Content area
Full Text
Gunn Steven. and Monckton Linda., eds. Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales: Life, Death and Commemoration. Woodbridge: Boydell Press, 2009. Pp. xi+193. $95 (cloth).
Poor Arthur Tudor. Along with Prince Henry, the eldest son of James I, he ranks as one of the great “might have beens” of English history. What if he had lived to rule and father children from his high-profile marriage? But he did not live to rule, let alone to father children, dying at age 16 in 1502 (and seven years before his father). So it was the early death of Arthur, as it was of Prince Henry in 1612, that opened the door for a younger brother—and in each case, a younger brother who left a distinctive mark on the subsequent course of English history. Nevertheless, the “might have been factor” is an intriguing one, though these essays have better sense and better professional focus than to let it take over. It turns out that what is really intriguing—and a bit of a surprise—is how little we actually know about Arthur, marginalized by the volume's editors in pithy fashion as “the forgotten prince.”
These ten essays were organized to accompany a 2002 reenactment (on its 500th anniversary) of the burial of Arthur in Worcester Cathedral (and as told by Julian Litten, one of its organizers). The essays fall into three groupings: those covering what we actually know about the...