The Turbulent Life of Henrietta Maria of France, Queen of England

 From All About Royal Families:

Recently I read a splendid book My Queen, My Love: A Novel of Henrietta Maria written by Elena Maria Vidal about Henrietta Maria of France. Who was she? Who was this French princess who became Queen of England?  So, time to make up another Royal History post.

Henrietta Maria was born on 25 November 1609 in the Louvre Palace in Paris. Her parents were Henry IV of France and Marie de' Medici. She was thus a member of the House of Bourbon. Of course Henriette Maria had other siblings. Among them were King Louis XIII of France and Elisabeth, who became Queen of Spain. Henrietta Maria was trained, along with her sisters, in riding, dancing, and singing, and took part in court plays. (Read more.)

 

Thanks to Kathleen for her wonderful review. To quote:

Due to my interest for royal history, I was very keen to read My Queen, My Love: A Novel of Henrietta Maria written by Elena Maria Vidal. The book didn't let me down, it captivated me from the beginning to the end, although I knew how the story continued...The author wrote this book very well and she painted a perfect picture from the 17th. century. It was very nice to read. So without no doubt, I recommend this book to all royal history lovers. I hope to read more books written by Elena Maria Vidal. I'm very pleased to give a 5 star rating for this captivating novel. (Read more.)

 

My Queen, My Love is available HERE.

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A Terrifying Transhumanism Warning

From The Vigilant Fox:

Biotech entrepreneur Ben Lamm painted a bone-chilling picture of where humanity could be headed on episode #2301 of The Joe Rogan Experience. Gene editing was at the heart of the conversation—and according to Lamm, China isn’t just experimenting with it. They’ve already created genetically modified children. He pointed to a now-infamous case in 2018, when Chinese scientist He Jiankui announced that he had cloned human embryos and edited their genes using CRISPR to make them resistant to HIV. The news shocked the world and led to widespread condemnation. He was later sentenced to prison for violating scientific ethics and conducting unapproved procedures. (Read more.)

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The Lancaster Sisters

 From History...the Interesting Bits:

Philippa of Lancaster was born at Leicester on 31 March 1360. She was the eldest daughter of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster and 4th son of Edward III, and his first wife Blanche of Lancaster, great-great-granddaughter of Henry III. Philippa’s father was one of the richest men in the country – and one of the most powerful. Her life as a child would have been one of luxury and privilege, with a glorious dynastic marriage awaiting her in the future. Philippa was raised alongside her younger sister, Elizabeth, who was born in 1363/4, and her baby brother, Henry of Bolingbroke, born in 1367.

The children lost their mother when Blanche died at Tutbury on 12 September 1368, from the complications following the birth a daughter, Isabella, who did not survive. The children’s father was with Blanche when she died but departed on campaign to France soon after; although it is doubtful the children’s care was interrupted.

Philippa and her sister were raised together in one household, with Blanche Swynford, the daughter of their mother’s lady-in-waiting, Katherine Swynford. John of Gaunt provided his daughters with an annual allowance of £200. The Lancaster household was well-organised and run by Katherine, now the girls’ governess. She became mistress to their father, John of Gaunt, in early 1371. Despite his relationship with Katherine, in September 1371 the Lancaster children gained a stepmother in their father’s new bride, Constance of Castile. Constance was the daughter and heir of Pedro the Cruel, the deceased King of Castile who had been murdered by his half-brother, Henry of Trastámara, in March 1369. A new sister arrived when Constance gave birth to Catherine (Catalina) of Lancaster, in 1372/3.

Despite several dynastic marriage propositions, by 1385 and at 25 years old Philippa was still unmarried. However, in the following year her father took all three of his daughters on his military expedition to Spain, hoping to claim the kingdom of Castile in right of his second wife, Constance. Philippa’s marriage to John – or Joao – I of Portugal was agreed as part of an alliance made with her father at Ponte do Mouro in November 1386. Philippa was married to King John at Oporto on 2nd February 1387, before they had even received the required papal dispensation. Philippa was 26 – about 10 years older than the average age for a princess to marry. John of Portugal was three years her senior and had been king for just short of two years. (Read more.)

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Of Nunneries and Fair Rosamund

My sympathies have always been with Queen Eleanor. From The Abbey of Misrule:

Rosamund was the high-born daughter of a Norman Lord from the Welsh marches. Not very much is actually known about her, which is why it is so easy to fill the gaps with stories. What we do know is that she became the mistress (or one of the mistresses: medieval kings were not especially faithful creatures) of Henry II. When their affair became public, in 1174, the Queen, Eleanor of Aquitaine, unsurprisingly soured on the King, and it is said that she swore revenge on both Rosamund and her husband. Soon enough, she had joined with the King’s sons in a public rebellion against him. It failed, and she was imprisoned for fifteen years.

All of which, of course, was great news for Rosamund - and, indeed, the King, who could now dedicate himself fully to his mistress. Henry had built her a palace at Woodstock, complete with a labyrinth, a well to bathe in (which can still be seen today) and a secret bower where she and the King would meet when the Queen’s back was turned. Now, there was no need to hide. The King and his lover could be out and proud.

Chroniclers of the time tended to paint Rosamund as a whore and a temptress, who had seduced the King away from the straight and narrow path - a standard treatment of women at the time. In fact, though, we know nothing much about her, or about her real relationship with the King. All we have today are a burgeoning mass of Romantic stories. Rosamund and Henry became, for a long while, an archetypal love story from the Age of Chivalry. (Read more.)

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Red Storm Rising

 From Amuse on X:

The calculus of war often hides behind the fog of peacetime wishful thinking. But when a regime faces the collapse of its internal order, the temptation to seek salvation through external aggression becomes not merely probable, but perilously rational. China’s present condition, as Kyle Bass argues, is precisely such a moment. A regime on the brink, with few options left but one: war. Specifically, a war to seize Taiwan.

At first glance, this might appear alarmist. After all, isn’t the People’s Republic of China deeply intertwined with global markets? Wouldn’t an invasion risk sanctions, conflict with the United States, and economic ruin? Possibly. But Bass and defense analyst Reuben F. Johnson compel us to ask the more urgent question: would not invading Taiwan present an even greater risk to the regime?

 Consider the facts: China’s banking system is effectively insolvent, propped up by bad debt and political pressure. Its real estate sector—formerly the engine of growth—has imploded, leaving unfinished towers and bankrupt developers as symbols of economic hubris. Youth unemployment is not just high, but incalculable; so massaged are official statistics that they have simply stopped reporting it. Worse still, the yuan teeters on the edge of devaluation, held aloft only by unsustainable intervention. When the peg goes, capital flight will follow—and so will any remaining illusion of stability. (Read more.)

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The Shocking Truth

 From The Vigilant Fox:

The following information is based on a report originally published by A Midwestern Doctor. Key details have been streamlined and editorialized for clarity and impact. Read the original report here.

In 1983, even CNN warned that prenatal ultrasounds could HARM your baby.

The FDA admitted the risk—then quietly raised the “safe” ultrasound dose by 800%.

It turns out that ultrasounds cause a dose-dependent injury to developing fetal tissues, making early-stage exposure especially risky.

All those dangers were buried. But A Midwestern Doctor has compiled over 200 peer-reviewed studies showing what ultrasounds can do to the brain, heart, reproductive organs, and more.

This research might just blow your mind. (Read more.)

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A Restored 16th-century Welsh Farmhouse

 

Austere, functional but beautiful. From House Beautiful:

Louisa and Lee Morgan's careful restoration of a 16th-century farmhouse in rural Wales evokes its original rustic charm. A former exterior wall is now a beautiful feature in the restructured hallway, while the tack room and workshop are unrecognisable as the pared-back, stylish, open-plan living space. And what's more, the views over the Monmouthshire countryside are to die for....Several small rooms were knocked together to form a long, open-plan living space with a marble-topped kitchen at one end. Original oak gateposts from the fields have been repurposed as window lintels, and a concrete-effect Italian light adds further texture against the smooth marble worksurfaces.

[...]

 Louisa, who is marketing director for Mandarin Stone, used limestone floors thoughout much of the ground floor so that spaces flow naturally into each other: grey in the new rooms, warmer honey tones in the older part. A woven light by Amanda Rayner of Wyldwood Willow and lengths of raffia hung from the beams show the height of the ceiling. (Read more.)

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Lawfare Isn’t Beaten—In France or America

 From Daniel McCarthy at Chronicles:

Elections are supposed to be decided at the ballot box, not in the courtroom—unless you’re French, or, in this country, a liberal.

What a judge in France has just done by disqualifying Marine Le Pen from running in that nation’s next presidential election is what Democrats dream of doing here. The controversial populist was ahead in the polls, but now Le Pen isn’t even eligible to run, thanks to a court that found her guilty of using European Union funds to pay for political expenses. She insists the spending was legitimate, but as things stand French voters won’t get to decide for themselves who’s right.

Americans might feel safe from this kind of lawfare—when New York County District Attorney Alvin Bragg went after President Donald Trump on campaign-finance technicalities, he won his case but lost his gambit. The nakedly political prosecution only added to the momentum propelling Trump back to office, and in our country voters, not judges, get the final word: Bragg’s convictions couldn’t stop the Republican from running, and winning.

Yet, in many ways, the lawfare Democrats waged during and after Trump’s first term succeeded. The price of serving in a Republican administration has gone up, with incoming staffers urged to buy legal insurance to cover the costs of defending against lawfare. “It’s edging into absolute requirement territory,” an official who served in Trump’s first administration told NBC News in January. (Read more.)

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The Islamic State’s View of Democracy

 From It Can Always Get Worse:

The 34-minute speech had a lot of content specific to the then-upcoming Iraqi parliamentary elections on 7 March 2010, and the Islamic State’s determination to abort the process through violence, but Al-Zawi’s speeches were always formulated to refine and promulgate the Islamic State’s doctrine, and this one was no different, consisting in its first half of a wholesale ideological assault on the premise of democracy.

The second half of the speech is largely given over to outreach to Iraqi Sunni Arabs, particularly the tribes. Al-Zawi claims the jihadists are reviving after the “Surge” and Awakening in no small part because Iraqi Sunnis have apparently seen the error they made in turning against the Islamic State to ally with a Shi’a-led, U.S.-supported government that continues to persecute them. Those Sunnis who continue to stand against the Islamic State—the Awakening militias and the politicians in Baghdad—are vilified and threatened, and Al-Zawi was not lying about the jihadists’ ability to assassinate Awakening officials. But this is paired with Al-Zawi offering an inducement: to set aside all grievances with Sunni insurgents and tribes who now join the Islamic State project, even proposing an independent committee to facilitate this unity, which would have the ability to demand payment of blood money and other debts for past wrongs (though Al-Zawi says the Islamic State waives all its claims against others). Al-Zawi is absolutely insistent, however, that the platform of this coalition holds to the Zarqawists’ version of Islam: he explicitly says a small number signing on to this is better than a broader coalition around a diluted (in his view “corrupted”) platform.

It is an interesting look at how the Islamic State rebounded from its 2008 nadir, how it held to its doctrine while taking lessons from that experience which allowed it to more successfully approach the tribes, a key modification that helped pave the way for the “caliphate” declaration in 2014. (Read more.)

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Elegy

From Vive la Reine.

Of the seventy-three years of her life, she passed eight (the best of her youth) in restraint or in a dungeon, and thirty-eight in exile; and yet she died acknowledging the mercies and the glory of God. Let us who have not known affliction, or who have been but lightly visited, derive wisdom from the instruction offered to us by the pious daughter of Louis Seize and Marie Antoinette. —The Gentlemen’s Magazine, Volume 36, 1851

For more about the life of Marie Thérèse Charlotte of France, read  Madame Royale. Share

Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent Breaks Down Trump's Tariff Plan and Its Impact on the Middle Class

 

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Challenging the Narrative: The Fate of the Princes in the Tower

 From Murrey and Blue:

Here is a bit of a coincidence: John Wesley died on 2nd March 1791 and Horace Walpole died on 2nd March 1797. Both of them wrote about Richard III. John Wesley was a widely respected cleric, theologian and evangelist of the 18th century. He wrote a concise history of England in four volumes. In Volume 2, pages 27 to 65 cover the reigns of Henry VI, Edward IV and Edward V. Pages 66 to 152 are devoted to Richard III. However he used the text from Horace Walpole’s book about Richard III. On Wikipedia it mentions this:-

In spite of the proliferation of his literary output, Wesley was challenged for plagiarism, for borrowing heavily from an essay by Samuel Johnson, published in March 1775. Initially denying the charge, Wesley later apologised officially.

In his book Horace Walpole defended the much maligned King in great detail and states that Richard was innocent of the many crimes that he had been accused of.

In short, that Henry’s character, as we have received it from his own apologists, is so much worse and hateful than Richard’s, that we may well believe Henry invented and propagated by far the greater slander against Richard : that Henry, not Richard, put to death the true duke of York, as he did the earl of Warwick : and that we are not certain whether Edward the Fifth was murdered; nor, if he was, by whose order he was murdered. (Read more.)

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Spring in the Middle Ages

From Medievalists:

Nowadays, in the Northern hemisphere, Spring starts on March 21, which corresponds to an equinox, when daylight and nighttime are equal in length. Medieval authors too associated the beginning of Spring with March. In his seventh-century encyclopedia known as the Etymologies, Isidore of Seville wrote that March is “also called the month of new things, because the month of March is the beginning of the year. It is also called the “new Spring” from its signs of germination…” But why did Isidore qualify March as “the beginning of the year”, you might wonder? In several regions of medieval Europe, civil calendars followed the Annunciation model, with a change of year on the feast day.

In Annunciation-style calendars, therefore, March 24 was the last day of the year, and March 25 marked the beginning of the new year. The Annunciation is a Christian holiday falling on March 25, which celebrates the archangel Gabriel’s visit to the Virgin Mary, when he told her she would be the mother of Jesus Christ, the Son of God. The new calendar year therefore began with Spring, a season linked to new life. This powerful association between Spring and rebirth was both religious (the Annunciation) and empirical, that is, based on observation (with Spring come new leaves, grass and the return of migratory species).

How did medieval people perceive the arrival of Spring? How was Spring depicted in medieval calendars and literary texts? And, was Spring the “mating season” for humans, as it is for many animal species? (Read more.)

(Image)

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Danger Close

 

 

Demons. From Tierney's Real News:

Did you know that the atheist, satanic & transgender lobbies in Minnesota are so powerful that they have taken over the Minnesota Capitol - even during Christmas & Easter? If you live in Minnesota - and are a person of faith - is this what you hoped for the future of your state and your children?

Governor Walz of Minnesota went to the Minnesota Capitol yesterday to declare March 31, 2025 as the official TRANSGENDER DAY OF VISIBILITY in the state during Lent. (Read more.)

 

Stealing Wisconsin. From Tierney's Real News:

Here is a summary of the election results in Wisconsin for the past 5 elections. Voter ID was on the ballot in the last election along with the Wisconsin Supreme Court race. The Democrat candidate for the Supreme Court, Susan Crawford, is AGAINST VOTER ID but somehow that measure passed and she won? That alone makes no sense. It’s almost like they flipped the answers.

The elections in Wisconsin are controlled out of Madison (Dane County) and Milwaukee - just as elections in Minnesota are controlled out of CD5 (Ilhan Omar’s district in Minneapolis) and Hennepin County. (Read more.)

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Canaanite Seal

 From The Times of Israel:

A three-year-old Israeli girl has found a scarab-shaped Canaanite amulet dating back some 3,800 years at the site of Tel Azeka near Bet Shemesh, the Israel Antiquities Authority (IAA) announced Tuesday.

Ziv Nitzan, from Moshav Ramot Meir, was hiking with her parents and two older sisters at the foot of the hill where the archaeological site stands when she picked up what appeared to be a small stone.

“We were walking along the path, and then Ziv bent down – and out of all the stones around her, she picked up this particular stone,” Omer Nitzan, Ziv’s sister, said in a statement sent out by the IAA. “When she rubbed it and removed the sand from it, we saw something was different about it. I called my parents to come see the beautiful stone, and we realized we had discovered an archaeological find! We immediately reported this to the Israel Antiquities Authority.”

Scarab amulets trace their origins to ancient Egypt, where beetles were revered as sacred symbols of renewal. Egyptians believed these insects embodied new life, as they laid their eggs inside the dung balls they rolled — seemingly bringing life from decay.

“Scarabs were used in this period as seals and as amulets,” Dr. Daphna Ben-Tor, an expert in the field, said in a statement. “They were found in graves, in public buildings, and in private homes. Sometimes they bear symbols and messages that reflect religious beliefs or status.” (Read more.)

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In the Heart of Hampstead

 From Country Life:

Oh, for a crystal ball. It would have helped to see the future in 1993, when Grade II-listed Cloth Hill, on The Mount in Hampstead, came to the market. By the end of October, it had been sold by Savills for ‘slightly less than the asking price of £1 million,’ as Country Life reported at the time.

Now, it is for sale — with Savills again, and also this time Marcus Parfitt — at a rather more robust £18 million. And no, the price rise isn't all down to inflation: £1 million from 1993 would be little more than £2.1 million in today’s money. This house has outpaced inflation nine-fold. Stratospheric rises aside, there is much to commend this Queen Anne house, thought to be the second oldest surviving in Hampstead — not least its history. Cloth Hill owes its name to Tudor laundry: some say the spot was where the Court launderers did their washing, others that, there, ‘the virgin heath was white with drying linen’. Much later in the same century, George Romney, his health declining fast, sought Hampstead’s fresh air. Having moved in 1796, he just about managed to knock down Cloth Hill’s stables and coach house to build himself a new home (with painting room and gallery), when he became so ill that he decided to head back to Cumbria and his wife — whom he had otherwise neglected for more than 30 years. Cloth Hill passed into the hands of Thomas Rundell, most likely a scion of the goldsmith dynasty. When living there, his wife, Maria, published the culinary bestseller of the time, A New System of Domestic Cookery. (Read more.)

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Trump's Tariffs

 From Sharyl's Substack:

The benefit will be felt by American agricultural exporters of products like tree nuts, soybean meal, and apples, which previously faced tariffs of 10-20% in Israel. The move will save U.S. exporters millions, and boost U.S. producers of those products, who will now have better market opportunities in Israel.

Reciprocal tariffs could have hit Israeli products hard, including diamonds, pharmaceuticals, and integrated circuits, impacting sale of foreign jewelry, medications, and electronics in the U.S.

Tariffs have deep roots in the U.S., dating back to the Tariff Act of 1789, one of the first laws passed by the new Congress, aimed at raising revenue for the federal government and protecting American industries. For much of the 19th century, tariffs were a primary source of federal income, often sparking debates over free trade versus protectionism. The Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act of 1930, which raised tariffs to record levels, is widely blamed for worsening the Great Depression by stifling global trade.

Simply put, a tariff is a government-imposed charge on imported goods, collected at the border as the products enter the country. And the media is full of reporters and commentators voicing various opinions and analyses on the Trump plans.

Yet polls consistently show many Americans don’t understand and cannot accurately describe tariffs.

This article will explore the practical aspects of Trump’s tariffs. Who really pays them? What are the best and worst case scenarios for impact to U.S. taxpayers? And how will the tariffs play out with real products from countries like Mexico, Canada, and beyond?

Read on for details. (Read more.)

 

I have a political podcast, HERE, mostly about Maryland, but other things, too. The latest episode is HERE. Please do subscribe.

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Why Do the Clocks Go Forward in Spring?

 From Country Life:

The idea of using different time during the summer is actually an ancient one, and Founding Father of the US Benjamin Franklin was among those. But a dual system of Greenwich Mean Time (GMT) in the winter and BST in the summer was first mooted by William Willett, in a pamphlet published in 1907, entitled The Waste of Daylight. Willett wasn’t a scientist, but a builder — and also, as it happens, great-great grandfather of Coldplay’s frontman, Chris Martin.

He was also a keen golfer, and it was this that prompted his idea: he resented the fact that the early onset of dusk curtailed his game. He was successful in lobbying Liberal MP Robert Pearce to introduce the Daylight Saving Bill in 1908. The bill, though, was rejected by the House of Commons and Willett, who died of influenza in 1915, was to miss out on seeing his dream come true by one year.

Ultimately, daylight saving was introduced in Britain in 1916 to conserve energy and help the war effort rather than to appease frustrated golfers. Taking their lead from the Germans, the British moved their clocks forward by one hour between May 21 and October 1. The move was so popular that BST has remained to this day, although the start and end dates — the last Sundays in March and October respectively — were only aligned across the European Union from October 22, 1995.

At the end of summer 1940, once more to conserve energy, clocks were not turned back. When the clocks were moved an hour forward in spring 1941, Britain operated a British Double Summer Time and continued to do so until the winter clock was realigned once more with GMT in the autumn of 1947. More radically, between February 1968 and November 1971, BST was adopted the whole year round on a trial basis. Due to its unpopularity, though, particularly among the farming community, the government abandoned the exercise in 1972 and reinstated the dual system. (Read more.)

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The Farewell of Madame Elisabeth to Madame Royale

The day before her execution the sister of Louis XVI, Madame Elisabeth of France, was taken from the Temple prison to the Conciergerie. Madame Royale describes the sad moment in her Memoirs. (Via Vive la Reine.) To quote:

My aunt kissed me and told me to be calm for she would soon return. “No, citoyenne, you will not return,” they said to her; “take your cap and come down.” They loaded her then with insults and coarse speeches; she bore it all with patience, took her cap; kissed me again, and told me to have courage and firmness, to hope always in God, to practice the good principles of religion given me by my parents, and not to fail in the last instructions given to me by my father and by my mother.

–from the account of Marie-Thérèse Charlotte of France, on the departure of her aunt Elisabeth from the Temple, May 9th 1794 Share

Reforming US Public Health under RFK

 From James Howard Kunstler:

Dr. Chris Martenson, is an economic researcher and futurist specializing in energy and resource depletion, finance and banking, and the science and politics surrounding the Covid-19 affair. Before founding PeakProsperity.com, where he provides analysis, commentary, and actionable advice, Martenson worked as a Vice President at a Fortune 300 company and spent over a decade in corporate finance and strategic consulting. His academic background includes a PhD in neurotoxicology from Duke University and a post-doctoral program in the same field, followed by an MBA in Finance from Cornell University. (Read more.)

 

From The Vigilant Fox:

Calley Means just dropped a series of truth bombs at Politico’s Health Care Summit—and anti-MAHA lobbyists weren’t ready for it. Lighting up the stage, Means ripped into the federal health agencies and the medical establishment, calling them out for being captured by industry lobbyists. He said these agencies have “utterly failed” and blamed them for overseeing a decades-long decline in American health. The election of President Trump, he argued, wasn’t just political—it was a clear message from voters demanding deep reform at every level of these broken institutions.

When it came to food policy, Means didn’t hold back in calling out how lobbyists have corrupted the system. “One thing Bobby Kennedy is not going to do,” he told Politico’s Dasha Burns, “is entertain comments from food lobbyists using food prices as an excuse to continue poisoning children. That’s not going to work… We have 10,000 chemicals in our food that are not allowed in any other country.” (Read more.)

 

From Keto Mojo:

 Although research is still in its early stages, several small studies suggest that ketogenic diets may lead to promising outcomes in several mental health disorders.

Depression and anxiety:

• • A 2023 systematic review of case reports and observational studies concluded that ketogenic diets may provide benefits for individuals with mood and anxiety disorders, although further study is needed. (8)
  • In a case series, three patients with major depression and generalized anxiety disorder who followed an animal-based ketogenic diet for 7 to 12 weeks  experienced complete remission from their condition, along with improvements in quality of life, body composition, and metabolic health markers. In addition, the two patients with binge-eating disorder reported that they no longer binged or felt the urge to binge within days of starting ketogenic metabolic therapy. (9)

Bipolar disorder and schizophrenia:

• • Researchers conducted a 6-8 week pilot study of a ketogenic diet in 26 euthymic individuals with bipolar disorder.  Among the 20 participants who completed the trial, 91% of blood ketone (beta-hydroxybutyrate) measurements fell within the nutritional ketosis range, and the diet was generally well-tolerated with minimal side effects. (10) Daily beta-hydroxybutyrate levels were positively correlated with self-rated mood and energy levels and inversely associated with impulsivity and anxiety. (11) In addition, participants lost an average of 9.2 lbs (4.2 kg).
  • A retrospective analysis explored the effects of a ketogenic diet in 28 inpatient adults with treatment-resistant severe mental illnesses, including schizophrenia and bipolar disorder. All patients experienced improvement in symptoms, with nearly half achieving remission, and 64% were able to reduce or discontinue their psychotropic medications. (12)
  • In a pilot study, 23 individuals with schizophrenia or bipolar disorder and metabolic abnormalities followed a ketogenic diet for four months. Schizophrenia patients saw a 32% reduction in symptoms, and 69% of those with bipolar disorder showed significant clinical improvement. Additionally, none of the participants met the criteria for metabolic syndrome by the end of the study, with adherent individuals experiencing significant reductions in waist circumference, insulin resistance, and triglyceride levels. (13)

Currently, several trials exploring the impact of KMT on mental health disorders are recruiting or already in progress. (Read more.)

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Rare Merlin and King Arthur Text Found

 From Popular Science:

Variations on the classic Merlin and King Arthur legends span hundreds, if not thousands, of retellings. Many are documented within handwritten medieval manuscripts dating back over a millenia—but some editions are far rarer than others. For example, less than 40 copies are known to exist of a once-popular sequel series, the Suite Vulgate du Merlin. In 2019, researchers at the University of Cambridge discovered fragments of one more copy in their collections, tucked inside the recycled binding of a wealthy family’s property record from the 16th century. But at the time of discovery, the text was impossible to read. Now after years of painstaking collaborative work with the university’s Cultural Heritage Imaging Laboratory (CHIL), archivists have finally been able to peer inside the obscured texts—without ever needing to physically handle the long-lost pages. (Read more.)

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Pets in Prison

Madame Royale in the Garden of the Temple Prison

From History Today:

The humanity with which Richard and his wife had behaved towards the queen during her first month at the Conciergerie, and the suspicion of their having collaborated in the Carnation Affair, had led to their being suspended. By the time they were reinstated in November 1793, Made Antoinette had perished on the guillotine. Given their previous acts of kindness they may well have taken pity on her pug, a breed to which she was famously attached. Whether this dog was the original Thisbee or the pet of another victim which she had adopted is impossible to gage.

The reticence of Madame Royale on the subject of her mother's dog at the Temple also applies to her own spaniel, Mignon, which her brother, the Dauphin, gave her before being finally separated from his sister on October 7th, 1793. In all probability he retained some of his earlier ambivalence towards dogs. The existence of Mignon is well documented: the eye-witness Hue, refers to 'a dog which was long the sole witness of her sorrows', and the dog features in many engravings of Madame Royale after her release on December 19th, 1795. When Mignon died in 1801, having fallen from a balcony of the Poniatowski Palace in Warsaw, Louis XVIII wrote to the poet Jacques Delille, then in England, asking for some lines to inscribe on the dog's tomb. In Malheur et Pitie, Delille incorporated an elegy to Mignon:

Be then the subject and the honour of my poems, Oh you! who consoling your royal mistress, Until your last breath proved to her your kindness, Who beguiled her misfortunes, enlivened her prison; Oh of the last farewell of a brother, unique and tragic gift ...

 If the Dauphin was wary of dogs, he was unequivocal in his liking for birds. At the Tuileries in 1792 he took care of the aviary and of the ducks in the pond, he also raised rabbits. At the Temple in 1795, in response to the boy's entreaties, one of the towers was transformed into a pigeonry and his gaoler, Simon, had a birdcage built in one of the window-recesses, even removing a plank from the hoarded-up casement-window 'in order to provide the birds with light'. Bills for supplying 'bird-seed for the little Capet's pigeons' are still in evidence. The Commune baulked, how- ever, when presented with a demand for 300 livres from a clock-maker, Bourdier, whom Simon had commissioned to repair a very beautiful bird- cage which he had found in the furniture-repository of the Prince de Conti, the former proprietor of the Temple. Simon had undertaken to pay this sum out of his own pocket but, by the time the work was completed, he too had been guillotined. (Read entire post.)

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St. John Paul II on the Personhood of Women

 It never occurred to me that there was any question about the personhood of women but it seems that in some circles there are. From Dr. Angela Franks in Church Life Journal:

Let us connect the dots. By the fact of their human nature, shared with men, women are also conscious, rational, creative, and free persons. Like all persons, they are structured to flourish through self-possession and self-governance, which leads to their self-formation through freely chosen virtuous action. Attempting to outsource this responsible and intelligent activity to someone else, even one’s husband, is not only bound to lead to disintegration, even mental illness. Such outsourcing is also impossible, because personhood is incommunicable. A human person cannot in fact uproot her self-determining personal structure.

This personal structure allows for and is perfected in the virtue of obedience, which is owed by all human beings to God and to legitimate human authorities. Yet a totalitarian imposition of arbitrariness or a denial of a person’s rationality, done in the name of hierarchical “obedience,” will taint the whole community. Such poorly conceived “obedience” leads to malformation and abuse, as too many recent examples in religious life testify. Indeed, a healthy community—explicitly including the family, as Wojtyła notes when speaking of parents—must allow for moments of healthy opposition.[16] A rigid conformism is not virtuous self-denial but instead rooted in the desire to avoid uncomfortable conflict; it actually selfish.

Right-wing power fetishists try to claim certain basic human actions as prerogatives of the male sex, such as thinking and arguing about the good, acting freely and creatively in moving toward that good, and possessing and governing oneself. Such actions, they argue, pertain properly only to the leadership and strength of men, and furthermore the wife is owned by the husband.[17] As a result, a wife should defer to her husband on all intellectual and practical matters. As one book’s chapter titles state, “The Basics: Do Whatever He Tells You,” which also means “Wear What He Likes, Do What He Likes.” On Wojtyła’s terms, this denial of the personalistic structure of women amounts to their dehumanization.

It should not need to be said that this is not how Jesus interacted with women, nor how he relates to his bride the Church, for whom he died: “Christ loved the Church and gave himself up for her” (Eph 5:25). Paul does not exhort husbands to rule over their wives or discipline them as though they were children. Rather, he insists that their primary job is not ruling at all but instead love:

In the same way, husbands should love their wives as they do their own bodies. He who loves his wife loves himself. For no one ever hates his own body, but he nourishes and tenderly cares for it, just as Christ does for the Church, because we are members of his body. “For this reason a man will leave his father and mother and be joined to his wife, and the two will become one flesh.” This is a great mystery, and I am applying it to Christ and the Church. Each of you, however, should love his wife as himself, and a wife should respect her husband (Eph 5:28-33).

The wife can only be loved like the body of the husband (echoes of the Church once more), and a husband can only love himself by loving his wife, if they are both equally and fully human. For Karol Wojtyła, the creative drama of the relations between the sexes requires nothing less. (Read more.)

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Life in the Temple Prison

In August 1792, Louis XVI, Marie-Antoinette, their children, and Louis' sister Madame Elisabeth were incarcerated in the Temple Prison. Marie-Thérèse-Charlotte later described their experiences in her Memoirs:

The following is the way our family passed their days.

My father rose at seven, and was employed in his devotions till eight. Afterwards he dressed himself and my brother, and at nine came to breakfast with my mother. After breakfast, my father taught my brother his lessons till eleven. The child then played till twelve, at which hour the whole family was obliged to walk in the garden, whatever the weather might be; because the guard, which was relieved at the time, wished to see all the prisoners, and satisfy themselves that we were safe. The walk lasted till dinner, which was at two o'clock. After dinner my father and mother played at tric-trac or piquet, or, to speak more truly, pretended to play, that they might have an opportunity of saying a few words to one another. At four o'clock, my mother and we went up stairs and took my brother with us, as my father was accustomed to sleep a little at this hour. At six my brother went down again to my father to say his lessons, and to play till supper-time. After supper, at nine o'clock, my mother undressed him quickly, and put him to bed. We then went up to our own apartment again, and the King did not go to bed till eleven. My mother worked a good deal of tapestry: she directed my studies, and often made me read aloud. My aunt was frequently in prayer, and read every morning the divine service of the day. She read a good many religious books, and sometimes, at the Queen's request, would read aloud.

~ Private Memoirs, by Madame Royale, Duchess of Angoulême, translated by John Wilson Croker. London: John Murray, Albemarle Street, 1823, pp.183-185

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Reflections on the Counter-Revolution in America

 From Victor Davis Hanson:

In general, no Republican president of the past 50 years sought to radically reduce the size of government and balance the budget. None closed the border and began deportations. None avoided optional ground wars while solely hitting aggressors from the air. None led a cultural counter-revolution to reverse the left’s long march through our institutions.

Why?

Because to have done so would have constituted a veritable cultural counter-revolution that would incur an unacceptable level of hatred and resistance from the entrenched left—defined by the nexus of the media, bureaucracies, campuses, foundations, Wall Street and Silicon Valley, and the Democratic Party. The latter were deemed just too formidable—and dangerous—to confront in a single term, if ever.

Or so it was felt by prior Republican administrations. So, most stayed clear and sought to deregulate, cut taxes, keep illegal immigration to about 30,000 or so a month, and use rhetoric to oppose the left’s cultural revolution.

Not so with Trump. The target of four years of lawfare in his wilderness years, he has now become a true counterrevolutionary determined not to slow down the progressive trajectory of the last 60 years but to end it and return the U.S. to the center—at least as now defined by a balanced budget, reciprocal fair trade, full use of all modes of energy, a closed border, legal only immigration, no optional ground wars abroad and a fierce effort to end the woke/DEI/ESG/Green New Deal leftwing orthodoxy.

Will it work?

The left’s revolution had become so deeply institutionalized that the once-bizarre had become the politically correct norm: three, not two, sexes; illegal aliens de facto not different from American citizens; a country without borders; massive debt and trade imbalances propped up for years by near-zero, de facto interest rates; and nation-building abroad as the country’s interior at home was hallowed out.

Trump is currently waging a 360-degree, 24/7 effort to undo at least the last 20 years of the most recent manifestation of the leftist cultural revolution inaugurated by Barack Obama. (Read more.)

Judge orders Trump officials to preserve Signal group chat records. From ArcaMax:

Judge James E. Boasberg of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia said he would enter the order in a lawsuit that alleges potential violations of the Federal Records Act, which requires agencies to retain records of their deliberations and decisions.

The order is set to last for two weeks and could be the start of further court action over whether Trump officials’ use of Signal or other messaging apps runs afoul of the records law.

During a hearing Thursday, the Justice Department said Trump officials were already taking steps to preserve the group chat, which apparently inadvertently included a journalist and had senior government officials discussing details of the attack in advance.

American Oversight, a watchdog group, filed the lawsuit against Secretary of State and acting National Archives and Records Administrator Marco Rubio, Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth, Director of National Intelligence Tulsi Gabbard, CIA Director John Ratcliffe and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent seeking to preserve records of the chat.

The Atlantic earlier this week detailed a group chat that discussed details of the attack on Houthis in Yemen and apparently inadvertently included Jeffrey Goldberg, the outlet’s editor-in-chief. The group asked Boasberg to order the Trump administration to retain the records. (Read more.)

 

From James Howard Kunstler:

The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is supposed to function like an immune system for the body politic, defending it against political sickness. The current organized action in the federal judiciary against the executive is a grave sickness induced by the Deep State that must be corrected by the SCOTUS. We await that corrective action — a sweeping decision in reply to 100-plus lawsuits — that the chief executive is in-charge of the executive department and that his prerogatives to manage the staffing and actions of the executive agencies can’t be arrogated by federal judges.

So far, obviously, the SCOTUS has not yet come to issue that decision. Many of you worry that they will fail to, because Chief Justice John Roberts appears to be somehow under the influence of the Deep State. Let’s have a look. Sheldon Snook is Special Assistant to Chief Justice Roberts, and is deeply involved in the day-to-day management of the SCOTUS. Sheldon Snook is married to Mary McCord. Ms. McCord has been a leading actor, via her various roles in the Deep State, in the seditious operations against President Trump since 2017.

As Acting Attorney General for National Security in 2017, Mary McCord, turned James Comey’s FBI jihad against National Security advisor Mike Flynn into a malicious and ultimately unsuccessful prosecution. (The DOJ dropped the charges, which Judge Emmet G. Sullivan refused to execute, thus necessitating a pardon from Mr. Trump.)

Mary McCord was instrumental in the DOJ’s dishonest FISA application to surveil Carter Page (when Judge James Boasberg sat on the FISA Court). Ms. McCord quit the DOJ to become a counsel to the committee in the first impeachment of Donald Trump. In that role, she assisted Norm Eisen, the Chief Counsel to committee Chairman, Rep. Jerrold Nadler. Norm Eisen has gone on since that time to become the chief coordinator of lawfare operations against Mr. Trump. Mary McCord remains a senior fellow of the Atlantic Council, sponsored by George and Alex Soros. Sheldon Snook remains at John Roberts’ right hand. (Read more.)

 

Biden's perjury. From The Reactionary:

If you recall, Special Counsel Hur was appointed after the disclosure that classified documents were found at President Biden’s homes and his office in Washington. Compared to the investigations of Trump, the Biden inquiry was, for lack of a better word, soft: searches were conducted without FBI monitors, Biden’s lawyers negotiated the terms of searches with a US Attorney appointed by Biden. (Our recap into the Biden classified documents saga goes into greater detail.)

The issue with Biden’s handling of classified materials wasn’t necessarily the possession of those materials, though that is a criminal offense. It’s that he lied about it to Special Counsel Hur. These written answers - first published in this article - are important in that they are made with thought and care, as compared to Biden’s rambling interview with Special Counsel Hur, where he was a bit slow and forgetful.

And these answers are provable deceit, though it would have been a near-impossible task to convince a DC jury to convict one of their own. Here are some examples of the lies. (Read more.)

The Signal flap. From Sharyl's Substack:

First, as far as the selective pearl-clutching over the Trump administration’s use of Signal, we can start with the example of James Comey, former FBI Director.

In August 2019, the DOJ Inspector General’s report, “Report of Investigation of Former Federal Bureau of Investigation Director James Comey's Disclosure of Sensitive Investigative Information and Handling of Certain Memoranda,” found that Comey, fired by Trump in May 2017, wrongly took FBI memos about their interactions and kept them in his personal possession. Several of the documents contained classified info—“Secret” and “Confidential”—including anti-Trump material. The IG noted that Comey even shared these with his lawyers, and one of the documents was purposefully leaked to The New York Times in order to hurt then-President Trump.

The DOJ IG referred Comey for prosecution—a momentous referral that was downplayed in the news—but Comey avoided charges when the DOJ declined to bring them in August of 2019, citing insufficient evidence of ill intent. (I hope if I’m ever commit a bad crime I can convince prosecutors to forget about it all by telling them I meant no harm.)

Anyway, the Comey revelations flickered, then faded—a minor blip for the propaganda machine compared to today’s Signal frenzy.

Then there was Hillary Clinton’s saga. As Secretary of State from 2009 to 2013, she improperly ran sensitive and classified State Department business through her private email server in violation of explicit security rules and record keeping laws.

The FBI’s July 2016 probe into Clinton’s actions found 110 emails with classified data—some “Top Secret”—on that unsecured system. FBI Director Comey’s July 5, 2016, statement about the breach warned that “hostile actors,” possibly Russia, might have accessed the material.

Yet, as The New York Times reported on July 6, 2016, Comey deemed Clinton’s behavior “extremely careless” but not criminal, and the DOJ followed suit deciding to file no charges. ‘After all, she meant no harm,’ they said. Backed by deep-pocketed allies.

Joe Biden’s turn came in February 2023. (Read more.)

 

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The Fall and Rise of Communism

 From Daniel McCarthy at Modern Age:

In the edited excerpt below, McCarthy and McMeekin discuss the ways in which Communism and its malign influence are not yet a thing of the past.

McCarthy: You say that communism, in some ways, is just getting started, and the final chapter of the book really lays out the ways in which the COVID lockdowns and the growth of the surveillance state within the West as a whole are following precedents set by Communist China and other Communist states. Tell us a little bit about the state of Communism today and why it’s something that should still concern Americans in the twenty-first century.

McMeekin: This is the part of the book that got a bit of attention and maybe riled a few people up, in part because most of us who are reasonably well-read in history have come to see that most of the Communist regimes of the twentieth century were economic failures, oppressed their people, committed all kinds of human rights abuses and violations, obviously piled up huge death counts, and so forth. But generally speaking though, I think most people, until pretty recently, thought that we could say goodbye to all that, thank goodness that’s over. That was the tone of a lot of the early books that came out in the post–Cold War years, whether about Soviet history or about Communism—“writing its obituary,” as I think Richard Pipes put it in his Short History of Communism, which came out a quarter century ago. It really did seem like Communism was finished.

There was a trial of sorts of the Communist Party and Richard Pipes, who was both a historian at Harvard and also an advisor of the first term of the first Reagan administration with a role in forming policy vis à vis Poland and the Solidarity movement, was actually called as an expert witness in that trial. I talk about it in the book because I think it was an important moment but not necessarily for the reasons people thought at the time. People thought it might be something of a Nuremberg for Communism, but that was a bit of a misconception. In fact, what had happened was that Yeltsin, after he came to power as president, tried to outlaw the Communist Party in Russia, and he was sued by the Communist Party. The part that most people don’t realize is that the Communist Party won—and they didn’t just win renewed legal status, their capacity to contest and fight elections, and become the largest or second largest party in Russia, which is to this day, of course, very influential. To some extent they also won back a little of their diminished luster and prestige. So I think that’s the first part of it: the story didn’t quite end as neatly as we maybe thought it did in either 1989 with the fall of the Berlin Wall or in 1991 with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

The other way in which I’m talking about Communism is as something that hasn’t quite vanished and maybe hasn’t finished with us yet—I suppose I might be channeling the Trotsky line, “you may not be interested in war, but war is interested in you,” and you might say the same thing about Communism. I suppose what I’m getting at is that a lot of, to borrow a term from Marx, the “superstructure” of Communism—the central planning of the economy, the full state control and ownership of the means of production—has been jettisoned at least by the more clever, ambitious, and successful Communist regimes, for example in China, where there is a kind of hybrid system. But the part they haven’t abandoned in China, the part that concerns me because it is creeping into a lot of Western social political life particularly over the past decade or so, are the subtler forms of social control, for example a social credit system. It’s subtler now. In the Communist days of the Soviet Union or in Eastern Bloc countries or in China, you obviously had a very rigid party structure: party membership was necessary to get ahead, you had to be on good terms with the party or formal party members, etc. They had a social credit system but it was more explicit, blunt, and in your face. Now, we have varieties of censorship and social control, varieties of not always repression exactly but certainly of surveillance and monitoring and the constant hectoring and surveilling of the population that you saw in Communist regimes is a bit subtler now. But in some ways I think it’s more insidious in many Western countries because we’ve become more accustomed to it. COVID was only the most obvious manifestation of it.

(Read more.)

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A Hundred Marriages at Notre-Dame de Paris

At the birth of her first child in 1778, Marie-Antoinette personally provided for the dowries of a hundred poor girls, enabling them to marry. Encouraging marriage led to a decline of illegitimacy and abandoned children. From Rodama:

Marie-Antoinette refused the celebrations offered to her by the municipality of Paris and asked instead that the money be employed to provide dowries for a hundred deserving poor girls, who would be married en masse on the day of the Royal thanksgiving service in Notre-Dame.  Additional allowances were be paid when a first child was born, with a higher rate available for mothers who breastfed.  As a further celebration of family life,  an elderly couple would be chosen to renew their marriage vows in front of their "children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren".

It is hard to gauge what the municipal corporation might have thought about  this charitable effusion of Rousseauist sentiment.   No doubt the requirements were both expensive and troublesome to arrange.  The brunt of the organisation fell on the church. A 1923 article  in the Revue des études historiques, by Gabriel Vauthier, publishes a copy of the rather terse circular, dated 14th January 1779, from Archbishop Christophe de Beaumont to each of the curés of  Paris's forty-three parishes:

Monsieur,
It is the Queen's intention to endow with a dowry, one hundred girls to be chosen from the different parishes of Paris.  Each one will be furnished with the sum of five-hundred livres, as well as outfits and robes, to be delivered to her on the occasion of her marriage.  In addition,  Her Majesty wishes to pay ten livres per month for a year during the time that the baby is being nursed.  If the mother feeds her own baby, she will be payed fifteen livres a month and given a layette.

You should, Monsieur,  without delay, find the means to fulfill the charitable wishes of the Queen and bring about their speedy execution.  You must choose from among your parishioners,  individuals who are poor and of good moral character, worthy to be recipients of Her Majesty's kindness.  You must make your choice within eight to ten days.  The marriages will follow the ordinary order of precedence for the parishes of Paris.  Kindly come to the Archbishop's palace next Monday at five in the evening. You can inform me of the results of your research so far, and, if there are any difficulties, we will resolve them.

(Read more.)

Marie-Antoinette Giving Alms

 

 

 

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Washington Senate Passes Bill to Make Clergy Mandatory Reporters of Child Abuse

 From February in The Washington State Standard:

The state Senate passed a bill Friday afternoon to make religious leaders mandatory reporters of child abuse and neglect. Supporters say the move is crucial to protecting children from harm, especially sexual abuse, while opponents argue the bill could end up doing more harm.

Senate Bill 5375 would make “members of the clergy” mandatory reporters like doctors, teachers and other people who work with kids. Under the law, religious leaders would be required to tell law enforcement or the Department of Children, Youth and Families if they suspect any harm has been done to a child. They must do so even if they learned that information during a confession or other penitential communication.

This is the third time in recent years that making clergy mandatory reporters has been attempted, with exemptions for reporting information learned in confession being a sticking point in the past.

Prime sponsor Sen. Noel Frame, D-Seattle, said religious leaders should have a responsibility to report abuse so the state can step in and take action.

“Children need trusted adults,” the senator said. “They need to know that if they tell somebody they’re being abused, like I told my teacher in the fifth grade that I was being abused, that they can trust that that person will make it stop.”

While the bill compels clergy to report child neglect information learned in confession, Frame said their privilege to not be compelled to testify in a criminal proceeding remains intact.

According to Frame, Washington is only one of five states where clergy aren’t mandatory reporters. She believes that has to change in light of reports of churches covering up harm done to children.

“The state does not have to be complicit when religious communities who engage in the practice of covering up abuse and neglect choose to do so,” she said.

Republicans said they supported previous efforts to make clergy members mandatory reporters, but took issue this time as there was no exemption for information learned in confession.

They believe those committing harm may do more harm if they cannot freely confide in religious leaders.

“People who want to ask for forgiveness for their past sins, they will not come and ask for help,” said state Sen. Judy Warnick, R-Moses Lake. (Read more.)

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Elizabeth de Burgh, the Captive Queen of Scots

From Sharon Bennett Connolly:

Elizabeth de Burgh was born around 1289. The daughter of Richard de Burgh, Earl of Ulster and Connaught, and his wife, Margaret, she was a god-daughter of England’s king, Edward I. At the age of 13 Elizabeth was married to Robert the Bruce, Earl of Carrick, in 1302; probably at his manor of Writtle, near Chelmsford in Essex. It is possible the marriage was arranged by Edward; he certainly encouraged it, as a way of keeping his young Scottish noble loyal to his cause.

However, events in Scotland would soon push the Bruce away from his English alliances; his murder of his greatest rival for the throne, John Comyn, in the Chapel of the Greyfriars in Dumfries. Aware that he would be excommunicated for his actions, Bruce raced to Scone to be crowned before a papal bull could be issued. 6 weeks later, on March 25th 1306, the Bruce was crowned King Robert I of Scotland, with Elizabeth by his side, by the Bishop of St Andrews, William Lamberton. They were crowned in a second ceremony the next day by Isabella MacDuff, Countess of Buchan, who had arrived too late to play her part in the ceremony on the 25th. As daughter of the Earl of Fife, Isabella claimed the hereditary right of the Clan MacDuff, to crown the King of Scots. Unfortunately the coronation was not the end of trouble for the Bruces. If anything, things were about to get much worse.

An ailing Edward I sent his loyal lieutenant, Aymer de Valence, north and he met and defeated Robert’s army at Methven in June of the same year. Robert sent his brother Neil and the Earl of Atholl to escort his wife to safety. They took the Queen, Princess Marjorie (Robert the Bruce’s daughter by his first marriage), sisters Mary and Christian and the countess of Buchan, north towards Orkney.

However, the English caught up with them at Kildrummy Castle and laid siege to it. The garrison was betrayed from within, the barns set alight and the Bruce women had barely time to escape with the Earl of Atholl before the castle was taken. Sir Neil Bruce and the entire garrison were executed; Neil was hung, drawn and quartered at Berwick in September 1306.

Queen Elizabeth and her companions made for Tain, in Easter Ross, possibly in the hope of finding a boat to take them onwards. However, they were captured by the Earl of Ross (a former adherent of the deposed King John Balliol), who took them from sanctuary at St Duthac and handed them over to the English. They were sent south, To Edward I at Lanercost Priory.

Elizabeth’s capture would have been a hard blow for Robert the Bruce. The new King of Scotland still lacked a male heir, and had no chance of getting one while his wife was in English hands. This made his hold on the throne even more precarious than it already was.

Edward I’s admirer, Sir Maurice Powicke said Edward treated his captives with a ‘peculiar ferocity’. He ordered that 24-year-old Mary Bruce and Isabella, the Countess of Buchan who performed Robert the Bruce’s coronation, should be imprisoned in specially constructed iron cages and suspended from the outside walls of castles; Mary at Roxburgh and Isabella at Berwick. Although it is more likely that the cages were in rooms within the castles, rather than exposed to the elements, they would be held in that way for 4 years, until Edward I’s successor, Edward II, ordered their removal to convents in 1310. (Read more.)

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