Friday, April 29, 2011

Question from Mer - Festivities of Arthur and Catherine of Aragon's wedding

I just saw an article on the most expensive royal weddings, and amidst them was a Tudor celebration. Where can I find more info on the wedding festivities of Arthur and Catherine of Aragon in 1501?

2 comments:

Foose said...

I think the standard source is The Receyt of the Ladie Kateryne, which details the pageants and other festivities prepared for the wedding. An edition was published in the 1990s, edited by Gordon Kipling. It's written in period English, so you might prefer the detailed descriptions provided in David Starkey's Six Wives.

Foose said...

Julia Fox's new book on Catherine of Aragon and her sister Juana, Sister Queens, contains some very interesting descriptions of the pageants presented for Arthur's wedding. Her notes for that chapter cite The Receyt, Mattingly's classic Catherine of Aragon, Sydney Anglo's standard reference work Spectacle, Pageantry and Early Tudor Policy, the Great Chronicle of London (1893) and Chronicles of London (1905), as well as Starkey's works.