Reading Group Guide to The Good Knight
Many readers over the years have asked for a reading group guide to my books. I am happy to announce that I now have one to The Good Knight! ______________ The Good Knight By Sarah Woodbury Reading Group Guide Gwen is a young woman living in twelfth century Wales, a time nearly eight hundred years before the present. How does Gwen’s behavior play into or defy stereotypes about medieval women? Do you think her portrayal is realistic? How do you think she would behave differently had she not been raised by an itinerant bard? Consider her relationship with her family, with her social “superiors” (lords, knights, princes, etc.), and her participation in traditionally “masculine” spheres, such as her intelligence work for Prince Hywel, or her active role in the murder investigation. Women in this story (and in medieval period in Read more…
Celtic Life Interview
This month’s issue of Celtic Life has an interview with me 🙂 http://www.celticlifeintl.com/sarah-woodbury/ With two historian parents, author Sarah Woodbury couldn’t help but develop an interest in the past. She began writing historical-romance fiction when the stories in her head overflowed and demanded she let them out. Recently we spoke with her about her passion and profession. What are your own roots? My roots are in England, Scotland, and Wales. From Scotland, my most famous ancestor is my multiple great-grandfather, Donald McKay, the Boston Clipper Ship builder. He was a Highland McKay from Thurso, whose father had fought for the British during the American Revolution, but then came home to find that his family lands had been ‘cleared’. He accepted land in Nova Scotia, and then Donald moved to Boston as a young man. From Wales, my ancestors come through—among others—my Read more…
Guardians of Time is here!
Christmas 1292. Time travel has meant many things to Meg, David, and Anna over the years, but regardless of the circumstances, it has always been about saving lives: their own, their family members’, their friends’. This time, it’s a combination of all three. Guardians of Time is the ninth novel in the After Cilmeri series. It is available at Amazon US and all Amazon stores, iBooks, Kobo, Google Play, Smashwords, and Nook.
The Statute of Wales
King Edward I issued the Statute of Wales (sometimes referred to as the Statute of Rhuddlan) in 1284 as part of his program of subjugating Wales to English law. For Prince Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, and his people, being able to live under Welsh law had been a primary concern and one of the most compelling reasons to war with England. Edward, knowing this, saw to it that the Welsh laws were overthrown, and this act was not repealed for centuries. It was comprehensive and complete–the most comprehensive any King issued during the middle ages (Bowen 1908). To download your own copy: http://www.archive.org/details/statuteswales01bowegoog This site states: “At the Statute of Rhuddlan, 1284, Wales was divided up into English counties; the English court pattern set firmly in place, and for all intents and purposes, Wales ceased to exist as a political unit. Read more…
Llywelyn ap Iorwerth (Llywelyn Fawr)
Llywelyn Fawr was possibly the most renowned Welsh ruler of the medieval period. Upon the death of Owain Gwynedd in 1170 AD, his eldest son, Hywel, purportedly a most capable man, succeeded to the rulership of Gwynedd. In Wales, all sons, regardless of their legitimacy, can inherit, provided their father had acknowledged them. This should have been the case with Hywel. As I wrote in this post, the downside of this enlightened approach to illegitimacy is that it divided the kingdom between all the heirs and fostered animosity among brothers over their portion of their inheritance. Such was the case when Owain Gwynedd overcame his brothers to take the throne, such was the case many years later after the death of Llywelyn Fawr, and such was the case in 1170. Thus, Dafydd ap Owain Gywnedd conspired with his mother (Owain Gwynedd’s Read more…
Dolbadarn Castle
? Dolbadarn Castle is only 6 1/2 miles as the crow flies from the Menai Straits, and yet, the topography of the area is such that it was built by Llywelyn Fawr (Llywelyn the Great) to guard the mountain pass from Caernarfon to the upper Conwy Valley. ‘Its position at the tip of Llyn Padarn allowed the garrison to blockade anyone’s movement through that part of the north, then as now a main link to the rest of Wales. The military worth of the spot was evidently recognized as early as the 6th century but surviving masonry dates no earlier than the 1200’s.’ http://www.castlewales.com/dolbd.html Llywleyn Fawr built the castle in the early 13th century and it was one of the last defenses of Dafydd ap Gruffydd–Llywleyn Fawr’s grandson–in 1283 after Edward had defeated Llywelyn ap Gruffydd, Dafydd’s brother (Paul Davis, Castles Read more…
Senana, Mother of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd
Senana, by all appearances, had to have been quite a woman. She was the daughter of Caradog ap Thomas ap Rhodri ap Owain Gwynedd, the great king of Gwynedd during the twelfth century. Her husband was the illegitimate son of Llywelyn Fawr, the great Prince of Wales. Llywelyn Fawr ruled Wales with a strong hand, and as his death approached, he made a fateful choice: that Dafydd, his legitimate son through his wife, Joanna, herself an illegitimate daughter of the King John of England, would rule after him. In so choosing, he put Wales on a course for inevitable conflict. Llywelyn Fawr died in 1240 and Gruffydd immediately began agitating for his own power. By 1241, Dafydd had imprisoned him in Criccieth Castle, along with his eldest son, Owain. Senana pleaded first with Dafydd to free her husband and son, Read more…
The First Welsh Parliament
The first Welsh parliament was established by Owain Glyndwr (Owain Glendower) in 1404 in Machynlleth, a small town on the northwest coast of Wales, not far from Harlech Castle, which was his seat. “In 1404, Glyndwr assembled a parliament of four men from every commot in Wales at Machynlleth, drawing up mutual recognition treaties with France and Spain.” http://freepages.history.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~bowen/owainglyndwr.html The Owain Glyndwr Centre exists now on the site of the building where this was established and Owain was crowned Prince of Wales. http://www.canolfanglyndwr.org/ Background: “Glyndwr was a member of the dynasty of northern Powys and, on his mother’s side, descended from that of Deheubarth in the south. The family had fought for Llywelyn ap Gruffydd in the last war and regained their lands in north-east Wales only through a calculated association with the powerful Marcher lords of Chirk, Bromfield and Yale Read more…
St. David’s Cathedral
St. David, or Dewi Sant in Welsh, was one of the original saints of Wales in the 6th century, along with St. Kentigern and Gwenffrewi. St. David’s Cathedral has always been Norman, but it stands on the site of a monastery Dewi Sant founded around 500 AD. Like the other saints we talked about earlier in this season of videos, he was known for miracles, the most famous of which was the rising up of a hill on the spot where he was preaching. His symbol is the leek, which is why Welsh soldiers in the middle ages were known to go into battle with a leek pinned to their clothing and the leek remains a national symbol of Wales. Such was the renown of the monastic community, even hundreds of years after David’s death, that King Alfred is said Read more…
Aberffraw
Aberffraw was the seat of Rhodri Mawr, one of the great kings of Wales, in the early Middle Ages. Nothing of it remains–it seems to have shared a similar fate with Aber Garth Celyn upon the death of Llywelyn ap Gruffydd. We do have information that some of it lasted until 1316 when the last remaining timbers were stripped to repair Beaumaris (or Caerfarnon) Castle, both part of Edward’s ring of iron castles that he built after the conquest of Wales. My favorite Castles of Wales site doesn’t even have Aberffraw in its database because, quite literally, nothing of it remains. The book by Paul Davies, ‘Castles of the Welsh Princes’, states only: ” . . . a modern village sits on top of Aberffraw; the occasional discovery of richly-carved stones hints at the vanished splendour of the great court.” Read more…
Medieval Monday with Mary Morgan!
Today is Medieval Monday! Welcome to Mary Morgan, author of DRAGON KNIGHT’S SWORD. Here’s hoping that you’ll find someone new to add to your TBR list! Duncan Mackay will do anything to lift the curse from his family – even forfeit his own life. But his plans change when he encounters the woman from his dreams, literally. She is from the future, somehow has his lost sword, and can talk to the Dragon that is able to lift his family’s curse. Brigid O’Neill has spent her life listening to the mythological legends from Ireland and Scotland. So, when an ancient sword lands at her doorstep and she starts dreaming of a rugged Highlander, she drops everything and takes on a quest that will alter everything she believes. Before their journey ends, not only will Duncan and Brigid battle an ancient curse, Read more…
Stupid Movie Blog Tour: Timeline (2003)
Just to be completely upfront about this movie, it has a staggeringly low 12% rating on Rotten Tomatoes: http://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/timeline/ so you know going into it that nobody liked it but me. Truthfully, my whole family thinks it’s WAY better than that. Of course, most of us are suckers for anything medieval. This movie derives from the book Timeline, by Michael Crichton (of Jurassic Park fame). While it’s been a long time since I actually read the book, I enjoyed the movie more, mostly because the plot is actually a bit less intricate, and the motivations of the various characters are clearer than in the movie. In a nutshell, the movie is about a bunch of archaeologists who are excavating a site in France–funded by an American corporation they don’t know much about–who end up being effectively faxed to the middle ages by that same corporation. Seriously, Read more…
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