Putting the Record Straight on the Lionheart

Today is the anniversary of the birth in 1157 of King Richard the Lionheart. Its common knowledge that he hardly spent any time in England. He owned more of France (part of what is known as the Angevin Empire of the English kings) than the French king did. So why would he spend his time in a little island country he is known to have hated?

Richard is often included in lists of gay kings. It must be said that Richard’s sexuality has confused historians for years. Even gay historians can’t agree. I know I’m going against most lgbt people’s opinions when I say that, to my mind, Richard the Lionheart was NOT gay or even bisexual.

Why?

It really started in 1948 – yes, as recently as that – when writer John Hervey claimed to have uncovered a “conspiracy of silence” about Richard. It was such a big “conspiracy” that it had been well known and documented for centuries and Hervey seems to be the only historian who didn’t know about it!

Hervey claimed Richard was gay because he was married but had no children (like thousands of other couples who aren’t gay), and that he spent the night in the same bed with King Philippe of France many times. Hervey failed to investigate the political and social conventions of the time.

In most cases, the only person rich enough to afford a bed was the king. Everyone else slept on straw mattresses on low benches or on the floor. Philippe couldn’t expect his ally Prince Richard to sleep on straw. Political allies in medieval times always had their beds on offer to each other. Practical reasons prevented most from taking the offers up, but Richard took up Philippe’s.

The Victorians idolised Richard, even inventing legends about him. But they were quite prudish, not, as you might have imagined, because of Queen Victoria herself, but because of the growing humanitarian and philanthropic enthusiasm that resulted from the Christian revival in the mid-19^th century (particularly the Unitarians, Quakers, Methodists, etc.). It was they who began to think of “sleeping together” as meaning something else – something adults now always think of first when they hear those words. John Hervey, writing in 1948, was living in what was still essentially a Victorian England, so he had the same prudish ideas. Before the Victorians, men sharing beds was common and raised no eyebrows.

One (and only one) of Richard’s contemporary chroniclers wrote that “they loved each other so much that the king of England (Henry II, Richard’s father) was absolutely astonished at the vehement love between them and marvelled at what it could mean”. What it meant was that they were being what the Catholic church at the time expected them to be – examples of the highest form of love, brotherly love, the love for others as much as for your family. And the reason why Henry II was astonished?

King Henry II was losing control of England and his family. His wife opposed him, and his children were split between the two. Henry offended both his son Richard and King Philippe by marrying Richard’s fiancé (Philippe’s sister) to younger brother Prince John – after fathering a son by her himself! Richard went to France to show publicly whose side he was on, and it wasn’t his father’s. Its not surprising King Henry was astonished – not because Richard was in bed with another man, but that he had been betrayed by his favourite son. Philippe also promised to provide an army to depose Henry. Henry felt rejected by his son’s betrayal and it destroyed his will to carry on and he died a year later.

That’s how much things have changed. Today’s politics isn’t about physical displays of allegiance but words, words, words. Politicians are seen shaking hands, but if the Victorians hadn’t demonised the sharing of a bed by two men we might see sights like David Cameron and Barak Obama sitting up in bed together giving a press conference!

This story illustrates well the caution needed when assigning a specific sexuality to a historical person. Attitudes change, and you need to look at what’s going on around them.

Extraordinary Lives 1

An Amazon of the Peaks

This is the first in a series of biographical sketches about lgbt people I find fascinating.

During my research I often come across information which catches my attention. When I was researching the family history of my ex-partner I came across the story of Phoebe Bown (that’s Bown, not Brown). My ex-partner is descended from the Bown family and Phoebe was a cousin.

Although I don’t approve of “outing” people just for the sake of it, I think the story of Phoebe Bown needs no “outing” – her life-story speaks for itself.

Phoebe was born in 1771, her father Samuel was a carpenter in Matlock, Derbyshire. It is probably from him that young Phoebe learnt the carpentry trade which she used extensively in adult life. She was also a dab hand at construction work – she once hand-built an extension to her one-roomed cottage just to house a harpsichord she had been given because there was no room in her house.

Speaking of music, it is said that she played the flute and cello very enthusiastically but not very skilfully, and sometimes joined an impromptu quartet with friends.

Phoebe’s musical and construction skills didn’t earn her a living. She had a great passion for horses and was a master horse-whisperer and horse-breaker. What she didn’t know about horses wasn’t worth knowing. Many bets were won due to her ability to judge the racing qualities of a horse.

The most visual eccentricity Phoebe had was her attire. She wore a handkerchief over her head, tied under her chin, and a man’s tall hat. She wore a dress, but over the top was a man’s long coat. Around her home, in every drawer and tucked away in corners, were dozens of knives, daggers and guns. Phoebe was afraid of being attacked in the early 1800s during the Pentrich Riots in the Derbyshire countryside that were taking place (another of my ex-partner’s ancestors was transported to Australia for his part in the riots). Phoebe went to a friend’s house with a couple of hand-made scythes so that he would have something to defend himself as well. Phoebe was more than capable of standing up for herself and was very strong. Some sources refer to her as the “Matlock Amazon”.

Phoebe was quite often terse with strangers. If she didn’t know anyone who came to see her she would take a few minutes to eye them up before deciding whether to engage fully in conversation. She once commented on the Earl of Chesterfield’s wayward son by saying “whitewash a red brick as much as you like, it’s still a red brick”.

As she grew older Phoebe became infirm and unable to earn a living (this was before old-age pension and state benefits). Such was her standing in the community that the Duke of Devonshire gave Phoebe a weekly pension for the rest of her life. Her association with the duke comes through her cousin, whose daughter married Sir Joseph Paxton, superintendent to the duke’s gardens at Chatsworth and designer of the legendary Crystal Palace.

Phoebe herself recognised her eccentricities and played on them. She asked the curate of Matlock to write an epitaph for her. The resulting verse pleased her very much. It reads:

Here lies romantic Phoebe,

Half Ganymede and half Hebe;

A maid of mutable condition,

A jockey, cow herd and musician.”

In case you’re wondering, Ganymede and Hebe were cup-bearers to Zeus, king of the Greek gods. Hebe, goddess of youth, lost her job to young mortal boy Ganymede because Zeus fancied him more than he did her. The epitaph wasn’t actually used on Phoebe’s grave, but it does show how at ease she was with assumptions of her sexuality.

Phoebe died in May 1854 at the age of 82.

The portrait of Phoebe Bown holding her flute shown here comes from “The Reliquary: the Quarterly Journal and Review” (Vol. II, 1861-2), and is copyright to Ann Andrews at http://www.andrewspages.dial.pipex.com/matlock/pix/p_bown_phoebe.htm

A good biographical sketch about Phoebe, written in her lifetime can be found at www.thebookofdays.com/months/july/4.htm - scroll down to "William Hutton's 'Strong Woman'."

Guest blogger

This is the first of a series of posts by a guest blogger. Narvel Annable is a novelist, writer and campaigner. His novels are based on his own life and contain details of life in Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire in the1906s. But I think I'll let Narvel introduce himself.

About Narvel Annable

My life has been a series of re-inventions.  In September 2010, a sudden promotion catapulted me from local to global author.  The Nazca Plains Corporation in Las Vegas published my third gay novel Secret Summer which is now available all over the world.  This boosted the sales of previous efforts including Lost Lad set in Heanor, Derbyshire; a rugged, macho, homophobic, hill top colliery town.  Lost Lad follows the transformation of a miserable prepubescent into the confident and happy adolescent who was re-invented and rechristened Dobba by his mates.  The move from a grim, gas lit, Dickensian Church of England all boys junior school in 1958 to Howitt Secondary School, a culture of kindness, was a dramatic improvement.

A further re-invention is described in my second autobiographic novel Scruffy Chicken.  It took place in 1963 when I emigrated to the United States and arrived in Detroit on the day before the assassination of President Kennedy.  It was a steep learning curve.  The repressed Derbyshire teenager of thick accent, deeply locked inside his shameful homosexual closet, had to fit in as a clean cut American, to be comfortable with his all-white racist buddies and appear hot to trot for the chicks.

The following years in Motown involved several jobs before graduating from Eastern Michigan University (magna cum laude) in 1975 followed by a year teaching African-American history at St Bridget High School.  Adapting to this strict Catholic environment, behind respectable spectacles, Narvel imitated his former teachers and transformed himself into a strict schoolmaster with traditional views.  This was a far cry from his parallel existence, the promiscuous, secretive chicken who consorted with Negroes and haunted the notorious bath houses of Detroit, Chicago and New York from 1964 to 1976.

People have asked me – ‘Why did you describe yourself as a scruffy chicken during your 1965 six month vacation in Britain?’  Scruffy in the title of Scruffy Chicken is not so much a comment on me; it is more a criticism of the Derby and Nottingham snobs who made me feel scruffy – scruffy accent, scruffy clothes, scruffy manners, scruffy education etc.

A rollercoaster of passion and pain, magic and menace, is celebrated in my latest novel Secret Summer.  In 1966 I fell in love with a mysterious tough guy who held me in the grip of agony and ecstasy.  The title - a comment on the necessity for gay teenage boys to lust in secret, hunt in secret and love in secret – is, sadly, still true here in the 21st century.

After several annual holidays in the UK in the late 1960s and early 1970s, chronic homesickness fuelled my departure from Detroit in 1976 to resettle in Derbyshire where I met my future long term partner Terry Durand who was married with children.  The trauma and shock of coming to terms with his life-long repressed same sex attraction triggered a breakdown and several weeks in a psychiatric hospital.  Electric shock aversion therapy was suggested as a ‘cure’ for his homosexuality.  This low point was followed by a painful and slow journey to eventual contentment and happiness.  On September 3rd 2011, we celebrated our 35 years together.

Narvel’s website is at http://www.narvelannable.co.uk/  

Connections

One reason I love doing research is coming across unexpected connections. They could be of the “6 Degrees of Separation” type, or the “James Burke’s Connections” type.

Using the 6 Degrees type I can place myself just 3 degrees away from both the Queen and the Pope through 2 different cousins.

“James Burke’s Connections” are those which follow the examples in the tv programmes of the same name (sadly never repeated enough, if ever). These connections cover any aspect of life – science, history, geography, art, biography, philosophy, technology – each step being inextricably linked to the next. It’s easy to do this yourself these days with Wikipedia. Just start with …. anything you want really. Keep clicking on a random link and see how far away from the original subject matter you can get in 6 clicks.

I created a card game a few years based on the “Connections” idea called “Around the World in 80 Gays”. Concentrating on the lgbt community I designed cards which could be linked to as many as 6 others. I’m no good with maths, so I can’t work out the possible number of combinations.

I’ve got the cards in front of me now, so I’ll just pick 2 cards at random. They are … actor George Takei and Otto Rahn (both shown below). Now I’ll try to link them together with 4 other cards. Back in a few minutes.

Okay, all 6 cards have been linked together. I’m sure I could have come up with a better chain of connections with other cards. Never mind, this is what I’ve come up with:

1          Actor George Takei and his partner are one of the relatively few officially married same-sex couples;

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2          as was Sir John Clanvowe (d.1391) and his partner Sir William Neville, Constable of Nottingham Castle;

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3          at the base of which is the medieval Brewhouse Yard;

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4          which at one time was under the parochial control of the Knights Templar;

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5          who allegedly knew the location of the Holy Grail;

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6          which was researched by gay German historian Otto Rahn.

I like a challenge. So if you can think of 2 entirely different things in the lgbt world that don’t seem to be connected, test me. Perhaps think of a famous lgbt person (dead or living) and an ancient historical event, or part of the lgbt community and a famous invention. I’m sure I can link anything together in 6 “degrees of connection” or less. Send me an email.

Work in Progress

I mentioned a while back that I was designing a leaflet on lgbt flags for LGBT History Month next February. Of the 100 or more flags I have identified and collected I had to decide which ones were likely to be seen in the UK (what’s the chances of seeing the Bisexual Mexican flag?). So I came up with the idea of a “spotter’s guide”. Combining this with providing information in an entertaining manner led me to decide to use 2 formats. For most of the flags I decided to use a “trading card” style presentation. For a few selected flags I decided on a less formal, hand-drawn cartoon style.

Here is an early draft of the front page which I’m still working on. I hope it looks good so far. Hopefully the leaflet will be completed by LGBT History Month next February.

The Gayest Games in Ancient Greece - Day 9

This week I’ve been describing the events of the Greater Panathenaean Games, the 4-yearly festival held in honour of the patron goddess of Athens, Athena. The exact timetable of events I’ve taken you through varied over the centuries. Sometimes the games lasted shorter. If you’ve been following you’ll agree with me that there was so much male-male love going on that they can be called the Gayest Games in Ancient Greece. Very few other Greek sport festivals owed so much to the influence of specific same sex relationships and the convention for erotic attachments between athletes.

The Gayest Games ended with a day of prize giving and celebration. The religious aspect was over and everyone could enjoy themselves. No doubt this would have included men and their boyfriends kissing and cuddling (they didn’t do that in public with their wives – that would be unnatural). And this reminds me of another contests the Ancient Greeks had in honour of an Athenian soldier called Diocles.

Diocles was a soldier from Athens. He may have even competed in the Greater Panathenaean Games. In the gyms of the city of Megara he fell in love with a young athlete and they became partners.

During a battle Diocles saw his young boyfriend was in danger and used his own shield to protect him. But that left him unprotected and Diocles was killed. The Megarans took this as a noble act and began a cult in his honour. Every year at the beginning of spring young athletes would gather at his tomb and compete in many games and contests.

One contest would have been perfect for me to judge. It was a kissing contest! Each young athlete would kiss a male judge (whether it was just a peck of the cheek or full sloppy kiss no-one knows) and the one who gave the “sweetest” kiss, as it is recorded, won a prize. I expect you can imagine what the prize for a decent kiss might be, but the judge only awarded a garland of flowers.

Perhaps I should start up a petition to introduce this kissing contest to the London Olympics. I’ll even volunteer to be the judge.

If you’d like to know more about the Greater Panathenaean Games – the Gayest Games in Ancient Greece – go to www.athens-greece.us/panathenaea.

I’ll have a break for a few days and be back after the Bank Holiday.

The Gayest Games in Ancient Greece - Day 8

Day 8 of the Greater Panathenaean Games was devoted to the sea. Athens had a close association with the sea, but we know very little about the boat races which were held today. So rather than waffle about very little I’ll take you back a day to the great procession of Day 7.

After the excitement of the night-time torch relay people were gathering at the Sacred Gate in the city walls to prepare for the procession rather than go to bed. The procession itself has been seen by millions of people, perhaps even you! Because it was preserved in marble by the greatest sculptor in Ancient Greece, Phidias, whose boyfriend he immortalised on the statue of Zeus at Olympia. The sculpted procession is known today as the Elgin Marbles.

As dawn broke over Athens the procession set off for the Acropolis. In front of the official religious part of the precession were girls carrying offerings. Like other participants, this was great honour for the girls and their families. But one year things didn’t go as planned.

Hipparchus ruled Athens with his brother Hippias. They were sons of Peisistratus, the main founder of the games and had a complicated family set up. Peisistratus and Hippias had the same boyfriend Charmus (not at the same time!) whose daughter married Hipparchus. But Hipparchus kept flirting with a young man called Harmodius, who wasn’t remotely interested because he was happy with a man called Aristogeiton. Their relationship had lasted beyond the usual intimate length. Neither married, and Harmodius didn’t seem interested in looking for a younger boyfriend as expected of his age. As such it was much like a gay relationship today.

Hipparchus was jealous. One year he chose Harmodius’s kid sister to be one of the girls in the procession. But as they were forming up before dawn he rounded on her and humiliated her in public, thereby insulting the whole family. For Harmodius and Aristogeiton this was the last straw. Plans had already been made with others to get rid of the tyrant brothers during the hustle and bustle of the procession. These plans were brought ahead and Harmodius and Aristogeiton decided to do it immediately. They found Hipparchus in the agora, the market place, and stabbed him. Harmodius was killed by the guards and Aristogeiton was captured and tortured. Hippias, brother of the assassinated Hipparchus, ordered the procession to go ahead regardless.

In later years the procession would pass a statue of Harmodius and Aristogeiton, perhaps the first ever statue to commemorate a gay couple, on the spot of the assassination. They became heroes by killing Hipparchus because it started a chain reaction which led to the establishment of the first democracy in Athens.

The procession itself contained winners of all the contests (except for the boat races), cavalry, priestesses, city elders, and also 100 bulls for sacrifice on the Acropolis. Something no-one would miss was a full-scale ship on wheels. Instead of a sail it had a huge embroidered dress which was to be draped around the enormous statue of Athena in the Parthenon. This was another mega-sculpture by Phidias out of ivory and gold plated bronze.

Non-Athenians weren’t allowed to follow up the steps of the Acropolis, but how they got all those bulls up the hundred or so steps is a marvel.

Once the people had assembled and presented their offerings, several sacrificial fires were lit, including one lit from the torch that won the relay. Then the bulls were sacrificed. The meat was handed out to the Athenians, and there was plenty of bread, cake and wine on supply. All in all, a great communal meal for the whole city, like a big barbecue.

With the procession over people could go home and rest up before the boat races that took place today. But tomorrow, Day 9, was a day they could let their hair down and party, party, party.

In a way I’m a bit disappointed, because the Panathenaean Games didn’t include a contest that was created in honour of an Athenian hero.  I’ll tell you what it was tomorrow, so prepare to pucker up.

If you’d like to know more about the Greater Panathenaean Games – the Gayest Games in Ancient Greece – go to www.athens-greece.us/panathenaea.