Talk:David Rizzio

Raped by Lord Darnley???

The (fictionalized) book about Mary Queen of Scot I am reading has a passage where Darnley rapes Rizzio. Does anyone know- is there any fact to this??ELBachh 15:54, 19 March 2007 (UTC)

Innaccuracies

For some reason this article claims that Rizzio's murder was organised by Elizabeth when my understanding is that he was killed by Darnley in a fit of jealous rage. Will someone who knows more please correct it? 80.177.170.112 16:09, 14 May 2007 (UTC)

Homosexuality?

Leaving aside for a moment the obvious anachronism of the term, can anyone provide a source for the claim that Rizzio was gay??

Ditto - a Google search doesn't turn up any evidence that he might have been gay (or whatever work best describes his "sexual orientation"). -- SatyrTN (talk | contribs) 21:54, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Spelling of the name

Why is the article headed "David Rizzio" and does it then keep referring to him as "Riccio"? We're told at the outset that there were several different spellings, but surely the article should stick to one of them - it doesn't much matter which, as long as it's consistent.213.127.210.95 (talk) 18:39, 26 February 2018 (UTC)

Scottish Solomon

The following statements lack sources: "David Rizzio's career was remembered and referred to by Henry IV of France. Mocking the pretension of James VI of Scotland to be the "Scottish Solomon", he remarked that "he hoped he was not David the fiddler's son", alluding to the possibility that Rizzio, not Darnley, fathered King James."

Two sources relating to the same rumor are as follows: (1) A French version of Henri IV's sly comment: “Je ne sçais pas (dit-il) pourquio le roi d'Angleterre mérite le titre de Salomon, si ce n'est parce qu'il est fils de David, joueur de violon” [I do not know, he said, why the king of England merits the title of Solomon, if not because he is the son of David, the violin player] . The anecdote is reported as being from 1625, the year of James' death. Since it refers to him as King of England, Henri IV must have spoken it after James' 1603 coronation in England – and before his own death in 1610.

   Note: This anecdote might be referred to in Jean Pierre Babelon, Henri IV (Paris: Fayard, 1982), but no online search of this exhaustive work [1,104 pages] is possible.

(2) A letter of [Thomas] Randolph to [the Earl of] Leicester, from Berwick [on-Tyne], 29 Jan 1566/7 [ie. 29 Jan 1567]: “Woe is me for you when David's sone shalbe Kynge of England!” . The quote appears in the notes to “Ane deeclaratioun of the Lordis Iust Quarrell” (Robert Sempill, Edinburgh, 1567) ll. 36, 37; the text of ballad is in Vol. I, pp. 57-64]. This letter is cited as "MS Letter SPO [State Papers Office] Randolphe to Leicester, Berwick, [dated old style] 29 Jan 1566"] and should be available in Calendar of State Papers, Scotland: Volume 2, 1563-69, ed. Joseph Bain (London, 1900), British History Online http://www.british-history.ac.uk/cal-state-papers/scotland/vol2 – but this volume is for paying subscribers only so it is not easily verifiable.

   Note: Also in Vol. II, p. 51 there is a variant of Henri IV's sly query: “Whether the Scottish Solomon, as people called him, was David the fiddler's son?” – but without any source citation.
   

I think a rewrite of the posted passage is needed, but that would best be done after the BHO citation for Randolph's letter is verified, and Babelon's biography of Henri IV searched. I'm not able at the moment to do those tasks, so I'm hoping someone else can.

Illotempore2003 (talk) 21:40, 20 September 2021 (UTC)

References

I recall reading a biography of King James VI and I back in the 1970s (part of a series edited by Antonia Fraser on English monarchs). It discussed early in the book his alleged paternity by Riccio (as the book spells his surname). I recall particularly one passage, that Henri IV of France had said James was indeed 'the Solomon of his day' because he was 'the son of David (Riccio)'. I am sure there are copies around that could be looked up for the precise wording and attribution.Cloptonson (talk) 17:54, 7 June 2022 (UTC)