VII. Fair Rosamond. ..................................................................................................
Most of the circumstances in this popular story of King Henry II. and the
beautiful Rosamond have been taken for fact by our English historians; who, unable
to account for the unnatural conduct of Queen Eleanor in stimulating her sons to
rebellion, have attributed it to jealousy, and supposed that Henry's amour with
Rosamond was the object of that passion.
Our old English annalists seem, most of them, to have followed Higden the
monk of Chester, whose account, with some enlargements, is thus given by Stow.
"Rosamond, the fayre daughter of Walter Lord Clifford, concubine to Henry II.
(poisoned by Queen Eleanor, as some thought) dyed at Woodstocke [A.D. 1177]
where King Henry had made for her a house of wonderfull working; so that no man or
woman might come to her, but he that was instructed by the king, or such as were
right secret with him touching the matter. This house after some was named
Labyrinthus, or Dedalus worke, which was wrought like unto a knot in a garden,
called a Maze;[1] but it was commonly said, that lastly the queen came to her by a
clue of thridde, or silke, and so dealt with her, that she lived not long after: but when
she was dead, she was buried at Godstow, in an house of nunnes beside Oxford, with
these verses upon her tombe
HIC JACET IN TUMBA, ROSA MUNDI, NON ROSA MUNDA:
NON REDOLET, SED OLET, QUÆ REDOLERE SOLET.In English thus:
"The rose of the world, but not the cleane flowre,
Is now here graven; to whom beauty was lent:
In this grave full darke nowe is her bowre,
That by her life was sweet and redolent:
But now that she is from this life blent,
Though she were sweets, now foully doth she stinke.
A mirrour good for all men, that on her thinke."
Stow's Annals, ed. 1631, p. 154.
How the queen gained admittance into Rosamond's bower is differently
related. Holinshed speaks of it, as "the common report of the people, that the queene.
.. founde hir out by a silken thread, which the king had drawne after him out of hir
chamber with his foot, and dealt with hir in such sharpe and cruell wise, that she lived
not long after." Vol. iii. p. 115. On the other hand in Speede's Hist. we are told that
the jealous queen found her out "by a clew of silke, fallen from Rosamond's lappe, as
shee sate to take are, and suddenly fleeing from the sight of the searcher, the end of
her silke fastened to her foot, and the clew still unwinding, remained behinde: which
the queene followed, till shee had found what she sought, and upon Rosamond so
vented her spleene, as the lady lived not long after." 3d. edit. p. 509. Our ballad-
maker, with more ingenuity, and probably as much truth, tells us the clue was gained
by surprise, from the knight, who was left to guard her bower.
It is observable, that none of the old writers attribute Rosamond's death to
poison (Stowe, above, mentions it merely as a slight conjecture); they only give us to
understand, that the queen treated her harshly; with furious menaces, we may
suppose, and sharp expostulations, which had such an effect on her spirits, that she
did not long survive it. Indeed on her tomb-stone, as we learn from a person of
credit,[2] among other fine sculptures, was engraven the figure of acup. This, which