wiki-illiam #108: q2

[dubdobdee]

2:
1: Who was known as the Queen of the Blues?
2: Who went from Hastings to Holland, and then to Cornwall?
3: Who retained the embalmed "capital" remnant of her executed husband?
4: Which corpulent lady was affectionately known by her family as Betty Humbug?
5: How is Tolhuys's creation bearing the inscriptions Victoria, Libertas and Scalda popularly known?
6: Which legendary serial gynaecocide was consigned to immurement, while her accomplices were burned at the stake?
7: Where is Whitehead's equine memorial to more than two and a half years of deadly conflict?
8: Who felt quickening at six months on receiving her cousin's good news?
9: Who lisped her threat to repeatedly scream to the point of vomiting?
10: Which relative called "Cusha! Cusha! Cusha!"?

Comments

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

6: is the real-life vampire and goth-heroine Erzsébet Báthory
9: is Violet Elizabeth Bott, from Richmal Crompton's Just William series

I suspect the theme is ELIZABETHS (or near offer)

[dubdobdee.livejournal.com]

On twitter, Matt McG points out that 1: is of couse Bessie Smith -- I actually (absurdly) looked up Mamie Smith to see if her birthname was "Elizabeth", even though my Scottish grandmother's name was Elizabeth, and everyone called her Bessie

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

8 is Elizabeth, cousin of The Virgin Mary and mother of John the Baptist - she was visited by Mary at six months and John leapt in her womb, whereupon she exclaimed "Hail Mary / Full of Grace / The Lord is with thee / Blessed art thou among women / And blessed is the fruit of thy womb"*, providing the out half of the Hail Mary, 2000 years of intermittent deep confusion regarding the finer details of pregnancy, and eventually an undercrackers manufacturing company.

*yes obviously in English, shut uppppp.

[kerrypolka.livejournal.com]

Yep!

[alextiefling.livejournal.com]

Exactly! And the idea that 'the babe leapt in her womb' is the 'quickening' is a good reminder that Catholics did not always believe that life begins at conception.

[petra jane (from livejournal.com)]

3.After Sir Walter Raleigh was executed on trumped-up treason charges, his wife allegedly kept his embalmed head in a velvet bag until her death. Had to google to confirm her name is Elizabeth, neé Throckmorton.

4. I thought this was James I's daughter Elizabeth, the Winter Queen (she of the really kooky mechanical garden), but googling proved I had the wrong king's daughter. Princess Elizabeth, daughter of Mad King George, married Prince Friedrich, heir to the landgrave of Hesse-Homburg. Being unable to get their mouths around "Hesse-Homburg", in spite of their Hanoverian roots, they corrupted it to Humbug.

My first hunch for 2 was that it was to do with the Glorious Revolution, but William of Orange's landing point was Devon, not Cornwall, and obviously neither he nor Mary are Elizabeths.

[anatol-merklich.livejournal.com]

Ha, I googled #2, but instead of revealing right away I'll give a hint that may help: Those three capitalized words aren't place names.

[alextiefling.livejournal.com]

Are they, by some chance, the territorial designations of British peerages held by successive husbands of someone named Elizabeth?

If so, I don't know off-hand who it is, but it's worth noting that the Duke of Cornwall is the Prince of Wales, and has been for hundreds of years.

[anatol-merklich.livejournal.com]

Close, but (I trust this q is beyond the reveal horizon now) they are the family names of men (all named John) of other peerages, all in turn married to Elizabeth of Lancaster (1363-1426), the third child of John of Gaunt (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Elizabeth_of_Lancaster,_Duchess_of_Exeter). In turn, she was married to John Hastings, 3rd Earl of Pembroke (the marriage was annulled when she was 23 and he 14); John Holland, 1st Duke of Exeter (executed); and John Cornwall, 1st Baron Fanhope (who survived her).

I've looked for these people without luck in Shakespeare, but it appears that The Physician's Tale (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Physician's_Tale) of Chaucer obliquely refers to her.

[katstevens.livejournal.com]

Googling #5 reveals it is an ENORMOUS CANNON called Queen Elizabeth's Pocket Pistol!



Built by Jan Tolhuys in Utrecht in 1544.