This book, filled with insults through the ages, is the full history of scurrilous political speech. Giving a voice to those gossips, rumourmongers and traitors, usually left out of history, this book examines the speech of ordinary people, who spoke scornfully of monarchs. The book reveals the lost conversations and expressions that got people into trouble, as well as unveiling moments when private words had public consequence. Although the proverb reads, ‘words were but wind’, tongues caused social damage, words challenged political authority, and treasonous speech imperilled the crown. Roya ... More

This book, filled with insults through the ages, is the full history of scurrilous political speech. Giving a voice to those gossips, rumourmongers and traitors, usually left out of history, this book examines the speech of ordinary people, who spoke scornfully of monarchs. The book reveals the lost conversations and expressions that got people into trouble, as well as unveiling moments when private words had public consequence. Although the proverb reads, ‘words were but wind’, tongues caused social damage, words challenged political authority, and treasonous speech imperilled the crown. Royals monitored talk they deemed dangerous in various ways: policing and surveillance, judicial intervention, political propaganda, and the crafting of new law. In early Tudor times, to speak ill of the monarch could risk execution, whereas by the end of the Stuart era, similar words could be dismissed with a shrug. This book traces the development of free speech across five centuries of popular political culture, and demonstrates how formerly treasonable talk, finally gained protection as ‘the birthright of an Englishman’.