The death of Edward II had quality of barbarity that has scarcely been equalled in the annals of England.

The death of Edward II had quality of barbarity that has scarcely been equalled in the annals of England.

Infamous for his alleged homosexual relationship with Piers Gaveston, Edward II was forced to abdicate and was imprisoned in 1327. Edward’s death was surrounded by rumours.

The dethroned king was taken from Kenilworth consigned to Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire. He seemed to be well treated at first, but an uncrowned king can never be safe. Two attempts at rescue were made, one of them partially successful, and with possibility of escape is fate was determined. It has been said that “between the prison and the grave of a king there is little space’. His death, in September 1327, has a quality of barbarity that has scarcely been equalled in the annals of England. It was said that he was slain with a poker, red-hot, inserted into his fundament. Or as Ranulf Higden put it in his Polychronicon. “he was sleyne with a hoote broche putte thro the secret place posterialle”. Yet this might simple be a poetical touch, an allusion to his supposed sodomitical tendencies. His heart was taken from his body and placed in a silver vase, which was put latter in his wife Isabella’s own coffin. None of his gaolers were convicted of his death, two were found innocent , one entered the service of Edward III, and the fourth was murdered in strange circumstances.

Source ~ Peter Ackroyd ~ The Foundation of England