Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #284154 in Books
• Published on: 2000-01-30
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 250 pages

Customer Reviews

Historically inaccurate and out of date
I started to read this book with great expectations. However, I was soon sadly disappointed. Almost every page in this book contains historical errors and ridiculous statements. For instance, we are told that Richard of Gloucester (Richard III) had nothing to do with the murder of Henry VI because he had a great regard for Henry, having grown up in his household! This, of course, is a total fantasy. The author also states (in an Appendix) that Henry VI died of "multiple stab wounds". No evidence whatsoever is presented in support of this statement. The author is even incapable of getting basic historical facts straight, such as the number of children of Henry VII. Some errors are quite embarrassing: we learn that Richard III was the only English king that was killed in battle... However, perhaps most upsetting are the outrageous statements about Queen Catherine of Aragon (first wife of Henry VIII). The author informs us that she was promiscuous, had a sexual relationship with a suspect Spanish priest and may have transmitted syphilis to poor Henry!! According to the author, it was Catherines fault that she had numerous miscarriages and early-dead children. Poor Henry was of course not to blame: he was a deeply religious man whom we are asked to symphatize with. The whole chapter on Henry VIII, as well as those on Elizabeth I and Mary I, contains such old-fashioned, out-dated notions and hypotheses that it is almost unbelievable that this book went to print in the year 2000. The medical parts are interesting: the only problem is that you don't know whether they are accurate or not, considering all the flaws in the historical sections of the book.

Readable, if not great history
I'll be honest and say I really enjoyed this book first time around, although having read some of the other Amazon reviews below, I have to agree this is a seriously flawed book.

Starting with Edward the Confessor each king and queen up to Victoria is covered, including Lady Jane Grey, Arthur (son of Richard I, seemingly murdered on King John's orders) and Oliver Cromwell. Each chapter is a potted biography, concentrating mainly on the political aspects, and ending with the events leading up to their death. This makes it more interesting - for example, if the book were only about the death of kings the chapter on Charles I (one of the few with an undisputed cause of death) would read "<> Thud." The longest chapter is twelve pages (Henry VIII) and many are only six or seven pages long so the pace keeps moving along - that makes it really handy if you are reading on public transport.

We're told on the back cover that Brewer has made this "the study of a life time, examining every act of violence and each unpleasant disease with a razor sharp eye for detail".

However, there are two main problems. The first is the quality of the scholarship. Other Amazon reviewers have picked up on particular points about getting names wrong, etc. These don't worry me too much, but if you check the biography you will find there is generally only one referenced source per king or queen and sometimes not even that. This concerns me and is possibly the cause of Brewer (as others have suggested) passing off his own imaginings about a person or event (such as the Battle of Bosworth) as fact. For a doctor trained in a scientific method he sometimes seems to accept the romantic or fail to question things - see, for example, Harold living on after Hastings or Edward II apparently being held down by a heavy door while the red hot poker was inserted per rectum (as doctors say) yet somehow this door didn't leave a mark on his body.

This is compounded by the second problem i.e. the lack of evidence on the medical conditions of many early monarchs. This means some chapters are very long on politics (subject to the problems above) and very short on medical analysis.

To me, the most appropriate way to investigate this would have been through forensic enquiry, listing the symptoms monarch's were said to have suffered, add in information about family history, listed possible causes and then reached a conclusion. A good part of the fun (and education) would have been in the deductive reasoning. The approach used comes over as much more whimsical than this, often not listing symptoms before giving us a judgement on the cause. An alternative would have been to pick out the ten most puzzling and interesting deaths of monarchs and gone into more detail.

Overall, this is an entertaining read but definitely not great history. Despite this it's worth dipping into as long as you don't take it too seriously.

Diagnoses of the Kings and Queens of England
The book is primarily medical rather than historical, but contains some interesting what-if facts concerning the impact of the health of English royalty on history. It is of course true in an exact sense that of the royals considered, Richard III was the only one killed during a battle, which has been an extremely unusual occurence. Fortune surely favours the brave given the survival of Richard I, Henry V and others in front-line combat, Lionheart's eventual shooting smacking rather more of dishonourable assassination. Henry VI was very nearly cured of insanity [and saved from murder] by an arrow-strike in the neck at St Albans, and thereafter "multiple stab wounds" is a perfectly reasonable description of the usual method of terminating a royal in a politically correct manner ie. perforating the GI tract via the anus. Also Henry VIII was as pious in his own way as Fray Diego, his first wife's chaplain, was indiscrete, and one might think at this time syphillis wasn't unknown to sexually voracious Spaniards. Clearly the diagnoses become more exact with the passage of time, and the chapters on William, Mary and Anne I found most interesting. Overall it should be recalled the author was a senior consultant and not a professional historical author.