Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie, Scottish court, Flodden Field, Skelton, 1513

<< previous   next >>

114

upon Skelton and Garnish the responsibility for something more than a minor court entertainment. ²⁰⁶

It has often been speculated that The Flyting of Dunbar and Kennedie (c.1495) provided inspiration for this event, although little has been said about why this Scottish flyting might have been deemed worthy of emulation at this particular time rather than at any other. ²⁰⁷ The demise of the Scottish court at Flodden Field in 1513 may have provided motivation for channeling the dispute into the format of a flyting. The appropriation of the courtly ritual by Skelton and Garnish in the following year may have been regarded as the spoils of war, of the plundering of a courtly entertainment for which the Scots became renowned following the publication of the Dunbar-Kennedy exchange in 1508. Alternatively, it is more likely (taking into account the mourning for James IV at Henry’s court) that the exchange might represent an attempt by Henry to preserve part of the culture of his brother-in-law’s eclipsed court that might otherwise have been threatened with extinction. This may, in fact, be an instance of Henry commanding Skelton to redirect his proven pyrotechnic virtuosity away from attacking the Scottish court posthumously, as he had in ‘Against the Scottes’, and towards (after a fashion) its memorialisation. These alternative cultural and political functions that the exchange might have served appear to have been overlooked, as does the considerable depth of hostility that appears to have gone into its making.

Skelton’s contribution fits neatly with Priscilla Bawcutt’s definition of flyting as “a collaborative game [that] also voices strong animosities” and appears to strike a balance

²⁰⁶ Walker, (1988), p.47 and p.48; Ian A. Gordon, Skelton: Poet Laureate (Melbourne UP; OUP, 1943), p.191.
²⁰⁷ Cooke Carpenter (1967), p.73; Walker (1988), p.47 and H. L. R. Edwards, Skelton: The Life and Times of an Early Tudor Poet (Cape, 1949), p.150.

<< previous   next >>

	Enter your search terms Submit search form
	Web www.cultureandrhetoric.net