Overview

Studies the manifestations of Edward the Black Prince in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. During the Georgian and Victorian periods, the fourteenth-century hero Edward the Black Prince became an object of cultural fascination and celebration; he and his battles played an important part in a wider reimagining of the British as a martial people, reinforced by an interest in chivalric character and a burgeoning nationalism. Drawing on a wealth of literature, histories, drama, art and material culture, this book explores the uses of Edward'simage in debates about politics, character, war and empire, assessing the contradictory meanings ascribed to the late Middle Ages by groups ranging from royals to radicals. It makes a special claim for the importance of the fourteenth century as a time of heroic virtues, chivalric escapades, royal power and parliamentary development, adding to a growing literature on Georgian uses of the past by exposing an active royal and popular investment in the medieval. Disputing current assumptions that the Middle Ages represented a romanticized and unproblematic past, it shows how this investment was increasingly contested in the Victorian era. Barbara Gribling is an Honorary Fellow in Modern British History at Durham University.

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9780861933426

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[A] fine study of an oddly neglected figure and a provocative template for future such work on the reception of historical figures. SPECULUM Gribling's work develops a further understanding of what medievalism and national identity meant to royal and popular audiences alike in the long nineteenth century (and beyond). In the end, The Image of the Black Prince draws new attention to the complicated views the Georgians and the Victorians had of the medieval period and the ways it could be used to depict and critique power, chivalry, and conduct. MEDIEVALLY SPEAKING

Gribling's work develops a further understanding of what medievalism and national identity meant to royal and popular audiences alike in the long nineteenth century (and beyond). In the end, The Image of the Black Prince draws new attention to the complicated views the Georgians and the Victorians had of the medieval period and the ways it could be used to depict and critique power, chivalry, and conduct. MEDIEVALLY SPEAKING

[A] fine study of an oddly neglected figure and a provocative template for future such work on the reception of historical figures. * SPECULUM * Gribling's work develops a further understanding of what medievalism and national identity meant to royal and popular audiences alike in the long nineteenth century (and beyond). In the end, The Image of the Black Prince draws new attention to the complicated views the Georgians and the Victorians had of the medieval period and the ways it could be used to depict and critique power, chivalry, and conduct. * MEDIEVALLY SPEAKING *

Author Information

Barbara Gribling is a Junior Research Fellow in the Department of History at Durham University. Barbara Gribling is a Junior Research Fellow in the Department of History at Durham University.

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