In the Wake of the Plague: The Black Death and the World it Made by Norman F. Cantor
I had some problems with this book, historically speaking, from the very beginning. It irritated me enough that I put the book down while reading chapter 3 and read something else. But, being the history geek that I am, I eventually went back to it.
Some examples:
The rest of the Plantagenet family now coalesced slowly around the duke of York, descended from Edward III’s fourth son, Edmund of Langley (57).
Ummmm, what about Lionel of Antwerp? The second son of Edward III to survive long enough to produce heirs? The last time I looked at a genealogy, Richard of York was descended from him, too. As demonstrated below:
And, anyway, Richard II’s heir wasn’t the Duke of York, but the Earl of March. Richard of York wasn’t even born yet. He was, in fact, just 5 years old when he inherited his duchy when his uncle, Duke Edward, was killed at Agincourt.
According to Lancastrian propaganda at the time Henry IV overthrew and assassinated Richard II, the House of Lancaster was the senior branch of the Plantagenet dynasty because Edmund of Lancaster was actually older than his brother, Edward I. Demonstrably untrue:
It was the long, seemingly interminable civil war between Lancaster and York factions . . . in the 1440s and 1450s . . . (57).
Okay, the first battle of the Wars of the Roses was at Saint Albans, which wasn’t until 1455. The Wars of the Roses lasted from 1455 until 1461, when Edward IV took the throne, then resumed in 1470 and 1471 (this is the period when the Earl of Warwick switched sides), and ended at Bosworth Field in 1485. For more information go here: Wars of the Roses.
See what I mean?
The rest of the book was okay, but my enjoyment was curtailed by my lingering annoyance.
Rating: 2.5 out of 5 stars
