Cordelia Dethroned: Warring Queens and Lording Wives in Milton's History of Britain

Abstract

Hath from the leaves of thy unvalu'd Book, Those Delphick lines with deep impression took Milton's "On Shakespear" (1630) DION 1 | SET TI NG TH E STAGEMilton opens his History by claiming that he will neither follow other historians, ancient or modern, in using elaborate examples nor "with controversies and quotations . . . delay or interrupt the smooth course of History" (CPW 5.1: 4). In short, he will include in his History only "things worth the noting" (4). Consequently, when we encounter a rare instance of literary embellishment within the History, Milton demands that we take note. One such instance is his retelling of the story of King Lear. 9 In it, he unexpectedly breaks from his historical sources and constructs an account that captures certain critical elements from Shakespeare's version, by far the most renowned. 10 Milton establishes the literary context for his retelling of the Lear story beforehand by introducing a mythical side note to his discussion about the etymology of Britain. Alluding to the Danaides, Milton signals to his readers a theme that will provide interpretive guidance for what follows in his distinctly ahistorical rendering of the Lear account. We know the story well: Danaus, the King of Libya, instructs his fifty daughters, the Danaides, to kill their husbands on their wedding night. All of them did so but one, who subsequently convinced her husband to spare the lives of her murderous sisters. In contrast to their chaste and loyal sister, Hypermnestra, the other Danaides violated the natural order by allying themselves with their father instead of their husbands. Forever thereafter associated with murderous seduction and deadly treachery, they incur hatred for "the whole Sex" (CPW 5.1: 7). Hypermnestra, the one daughter who had so disappointed her father, is subsequently pursued and confined by him. The prophecy of Danaus's undoing at the hands of a son-in-law is a critical component of the myth, and Milton's sources include it to justify the king's wicked machinations. 11 By omitting this fact in his own account, Milton encourages us instead to treat the daughters' perverse misdirection of affections, rightfully due to their husbands, as the sole cause of the tragedy that unfolds.Further anticipating Lear, Milton next relates the story of Guendolen. Couched between two references to Spenser, it further orients us away from the historicity of his account of Lear, which immediately follows it. Guendolen's story similarly begins with an aging father, the legendary Brutus, and the division of his kingdom into three sections, including Albania and Cornwall. His daughter, Guendolen, becomes ruler of another kingdom, Wales, only to return at the head of an army and win military victory over a domestic adversary. Her two grandsons, like Cordelia's two nephews, later battle over a divided kingdom, and the dispute is settled in fratricide. Like Cordelia, she is reunited with her father after a separation brought about by marriage. Her military might extends to the political realm, whereby ...