Athelstone

Wow! Saw John’s news but didn’t realise Mad was in the longlist too! Flippin’ well done to both of you xx

What lovely news. Congratulations both of you.

Oh wow, BOTH of you? That is just brilliant, I’m so pleased to hear it! A big achievement right there. Congratulations! xx

Here, here. Well done chaps!!!

Thank you, Jane!

Many thanks Jane and Thea! If anyone who has read it could consider leaving a review on Amazon and/or Goodreads, that would be wonderful. Thanks for your review Squidge, delighted you liked it

Congratulations, Jules your book looks fab – I’m looking forward to starting the series! Also, really enjoyed reading about your research, especially re the horses. It made me wonder whether you’d written a short story for the winter challenge that featured a talking horse, but maybe my imagination is running away with me…

Well done, Denizens, what a great concept, am looking forward to reading all the stories.

Thanks, Jim. And I’m so glad you enjoyed the Oath and Crown duology 😊

And the armour would have gone rusty.

Most probably true, Richard. There’s a great youtube video showing people wearing full plate armour doing somersaults. Squires were required to master all the courtly and manly arts – combat, riding, tumbling, swimming, dancing etc – and often practised all of them in full armour. (Well probably not swimming because then there would have been far…[Read more]

I believe I once read that Henry VIII, in his youth, could reputedly vault into the saddle over the horse’s hindquarters while wearing full armour…

I think you’re probably right there, Daed. I doubted my own findings so I consulted a few horsey people (breeders, riders etc) A horse can comfortably carry a third of it’s own weight. You’re average destrier of 15 hands weighed 1200 lbs. So they could comfortably carry 360lbs.
Assuming the average height and weight of a knight was 5’7″ and 150lbs…[Read more]

I wonder if there was a bit of modern extrapolation going on with the notion of destriers being really huge, based on the misconception of the weight of armour? I admit I thought they were vast until I looked into it. If it was thought that armoured knights needed to be winched onto their horses, it would need to be a seriously hefty horse

Thanks, Sandra 🙂 re destriers – apparently the modern shire/ cart/ draught horses are descended from them. Basically they bred some warhorses too big to have enough speed for battle and that’s where the latter great horses come from. I too was surprised to learn that a Medieval warhorse was usually only 15 – 16 hands high. (Apparently I also…[Read more]

Well done, Jules and thanks for the horse breed check list, correcting my belief that a destrier was a sort of fast carthorse. I’m a big fan of Dorothy Dunnett so this will be added to my list.