Sir Guy of Gisbourne. A Medieval Assassin.

 

Sir Guy of Gisbourne. A Medieval Assassin.

 

In early legends of Robin Hood, Guy of Gisbourne is an assassin who tries to kill Robin, only for Robin to kill him. In these accounts, Guy is depicted wearing a robe made of horse hide, “topp and tayll and mayne.”  So very distinctive! As horse leather is also tough and hard-wearing, an assassin out in all weathers would find it useful.

 

In later stories, Guy is shown as keen to woo and win Maid Marian, but it is the assassin aspect of his character that intrigues me. In the west, the most famous assassins were those of the order of assassins, the Hashishiyun. Founded in the late eleventh century by the Persian Hasan as-Sabah, the order of the assassins soon became notorious for their obedience to their master and their deterination to kill their opponents, whatever the personal cost. It was believed that to aid their goals, the assassins would use drugs such as hashish (cannabis) to make them utterly fearless and ruthless.

 

Site of Alamut Castle in Iran

The Assassins were Shia Muslims and many of their killings took place within the Islamic kingdom to remove political and religious enemies. From his stronghold in Alamut Castle in Persia (Iran) the Grand Master of the Order, who became known as The Old Man of the Mountain, sent out his deadly emissaries. They killed by dagger, poison or arrows and murdered many men, including three caliphs and the King of Jerusalem, Conrad of Montferrat. Saladin, the Kurdish Sunni who fought against the crusaders, was twice targeted by the Assassins, who failed each time. After the second attempt, the Old Man of the Mountain and Saladin appear to have come to terms.

 

Nevertheless, the Assassins were feared. As an unknown poet of the middle ages said, “By a single warrior on foot, a king may be struck with terror, though he may own more than 100,000 horsemen.”

 

I have an assassination attempt in my romance, “The Snow Bride,” and have included an excerpt.

 

Excerpt.          

 

He heard a faint click and creak behind him and knew at once it was a bow and arrow being readied and aimed. There was no game in the wastes and thickets of hazel ahead, so he must be the target.

Before he completed his conscious thought, he had reacted, dragging his left foot out of its stirrup and head-butting down into the snow, not considering the speed of his cantering horse or where he might land. Snow-crusted brambles snagged and broke his fall, and as he urged his flailing limbs to roll away, he felt the vane of the arrow score the top of his shoulder, where the middle of his back would have been.

“Magnus’s! Areee yeee weeeeelllll?”  

Gregory Denzil’s question crawled from his mouth as the world about Magnus slowed into thick honey. As his jaw crunched against a branch and threatened to loosen more teeth, he felt a trickle of blood run into his eye.

He compelled his sluggish body to sit up, a devil caught in a thicket. He knew he would make that picture, and he grinned, raising an arm to his men and yelling, “Hola! What a ride!”

Denzil and his mob nudged their horses closer. Mark had already leapt from his own with his hunting spear aimed at Denzil's throat. Magnus stood up, cursing with all the oaths of Outremer he could remember, and looked around him. His own men were honestly puzzled, while Denzil's wore expressions of studied innocence.

“Not a good time for archery practice,” he said. All good fun, all men together.

Denzil smiled thinly. “A fool, too eager for sport.”

“Indeed.” As an assassination attempt, Magnus rated it as poor to moderate, but Gregory Denzil had always been lazy. And in the clustered mass of hunters, he saw no skinny stranger with distinctive rings.

“Time to go on?” he asked, knowing if he suggested it, Denzil would say the opposite, which he did.

“We go back.”

 

 

 

The Snow Bride: To buy on Amazon https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07VSHHX4N

 

 

A Medieval Summer

A Medieval Summer - by Lindsay Townsend

 

 

Summer for people in the Middle Ages was both very busy and a time of relaxation and pleasure. After the hard graft of winter and spring, May was a holiday month in early summer, with few tasks in the agricultural calendar. May Day, a blend of Christian and older pagan traditions, was celebrated by everyone, with dancing, revels and drink.

Later summer was a harder task-master: if a peasant worked on the land, later summer was when the sheep were sheared, then the hay and wheat harvests were gathered in. Summer, too, was often the prime time for miltary activity, when knights might be called to fight for their overlord or king on campaign. However, even in these months there was merry-making. Midsummer was marked by bonfires, a pagan ‘left-over’ from the earlier festival of Beltane and celebrated in the Middle Ages as the saint’s day of St John. Young couples would sometimes leap over the midsummer bonfire for luck. Wells could also be dressed with flowers around this time – a relic of earlier water-spirit worship.

July was marked by St Swithin’s day, when the strewings in the churches would be changed from the winter rushes and straw to the summer hay and sedges, and August saw the feast time of Lammas – loaf mass – to give thanks for the hard-won harvest.

 

 

I often use the seasons, and the folklore and symbols attached to these, as ways to point out contrasts in my stories. So in “The Snow Bride” I have the harshness of winter set against my heroine and hero’s dreams of summer – a clue to their developing feelings and relationship.

                                                                                                                                                                      

 As part of Christmas in July, here is an excerpt.

Excerpt

                                                               

They plodded another mile, then Magnus admitted they should stop. Even on the old west road, which they had stumbled onto at midnight, going was onerous. The horses were weary, heads down, stumbling, their hooves covered in snow. When the snow turned to a biting sleet, everyone had endured enough.

          Before him Elfrida was silent, uncomplaining, though God knew she must be chilled and weary. It was she who noticed the forester's hut, set back from the road behind a holly tree. She tapped his arm to alert him and he called orders to the others, his voice cracking in the cold.

          The forester, whoever he had been, had abandoned the hut, but it was just big enough for them all. Magnus knocked out a panel of wattle to enlarge the door and they brought the horses in.

          While he made a fire just inside the doorway Elfrida slipped off into the darkness. When she returned the men had bedded down and were chewing whatever rations they had with them. Magnus patted a lump in the floor beside him, close to the fire, and she lay down without a sound.

          Magnus rose and put what remained of the door back across the threshold as a barrier and wind-break. Checking it was secure, he knocked the snow off his cloak and stretched out again beside Elfrida. As soon as he closed his eyes he slept, and dreamed.

 

          It was summer and he was in a pleasure garden. Protected by a stout stone wall, it was bordered by fruit trees and ripening vines and filled with small sparkling fountains, the like of which he had not seen since his return from Outremer. One fountain played over a turf seat studded with marigolds and daises. Magnus ran his fingers through the damp flowers and he heard a woman sigh with contentment, a welcome sound.

 

          Elfrida always knew when she was dreaming and this time was no different. It was midsummer and she strolled in an orchard filled with fragrant apple blossom. She carried a twig of mistletoe, its waxy berries still in impossibly fresh bloom. Above her head finches darted and sang and bees buzzed in lazy contentment, dusky with pollen. There was a hay stack beneath an oak tree and a green man smiling at her though the heavy white-green pomanders of a guelder rose. 

 

          "You have a gentle, courteous touch, Sir Magnus."

          Elfrida sighed again and stretched out on the turf seat. Where she lay down roses sprouted and burst into flower, their petals as soft and flawless as her skin. She smiled, and in the wonder of the moment Magnus could not tell if she was clothed or not. From a blower of white and pink rose petals, she held out her hands to him and smiled a second time, trusting and warm, her bright eyes filled with admiration. "Come."

 

          The green man sprang down from the branches of the guelder rose and became Magnus. He bowed to her, a warm breeze ruffling his black hair curls. "My Lady."

 

THE SNOW BRIDE (THE KNIGHT AND THE WITCH 1) https://amzn.to/2MZZan0    

UK  https://amzn.to/2H1tYzY

 

Lindsay Townsend