The birth of King Richard II

645 years ago today in Bordeaux the Princess of Wales was delivered of a son, who was to become King Richard II a decade and a half later. The second son of her marriage to the Prince of Wales he did not become the direct heir until the death of his elder brother, Edward of Angoulême, in 1371.

At the time of his birth his father, Prince Edward, was about to set off on what was to become the Nájera campaign in support of of King Pedro I ( The Cruel ) of Castile and some sources maintain that the Princess went into early labour because of her anxiety about her husband’s departure for a mid-winter crossing of the Pyrenees. There is an account from Wikipedia of the campaign and the Prince’s victory near Burgos the following April at Battle of Nájera

My post from five years ago about the future King’s birth can be seen at Birth of King Richard II. Born as he was on the feast of the Epiphany in adulthood he, and his circle, appears to have drawn upon the symbolism of the day in such things as the Wilton Diptych and in literary works, as I point out in that post. In an age of sacral monarchy being born at Epiphany and reportedly having three kings at his baptism could clearly be presented as auspicious. Here was birth, baptism and naming, manifestation to the world in the Epiphany season of a child born, as it turned out, to be King. Furthermore he appears to have been initially baptised as John, from came his strong and self-acknowledged devotion to St John the Baptist, a saint who figures prominently in the narratives of Christ’s birth and baptism, and both commemorated in the traditional liturgy for today. Perhaps it is no wonder if it possibly all went to his head. That however might be too easy an explanation of the causes  and effects, of the political factors which shaped the life of a late medieval monarch, and which led finally to the death of Richard of Bordeaux in the castle of my home town at the age of 33 - or is there in that an ultimate violent fulfilment of his Christ-like quality? Shakespeare was not a contemporary but his poetic account conveys something of the sense of the deposition and murder as having a Passion-like quality. It may well not have been the view of the majority of the country in 1400, but it may have sustained the dethroned monarch.

That post I wrote in 2017 can now be supplemented by other online articles about the city of his birth, which was then the second city in the dominions of King Edward IIi and the capital of his father’s Principality of Aquitaine created by the peace treaty of 1361. This topic is covered in a very readable form by Michael Jones’ relatively recent biography The Black Prince.

The French website BORDEAUX-MEDIEVAL-DOSSIER-ENSEIGNANTS gives both an introduction to surviving medieval buildings in the city and also has a number of striking reconstructions of the appearance of late medieval Bordeaux, including the Ombrière and the area around the cathedral.

Wikipedia has a much improved and more detailed article about the cathedral at Bordeaux Cathedral and one about the neighbouring basilica of St Severinus at Basilica of Saint Severinus of Bordeaux

One of my intentions at the High Mass for Epiphany this evening was to pray for the repose of King Richard II. May he rest in peace.