deformity, and even his enemies agreed that he demonstrated considerable prowess on the battlefield. Clearly, then, Richard was not sufficiently impaired to be unable to use his weapons or control his horse, and it is quite possible that More was participating in some propaganda, playing on the medieval belief that a twisted mind must dwell in a twisted body.
In his play Shakespeare has Richard maligned as a ‘wretched, bloody and usurping boar’. Here he is basing his portrayal on the king’s heraldic device of a boar passant argent . A contemporary satirist called William Collingborne also alluded to this nickname when he penned a little ditty that included the lines:
The Cat, the Rat, and Lovel our Dogge,
Rules all England under an Hogge.
The first three animals refer to contemporary nobles. ‘Hogge’ was clearly a none-too-complimentary reference to the king, and for this clumsy piece of doggerel Collingborne paid with his life.
Boleslav the Crooked-Mouthed
Boleslav III, prince of Poland, 1085–1138
Boleslav ‘Krzywousty’ heroically defended Silesia against German invasion, and his heavy defeat of the imperial forces in 1109 must have left a big grin on the royal asymmetric jaw. His rivalry with his brother Zbigniew gave him little reason to smile, however. Terrified that he might stage a coup, Boleslav had Zbigniew blinded. Tragically, his henchmen did such a careless job that Zbigniew died of his wounds.
Christian the Cruel see Christian the TYRANT
Henry the Cruel
Henry VI, king of Germany, 1165–97
Cold and calculating, mean-spirited and money-grabbing, Henry was considered one of the cruellest men in what were cruel times. His successful invasion of Sicily, financed by the huge ransom he exacted for the release of his prize prisoner Richard the LIONHEART , might have been enough to earn him the nickname ‘the Conqueror’. However, history remembers him as ‘the Cruel’, perhaps for his blinding and castration of Sicily’s four-year-old King William, possibly for his desecration of the corpses of Tancred and Roger the GREAT COUNT (see the SONS OF TANCRED ), two of the island’s former leaders, but mostly probably for the merciless vengeance he took on the ringleaders of a failed coup against him in May 1197.
Peter the Cruel
Peter I, king of Portugal, 1320–67
Peter was a popular king who liked to dance in the streets with his people and whose love affair with his ‘mistress’ Ines de Castro became the subject of legend and poetry. When he learned that Ines had been murdered on the orders of his father Alfonso the FIERCE , his twin nicknames of‘the Just’ and ‘the Cruel’ proved especially apt. Two of the assassins, who were found hiding in the lands of his namesake ‘Peter the Cruel’ of Castile, were brought back to Portugal and summarily executed by having their hearts ripped out, one through his chest, the other through his back.
Peter then publicly revealed that he had been secretly married to Ines for a number of years, and commanded, somewhat grotesquely, that her body should be exhumed and translated to a sumptuous tomb at Alcobaca where all were solemnly to acknowledge her as queen.
Crum-Hell see NOSE ALMIGHTY
Sigurd the Crusader
Sigurd I, king of Norway, c.1089–1130
In 1099 Sigurd’s father, Magnus BARELEGS , left him in charge of the southern Hebrides and the Isle of Man and headed back to Norway. Three years later Magnus returned to Britain and, in order to consolidate his territories, arranged a marriage between Sigurd and Blathmina, the daughter of the Irish high king. Sigurd was thirteen, Blathmina five. The following year Magnus died and the young couple returned to Sigurd’s homeland. Only then did his crusading really begin.
According to the medieval Icelandic historian Snorri Sturlu-son, Sigurd set sail on a crusade to Jerusalem, fighting and defeating the ‘heathen’ along the way. One of his most famous exploits was the capture of a seemingly
In his play Shakespeare has Richard maligned as a ‘wretched, bloody and usurping boar’. Here he is basing his portrayal on the king’s heraldic device of a boar passant argent . A contemporary satirist called William Collingborne also alluded to this nickname when he penned a little ditty that included the lines:
The Cat, the Rat, and Lovel our Dogge,
Rules all England under an Hogge.
The first three animals refer to contemporary nobles. ‘Hogge’ was clearly a none-too-complimentary reference to the king, and for this clumsy piece of doggerel Collingborne paid with his life.
Boleslav the Crooked-Mouthed
Boleslav III, prince of Poland, 1085–1138
Boleslav ‘Krzywousty’ heroically defended Silesia against German invasion, and his heavy defeat of the imperial forces in 1109 must have left a big grin on the royal asymmetric jaw. His rivalry with his brother Zbigniew gave him little reason to smile, however. Terrified that he might stage a coup, Boleslav had Zbigniew blinded. Tragically, his henchmen did such a careless job that Zbigniew died of his wounds.
Christian the Cruel see Christian the TYRANT
Henry the Cruel
Henry VI, king of Germany, 1165–97
Cold and calculating, mean-spirited and money-grabbing, Henry was considered one of the cruellest men in what were cruel times. His successful invasion of Sicily, financed by the huge ransom he exacted for the release of his prize prisoner Richard the LIONHEART , might have been enough to earn him the nickname ‘the Conqueror’. However, history remembers him as ‘the Cruel’, perhaps for his blinding and castration of Sicily’s four-year-old King William, possibly for his desecration of the corpses of Tancred and Roger the GREAT COUNT (see the SONS OF TANCRED ), two of the island’s former leaders, but mostly probably for the merciless vengeance he took on the ringleaders of a failed coup against him in May 1197.
Peter the Cruel
Peter I, king of Portugal, 1320–67
Peter was a popular king who liked to dance in the streets with his people and whose love affair with his ‘mistress’ Ines de Castro became the subject of legend and poetry. When he learned that Ines had been murdered on the orders of his father Alfonso the FIERCE , his twin nicknames of‘the Just’ and ‘the Cruel’ proved especially apt. Two of the assassins, who were found hiding in the lands of his namesake ‘Peter the Cruel’ of Castile, were brought back to Portugal and summarily executed by having their hearts ripped out, one through his chest, the other through his back.
Peter then publicly revealed that he had been secretly married to Ines for a number of years, and commanded, somewhat grotesquely, that her body should be exhumed and translated to a sumptuous tomb at Alcobaca where all were solemnly to acknowledge her as queen.
Crum-Hell see NOSE ALMIGHTY
Sigurd the Crusader
Sigurd I, king of Norway, c.1089–1130
In 1099 Sigurd’s father, Magnus BARELEGS , left him in charge of the southern Hebrides and the Isle of Man and headed back to Norway. Three years later Magnus returned to Britain and, in order to consolidate his territories, arranged a marriage between Sigurd and Blathmina, the daughter of the Irish high king. Sigurd was thirteen, Blathmina five. The following year Magnus died and the young couple returned to Sigurd’s homeland. Only then did his crusading really begin.
According to the medieval Icelandic historian Snorri Sturlu-son, Sigurd set sail on a crusade to Jerusalem, fighting and defeating the ‘heathen’ along the way. One of his most famous exploits was the capture of a seemingly
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