The English legend about a beautiful lady who overcame her bashfulness for the welfare of ordinary townspeople is known all over the world. Researchers are divided into skeptics who believe that Lady Godiva's story is a myth, and those who steadfastly believe in its veracity. But perhaps both camps are partly right. Be that as it may, in England the feat of the naked horsewoman is still extolled …
Legend of the noble savior
According to legend, the kind-hearted Lady Godiva could not indifferently look at the suffering of the inhabitants of the medieval English town of Coventry, to whom her husband, Count Leofric, once again raised taxes. She repeatedly appealed to her husband with a plea to take pity and cancel the extortions.
For a long time, the count was adamant. Finally, tired of the requests, he declared in his hearts that he was ready to make concessions if she rode naked on a horse through the streets of the city for which he so passionately asked.
The count believed that the condition was too humiliating and impracticable. However, Lady Godiva, catching her husband at his word, decided to take an insane step. She drove into Coventry Square, covering her nakedness with only her luxurious hair. The townspeople at the appointed hour stayed at home and closed the shutters on the windows. Legend mentions the tailor Tom, who looked at the horsewoman through the crack of the door.
Painting by John Collier "Lady Godiva" (1898)
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Heavenly punishment was instantaneous - he went blind.
The count had no choice but to fulfill his promise. Lady Godiva for the inhabitants of Coventry has become a heroine and a savior from an unbearable tax burden.
Real woman and historical inconsistencies
Lady Godiva, wife of Leofric, Count of Mercia, did indeed live in the 11th century. Her husband was one of the most influential people in England, close to the Anglo-Saxon king Edward the Confessor. Empowered by the monarch, he collected taxes from his subjects.
There is evidence of the count's cruelty to non-payers, up to the death penalty.
Apart from Coventry, to which the legend refers us, a wealthy aristocratic family owned lands in Warwickshire, Gloucestershire and Nottinghamshire. It is known that the couple were actively involved in the construction and renovation of churches and chapels in their domains.
At Coventry, they erected a priory, a huge Benedictine monastery that occupied half of the medieval city, and gave it 24 villages. The monastic chronicles describe Lady Godiva as a devout parishioner and generous patroness.
One gets the impression that contemporaries did not hear anything about Lady Godiva's brave act. The Anglo-Saxon Chronicle, compiled before 1066, bypasses the extravagant departure of the Count's wife in silence. There is not a word about him in the Book of the Last Judgment by William the Conqueror, a detailed source of information about England in the 11th century.
The first mention of a naked horsewoman appears in the records of Roger Vendrover - a monk of the monastery of St. Alban - only in 1236, or almost 200 years after the death of Lady Godiva. He even indicated the exact date of the event - July 10, 1040.
The painting by artist Edmund Leighton depicts the moment when the lady makes her noble decision. 1892 g.
At the end of the 13th century, King Edward I, being an inquisitive person, wanted to know the truth about the history of Lady Godiva and commissioned him to study the documents of a bygone era. Indeed, in 1057, some of the taxes in Coventry were abolished, which was an unprecedented event for those times. However, the difference of 17 years between the departure of the brave horsewoman and the real date of the abolition of taxation made the inquisitive king doubt the veracity of the story.
The legend of Lady Godiva is filled with controversy. The lady is obedient to her husband, but bravely seeks the abolition of taxes. She rides naked through the streets of the city, but in the minds of the townspeople she remains modest and highly moral. She is a member of the ruling class and, nevertheless, sympathizes with the plight of ordinary people.
English literature professor Daniel Donahue argues that the myth developed over the centuries and was based on the life of a real woman, who may have helped the common people. However, this myth lay on the fertile soil of ancient folk tales and pagan rituals. The legend of Lady Godiva appealed to the people of Coventry, because they worshiped a naked pagan goddess on horseback from time immemorial.
Monument to Godiva in downtown Coventry
Ancient goddess
Before the Norman invasion, the Angles - the Mercians lived north of modern Coventry, and the Saxons - the Hvikke in the south. It is with the latter that the appearance of the word "Wicca" - a pagan witch is associated. By the way, in the official title of count
Leofric, he was also referred to as the "lord of the Hvikk."
The Hvikk supreme goddess of fertility was called Koda, or Goda. This ancient name appears in many place names in the area southwest of Coventry. During excavations in the village of Veginton on the southern outskirts of Coventry, archaeologists have discovered the temple of the goddess God. In the north there is a settlement of Koda. It has been suggested that an entire region, the Cotswolds, bears the name of this goddess.
Standing isolated among forests, far from major cities and main roads, Coventry was an ideal place to preserve pagan culture for several centuries after the country's adoption of Christianity. It is now generally accepted that the toponym "Coventry" comes from the name of the sacred tree Kof, which the locals worshiped and near which pagan rituals were performed.
Every year, in the middle of summer, in honor of the goddess of Years, mysteries were arranged with a procession, in which a naked priestess, personifying the goddess, rode around the city on horseback and went to the sacred tree, where honors were given to her and young men and horses were sacrificed.
Christianization of the pagan holiday
The Anglo-Saxon pagan cult existed for a very long time. Even after the construction of the monastery of St. Osburg in the 10th century and the Benedictine abbey in 1043, annual pagan processions and sacrificial rites continued. Unable to prohibit a pagan holiday, the monks very wisely replaced the pagan goddess with a real pious woman with a consonant name, and here the story of taxes came in handy. In fact, the monks changed the meaning of the holiday - instead of a pagan cult, the worship of a believing Christian woman, almost a holy woman, began.
The turning point in the consciousness of the inhabitants of Coventry occurred around the 12th century. The pagan God was forgotten, Lady Godiva was revered, the processions continued, but they no longer had anything to do with paganism.
The figure of the peeping Tom is interesting in this talented substitution. In paganism, Tom was associated with that young man who was sacrificed to the goddess. The monks were able to turn the curious tailor into an odious figure of a punished sinner.
Undoubtedly, the church authorities chose the surest way to fight paganism, which was too strong to be eliminated overnight. They managed to transform the worship of a pagan goddess into the worship of a good Christian woman, while omitting all the unwanted details from the past.
Festivals and festive processions in Coventry continue to this day. They are dedicated to Lady Godiva, and her name has become a brand and part of the history of the city. Whether this story is invented or real - the modern inhabitants of Coventry do not care. Every year, like their ancestors many centuries ago, they gladly go to the main square of the city to pay tribute to their protector and patroness - a naked woman on a horse.
The detail about Peeping Tom, according to some sources, appeared in 1586, when the council of the city of Coventry commissioned Adam van Noort to depict the legend of Lady Godiva in the picture. After the order was completed, the painting was exhibited in Coventry's main square. And the population mistakenly took the Leofric depicted in the painting, looking out the window, for a disobedient citizen.
Ruth Powers. Lady Godiva
Jules Joseph Lefebvre. (1836-1911) Lady Godiva
E. Landseer. Lady Godiva's prayer. 1865 g.
Most likely, this legend has little to do with real events. The lives of Leofric and Godiva are described in detail in the chronicles preserved in England. It is known that Leofric built a Benedictine monastery in 1043, which overnight transformed Coventry from a small settlement into the fourth largest medieval English city.
Leofric endowed the monastery with land and gave twenty-four villages into the possession of the monastery, and Lady Godiva presented such an amount of gold, silver and precious stones that no other monastery in England could match it in wealth. Godiva was very devout and after the death of her husband, being on her deathbed, transferred all his possessions to the church. Count Leofric and Lady Godiva were buried in this monastery.
However, the chronicles are silent about the events described in the legend.
The image of Lady Godiva is quite popular in art. Poems and novels are dedicated to her. The image was recreated, on the tapestry, on the canvases of the painters
Edward Henry Korbould (1815 - 1904) Lady Godiva
Equestrian statue of Lady Godiva, John Thomas Maidstone Museum, Kent, England. 19th century
Marshall Claxton 1850 Lady Godiva.
Alfred Woolmer 1856 Lady Godiva
Salvador Dali. Lady Godiva
Lady Godiva "with a loose red mane" is mentioned by Osip Mandelstam in a poem I was only childishly connected with the world of the sovereign …
Lady Godiva is mentioned by Sasha Cherny in the poem "City Fairy Tale" ("… camp, like Lady Godiva")
Lady Godiva is mentioned by Joseph Brodsky in the "Lithuanian Nocturne" ("At midnight, every speech / gets the grip of a blind man; so even the" motherland "to the touch is like Lady Godiva")
Lady Godiva is mentioned by Boris Grebenshchikov in the song "Steel" ("Well, if someone is not yet already / And the soul is like that lady riding in negligee"
Freddie Mercury mentions Lady Godiva in the song Don't Stop Me Now: "I'm a racing car passing by like Lady Godiva."
The famous Belgian chocolate owes its name to a beautiful legend about Lady Godiva, who is still told to children in Belgium at Christmas.
Godiva chocolate is the official supplier of the Belgian royal court and is served at the official ceremonies of the Cannes Film Festival.
Archaeologists have found stained glass windows depicting Lady Godiva, which are now in the surviving church of the first monastery founded by Leofric and Godiva.
The article uses materials by Marina UDENTSOVA