Abbey Body Identified As Gay Lover Of Edward II

The Telegraph (UK) ^ | 2-18-2008 | Laura Clout

[dighton]

Worst history ever, with Guinness-long pregnancy of subteen She-Wolf of France.

[AnAmericanMother]

Totally socialist bovine scatalogy, as you say.

Actually, "hanging, drawing, and quartering" was the legally prescribed death for traitors. The four quarters were generally displayed at the four major city gates of London as a warning, while the heads were nailed onto "Traitors' Gate" at London Bridge (Sir William Wallace's was placed there), although at a somewhat later period they were put on Temple Bar . . . where I think it was Dr. Johnson who tipped his hat to the head of Sim Fraser, Lord Lovat, the last peer beheaded for treason in England.

You want to read some REAL heavy-duty academic nonsense, check this one out: Deconstructing identities on the scaffold: the execution of Hugh Despenser the Younger, 1326

[Verginius Rufus]

Ambrose Bierce has a definition of genealogy something like "tracing one's ancestry back to an ancestor who didn't care to trace his."

Interesting quote. I think anyone who taps into a royal line can ultimately go back to the earliest traceable ancestors of Charlemagne, the Arnulfings (descendants of Arnulf, bishop of Metz in the early 600s).

Anyone who can reliably trace ancestry back to Muhammad could then follow his ancestry back several generations earlier. There may be some Irish genealogies that are slightly older, and there are people today who claim descent from Confucius--if accurate, those lineages would be much longer.

[SunkenCiv]