Hi I’m the History Guy, I have a degree in history and I love
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We don't know a lot about the life of individual women in medieval England. We know that life was
harsh, that there were few options for women of any social strata in medieval England,
that women weren't considered important enough to generally make the historical record,
and yet there is one 11th century Coventry noblewoman whose name is known throughout
the world, and the thing is, virtually everything you think you know about her,
is wildly inaccurate and so today, the History Guy is going to try to delve into the Forgotten real
history of the world's most famous horseback ride. The old English name Godgifu, means gift of God,
and was a recently common name for women in medieval England. The latinized version of
the name is Godiva. The woman the world knows as Lady Godiva was the Countess of Murcia,
wife of Leofric the Earl of Mercia. We don't know the exact dates of her birth or death
but there are records of her and her husband's acts in the middle of the 11th century. She was
independently wealthy, holding property that she had inherited from her father. To understand the
world of Lady Godiva, we have to understand the context of English politics at the time.
In the first decade of the 11th century Sweyn Forkbeard, the King of Denmark,
carried on a campaign against England, forcing English King Ethelred the Unready and his sons
to flee into exile. Sweyn was made King of England on Christmas Day 1013, but died only
a few weeks later as the result of a fall from a horse. Sweyns oldest son, Harald II, became the
new King of Denmark but the vikings, who had just defeated Ethelred voted for Sweyns younger son,
Cnut, to be the new King of England. But the Lords of England saw Sweyns death as an opportunity,
Ethelred was recalled from exile and the English drove Cnut in his army from England. However, Cnut
returned the next year with a substantial fleet including Vikings from all over Scandinavia. Cnut
finally defeated the English army at the Battle of Assandun in October of 1016. After the death of
Ethelred's son, Edmund Ironside in November, Cnut the Great was crowned King of All England. Cnut
ruled England for just short of 20 years and with the help of the English, he eventually came to
rule Denmark, Norway, and much of Sweden as well in what was called the North Sea Empire. As he
protected England from the Viking raids that had been devastating England since the ninth century,
England prospered under Cnut, and he is considered one of the greatest of the Anglo-saxon Kings.
In his early reign, he spent a deal of time eliminating challenges to his rule and purging
and executing people he did not trust. One of those purges had to do with the Earldom
of Mercia, formerly a kingdom in the English Midlands. Sometime between 1017 and 1023,
Cnut executed the former Earl and gave the Earldom to a member of one of the leading
Anglo-saxon families of the region. The new Earl was Leofric. As Earl of Mercia,
Leofric was one of the most powerful rulers of England and he was certainly a skilled politician,
keeping his position and his head for nearly 40 years through the reins of Cnut, two of Cnut sons,
and into the period where the Wessex dynasty was restored with the reign of Ethelred's son Edward
the Confessor. It is not clear when Leofrick and Godiva married. We know that she outlived him,
and it may have been a second marriage for both of them. At least one twelfth century record records
that she was a widow when they married. The earliest known mention of them as a couple has to
do with the endowment of a Benedictine monastery in Coventry in 1043 and while Leofric and Godiva
were recorded with many such acts of charity, the dedication of that monastery says much about
Leofrick, Godiva and the period. The monastery was built on the ruins of a nunnery that had
been destroyed during Knut's invasion in 1016. Godiva and Leofric, like Cnut, were Christians
and all seem to have felt the need to atone for the destruction of the period of conflict that
brought Cnut to the throne. Cnut, like Godiva and Leofrick was well known for his ecumenical gifts,
giving lands, freedom for taxes and religious relics to churches and monasteries. Much of what
we know about Godiva and Leofrick comes from their charity to the church. They were benefactors of
monasteries in Worcester, Leinster, Chester, Much Wenlockc and Evesham. They gave jewelry to adorn
statues of the Virgin at St. Paul's Cathedral in London. Many of the valuable gifts would
have been taken by the Normans after 1066, many of the monasteries stood until the dissolution
of the monasteries in the 16th century. But how does this all fit with a legend that
we all know of the beautiful English noblewoman riding naked through the streets of Coventry?
The first description of Godiva's ride was in a history written by a monk named Roger of Wendover
in the 13th century. In that story, her husband Leofrick had levied oppressed taxes on the city
of Coventry. Godiva, particularly interested in Coventry since it was on land that she inherited,
pestered her husband to reduce the taxes. He rebuked her but she was persistent and
so exasperated he told her that he would grant her wish if she would ride naked through the
town. To his surprise, she did, covered only by her long hair, and he therefore kept his word.
But why would an English Earl want his wife riding naked through town? Some describe it as an insult,
an attempt to humiliate his wife for challenging him, others describe it as a test of faith
testing both her piety and willingness to supplant herself before God, and the
piety of the people of Coventry. But it begs the question... did the famous ride actually occur?
Most historians think not, owing to the fact that there is no contemporary record and the
first account comes nearly 200 years after the supposed event. But one thing we do know, if Lady
Godiva's ride did occur, it was almost certainly not as described. For example the claim that she
was riding to convince her husband to reduce taxes makes no sense. Coventry was her land,
not his. In Anglo-saxon England, a woman could own land and was in charge of that land. In short,
taxes over what was then the new and small town of Coventry were hers to control,
not his. It is highly unlikely that her brutal Lord would have tried to humiliate her. In
Anglo-saxon England she could divorce him, even an Earl, and still keep her property. In short,
the 13th century description is grounded in 13th century culture following the Norman Conquest
rather than the Anglo-saxon culture where it supposedly occurred. The motivation of freedom
from excessive taxes described in the 13th century account, for example, came from the same era that
created the legend of Robin Hood. Rather, if the Countess of Mercia rode naked through Coventry,
it was far more likely that the motivation was much different, it was much more likely an act
of penance. In medieval culture self debasement, especially the removal of the trappings of wealth,
was a common way to seek forgiveness by God for sins, and if Lady Godiva was seeking God's
forgiveness, taxes may actually have been involved after all. In 1041 Cnut's son, Harthacnut had
become King. Not trusting the English Lords, he increased the size of his army and navy requiring
a significant and highly unpopular increase in tax rates, as a result two of Harthacnut's tax
collectors were overwhelmed and killed by angry citizens in the town of Worcester. In sense that
this attack on his authority Harthacnut ordered Leofrick to raise the town. With no choice to defy
the King, Leofric destroyed the town, which was on his own land and the surrounding area leaving
it was said not one grain barn standing. He donated money there the rest of his life,
hoping to preserve his legacy, if Lady Godiva humbled herself before God, it was most
likely in penance for that most terrible event. There are many theories to explain the ride if in
fact it even occurred, some say that naked might only have meant taking off her jewelry and letting
down her hair, others say it was a pagan fertility ritual and still others suggest that it was just a
story told by Leofrics enemies to embarrass him, but whatever happened or did not happen in the
11th century was most certainly transformed when the story was first written down 200 years later,
and that has continued to occur. For example, over time the ride has become much more sexualized with
the portrayals of Lady Godiva being younger and more beautiful. The story of Peeping Tom,
one villager who looked and who depending upon the story, was either struck dead or blind for
peeping, wasn't added until the 17th century. Puritan spin of divine retribution put into the
tale. By the 1900s it was a little more than a titillating tale for prudish Victorians. The
ride has been re-enacted tongue-in-cheek in the Coventry Fair usually portrayed by an actress in
skins and clad dress or sometimes even by a man in the wig between the 1600s all the way to the
1960s and the tradition has been revived since the 1990s as part of Coventry Godiva festival which is
billed as the largest free family music festival in the UK. She's been commemorated in portraits,
in poetry, famously by Lord Tennyson, in song, in more than a dozen films one of which included the
Three Stooges, in chocolate. It is all a very odd legacy for a woman for whom the historical record
mostly notes her charity to the church. There's so much we don't know about her. We don't know
when she was born, we don't know when she married Leofric, we can only guess at when she died, she
was in the great Domesday survey in 1066 as still owning her land seven years after Leofrics death,
and making her one of the few Anglo-saxon Nobles, and very few women to maintain their lands after
the Norman Conquest, which was an achievement in herself but she was not in that survey in 1086,
meaning that she died somewhere in between. And it perhaps says more about us, than her,
that all she's remembered for is taking off her clothes. The ride might not even have
happened and if it did, it's not for the reasons that we seem to think. And maybe
she deserves to be remembered for more than just what was hidden under her golden hair.
I'm the history guy, I hope you enjoyed this edition of my channel,
5 minutes of history, short snippets of forgotten history 5 to 10 minutes long.
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