Who was the real Lady Godiva?

hi on the history guide I have a degree in history and I love history and if you love history too this is the channel for you we don't know a lot about the life of individual women in medieval England we know that life was harsh that there were few options for women of any social strata in medieval England that women were considered important enough to generally make the historical record and yet there is one 11th century Coventry noblewoman whose name is known throughout the world and the thing is virtually everything you think you know about her is wildly inaccurate and so today the history guy is going to try to delve into the Forgotten real history of the world's most famous horseback ride the old english name Cagiva means gift of God and was a recently common name for women in medieval England the latinized version of the name is Godiva the woman the world knows as Lady Godiva was the countess of Murcia wife of Leofric the Earl of Mercia we don't know the exact dates of her birth or death but there are records if she and her husband's axe in the middle of the 11th century she was independently wealthy holding property that she had inherited from her father to understand the world of Lady Godiva we have to understand the context of English politics at the time in the first decade of the 11th century Spain pork beard the King of Denmark carried on a campaign against England forcing English King Ethelred the unready and his sons to flee into exile Spain was made King of England on Christmas Day 1013 but died only a few weeks later as the result of a fall from a horse Spain's oldest son harold ii became the new king of denmark but the vikings who had just defeated ever red but it retains younger son Knut to be the new king of England but the Lords of England saw vanes death as an opportunity fo red was recalled from exile and the English drove Knut in his army from England however Knut returned the next year with a substantial fleet including Vikings from all over Scandinavia Knut finally defeated the English army at the Battle of a sin dune in October of 1016 after the death of ethelred's son Edmund Ironside in November Knut the great was crowned king of Old England can you ruled England for just short of 20 years and with the help of the English he eventually came to rule Denmark Norway and much of Sweden as well in what was called the North Sea Empire as he protected England from the Viking raids have been devastating England since the ninth century even prospered under Knut and he is considered one of the greatest of the anglo-saxon Kings in his early reign he spent a deal of time eliminating challenges to his rule and purging and executing people he did not trust one of those purges had to do with the earldom of Mercia formerly a kingdom in the English Midlands sometime between 1017 and 10:23 Knut executed the former Earl and gave the earldom to a member of one of the leading anglo-saxon families of the region the new Earl was Leofric as Earl of Mercia Leofric was one of the most powerful rulers of England and he was certainly a skilled politician keeping his position and his head for nearly 40 years through the reins of Knut to Knut sons and into the period where the Wessex dynasty was restored with the reign of ethelred's son Edward the Confessor it is not clear when Lea Frick and Godiva married we know that she outlived him and it may have been a second marriage for both of them at least one twelfth century record records that she was a widow when they married the earliest known mention of them as a couple has to do with the endowment of a Benedictine monastery in Coventry in 10:43 and while Neil fricken Godiva were recorded with many such acts of charity the dedication of that monastery says much about via Frick Godiva in the period the Munster was built on the ruins of a nunnery that had been destroyed during Canute's invasion in 1016 Godiva Lea Frick like canoed were Christians and all seem to have felt the need to atone for the destruction of the period of conflict that brought Knut to the throne Knut liked Godiva and Lea Frick was well known for his ecumenical gifts giving lands freedom for taxes and religious relics to churches and monasteries much of what we know about Godiva and Lea Frank comes from their charity to the church they were benefactors of monasteries in Worcester Leinster Chester Much Wenlock and evesham they gave jewelry to adorn statues of the Virgin at st. Paul's Cathedral in London many of the valuable gifts would have been taken by the Normans after 1066 many of the monasteries stood until the dissolution of the monasteries in the 16th century but how does this all fit with a legend that we all know of the beautiful English noblewoman riding naked through the streets of Coventry the first description of Godiva's ride was in a history written by a monk named Roger wind over in the 13th century in that story her husband Lea Frick had levied oppressed taxes on the city of Coventry Godiva particularly interested in Coventry since it was on land that she inherited pestered her husband to reduce the taxes he rebuked her but she was persistent and so exasperated he told her that he would grant her wish if she would ride naked through the town to his surprise she did covered only by her long hair and he therefore kept his word but why would an English Earl want his wife riding naked through town some describe it as an insult an attempt to humiliate his wife or challenge Emma others describe it as a test of faith testing both her piety and willingness to supplant herself before God in the piety of the people of Coventry but it begs the question did the famous ride actually occur most historians think not owing to the fact that there is no contemporary record and the first account comes nearly 200 years after the supposed event but one thing we do know if lady Godiva's ride did occur it was almost certainly not as described for example the claim that she was writing to convince her husband to reduce taxes makes no sense Coventry was her land not his in anglo-saxon England a woman could own land and was in charge of that land in short taxes over what was then the new and small town of Coventry were hers to control not his it is highly unlikely that her brutal Lord would have tried to humiliate her in anglo-saxon England she could divorce him even an Earl and still keep her property in short the 13th century description is grounded in 13th century culture following the Norman Conquest rather than the anglo-saxon culture where it supposedly occurred the motivation of freedom from excessive taxes described in the 13th century account for example came from the same era that created the legend of Robin Hood rather if the Countess of Murcia rode naked through Coventry it was far more likely that the motivation was much different it was much more likely an act of penance in medieval culture self debasement especially the removal of the trappings of wealth was a common way to seek forgiveness by God for sins and if Lady Godiva was seeking God's forgiveness taxes may actually have been involved after all in 1041 Knut son Arthur Knut had become King not trusting the English Lords he increased the size of his army and navy requiring a significant and highly unpopular increase in tax rates as a result two of hearthat Canute's tax collectors were overwhelmed and killed by angry citizens in the town of Worcester in sense that this attack on his authority karthick an orderly effect to raise the tower with no choice to defy the king Leofric destroyed the tower which was on his own land in the surrounding area leaving it was said not one grain barn standing he donated money there the rest of his life hoping to preserve his legacy if Lady Godiva humbled herself before God it was most likely in penance for that most terrible event there are many theories to explain the ride if in fact it even occurred some say that naked might only have meant taking off her jewelry and letting down her hair others say it was a pagan fertility ritual and still others suggest that it was just a story told by lyrics enemies to embarrass him but whatever happened or did not happen in the 11th century was most certainly transformed when the story was first written down 200 years later and that has continued to occur for example over time the ride has become much more sexualized with the portrayal of Lady Godiva being younger and more beautiful the story of peeping tom one villager who looked and who depending upon the story was either struck dead or blind for peeping wasn't added until the 17th century Puritan spin of divine retribution put into the tale by the 1900s it was a little more than a titillating tale four prudish Victorians the right has been re-enacted tongue-in-cheek in the Coventry Fair usually portrayed by a an actress in skins and clad dress or sometimes even by a man in the wig between the 1600s all the way to the 1960s and the tradition has been revived since the 1990s as part of Coventry Godiva festival which is billed as the largest free family music festival in the UK she's been commemorated in portraits in poetry famously by Lord Tennyson in song in more than a dozen films one of which included the Three Stooges in chocolate it is all a very odd legacy for a woman for whom the historical record mostly notes her charity to the church there's so much we don't know about her we don't know when she was born we don't know when she married Lea Frick we can only guess it when she died she was in the great Domesday survey in 1066 is still owning her land seven years after lyrics death and making her one of the few anglo-saxon Nobles and very few women to maintain their lands after the Norman Conquest which was an achievement in herself but she was not in that survey in 1086 meaning that she died somewhere in between and it perhaps says more about us than her that all she's remembered for is taking off her clothes the right might not even have happen and if it did it's not for the reasons that we seem to think and maybe she deserves to be remembered for more than just what was hidden under her golden hair I'm history I hope you enjoyed this edition my series five minutes of history short snippets of forgotten history five to ten minutes long and if you did enjoy please go ahead and click that thumbs up button which is there on the left if you have any questions or comments feel free to write those in the comment section I'll be happy to respond if you'd like five minutes more forgotten history all you need to do is subscribe [Music]

Channel: The History Guy: History Deserves to Be Remembered

Views: 730,381

Rating: 4.927804 out of 5

Keywords: history, the history guy, godiva, coventry, great britain, world history, history guy

Id: gOqJzcsXGvo

Length: 9min 47sec (587 seconds)

Published: Tue Mar 06 2018