We don't know much about the lives of women in medieval England. We know that life was cruel, that there were few options for women of any social strata in medieval England, and that women were not considered important enough to be recorded in the historical record in general, yet there is a noble woman in Coventry from the 11th century who knows her name all over the world, and almost everything she thinks you know about her is largely inaccurate, so today we will try the story and what it is to delve into the most forgotten true history. A world-renowned figure. She is Lady Godiva naked on a horse !
Who's Lady Godiva?
Godiva meaning is 'God's gift' and was a recently common name for women in medieval England, the Latin version of the name Godiva. The woman known to the world as Lady Godiva was the Countess of Murcia, wife of The Earl of Mercia. We don't know the exact dates of her birth or death, but there are records of her and her husband in the mid-11th century.
Lady Godiva was independently wealthy and owned property she inherited from her father. To understand Lady Godiva world, we have to understand the context of English politics at the time. In the 11th century, The King of Denmark, Swain Forkbird, campaigned against England, forcing English King Ethelrid and his sons into exile. Swain became king of England on Christmas Day 1013, but died just a few weeks later as a result of falling from a horse. Sweden's eldest son, Harald II, became denmark's new king, but the Vikings, who had just defeated Ethelrid, voted for Swins' youngest son Knut to be the new King of England. But the Lords of England saw Swins' death as an opportunity, and Ethelrid was summoned from exile and the English led Knut in his army of England. However Knut returned the following year with a large fleet including Vikings from all over Scandinavia. Knut finally defeated the English army at the Battle of Asandon in October 1016. After the death of Ethelrid's son Edmund Ironside in November, the great Knut was crowned king of all England, ruling England for less than 20 years and with the help of the English, eventually coming to rule Denmark, Norway and most of Sweden also in what was also called the North Sea Empire.
Protecting England from the Viking raids that had destroyed England since the ninth century, England flourished under Knut, and is considered one of the greatest Anglo-Saxon kings. In his early days, he spent a long time eliminating the challenges facing his rule and cleansing and executing people he did not trust. One of these purges concerned The Earldom Of Mercia, formerly a kingdom in the English Midlands. Sometime between 1017 and 1023, the former Earl Knut was executed and gave Earldom to a member of one of the region's leading Anglo-Saxon families. The new Earl of Leovric as The Earl of Mercia, Leovric was one of England's most powerful rulers and was certainly a skilled politician, retaining his position and head for nearly 40 years through the reins of Knut, and during the period when the Wessex dynasty was restored with the reign of Ethelrid Edward's recognized son.
It is not clear when Leovric and Lady Godiva got married. We know she lived after him, and it could be a second marriage for both of them. At least one record from the 12th century records that she was a widow when they married. Their first known male as a couple relates to the suspension of the Benedictine Monastery in Coventry in 1043 and while Leovrick and lady Godiva have been recorded with many charitable works, the dedication of this monastery says a lot about Leufrik and Lady Godiva.
The monastery was built on the ruins of a nunnery destroyed during the invasion of Knut in 1016. Godiva and Leovric, like Knut, were Christians and all seemed to feel the need to atone for the destruction of the period of conflict that brought Knut to the throne. Like Godiva, Leovric is known for his ecumenical gifts, land grants, free taxes, and religious monuments of churches and monasteries. Much of what we know about Lady Godiva and Leovric comes from their charity work for the Church. They were beneficiaries of monasteries in Worcester, Leinster, Chester, Much Wenlock and Evesham. They presented jewellery to decorate statues of the Virgin at St Paul's Cathedral in London. Normans could have taken many valuable gifts after 1066, and many monasteries remained in place until the monasteries disintegrated in the 16th century.
How does all this fit into lady Godiva naked legend on a horse?
We all know about the beautiful English nobleman who rides naked on a horse on the streets of Coventry?
The first description of Lady Godiva ride was in the history of a monk named Roger of Windover in the 13th century. In that story, her husband, Leovrik, unfairly taxed Coventry. lady Godiva was particularly interested in Coventry because she was on the land she inherited, upset her husband to cut taxes. He scolded her, but she was so insistent and angry that he told her that he would give her her wish if she would ride naked around the city. To his surprise, she did so and covered her body only with her long hair, and therefore adhered to his word.
Why would an English earl want his wife, lady Godiva, to ride naked around the city?
Some describe it as an insult, an attempt to humiliate his wife to challenge him, others describe it as a test of her faith and piety, and the piety of coventry people. But it makes us ask the question, has the famous trip really happened? Most historians don't think so, given the lack of a contemporary record and the first novel comes nearly 200 years after the supposed event. But the only thing we know is that if lady Godiva's trip occurred, it certainly wasn't what was described. For example, the claim that she was going to convince her husband to cut taxes makes no sense. Coventry was its land, not its own. In Anglo-Saxon England, women can own the land and were responsible for that land. In short, taxes on what was then Coventry's new and small city were under its control, not its own. It is highly unlikely that her brutal husband will try to humiliate her. In Anglo-Saxon England, it could have divorced it and retained its property.
In short, the description of the 13th century is based on the culture of the 13th century after the Norman conquest rather than the Anglo-Saxon culture where the motive for freedom from the excess taxes described in the 13th century report, for example, is supposed to come from the same era that created the legend of Robin Hood. The middle was self-deprecation and especially the removal of the decorations of wealth, a common way to ask God for forgiveness for sins, and if lady Godiva sought God's forgiveness, taxes might already have been included after all.
In 1041, Knut's son, Harth, became king and did not trust the English Lords, increasing the size of his army and naval forces, requiring a significant and unpopular increase in tax rates, and as a result two tax collectors in Harthaknot were killed by angry citizens in Worcester. In other words, this attack on his authority ordered Harthaknot Leovrik to lift the city. With no choice to challenge the king, Leovric destroyed the town on his land, and the surrounding area was said to have not had a single grain barn. He donated money there for the rest of his life, hoping to preserve his legacy, if lady Godiva humbled him, it is likely to be a atonement for this most terrible event.
Theories about lady Godiva riding a naked horse
There are many theories to explain the ride if it actually happens, some say that nudity may only mean taking off her jewelry and loosening her hair, while others say it was a pagan fertility ritual, while others still suggest that it was just the ritual of the story told by The Enemies of Yverex to embarrass him, but everything that happened or did not happen in the 11th century certainly changed when the story was first written 200 years later, and it continued to happen. For example, over time, the journey became more sexualized with lady Godiva portrayal of being younger and more beautiful. Peeping Tom, a villager who mistook Godiva for the story, was not added to the story, who was found either dead or blind by peeping until the 17th century. Strict divine revenge is placed in the tale. By the 20th century, it was little more than a tickling story for cautious Victorians.
Lady Godiva immortalized
- She has been commemorated in paintings, poetry, cinema, festivals and in a global chocolate brand named after her:
- Theatre and cinema: Lady Godiva's journey at the Coventry Gallery was re-enacted by an actress wearing leather and a dress or sometimes even by a man wearing a wig from the 17th century to the 1960s. In more than a dozen films, including The Three Funnymen, Lady Godiva (2008 film)
- Lady Godiva Festival: Revived as a tradition since the 1990s as part of Coventry Godiva Festival, which is described as the largest free family music festival in the UK.
- Ms. Godiva's painting: English artist John Collier painted a portrait of Ms. Godiva in 1898, located at the Herbert Museum in Coventry, Britain, as a witness to that incident.
- Godiva Chocolate: In 1926, a person named Joseph Darps decided to create a line of Belgian chocolate, and chose a name for his company that fit the timeless values of modern audacity, and found the best example of Ms. Godiva naming his company after her.
It is a very strange legacy for a woman whose historical record often refers to her charitable sincey of the Church. There are often we don't know about them. We don't know when she was born, we don't know when she married Leovrik, and we can only guess when she died, she was in the Great Domesday Poll in 1066 where she still owned her land seven years after Leovric's death, making her one of the few Anglo-Saxon nobles, and very few women to preserve their land after the Norman conquest, which was an achievement in itself but was not in this poll in 1086, which meant that she died somewhere in her own right. between them. Perhaps many say that all you remember is taking off her clothes. The journey may not have happened, and if that happens, it is not for the reasons we seem to be thinking about it. Perhaps she deserves to be remembered for more than just what was hidden under her golden hair.
