History Links: Historical Haberdashery

A shortish edition of History Links this time, but I want you to know about these auctions before they happen. Ha.

A Paris auction house is selling off a letter written by Catherine of Aragon asking the Pope to block Henry VIII’s attempts to end their marriage. WANT.

Also up at auction: Napoleon’s hat. The Grimaldis are auctioning a ton of stuff this weekend, if you have immense piles of cash and an interest in historical artifacts.

The Toast has a delightful essay on Boudica being The Best, which she kind of is- she was a rampaging, Roman-killing, London-burning, revenge-having BADASS. And this is a good time to recommend Antonia Fraser’s Warrior Queens, which is full of ball-busting ladies.

If you read a lot of historical romances (or just love Austen) you’ll love this collection of romantic advice from the 19th century.

History Today has an interesting if brief review of a new book about France’s Henry III, one of the younger brothers of our beloved Francis from Reign.

200 years of Jane Austen book covers! Some of these are BAD but I covet them ALL.

I haven’t had a chance to investigate The Magna Carta Project yet, but it looks stupendous. (And their Twitter feed is fun too.)

And finally, for paleography fans, I recently found two fantastic apps: Medieval Handwriting and English Renaissance Handwriting. I cannot wait to play with these, for I am an enormous geek.

Happy Friday!