History Commons^™

Literary Visions Of Edward Ii And Isabella Of France, Dana L. Sample

Institute for the Humanities Theses

The historical Edward II and Isabella of France do not always resemble the literary Edward and Isabella. Chronicles written after their deaths produced romances about their lives that to this day have colored historical scholarship. Other literature in the form of plays and novels have also been responsible for nurturing legends about Edward and Isabella. This thesis examines first the contemporary chronicles and government records in order to establish some facts about the ill-fated king and queen; then it analyzes the romances and the media that produced them, in an effort to test their reliability. Although some of the legends …