Katherine Swynford: The Story of John of Gaunt and his Scandalous Duchess.

UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn,2nd imp.[Complete number line 3 5 7 9 10 8 6 4 2.] FINE+/FINE+.No owner inscrptn but price-clip to dw/dj. Bright,crisp, clean,matt,colour pictorial detail (of St Katherine from an illumination from the 'Beaufort Hours' - courtesy British Library,London) illustrated dw/dj panels,with white+gilt lettering to front and spine,b/w lettering to rear panel; with negligible shelf-wear or creasing to edges and corners - no nicks or tears present.Top edges very lightly toned,fore-edges bright and clean - no foxing/spotting; contents bright,tight,clean,solid and sound - pristine - no dog-ear reading creases to any pages' corners, appears unread - apart from my own collation.Bright,crisp,clean,sharp-cornered, publisher's original plain black cloth boards with bright,crisp, stamped gilt letters to spine/backstrip and immaculate plain maroon endpapers.UK,8vo HB+dw/dj,1st edn,2nd imp,ixpp-xviipp+2-366pp [paginated] includes illustrations list/table,acknowledgements,author's introduction,a prologue,10 chapters,16pp b/w+colour reproduction illustrations and colour photographs in 2 blocks of 8pp apiece,between pp110/11 and pp238/9 respectively,an appendix,genealogical tables,a select bibliography,notes and references,an index; plus [unpaginated] half-title+title pages,a dedication,contents list/table and author's notes. In her remarkable new book,Alison Weir recounts one of the greatest and most remarkable love stories of mediaeval England.It is the extraordinary tale of an exceptional woman,Katherine Swynford,who became first the mistress,and later the wife,of John of Gaunt,Duke of Lancaster.Katherine Swynford's charismatic lover was one of the most powerful princes of the 14thC.Their relationship was passionate and ultimately poignant.Katherine was renowned for her beauty; she was enigmatic and intriguing; and some of her contemporaries even regarded her as dangerous.Her colourful existence is played out against a vivid backdrop of court life at the height of the age of chivalry,and she knew most of the great figures of the time - among them,her brother-in-law,the poet Geoffrey Chaucer.She lived through the Hundred Years War,the Black Death and the Peasants Revolt,she knew loss, adversity and heartbreak,and she survived them all triumphantly.Although Katherine's story provides unique insights into the life of a mediaeval woman she was far from typical in that chauvanistic age.She was an important person in her own right,a woman who had remarkable opportunities,made her own choices,flouted convention and took control of her own destiny - even of her own public image.Above all,perhaps, Katherine Swynford must be retrieved from the footnotes - and set to live and breathe again - because of her key dynastic position within the English monarchy.She was the mother of the Beauforts,and through them the ancestress of the Yorkist kings,the Tudors,the Stuarts and every other sovereign since - a prodigious legacy that has shaped the history of Britain. Since April 2013,again in March 2015,and in this year too,the UK Post Office has altered it's Pricing in Proportion template,altering it's prices, weight allowances,dimensions and lowered it's qualifying compensation rates too!
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