This lad's tutor I doubt is a prude but that's your own opinion only.
*If* the OP's tutor really said that he had a "disgusting mind" and a "dirty mind," especially just for asking a question about the sexuality of an historical figure in a film, then not only is she a prude, but she should be fired from her job forthwith. As a former tutor, I can say that I would never call my students names like that and that it is damaging and unprofessional to do so.
Is it possible the OP is exaggerating or making things up? Sure, but it's not something we can know or that is really our business. I can only say that a tutor who refers to one of her (or his) students as "disgusting" and "dirty" should not be teaching students of any age. Period.
A couple of other points, briefly - the age of consent in the 12thC was much lower than it is today.
Correction--the age of consent was nonexistent in the 12th century, anywhere (since as wide a variety of cultures existed then as today), especially since children's marriages were arranged for them by their parents or guardians. There were guidelines, recommendations and expectations that might push the age of marriage back, but families had a great deal more internal power than they do today. And the consent of the two parties being married to each other, while desirable, was not necessary.
There were rumours aplenty that Prince Richard and Phillip of France might indeed have had what we now term a gay relationship, but from way back then, no definite proof in surviving documents. Suffice to say it has been documented they were once extremely close friends. Thus it might have been platonic.
Correction: There were contemporary rumors that *Richard* engaged in sodomy, for which he did penance twice, years after the period of the film. It was well-documented that he and Philip were close friends for years, but the affection recorded between them was well within the bounds of affection between men at the time. The insinuation that this was sexual is a modern invention.
The definition of homosexual behavior (such as they understood it) between men was very different in 12th century England than it is now. It was quite common for men, even monks, for example, to greet each other with a kiss on the mouth.
You mentioned Ancient Greece - it is not the case entirely that older men had sex with young boys at all. I refer to the Greek noun, 'paidiskos' which translates as 'boyish'. This covers a youth between 10-16, roughly. Many Classicists would broadly agree that the gay (forgive the modern usage, not used in Ancient times) relationships were probably between 15/16 year old youths and over 18 year old young men, even 20 year olds. This was documented as 'aner' which was a young Greek warrior (about to enter the Krypteia in Sparta) who would be close to 20 years old plus, by that stage.
This is splitting hairs by, again, resorting to anachronistic values. I've read the literature discussing this subject and the Greeks perceived it as relations between older men and younger boys, with the age difference and mentor-mentee relationship being the important part of it. Whether the boy was 13 or 17 really is beside the point.
And there is pictorial art to back up exactly what the Greeks intended when they talked about boy love:
http://notsoreviews.files.wordpress.com/2012/07/oxford_pederasty-1.jpg I would recommend you refer to 'Greeks and Greek Love' by James Davidson, an authority on Ancient Greece and who puts this myth of paedophilia in Ancient Greece in context. It is a dangerous myth too.
I have a BA in Classical Languages and a PhD in Medieval History, with a focus on the Knights Templar. I am reasonably confident that I know far more about this subject than you do, particularly in regards to what you have posted so far.
Pederasty, even of the institutionalized variety, in Ancient Greece is well-documented, especially for Sparta. That some scholars want to argue that it did not exist does not make that so.
Further to the point, the author of the play is most certainly referring to the "myth" of pederasty in Ancient Greece with that line, as well as medieval beliefs in it, and that's what's important, not whether an academic since then has decided that the original idea was muddle-headed.
However, to return to this epic. I attended one of the very early showings of LiW soon after its release, and in those days, one could purchase an accompanying booklet in the cinema, carrying short articles about the film's making, stills, and interviews. I still recall Richard described as "a mummy's boy who over-killed his way around the world to hide his weakness". Back in the 60's, still not quite the permissive society outside of London, the weakness was not specified. As I became an older teenager, reading through the film booklet my parents had bought for me when we had a family afternoon out, I guessed what the weakness more than likely was in our 'Coeur de Lion', hero of schoolboys all over Britain.
It's cool that you saw the film so early on, which is a nice bit of film history. However,
the play/film is not historically accurate. Among other things, the biggest is that there was no such Christmas court at Chinon in that year. And I find it rather odd that you are so determined to believe a single Classical Studies historian on the subject of Ancient Greek pederasty, yet completely ignore the controversy surrounding the subject of Richard's sexuality. Yes, there are historians who believe Richard was gay, or at least bisexual. I've got one of them, Jean Flori, right here on the shelf beside me.
But others strenuously disagree. Just because you and others assume today that the weakness mentioned about Richard was the homosexual version of sodomy, that doesn't mean we actually know for sure what it was. There is evidence for both sides of the argument.
Also, even historians like Flori who believe Richard was gay would never simplify him into the mama's boy of the play. Yes, Richard loved his mother dearly and ended up being her favorite. But this was in part because for most of his early life, his older brother, Henry the Young Lion, was the heir apparent to England and Eleanor took Richard as the second son to become her heir in Aquitaine. Something that Old Henry readily agreed to at the time, by the way.
The play/film's portrayal of Richard as being spoiled and rather dim is also *highly* inaccurate. In fact, Flori spends the first two chapters of his biography of Richard discussing at well-referenced length how hard and cunningly Richard had to fight to pacify Aquitaine, which was a territory much larger than England at the time. Then, as soon as Richard did so, his father immediately decided to take it away and give it first to Richard's older brother Henry and later to his younger brother John. The real Richard was probably a good bit more like Geoffrey in the play in his relationship with the older Henry, albeit without the treacherous side.
Again, this idea of a spoiled mama's boy is an anachronism reflecting mid-20th century British views of homosexuality rather than how Richard's contemporaries perceived him.
As much as I love The Lion in Winter, I've always been skeptical that the Plantagenets were nearly as dysfunctional as portrayed in the film. All things considered, they actually managed fairly well together. Nobody went quite so far as to stab, poison, or order assassinated others in the family, which was a step up from some of their contemporaries or near-contemporaries.
And there's never been much evidence to support the idea that Henry would ever have gone so far as to murder his sons. Despite their rebelling against him, all of them more than once, he still eventually brought them back into the fold, up to the point where he died in the middle of their latest rebellion. Henry is well-documented as a hothead, albeit a very smart and manipulative one, but he wasn't a parricide. And neither were his wife and his children.
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ronfirv
11 years ago
I have read your very lengthy response.
Your assertion that this lad's tutor should be fired is silly, a knee-jerk, and intolerant of a teacher's right of free speech, and rights to discipline. Let me state I am British, and I was educated in the 50's/60's, where if every teacher at the schools I attended had been fired for only saying a pupil had "a dirty mind", we might have been (correction, would have been) left with fewer teachers than I have fingers on one hand! We even had corporal punishment back then, shock, horror! And, you come across as possessing an element of arrogance of one who has a degree in Classics,("I know more than you"), and all who don't hold one, are beneath the pale.
I find it strange also in some ways you felt the need to state your degree qualifications at all, strange because another poster did so on another board many months ago,which indicates a type of insecurity. My own qualifications are not in the Classics ; all of my knowledge (of the Ancients) is from school instruction,a very thorough and wide Scottish education, plus reading material since leaving these admirable halls of learning. So,try to relax, I am well aware I am no authority on the Ancients, or indeed the British Middle Ages, but I am intelligent enough to work out that one source is not necessarily the definitive word!
I do believe Prince Richard was probably gay or bisexual, in my opinion, but equally aware this is only a possibility, and the man might have been strictly heterosexual. Like other historical figures, there is much modern debate surrounding their sexuality, but in the absence of firm proof, all we are left with is speculation, however intellectual we make it.
I noted you have specialised in the Knights Templar; I was born and raised in and around Edinburgh, so you will be aware the Scottish King of the times,(Robert de Brus, a Scoto-Norman, if my memory serves me) granted lands to them in what is now the county of Midlothian, mostly rich arable land. Suburbs to the south of the Scottish capital now sit on a lot of these lands, and there is one delightful village south of Edinburgh named...Temple, named after these Mediaeval knights, a link with these Crusaders of old.
Interesting that the pupil to whose defence you rose so rapidly has not been heard of since, to further elucidate us all on his original assertions and accusations.
I have read postings such as his on other boards - ask them to expand, and they can't, or won't. Says all, well, at least to me. Have I been surprised ? Not at all. I remember recently reading one poster opining that another historical epic was, "boring", and when asked to expand on that one-liner,by another poster, didn't,until some several days later he/she came back with a simple, immature, "no!" Then people such as that expect respect? Oh my.
In strict conclusion, I will not discuss this rather splendid film further with you my dear lady, until or unless you drop this tone of self-righteousness in your own beliefs.
It is defensive, needlessly so.
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BooksArsenal
11 years ago
Your assertion that this lad's tutor should be fired is silly, a knee-jerk, and intolerant of a teacher's right of free speech, and rights to discipline. Let me state I am British, and I was educated in the 50's/60's, where if every teacher at the schools I attended had been fired for only saying a pupil had "a dirty mind", we might have been (correction, would have been) left with fewer teachers than I have fingers on one hand! We even had corporal punishment back then, shock, horror!
Yeah, well -- things have changed since the 50s/60s.
That's not acceptable behavior on the part of a tutor in this day and age, which is all that matters.
Get with the program and come into the modern world.
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ronfirv
11 years ago
Let me start by saying there are some very good teachers out there, very good indeed.
I had a thorough Scottish education, broad, disciplined (not excessively strict)based on the grammar school system. That previously maligned (politically) system produced solid results, as it had for decades, in fact, producing some of the best doctors, engineers and experts in their respective fields this world has ever known. So, it and the teachers must have been doing something right.
What I see now is a decline in standards across the board, a drop in discipline, and an increasingly political teaching profession. These are not acceptable to me in any age.
I have not read any source which stated, with proof,that King Henry was a paedophile, so yes, that was a silly question by the pupil and the teacher was within her rights to correct the lad. He should be taught to question, of course, that is essential, but with pertinent and mature questions. That's the difference.
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syntinen
11 years ago
I have not read any source which stated, with proof,that King Henry was a paedophile, so yes, that was a silly question by the pupil and the teacher was within her rights to correct the lad.
Oh come off it,
ronfirv: what you've read about Henry II, with or without proof, is wholly irrelevant, as you surely know. What
is relevant is that the lad had just been shown the film, in which Henry says that he is, or at any rate has been, a paedophile; so for him to say 'Gosh, did that line really mean what I think it meant?' is not stupid, and the teacher was way out of line 'correcting' him for asking it.
Of course, we can't know if he actually asked it in a silly and salacious way, but that's not the issue - and a competent teacher surely should know how to choke off any schoolboy sniggering without getting uptight, and leaving herself open to accusations of 'I asked a simple question and she called me names'.
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zacariah-13826
9 years ago
How is it that you condemn the poster for her self-righteousness while simultaneously spending so much of your post touting your own qualifications? I know something about history; also know that 12th century sources are too poor to allow us to reach any definitive conclusion at all; and finally know that both you and your antagonist are uppity twits. "Take the mote from your own eye" (and no, I'm not a Christian).
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ronfirv
9 years ago
Not "uppity twits" just two folks passionate about our ancient heritage, yes, ours, not yours.
Just think - we can walk over ground where the Caesars themselves once strode followed by their mighty Legions, and that a mere very few hours' drive from our garden gates! Such a glorious past has helped shape we Brits right up to modern times.
To have had such illustrious Ancients who strode across the known world like giants must make you pretty green, coming from a relatively new nation, does it not?
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rrb_1
9 years ago
Some would say it's better to be striding the world like giants today, as Americans do and have been for some time, than have to look back at "ancients" for their glory.
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ronfirv
9 years ago
Well, we regard the job our Military has done in Iraq & Afghanistan as the work of heroes & giants every bit as honourable in their way, as the US Forces. Which country has been and remains your most trusted ally, because of our experience, loyalty and supreme professionalism? You know the answer. If you can find another, then by all means, do so, and save future British lives and injuries. You couldn't, of course.
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rrb_1
9 years ago
Please. Britain is a US ally when it's in their own interests to be one, not b/c of the reasons you give. The loss of British lives and injuries you note are due to your government's policies, not that of mine.
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ronfirv
9 years ago
UK is an ally of USA when it's only in our interests say you. Ok, funny that it seems only in UK's interests (largely) to back USA many,many more times than your other "friends" and allies do these days, and Heaven knows your "friends" are not all that numerous.
How many times have your modern Presidents come calling on UK, asking for strong support? Many. And you got it.
Your Govt. knows one thing above all else - Britain is 100% reliable. A true friend of America's.
Pity you look on loyalty so fleetingly,and without value, but in no way do I regard you as typically American, which is fortunate, or the special relationship would be dead in the water. As dead as the dodo.
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zacariah-13826
9 years ago
Virtually all the music referred to as the "British Invasion" after 1963 was directly inspired by American roots music, and most specifically, the blues. And people like Keith Richards and Paul McCartney have admitted this. The folks in the Brill Building even wrote a lot of the hits recorded by mid-60s Brits. To be sure, the Beatles owe the second half of their career mostly to themselves, but most of the others--Clapton, e.g.,--kept returning to American roots. So you should spend some time walking through Memphis, Chicago, New Orleans, etc. and you might feel a less remote, and more relevant, connection to the past than bouncing around a medieval castle. And I say this as a half-Midlands descendant (but also half-Scottish, so I might want to walk around Bannockburn as well). But what the hell, we can still be friends, as long as you don't defend "Lady Thatcher").
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BooksArsenal
11 years ago
*If* the OP's tutor really said that he had a "disgusting mind" and a "dirty mind," especially just for asking a question about the sexuality of an historical figure in a film, then not only is she a prude, but she should be fired from her job forthwith...a tutor who refers to one of her (or his) students as "disgusting" and "dirty" should not be teaching students of any age. Period.
Hear, hear!
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