Gone Medieval - The Real Dick Whittington

Episode Date: March 25, 2023

Dick Whittington - who died 600 years ago this month - is a familiar name to generations of pantomime goers. But Richard Whittington’s real life was far more compelling than the theatrical story suggests. He was a civic reformer, an enemy of corruption, the author of an extraordinary social legacy, who contributed to Henry V’s victory at Agincourt, building works at Westminster Abbey, and to London’s ceaseless development.In this episode of Gone Medieval, Matt Lewis is joined by biographer Michael McCarthy, to trace Whittington's life - from his arrival in London as a young boy to his death in 1423. This episode was edited and produced by Rob Weinberg.If you’re enjoying this podcast and are looking for more fascinating Medieval content then subscribe to our Medieval Monday newsletter here >If you'd like to learn even more, we have hundreds of history documentaries, ad free podcasts and audiobooks at History Hit - subscribe today! To download, go to Android > or Apple store > Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

From long-loss Viking ships and kings buried in unexpected places to tales of murder, power, faith, and the lives of ordinary people across medieval Europe and beyond. Join me, Matt Lewis, Dr. Eleanor Jarniger, and some of the world's leading historians as we bring history's most fascinating stories to life only on history hit. With your subscription, you'll unlock hundreds of hours of exclusive documentaries with a brand-new release every week exploring everything from the ancient world,

to World War II. Just visit historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. Welcome to this episode of Gone Medieval. I'm Matt Lewis. No pantomime season would be complete without Dick Whittington, thrice Lord Mayor of London and his cat. But did you know that Dick Whittington is based very, very loosely on a real person who really was Mayor of London? Michael McCarthy has been on the hunt for the real Richard Whittington and you can meet the basis of the Panto favourite in Michael's book, Citizen of London, Richard Whittington, the boy who would be mayor. Thank you very much for joining us, Michael. Thank you, Matt. Thanks for inviting me. It's wonderful to have you on and explore this favourite pantomime character and the reality that

lies behind it. Before we kick off, is there a big challenge in trying to write a biography of a fairly normal medieval person? So even though he's mayor of London, is his life well documented or is there an element of fitting together some facts that we do have to try and build a story? I'm a curious answer really in some ways because this is where fact and fiction actually so harmonise. We do become some reliant on the mythology of the pantomime character because we only really know about Richard Whittington from 1379 when he comes to attention in London making five-pound gift on behalf of the city to the crown. Before then, we know very little indeed. And so there's quite a detective story to assemble. The sort of things we do

know, and the pantomime helps us a bit here, is that the pantomime almost entirely presents him in whatever form, or wherever you see it or read it as a young boy. He's not a teenager. He's somebody around the age of maybe 10 to 12. And that's quite instructive here, because it was a tradition at that time for youngest sons, particularly the third son of rural, landed families to actually send the third son to London to take up an apprenticeship to carve out a professional career for themselves and of course to remove a weight of expenditure from the family which could often be hard pressed so that's one area that we can rely on but apart from that you really have to search for other leads to the character and the life of whittington before 1317

you have to build that through archives archives are very limited you may probably know that black death 20 years earlier in 1348, wiped out about half or more of the rural clergy. And the rural clergy in England was largely charged with maintaining local records, families, dates of birth, schooling, and all sorts of things like this. Much of that was wiped out. So there is a real detective story. And what you have to do is you have to go off in all sorts of directions and create the circumstances rather than the accuracy of the person, the circumstances in which a boy of that age at that time would grow up and in that locality. So the book is a combination really of a great deal of real fact and detail, but also there's a bit of a detective story where you're

having to piece a jigsaw together. And I guess, I mean, one of the things you point out into the book, we don't even really know Richard Whittington's year of birth, so we don't know how old he is at these various milestones in his life when he does become prominent. There's been a long debate about Richard Whittington's date of birth, and some people put his date of birth as somewhere around 1350. There was then a sort of a fashion for putting it around 1355. It is almost certainly 1358 stroke 59. There is evidence for that. We know that the city of Gloucester and Gloucestershire County Council celebrated in 1959 the anniversary of his birth. We also know that he died in the year of his father's own death, which is 135.

1558-59. St. John the Evangelist, which is the church of Pauldey, which almost certainly baptised him, has a plaque as you walk through the door, which actually says Richard Whittington 1358 to 1423. And there are other circumstances. We also know, because we've a bit more detail on his brother, Robert, we know that Robert is two years younger and he was born in 1356 stroke 57. So I've gone for 1358-59 in the book. It's a good example, though, of having to piece. bits of evidence together to reach a fairly solid conclusion. These people can be quite elusive in medieval records, I guess. So what do we know then about Richard's arrival in London? Do we have an idea of how old he was, why he comes there, what he does for a living when he arrives in London?

Yeah, I go back to this sort of rural tradition of the time. It's a tradition that's carried on pretty much to the present day, where the sons of sort of wealthy rural people were often sent to London to effectively find their way in life, find a career. And that typically would have been done at that time for some boys of 10 or 11. And part of the indication for that age is that they're typically coming for apprenticeships. And apprenticeships for nursery, for example, would last about nine years, as much as 10 years. And we have a pretty good idea that he's around the 20-22 mark in 1379 when he makes that gift and comes effectively onto the London stage, no pun intended. So we can work back a little bit and say if he is that age in 1379, and we're thinking that

he's actually been born around about 58, 59, we can pretty much insert the 10 years, 9 of 10 years for the apprenticeship and we go from there. And that then fits in together reasonably well. It would be great to have a perfect written record of that. But I think that's part of detective work and I think you have to accept that and I think you are implying that and it's true. You have to accept that a great deal of what you will write will be very well documented and recorded but there are gaps where you have to take a bit of a risk and speculate but speculate on the basis of as much sound research as you can. I've almost used the word guess but it's almost like an informed opinion. I don't want to say guess because it's not a guess but you know it's a

heavily informed opinion and quite often events that are happening around things can be quite useful as well, can't they, to feed into what's happening in someone's life? That last point is almost the crucial one, because one I tried to do, and it's very much there in the book, I try to create an impression that is recorded, in fact, of what Gloucester and the outlying sort of villages and towns were like at the time that he would have been 10 or 11, where he could have been school. There were only two logical choices. It was the Abbey School or Lanterni Priory, or he could have even been tutored at home.

We know the names of some leading merces in Gloucester. literally at that time. And it would have been almost, and again, I've put it in the book, the surmising that you have to do, that his mother would almost certainly have gone to those men because he would have known them socially and said, who should I link him with in London? Is there somebody that you could vouch for?

But I think in this particular instance, as I show later in the book, Sir Ivo Fitzwarrant, who took him into his household, was already known to the family, but Richard probably didn't know that until he arrived. And do we know what apprenticeship he ends up doing, you've mentioned the mercers a couple of times there. Is that what we think Richard was apprenticed to do to become a mercer? We know that for certain. Yeah, it's actually basically the

bedrock of his life. So he actually comes into the home of somebody who's essentially a young soldier, but also dabbles in nursery. And I think really what I've tried to portray is that this was an opportune moment for him. And effectively, he goes through a sort of period of apprenticeship as a Mercer, and we see him emerge as a Mercer in 1379, making the gift. By 1381, he's been introduced at court, and he's already by 1382-83 selling luxury goods, the role of the Mercer at the court of Young Richard II. And the extraordinary thing here, which I think is new in the book, is I've tried to demonstrate that there are two real powerful connections that send him on his way. One is that he almost certainly discovered, was told, that his own father who died in the year of his birth, Sir William Whittington, was a Bannerette knight under Sir Ivo Fitzwarrant's father and both men had died by this point. So there was a duty of care almost and they knew each other and they almost certainly were very distant relations as well. From Shropshire, perhaps, Whittington Castle was owned by the Fitzwarrans. The second thing is that because of that, his facilitated,

into the court, the introductions to senior figures in the court are really interesting, because again, we can document this. They are nearly all military figures. It's a powerful military network, as you would expect at that time. They are wealthy men. They find this young man who is discreet, has lots of integrity, has been vouched for, and they give him business, and they enable him. And that's the thing that we actually find at this time. And so he goes on to become a really quite successful Mercer before he goes on to his next. couple of careers. You hinted at it there, but what precisely is a Mercer in the medieval period? In the medieval sense, a Mercer is somebody that sells luxury goods. So you'd expect them to

sell silks, very fine, wustards, and they dabble in wool. They will sell wool, but fine wool. And very often they're exporting wool to Italy, to Venetian and Genoese and Florentine merchants. And what happens then, as it does these days, is that very fine English wool is then finished in other ways. And that might be tapestries, forms of silk, whatever, clothing. And this is an interesting period. I thought at the beginning of this research for this book that I would call this right place, right time, right boy. And that's really what the whole thing is. And he comes into London at just the right moment. It's in turbulence, turmoil, but there's also huge benefits in that. Such a shake-up. And you make your mark very young. Half the population has died. Titles of land and

wealth are all in the air. And he actually drops into that at this moment. He's bright. He's perceptive. He's got connections. And he explores them. He's not an opportunist. He's opportune. In fact, before his death, he describes himself as a very pious man, very devout man, whose sense that he had wider responsibilities, hence this amazing will that he produced. It's somebody that's selling luxury goods. And he then branched out beyond wool into sort of Italian goods from Venice and Milan and so on. Probably dabbled in other products as well. But they were the sort of things that met the time, the age, because this was a time of conspicuous consumption, because in the city, people without title were beginning to make money. Merchants, whether they were mercers, whether they were

goldsmiths, whether they were tailors, whatever, they were making money, grosses, the Vittlers, and there was money to be had. And if you could produce or alternatively you could trade, luxury goods, you were not too good. I was going to say, as you said, that the idea of right place, right time, I was thinking the same thing. You know, someone who arrives in London in this period with military connections who wants to sell luxury goods, you are in the right place at the right time. You know, you've got a country, aside from the black death, is full of people who have got incredibly rich on the 100 years war under Edward the 3rd. So have an awful lot of money to spend, and those are the military men.

So if you get in with them, it must have been a perfect storm for him. And it's interesting. You introduce the 100 years war, and of course it's a thread right through. the book. He actually becomes a supplier of luxury goods, but then later a lender of money to kings, very discreetly, and to very senior military figures. In some instances, he didn't look for the money to be paid back. He became wealthy enough not to do it. He was smart. He didn't really want to be involved in politics per se. But my goodness, he wanted to be right there, but not necessarily a participating figure in it. Yet we do see him later taking on really significant roles for the crown. He becomes the mayor of the staple at both Westminster and things like

looking after Westminster, Abbey, while Henry the fifth is away, Ashinko. So he is in the right place at the right time. But he also, I think, makes the right place at the right time too. He's perceptive. He's smart. Yeah, seizes the opportunities that are there for him. So how do we see him over the years that follow that first appearance in 1379? How do we see him begin to climb the social ladder? I mean, obviously he famously becomes mayor of London. I think you point out that There's no such thing as a Lord Mayor of London at this time. We have to distinguish that. But he does eventually become Mayor of London. Do we see the steps on that career that would lead him to become mayor? As I said a moment ago, he starts lending really about 1381 at court. He's come to attention in 1379.

He's obviously on an upward trajectory. I would suspect he's got a group of backers and he has a very close network over the years that follow. See, this is a smart guy and we're getting older and we can support him and he can do things for us. and we'll enable him to do things for himself. And I think what happens is that it's one thing to say this career as a Mercer is ongoing and very lucrative and very influential for him. But what he then does in 1384, so this is only five years on from his arrival, as it were,

he becomes a common counsellor and common counsellors are the people who actually elect the mayor. And that gets him into the sort of the civic route. We see him represents two different areas over a period of time. He then becomes sheriff of London, in the 90s and being sheriff of London is usually almost a prerequisite at that time to becoming mayor. The really fascinating thing, which has animated medieval historians for many years, is how he came to be mayor in the summer of 1396. I don't doubt for one second that he would

have been ambitious to become the mayor, but it fell into his lap. Again, right guy, right place, right time. And the circumstances here is a very popular mayor of London. who saved London from starvation a few years earlier, Adam Bam, dies in office only a few months into his mayoralty. So we find in the summer of 1396, London suddenly requires a mayor. The guy has literally died in office. And what happens is that before anybody can manoeuvre

into the normal routes of electoral process, and this is a difficult time for London between Crown and City, the king himself, Richard II, intervenes. and he literally, in inverted commas, installs Richard Whittington. So his first role as mayor, this is where we get the four times mayor rather. It's really three and a half. He takes over from Bam in office and it's the king that installs him.

Why does he do that? He's close to the king. He's sold to the king. He's a known quantity. He's also incredibly capable. Great reputation in the city. So Richard is gambling. This will be a smart move.

and Richard's in a difficult situation with the city. And he's not technically elected. The documentation that's required is not signed by the Common Council, by the city itself. But effectively, he becomes the mayor. And he does a good job. So that by the time we get to next October, he is elected as mayor. And that becomes his real full term, but also his second term as mayor. So he's almost, having tried to avoid politics in his late 30s at this point,

he's kind of thrust into politics between a king and a city who, were at odds. And is he seen kind of as a unity candidate. He's acceptable to both sides. The king likes him and the city like him. Perhaps he can smooth over some of those problems that are going on between the two parties. I certainly think in the summer of 1396, Richard I second saw him as that. I think Mercer's would have probably welcomed that and probably the companies or the mysteries, as they would call up the guilds, if you like, that were close to them, like the drapers would have welcomed that. He probably would have been opposed. by guilds companies like the grocers and the fishmongers,

because they were very powerful guilds at this time. They would have had their own men. There was intense competition for the meritori, which became increasingly political. It became far less ritualistic in many ways. It became much more politically competitive. They probably wouldn't have welcomed it as much. But he did a good job.

He's well regarded, and that's why we see him back in 1406 and 1419. I'm Professor Susanna Lipscomb, and on my podcast, Not Just the Tudors, from history hit, we talk about everything, from what Queen Consul, Camilla, could learn from the Renaissance. Really, when we begin to look at Queen Consorts, we notice that there's a lot of ways that women could have authority through their relationship with the King. To how you should never upstage Henry VIII. You'd have been a very unwise individual turning up to court, probably with a larger cutpiece than the King, I suspect. From the real Matawaka, better known as Pocahontas.

She's brought and presented to the King and Queen as this shining exact. of what we could achieve. To how to tell someone to get lost. You could say, turd in your teeth. In other words, not just the Tudors, but most definitely also the Tudors, twice a week, every week. Subscribe now to Not Just the Tudors from History Hit, wherever you get your podcasts. So the three slash four periods that he is mayor, they're not consecutive. There's quite a long period over which he serves kind of 20 years or more.

So to remain so prominent and so popular throughout that length of time, given what's going on in the country, I mean, we're talking about Richard II losing the throne a few years later and the turbulence of the early Lancasterian years and then we'll come on to the resurgent 100 years war in a little bit. But to kind of remain so prominent and popular throughout all of that maybe speaks to Richard's qualities as a man. Yeah, it certainly does. And I think we need to remember something that you were asking about at the beginning, which was how his career started. And I, indicated he moves into other careers then. So he starts off, if you like, as a mercer in the true sense of the term, where he's actually selling luxury goods. He's trading. But within four or five

years, by the mid-80s, late 80s, he's actually making loans. He becomes a lender. That takes him into different relationships and a different form of service, if you like. And that includes the king by the end of the decade. That, in a sense, creates the ground work for the civic career in many ways and reinforces it, and it creates the opportunity to make second fortune through wool and through the staple and that sort of thing. And that, I think, is because he's almost a chameleon and changing his colours every now and then, he's able to manoeuvre and flex as a figure that through nursery, through civic life, and to some degree, if you like, politics and counselling. And we see that over that period. By this time, the mayority is very competitive. So to be mere four times is

really quite unusual. There are a few around who've done it twice, one or two have done it three, but not over that period of time. And what are the striking kind of events of his terms as mayor? I mean, I guess the one that stands out, although I don't think he's mayor necessarily at this point, but his involvement in the Battle of Agincourt. But during his terms as mayor, is there any big standout events, anything that he's involved in where we can see him at work as mayor? As mayor, you're not just governing in the strict sense of the term at this time. London and the city in particular can be at times a battleground for almost internecine warfare between the powerful guilds. And the three most powerful guilds other than the mercers are the fishmongers, the brewers,

and there are one or two others that he gets in the face of. He has an early battle which recurs through later merialties in his first meriulty with fishmongers. The fishmongers were actually fishing illegally in areas of the Thames that they shouldn't fish. and they were blocking them off with nets and roping them in. His most prominent battle was much later in his third and final Merlty in particular, was with the Brewers, where it became increasingly obvious that somebody needed to intervene because they were diluting ale, they were stocking damp, barley,

and many corrupt practices that actually contravened the laws of the state, London's trading arrangements. And he was pretty full-frontal on that. And in fact, he alienated a lot of his own base of support, some because they feared that he was going to end up in a bad way, or alternatively, where would it stop? Because he was very almost religious in his determination which Henry V saw in him, which is why he then placed him with the head of a commission, almost religious in his pursuit of weights and measures and bringing London to heal really, which really meant two or three of the leading bills, which at their end. become companies. So it wasn't always an easy ride. And that might also explain, I think, your observation really, that wasn't it curious that this longevity as mayor, you can understand 1396, 97 and 10 years later to 14.6, but when you get to 1419 and you're at the 60 mark,

you know, that's a different ballgame here. That I think is a direct consequence of Henry the 5th, basically needing somebody to actually bring some of the companies to heal, really. And was seen as somebody that was discreet, had integrity, and no nonsense. But a good track record of enforcing the rules and getting people to tow the line. So Richard Whittington is kind of famously involved in a sideways manner in the Battle of Agincourt. Can you just talk us through that a little bit? Because obviously that's a hugely famous battle for the period. Yeah, I said very earlier at the beginning of this that he had started to lend a court in the early 80s. And he lent to people like John of Gaunt, then the

richest man in England, very prominent as a military man and all the rest of, and the guy who always felt he should be king under the minority of Richard II. As it happens, he also supplied at that time to Henry Bolingbroke. He then began to lend to Henry V. When Henry VIII, there was a relationship through the family, basically. And so he knew of this man. But there was also a feeling that what Henry was primarily interested in was just one thing. Could Whittington raised money for the hundred years. He wasn't particularly interested in things like Mercery or all the rest, although we actually did give him a number of sine of cures and major roles, but what he was really interested in was him as a money raiser. And of course,

Whittington had lent heavily to Richard II, and even more heavily to Henry IV. Some of that had gone actually into military campaigns, and here we have Henry V. Determined to win the war with France. And he was one of the first ports of call. Henry VIII immediately went to leading bishops, leading people in the shires. And I say in the book, he was probably the second or third person that Henry V called upon. And he lent money towards the army. And what's important to understand here is the context is that there'd been a period at which the army had been in a direstate, at Calais, almost in revolt. Lack of food, that you couldn't forage in the countryside. There was considerable sort of pain for want of another word. And it was vital, I think, that two things would

happen. One was that Henry would restore his own faith in the army and then in the monarchy, and also restore faith in the purpose of the war. So there was a selling job to do. And Henry and his queen went out and raised money themselves. But Henry saw in Whittington somebody that could open door. So there were two roles for Whittington here. One was actually to cough up personally, which he did. And I think it's generally accepted that he was the second or third significant contributor, but he was also somebody who almost certainly then went round with his hat in the city metaphorically and said, look, you need to contribute. I've done this. Okay, you can't contribute that sum, but can you contribute half or a third or a quarter?

You really must do this. It's not just the war that's at stake. It's the economy and it's in our self-interest to put money in the hat. And I think Henry V was somebody that was also impressed by Whittington's management and admin skills. And that also includes. And that also includes, money. That was the conservation of money, how to manage money. And that was one of the reasons, really, primary reasons for saying, I want you to now take over the thorny and costly because it's running away from me or building the roof of Westminster Abbey. I need somebody to complete that. So effectively he became almost a clerk of works. And then Henry then added another role. He said to him, look, while I'm away, I'm now going to which you won't just be looking after Westminster Abbey.

but any new building, major building, proposed in London while I'm away, will now go through you. It must be approved by you. And he actually did leave him this reminder, which is, I had better find London in a better state than when I left it. And that's down to you. That was the great sort of story. And it is interesting, just by way of a side story, that Geoffrey Chaucer of all people, some years earlier, had also acted for an English king finding himself actually looking after the sewers and the waterways of London. and to earn a few bob when he needed to hide himself away and do some writing.

There was a precedent. You mentioned a little bit earlier about Richard Whittington's will. So I think he passed away in 1423, but can you tell us what he does and what he says in his will? What are opinions of Richard Whittington in the immediate aftermath of his death? I think the main thing to observe about Richard Whittington was that he had no heirs. There's no family. He's lost his wife, her father, the man he almost regarded as his father, and a man who in his own will in 1414 referred to Richard Whittington, both as my son-in-law, and how would I describe

him as a citizen of London, hence the title. So there was nobody to pass his wealth on. He wasn't really close at all to his birth family back in Gloucestershire, pretty distant from them, and he'd accumulated a huge amount of wealth. So he actually instructed his executors to monetise everything. And the estimate historically has been that was something like £7,000 worth of money, of chattels, of jewellery, some amount of property, but nothing like the other sort of major investors. And he was determined that, as I said earlier, he had this vision of himself as a devout and pious man and that his responsibilities lay beyond the grave. And what he must do is he must alleviate distress. There is a very strong culture right throughout his life, which you'll be more than familiar with,

which was, look, you need to act now and donate now and do good and pious works now to secure your salvation and a good life in the next. I mean, clearly he followed and believed that, but I think it was far more with him. He was passionate, particularly with the grocer Thomas Knowles. He was very passionate about Newgate. It's something that exercised him through the entirety of the second half of his life. He thought it was a dire, utterly appalling place. And people were in there for the most minor, minor crimes for years on end,

decaying and starve and frozen and all the rest of it. He was very far-sighted. There was a social opportunity, I think, that he saw. Things like funding a wing, as it were, in modern parlance at St. Thomas's for women without a husband. Now, that didn't just mean single women who got pregnant. It was also the fact that the war, as you were saying earlier, that took huge stock of life.

So men were not coming back. There were children and women were pregnant before they went toward that sort of thing often happens. And he was far-sighted in this. And the sort of things that he was doing was he was involved in improvements to the water supply, sanitation, the famous long bench for defecation into the Thames, donations to churches for their re-edification or building anew,

reform of weights and measures and trading practice. And money was left for some of these things, but the big things that people would notice after his death would be the rebuilding of Newgate. Also, that created the formation of an adjoining office, which was the origins of the old Bailey. He largely funded the building of the Guildhall. He almost wholly funded the library of the Guildhall at that time.

He created almshouses, the most notable of which were his great joint vision with his wife, St. Michael Paternoster. Other things that people might not be aware of, his great friendship in later life and the man who helped him write the will, and was then the chief executive John Carpenter, effectively became England's really first town clerk, and he wrote the famous Liber Albus, and Whittington almost certainly contributed the funding to that.

The biggest thing, of course, is that he put the contents of that will into the hands of the Mercer's company, and the Mercer's company sustained that vision for the last 600 years. It's a remarkable thing to do anywhere, but to invest that in his own sort of truels, his own company. Going back to this boy, we were talking out right at the beginning of this conversation, and here he is at the end of his life, absolutely still wedded to the principles, the integrity of the Mercer's company, but also their ability to administer and their ability

to sustain and safeguard his vision and his will by actually investing it. The most remarkable thing about his will is that I describe the group of executors as a task and finish group, partly because he was very unusual in saying to them, look, when I disappear from this earth, you can make your own judgments. I'm not tying you specifically to this, that or the other. There are some things I want doing. Newgate is an obvious one and arms for the poor.

But long after my death, there will be things that arrive on the scene that require attention, that could benefit from some of the money that I'm leaving. It's your judgment. That was really a very interesting. far-sighted thing to do at that moment in time. So it's not just the money which in today's figures is many millions. It is actually what was done with it and not only what was done with it,

but there was a vision, a coherent, far-reaching vision of what should be done with it and how it should be administered. That was very unusual. And here we are 600 years later and it's still thriving. You've a Whittington hospital, you have a Wittington school. You have all those houses that was supported by Whittington money. It goes into social projects in London and other towns. It's fantastic. Incredible to think, you know, we go and watch a pantomime and we see this boy walking on stage with his cat

trying to make his mark in London where the streets are paved with gold. But the reality is so much more interesting, so much more fascinating, this boy could arrive from the shires become so incredibly wealthy, so incredibly influential that 600 years after his death, he's still being a benefit to London,

people are still seeing the rewards of Richard Whittington's life 600 years ago. Believe it or not, you've just captured the essence the reason for the book. And that was my thinking. My thinking was, look, I've been to the pantomime. I took my kids when they were young to the pantomime. I always liked the theory. I found myself over the years in an earlier career lecturing politics. My particular area of interest was interest group politics and the poverty of welfare and industry.

And I suddenly got engaged by him over the years thinking, actually there's more to this guy. And here we are celebrating the pantomime figure. But actually, we haven't got out there into the firmament, all these things that this guy is doing and saying, look, without giving you a catechism or a list, have a look at it. But at the same time, hey, if you're sitting in this audience, this is why there is a pantomime, because there is a mythology in there, but it's a mythology that's very much based on a real life and a real person, except that it doesn't really go very far. But having seen that and enjoyed it,

why don't you go learn more? Because he's such an important figure. Thank you very much for joining us, Michael. I found that absolutely fascinating. And if that has wet your appetite at all, then Michael's book, Citizen of London, Richard Whittington, the boy who would be mayor, is out now.

And you can get up close and personal with the real man behind the pantomime fun. You can join Dr. Kat Jarman on Tuesday for another brand new episode. Don't forget to also subscribe or follow us wherever you get your podcasts and to tell all your friends and family that you've gone medieval. If you get a moment, please do drop us a review or rate us anywhere that you listen to your

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