Welcome to the official website of John Guy
Here you can find a biography of John Guy and a list of books by John Guy, as well as a summary of his broadcasting activities (including some videos), some non-copyright photos, and a list of forthcoming events .
John Guy's latest book, A Daughter's Love: Thomas and Margaret More, is published on 1st July 2008 by Fourth Estate. Here is a shortened extract from the Prologue:
Early one morning in August 1535, a twenty-nine-year-old gentlewoman and her maid boarded a wherry and were rowed three miles along the River Thames to London Bridge. They paid the oarsmen and climbed the steps from the river, walking until they reached the north tower before the drawbridge. Looking up, they would have seen the dozen or more skulls on poles protruding from a ledge of the parapet, parboiled and coated with tar to prevent the circling, screaming gulls from scavenging them.
The bridge-master's door opened to admit the women. After a brief conversation, the maid unclasped the purse and handed over some coins. In return she received a skull, which she gently wrapped in a linen cloth before putting it in the basket.
The gentlewoman was Margaret Roper, her maid was Dorothy Colley, and the head they had surreptitiously recovered that of Sir Thomas More, Margaret's father, executed just over four weeks earlier.
