, who has brought a Saxon army to stop a Saxon army, turns on the Northmen and cries, “Shieldwall!”

Alfred was a great king. He survived months in a swamp, he rallied his people to save Wessex from destruction by Viking raiders, and he began the task of fulfilling his dream of a united England. He was also ruthless, because a 9th century king had to be ruthless. That is the Alfred that we see in this episode when, back at Winchester, he is forced to turn his ruthlessness on an old friend.

Uhtred returns to Cookham, and it is his voice that reminds us of the theme that Pyrlig introduced at the beginning.

What binds a man to his land? What power within allows him to give his life to preserve his land and the lives of the families who work it? It can only be love. It will not be written that Odda gave his life to save Wessex, but that is the story I will tell – that he gave his life to save the lives of many and ensured that King Alfred of Wessex became more powerful than ever.

Did it happen this way in Cornwell’s novel? No. There are enormous differences. For one thing, ODDA WASN’T EVEN THERE! But both versions of this story are beautifully told. If you haven’t read the books, now would be a good time to start while we hope that Uhtred and The Last Kingdom will be back for a third season next year.

  1. The Last Kingdom
  2. The Pale Horseman
  3. The Lords of the North
  4. Sword Song
  5. The Burning Land
  6. Death of Kings
  7. The Pagan Lord
  8. The Empty Throne
  9. Warriors of the Storm
  10. The Flame Bearer
  11. War of the Wolf
  12. Sword of Kings
  13. War Lord
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THE LAST KINGDOM 2, Episode 7

Posted on May 19, 2017 by Patricia

THE KING’S DAUGHTER

Warning: Spoilers ahead.

In the opening scene, Uhtred and his companions arrive at the Saxon camp to find no one left alive. It is heartrending to watch Beocca calling Thyra’s name over and over and getting no reply. That entire scene had me all misty-eyed.

Despite having read Bernard Cornwell’s Sword Song, I did not know how Beocca’s search was going to turn out because the book handles this event quite differently. The screenwriters are, of course, forced to compress and revise because of time and because they are dealing with a different medium; at the same time it allows them to toss in some surprises for those of us who have read the novels on which the show is based. I’m enjoying the changes/additions because they remain true, I think, to the world, the characters and the story that Cornwell created.

Now, back to that ravaged Saxon camp. Unfortunately for Æthelred, he has to go back to Winchester and face Alfred’s wrath when the king learns that his daughter is missing. Serves him right, the weasel. Luckily for Æthelred, who apparently has only half a brain, his buddy Aldhelm is there in every scene, murmuring instructions in his ear about what to do, say and think. Æthelred is one step up from a ventriloquist’s dummy.

Alfred is royally outraged upon learning that
a) his daughter accompanied her husband to battle and
b) she is probably a hostage of the Danes.
He is, though, amazingly self-controlled, and all the good lines are given to Odda. He snarls that Æthelred has put the kingdom at risk and gets to call him useless, arrogant, a toad, an idiot and a fool. We are cheering Odda on, and we cheer again when Æthelwold pipes up and adds that the only man capable of cleaning up this puddle of shit that Æthelred has created is Uhtred.

Uhtred has wasted no time in sending spies to Benfleet to discover if the king’s daughter lives, but he doesn’t go to Winchester because Alfred has banished him from court. Instead he goes to Cookham and he tells Gisela what happened. Now we are treated to a couple of scenes that illustrate the close relationship between them. She tells him, You will be Æthelflæd’s hope, and she urges him to go to  to Winchester right away to take part in the search for the girl. He counters that they will go, but not yet. He wants no part of the court intrigue until he has news. (Is he just a little pissed off at the king? You bet!)

We go to Winchester, next, to witness a scene between Alfred and his wife Ælswith. She is no friend of Uhtred’s but, fearful of what the Danes will do to her daughter, she gently echoes what Gisela has said. Send Uhtred to Benfleet. If our daughter is there, and alive, Uhtred will raise her spirits. Alfred, though, is as stubborn as Uhtred. His hope must be in God, not in Uhtred.

In the Anglo-Saxon culture, it was expected that a good wife would counsel her husband and that he should listen. He may not follow her counsel, but he should listen. This is where Uhtred, Alfred and Beocca differ from The Weasel. They listen to their wives, even if they don’t agree with the advice they’re given. The Weasel, though, doesn’t want Æthelflæd’s advice about anything. She’s just supposed to shut up and do as she’s told.

When the Witan meets to discuss the problem of Danish armies and a captive royal daughter, Ælswith is at her husband’s side.

Uhtred arrives with news that Æthelflæd is alive, and Alfred orders The Weasel to negotiate with the Danes for her release. Odda, Æthelwold and Beocca counsel that Uhtred should go as well, and now Alfred’s doubts are whirling in his mind and we see them reflected on his face. Can he trust Uhtred? He sought counsel over that and prayed over that, and he still does not know. It is Ælswith who, with a single, pleading look, convinces him. Yay Ælswith! (Eliza Butterworth, can you hear us applauding your portrayal of Alfred’s wife?)

I have to say, though, that like that snake, Aldhelm, I am wondering how Erik knew where Æthelflæd was or even that she would be with her husband’s army. All I can think of is that he must have had spies shadowing the force from Mercia and Wessex, and that would certainly make sense.

In the Viking camp at Benfleet, Æthelflæd has drawn some unwanted attention. Hæsten and Sigefrid have both been leering at her, and Erik seems to be puzzled and bemused by his own growing feelings for the Saxon king’s daughter. Hæsten tries to rape her (this is practically a requirement, right?), and she defends herself using whatever comes to hand: first a bucket of piss, then the bucket itself, and then a knife.

Erik steps into the fray and, to her surprise, he’s on her side. One thing leads to another, and although the relationship that springs up between them seems to happen very quickly, it probably develops over many weeks. Besides, Erik is far more tender toward her than The Weasel ever was.

In Winchester Odda suggests to Alfred that if the ransom demanded for Æthelflæd is too costly in silver or blood, perhaps she should be encouraged to take her own life. She would be one of God’s martyrs, rewarded in heaven. You are a king before you are a father, Odda says.

Whoa! I did not see that coming. Alfred didn’t either, and he is not exactly receptive to this suggestion.

Let’s talk about Odda for a moment. I do not know if I’m right here, but I think this is an illustration of Odda’s concern for Wessex. He puts Wessex first always. He supports Uhtred not because he’s fond of the warrior, but because he recognizes Uhtred’s value to Wessex. And let us remember that in Season 1, Odda killed his own son because he had been a traitor to Wessex.

Æthelwold overhears Odda’s conversation with Alfred, and later Odda accosts him and says that if Æthelwold is anything like his father, Alfred’s brother, I may need you. For what? Æthelwold asks. And I’m wondering, too. For what?

I do not know what Odda is going to do next. We know that he feels as if his life has been wasted – he is always drinking  –  so what is going on in his head?

When the negotiation team from Wessex arrives at Benfleet, the Danes totally humiliate The Weasel and we are cheered to see him wake up naked in a pig pen, which means that he and Æthelwold now have something in common. While The Weasel has been unconscious, Uhtred has been negotiating a price for Æthelflæd as well as watching Erik with interest and concern because he intuits that something may be going on between Erik and his hostage. In private, Erik confesses to this. Then Æthelflæd puts Uhtred in a really tight spot because she and Erik want to run away and she wants Uhtred to help them. He uses all the arguments against it that he can think of – and they are really good arguments. Your husband, your father and Sigefrid will all come after you. You’ll die. Your family will die. I am sworn to your father. If I help you and succeed, he will have me killed, and besides that you are asking me to assist in getting you killed.

But Æthelflæd is not just a young girl in love. She tops all his arguments with I will not be the treasure that builds an army against my father.

Whoo boy. Now what?

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THE LAST KINGDOM 2, Episode 6

Posted on May 18, 2017 by Patricia

ARE YOU SAXON OR DANE?

There are numerous plot lines weaving through this series now, and here’s a look at how they develop in this episode.

ÆTHELRED vs UHTRED: There is never going to be a bromance between these two.
Æthelred is jealous of Uhtred’s skill as a warrior and of his friendship with Æthelflæd.  Uhtred sees Æthelred for what he truly is – not the good and godly man that Alfred imagines, but a smarmy, preening, egotistical, treacherous, lying, smooth-faced weasel. And that’s before Uhtred learns that Æthelred is cruel to Æthelflæd. Oh, and he’s stupid. Did I forget anything?

ÆTHELRED vs ALFRED: Æthelred wants to be king of Mercia AND Wessex, and his buddy Aldhelm (James Northcote), who is a viper in men’s clothing, reminds him that he can only accomplish this goal if Alfred is dead. Also, he says, a war between Wessex and the Danes would help. With these guys as allies, Alfred needs no enemies, although he has lots more.

ÆTHELRED vs. ÆTHELFLÆD: Æthelred reveals his true nature on their wedding night. Yes, it was a very brief honeymoon. When it comes to his wife, Æthelred is suspicious, possessive, controlling and mean.  Æthelflæd has allies, though, in Hild, Beocca, Thyra and Uhtred. She is politically savvy, so she understands how important her marriage is to her father’s plans for Wessex. This puts her in a bind because it forces her to submit to her husband’s control. Nevertheless, she is determined that he will not break her. And remember, she’s only 15.

BEOCCA and THYRA: We see them wed in this episode, and it’s a striking contrast to the marriage of Æthelflaed and the weasel. I don’t know about you, but at the end of the episode I’m really worried about Thyra.

ÆTHELWOLD vs HIS MOUTH: This guy is the show’s comic relief. In Season 1 he was sleeping with a pig, and that pretty much says it all. His one-liners are terrific, though, and he can occasionally be quite bright although we are constantly reminded by his companions that he has the spine of a jellyfish. Sometimes, though, he just can’t shut up, and in this episode he is continually yammering at Uhtred about how they could be kings of Wessex and Mercia because Dead Bjorn said so. Uhtred knows Bjorn was a trick, but he won’t reveal that to Æthelwold because of his big mouth.

OSFERTH and HIS CAREER PATH: This is Alfred’s illegitimate son. Osferth (Ewan Mitchell) is a monk who wants to be a warrior like his Uncle Leofric, Uhtred’s best buddy from last season who introduced us all to the word earsling.

ALFRED vs UHTRED: Alfred spends most of his screen time in this episode trying to resolve his doubts about Uhtred. David Dawson is terrific in this role of a man conflicted, a king beset by enemies and unable to quite bring himself to trust the warrior who stands at his right hand.
He’s given some fabulous dialogue, all of it to do with Uhtred. He wonders if Uhtred is
a seemingly loyal and brave man who piece by piece is eating at my soul and clouding what I believe to be right and wrong.
Wow.

Alfred flings accusations at Uhtred about his relationship with Sigefrid and Erik, and he argues with Odda about whether Uhtred is a spy, calling him
a sword I would rather wield than face.
At one point Alfred asks Steapa, Do you trust Uhtred?
And Steapa’s answer is simple and eloquent. With my life, lord. 
I love that.

But Alfred is still not convinced that he can trust Uhtred. That is because Alfred’s mind works in a way that Uhtred’s does not.
I do not understand you, he says to Uhtred. And it’s true.
But he also says, I do not know you, and Uhtred looks as if Alfred has slapped him. My mind immediately went back to last season and those moments at Athelney when Alfred’s son was at the point of death and the two men spoke long into the night together. They knew each other then. And it seems to me that Uhtred is thinking of that, too, for soon he asks Odda,
How can I serve a man who doesn’t trust me?
Face twisted with grief Uhtred continues,
A man to whom I have given so much?
Alexander Dreymon and Simon Kunz were absolutely wonderful in this scene. Heart wrenching, the both of them.

UHTRED vs SIGEFRID & ERIK: In Bernard Cornwell’s novel Sword Song, written in Uhtred’s first person viewpoint, our hero is tempted by the idea of joining Sigefrid and Erik, and of becoming king of Mercia. The moment that he realizes that he cannot do that is when he sees the brothers about to crucify Fr. Pyrlig. Things develop a little differently in this tv series, and although Uhtred strings the brothers along for a while, we know early in the episode that Uhtred is going to stick by Alfred. Even though he is embittered by Alfred’s lack of trust in him, Uhtred is no oathbreaker. He bows to Alfred’s irritating and unwise decision to put Æthelred in charge of scouring the Danes out of London, and is the first to realize that the Danes are after a different prize that leaves us with a cliffhanger of an ending.

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THE LAST KINGDOM 2, Episode 5

Posted on May 16, 2017 by Patricia

THE DEAD SPEAK

Three years have passed since the rescue of Thyra and the banishing of Sigefrid and Erik. Ragnar and Brida are in Dunholm (Durham), Guthred rules at Eoferwic (Jorvik/York), Guthrum/Athelstan) is sitting like an old hen in East Anglia, Æthelred is Lord of Mercia, and Uhtred is an ealdorman and is living at Coccham (Cookham). The action has moved south now. Want a map? Here.

Map from THE PRICE OF BLOOD by Patricia Bracewell

Map from THE PRICE OF BLOOD by Patricia Bracewell

The first scene, of Uhtred’s attack on some ravaging Danes, is wonderfully faithful to the Prologue of SWORD SONG, the book that is the basis for this episode and for those that will follow. Uhtred is protecting his land and the nearby villages from Danish raids. As ealdorman, that is his responsibility – protect the people, maintain bridges and roads, keep the peace, punish offenders. As you can see on the map, Cookham is on the Thames and not far from Watling Street, which is the border between Saxon Mercia and the Danelaw – called the Danelaw because those living there were governed by Danish laws, not Saxon laws. Alfred reprimands Uhtred, at one point in this episode, for following the wrong law. We are west of Watling Street, Alfred snaps. Also, remember that London, at this point, is part of the Danelaw. Alfred’s royal city was Winchester, not London.

But I’m getting ahead of myself. Uhtred is now a family man, married to Gisela, with two lovely children – his son Uhtred and his baby daughter Stiorra.
Cookham itself is Uhtred’s holding, but it is also a settlement and, somewhere, there’s a burh. A burh is a large, fortified enclosure where the people can go for safety/defense in case of attack. They were a defensive network that Alfred built all across England, and many of them eventually became towns. We don’t see the burh, but at one point we’re told that that’s where Uhtred is.

And I’m getting ahead of myself again because… Æthelwold! He’s waiting to see Uhtred to give him a message that is, essentially: I’ve been told by a dead man that I’m to be king. He wants to talk to you because you’re going to be a king, too.

Now, just when we thought that maybe Æthelwold was showing some promise, he slips back into stupidity. I don’t mean the talking dead. The Anglo-Saxons believed in ghosts, as did the Danes, the Celts – heck, everybody in the 9th century, pagans and Christians, believed in supernatural beings, both benevolent and evil. No, I mean, Æthelwold has been colluding with Danes. He’s gone into the Danelaw – forbidden territory – and we know that Alfred is keeping him on a short leash and he’s been very naughty. Uhtred knows it too, so he’s in no hurry to go talk to the Danish dead. Alfred would not be happy about it, and Gisela warns him probably 3 times in this episode not to get on Alfred’s bad side.

Next thing you know, Alfred arrives at Cookham, and we have a couple of scenes in which the discussions range from Æthelflæd’s upcoming marriage (Odda: The purpose of marriage is not to be happy); to Æthelwold’s naughty excursion into the Danelaw (Uhtred: Put him on trial, lord, and then kill him. Just saying.); to the Viking threat at the mouth of the Thames that should be Guthrum/Athelstan’s problem but about which he is doing nothing (Uhtred: Guthrum won’t stop them, lord. Send ships and men to Benfleet before they find a leader and become an army).

Alfred doesn’t like Uhtred’s suggestion about Benfleet because he doesn’t want to break the peace that he has worked so hard to build. He is not a preemptive strike kind of guy. But before the episode’s end, Æthelwold will observe that Alfred’s peace is already over, and early on we are given the reason why. Erik, brother of Sigefrid, arrives at Cookham while the king is there (I don’t know why Uhtred isn’t more nervous about this) and makes nice with Uhtred for a few minutes, letting him know that the power structure in southern England is about to change.

Sigefrid, Erik says, is bringing 19 ships (that’s 500 men) from Frankia to the fort that the Danes have built at Benfleet. They are not going to stay at Benfleet but will make bold inroads on Wessex. It’s clear that Erik wants Uhtred to join them. Well, we’ll see.

In this episode we meet, at last, Fr. Pyrlig (Cavan Clerkin), a Welsh priest who appeared in the books much earlier. Alfred sends him to East Anglia to goose Guthrum/Athelstan into action against the Danes in Benfleet. He’ll be back. (Which reminds me, what’s happened to Brother Asser? He was Uhtred’s bane last season, but he seems to have disappeared.)

In Winchester preparations for Æthelflaed’s marriage to Æthelred are under way, and Alfred tears himself away from his work for a moment to look fondly upon his daughter in her wedding finery before going back to his parchments. Alfred is definitely a Type A personality.

Æthelflæd, who already looked 22 three years ago when she was 11, hasn’t aged a bit. She still looks 22, but now she’s 15. Nobody else has aged either, certainly not Uhtred. Apparently, I’m the only one who has aged since the last episode.

Æthelflæd’s intended, Æthelred, is bad-mouthed by just about everyone. Ælswith, who rarely has a good thing to say about anyone, thinks he’s a little too fond of himself. Someone else calls him a peacock while Alfred tries to convince himself that Æthelred is a good and godly man. (He’s wrong.)

Regarding the upcoming nuptials, Gisela observes that a peace cow is just a whore in a wedding gown. Peaceweaver is the Anglo-Saxon term, but Cornwell uses peace cow and I’m glad that writer Stephen Butchard managed to work that in.

Father Beocca, though, has found love with Thyra. In the book this happened much sooner, and they already had children by this time. I was afraid that Stephen Butchard was going to cut this relationship, but I need not have worried. Priests, by the way, could marry in 9th century England, but the stunned reaction of the royal family to Beocca’s announcement is hilarious. And we need some hilarity because things are about to get dark.

Uhtred finally decides to go visit the ghost. He heads into the Danelaw with Æthelwold, and when Alfred learns of it he puts a guard on Gisela. I feel the need to defend Alfred here. He’s a worried man. Danes are traveling through Mercia to hit Saxon villages; Lord Æthelred, in Mercia, is ambitious and has his eye on Alfred’s throne (his reason for marrying the king’s daughter, duh); there are Danes gathering at Benfleet but Guthrum/Athelstan is doing nothing to stop them; Æthelwold thinks he is the rightful king and is apparently plotting with powerful Danish warlords; Uhtred is married to a Dane, has a powerful Danish brother in the north, and now is hanging with Æthelwold and his Danish buddies. Alfred is, like the king on that Tæfl board last episode, surrounded by enemies and does not know who he can really trust.

And then there’s Dead Bjorn. Uhtred and company arrive at Eilaf’s hall, and the dead guy couldn’t possibly be any scarier than these thugs hanging out with Eilaf. Haesten is there – Uhtred saved his life at Eoferwic – and the lead-up to the meeting with the undead is appropriately creepy. Now, Uhtred himself has played an undead horseman, so he’s appropriately skeptical. He orders Sihtric to hide and keep an eye on what happens after the meeting with the dead guy is over. Sihtric, the ninny, will get scared and run away. But they are all scared, Finan probably most of all because, hey, he’s Irish and probably more superstitious than anyone. Things get under way when a man is killed to beckon the Dead Bjorn, and, yes, that was gross, but he was a thief and by Danish law he was doomed, so no one bats an eye except Æthelwold who is a dweeb. Dead Bjorn is remarkably eloquent in his prophecy: Tonight, London’s streets are red with Saxon blood. And Uhtred, he says, will one day be the Mercian king of both Saxons and Danes.

And so we anticipate that London – beautiful London – had better look out.

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