Henry VIII’s more famous for his wives than for his spies, but the wife story’s so well known that it’s hard to wring anything new out of it, so let’s talk about a spy: Petrus Alamire. Or Pierre Alamire. Or Peter van den Hove, Petrus Van den Hove, Petrus van den Hove (we lost a capital letter there, but spelling was still a liquid so we shouldn’t make too much of that), or if you like, Petrus van den Imhove. Because what’s a spy without a few names to spare? We’ll call him Petrus Alamire, because that’s the name he was wearing when I stumbled over him and it seems to be the main name he wears on the internet.

Which had not been invented when he was alive, you understand, but he might have enjoyed knowing he’d have a virtual afterlife.

 

The family stuff

Alamire was born in 1470 and by one account was German-Dutch.  By another he was Netherlandish or German. Take your pick. I expect he did, more than once. Doesn’t any good spy need at least one extra nationallity? 

He had even more skills and occupations than names and nationalities: he was a scribe, specializing in illuminated copies of musical compositions. He was also a singer, composer, instrumentalist, mining engineer, merchant (he sold manuscripts, musical instruments, lute strings, and paintings), diplomat, courier, and spy. And somewhere in there he found time to be a chaplain, although only one source mentions that. But what the hell, why not? TV hadn’t been invented. A fellow had to do something in those long hours before the candle itself burned itself out.

He was from a family of merchants–details are thin; make them up if you’re in the mood–and created the name Alamire from the syllables given to the musical scale (la, mi, and re are notes six, three, and two), tossing A–a note on an instrument–in front for good luck. 

At some point he married, and I have a name–Katlyne vander Meeren–but not a date or anything substantial about her.

 

The times

The Netherlands were cranking out more composers than the rest of Europe rolled in together, spreading the gospel of polyphonic music, so it was the right time and place to be a skilled copyist and illuminator, and as musicians spread outward into the European courts, so did Alamire’s work and reputation.

To remind you of what you may already know, because that’s part of my job description, music was a Big Thing in the European courts, and moving it from place to place involved hand-made copies, which take a bit longer than downloads or even sheet music, and Alamire made work for Philip I of Castile and Archduke Charles, among others.

Alamire’s manuscripts weren’t just for some low-life musician to play, though. They were collectables made for royals and aristocrats. Each copy had to be unique and a thing of beauty, hence the illuminations. Think of them as singable, playable works of art, which made them nifty gifts. Want to buy a vote in the election of the Holy Roman Emperor? One of Alamire’s manuscripts would be perfect, which is why when Archduke Charles emerged from his cocoon he was, thanks to many expensive gifts, some made by Alamire, the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V.

But when I talk about Alamire’s work, I’m not talking about Alamire alone, I’m talking about is him and all the people working under him, because he had an entire atelier–a workshop full of skilled but unfamous people doing his bidding.

 

Henry’s court

It’s impossible to tell Alamire’s story in any sane sequence without making things up, so we’ll skip over I have no idea how many crucial events and drop in at the point where Alamire gave Henry some musical gifts, including a beautiful manuscript. 

Why did he do that? Dunno, but gifts were the oil that kept the court machinery of many countries working smoothly, so let’s assume he was trying to catch Henry’s eye. Or ear. In return, he might get trade concessions, information, orders, connections. Sadly, he wouldn’t have gotten a cup of tea out of it because it wasn’t available yet. Tea didn’t hit Europe until 1555, and it took longer than that to reach England. Still, I’m sure it was worth his while.

People who know these things (which is to say, not me) believe the manuscript he sent was made for Louis XII and of France and his wife, Anne of Brittany, but they died before he could deliver it and–well, hell, you don’t just chuck something like that behind the filing cabinet and move on. He changed the names and poof, it was made for Henry and only Henry.

We need a date here, don’t we? Louis died in 1515, and 1515 was when Alamire started traveling between England and Europe, doing his merchant/musician/chaplain thing, and dropping in, ever so casually, on Richard de la Pole, who Henry had every reason to want to keep tabs on.

Who was de la Pole? He could–and oh my, did he–trace his descent back to the Yorkist kings–the ones Henry’s father had run off the playing field. His mother was a Plantagenet and the sister of Edward IV. and Richard III, and Richard was pretty clear about wanting to be de la Pole the First. 

Okay, it probably would’ve been Richard IV, but far be it from me to get it right on the first try. And it doesn’t matter because he never became king. In an effort to keep his head attached to his neck, he went into exile and planned to invade England a couple of times but the first draft was rejected by the publishers and he died in 1525, before the rewrite could go to press.

All of that, since he wasn’t dead yet, made him into a person Henry wanted to keep an eye on, and musicians made good spies. They had a reason to travel from court to court, and they may have had a certain invisibility, since as commoners–servants of a sort–they weren’t people who mattered. They might be off to the side, doing their music thing and in a position to eavesdrop, in rooms where important stuff was discussed. Or so says one of the sources I used. I’m not 600% convinced about the eavesdropping. If you’ve ever tried to sing in the car when the news is on,  you’ll know how little of the news you actually take in. But the other stuff–the travelling from court to court and all the rest of it–that makes sense.

It’s worth mentioning that at this point Henry, his court, and his country were still Catholic. He was still married, uncontroversially, to Catherine of Aragon. But that didn’t exempt him from worrying about invasions, enemies, spies, and things that went bump in the night. He had enough worries to make you wonder why de la Pole would want to be king.

Here again we’ll skip a few important bits of information. We don’t know what information Alamire sent back to Henry or how useful it was. What we do know is that Alamire became a counter-spy, giving de la Pole information about Henry’s court and Henry’s travels in England, which would’ve been many since kings were constantly on the move, stitching their realms together by being seen, keeping their nobles’ loyalties in place, and not so incidentally getting their extensive retinues fed at someone else’s expense.

Alamire’s letters to both the king and de la Pole have survived, making it clear that he was playing for both teams.

At some point, Henry and his chief advisor, Cardinal Wolsey, started to distrust him and not even a gift of five part books (see Ubi Dubium’s comment, below, for a convincing explanation of what a part book was), a parchment choir book, eight cornetti, many lute strings, and some political information were enough to buy his way back into Henry’s good graces.   

Alamire had the good sense to make himself scarce. He never returned to England and not many English composers show up in his manuscripts. 

That didn’t end his career, though. During the 1520s he was a diplomat and courier (getting banned from Henry’s court didn’t mean he was banned from all courts) as well as a music illustrator and copyist, and he carried letters between leading humanists of the time, including Erasmus, who described him as “not unwitty,” which probably wasn’t the glowing praise he was hoping for but could be worse. In his surviving letters, he has assorted clever and insulting things to say about other musicians. 

At some other point Christian III of Denmark paid him a hefty (if unspecified–sorry) sum of money for what’s called in the records instruction in the “craft of mining.”

Was that a way of saying spying? Or did mining really mean mining? We’re back to my old friend Dunno here. 

In 1534, Maria of Austria gave him a generous pension in return (presumably) for a number of manuscripts. Although another source calls her Maria of Hungary. Either way, she was the governess of the Low Countries after Margaret of Austria, all of which is a bit of history I’ve never stubbed my toe on until now.

And then he disappears. As will I for another week.

*

My thanks to 63Mago for suggesting spies and spying when I asked what people would like to read about. I’m sure that thought will have me wandering into related corners at some point.

And finally, apologies for posting this late. It’s been sitting around and ready to go for a week but I screwed up. I plead temporary insanity.