King Henry I’s porcupine

Henry I had quite a collection of exotic animals including a porcupine and some hyaenas which he kept at Woodstock. Thankfully he built a large wall around it. The local population may initially have thought that he was establishing a deer park – so it may have come as something as a shock when the hyaenas arrived with the lions, leopards and camels. Henry arranged for fodder to be strewn for his non carnivorous pets by Henry de La Wade of Stanton Harcourt who also came to have responsibility for the royal falcons.

Which leaves us with the porcupine. It was a gift from William V of Montpellier who had gone on the First Crusade. Medieval bestiaries describe porcupines using their quills to spear fruit. They were also symbolic of sin -the fleshly ones apparently so an eminently suitable pet for womanising King Henry I. If you don’t fancy that particular sin othe bestiaries pinned avarice and covetousness on the porcupine and hedgehog – all those spikes collecting up everything around it.

Henry III would develop the menagerie Woodstock to form the basis of his own menagerie at the Tower of London which was initially founded by King John.

Grigson, Caroline, Menagerie: The History of Exotic Animals in England, 1100-1837, (Oxford University Press, Oxford 2016)

Poole, Austin Lane, From Domesday book to Magna Carta, 1087-1216 (Oxford University Press, Oxford, 1951)

History Jar Challenge 13

Fair Rosamund Clifford, the mistress of King Henry II by Dante Gabriel Rosetti. In 1174 Henry II acknowledged his relationship with Rosamund having probably turned to her when Queen Eleanor was pregnant with the couple’s final child – John. She retired to Godstow Nunnery where she had been educated in 1176. Fable says that Henry hid his mistress from Queen Eleanor in a maze at Woodstock but that Eleanor found her and offered her a choice between a dagger and a bowl of poison. Rosamund drank the poison. The story does not appear before the fourteenth century. rosamond’s tomb was moved from inside Godstow Church on the orders of Hugh of Lincoln but the tomb itself was only finally lost with the Dissolution of the Monasteries.

Royal mistresses since 1066, this week, if you please. We’ll leave Elizabeth I’s romantic attachments to one side and Queen Anne’s as well. Some monarchs are remarkably discreet, others less so. Henry VII for example was not known for his mistresses – but his account book reveals payment to “dancing girls” …they may just have been dancing. Other mistresses have achieved notoriety and in the case of Henry VIII’s mistresses, in many instances, the Crown itself. You may find yourself dealing with potentially bigamous monarchs as well this week. Good luck.