Like Lady Godiva

Introducing Lady Godiva through a Fan-Historical Lens The legend of Lady Godiva, who famously rode naked through the streets of Coventry, veiled only by her long, flowing hair, has endured for centuries as a symbol of protest, sacrifice, and spectacle. According to the most popular version of the tale, Godiva pleaded with her husband, Lord Leofric of Mercia, to lift an oppressive tax that threatened to impoverish the people of Coventry. In response, Leofric issued a provocative challenge: he would revoke the tax only if she rode unclothed through the town. Godiva accepted, and in a gesture of defiance and compassion, undertook the ride. The townspeople, out of respect, are said to have shuttered their windows except for one man, later dubbed ‘Peeping Tom,’ who was struck blind for his voyeurism. In some versions, Leofric, moved by her courage, kept his word and abolished the tax. Godiva’s story survives in a rich blend of history, folklore, and myth. Over time, she has been cast variously as goddess, martyr, sinner, and saint. While some historians dismiss the ride as apocryphal (Donoghue 3), there is no doubt that Lady Godiva was a real figure who lived in eleventh-century Anglo-Saxon England (Donoghue 5). Regardless of historical accuracy, her legend continues to captivate and inspire. This article begins by exploring key definitions of fandom, followed by a brief herstory of the historical Godiva. It then examines the Godiva legend as a form of fan-history, with particular attention to its intersections with feminist activism. By tracing how Godiva has been reimagined across time, I argue that her legacy offers a compelling lens through which to view participatory culture, feminist resistance, and the politics of storytelling. Defining Fandom: Do(ing) (Feminist) Things with Godiva? Lady Godiva’s enduring appeal and cultural presence can be meaningfully explored through the lens of fandom. While fandom is typically associated with contemporary media cultures, applying it to a historical figure like Godiva requires careful contextualisation. Drawing on Henry Jenkins’s definition of fandom as an “interpretive community” (137), this article positions fans not as passive consumers but as active participants who generate meaning through cultural production. In Godiva’s case, this includes storytelling, literature, poetry, plays, comics, films, fanfiction, and visual art—from classical gallery works to digital mashups. Musical interpretations range from Pietro Mascagni’s opera music Isabeau to Queen’s “Don’t Stop Me Now” and Beyoncé’s Godiva-inspired album cover (Mascagni; Queen; Beyoncé). Fandom is not only about cultural engagement, but it is also about power. As Duffett notes, fandom involves “a particular kind of engagement with the power relations of media culture” (18). It can serve as a transformative force, enabling creativity, influence, and activism (Lamerichs 147). Fanfiction, for instance, reflects humanity’s long-standing impulse to reinterpret and remix stories, echoing oral and mythic traditions (Blakemore 2017). The intersection of fandom and historical inquiry has gained traction in recent fan studies. Stevens and Webber introduce the concept of the fan-historian, describing fans who engage in both curatorial and transformative practices akin to professional historians. These fan-historians help make the past usable and meaningful, often functioning as agents of public history within fan communities (Stevens and Webber). Feminist media analysis further illuminates how fandom can reimagine female archetypes. In her book I'm Buffy and You're History, Patricia Pender demonstrates how fandom enables playful and subversive representations of femininity. Through narrative and performance, Pender argued that characters such as Buffy reclaim female power and become sites of feminist mythmaking and critique, but with cautions that ‘doing feminist things’ must, as Mayer puts it, “lead us to look at our own complicities, rather than just wave our pompoms in celebration of popular culture that appears oriented towards (normative) female audiences”. Lady Godiva’s legend, especially in its Victorian and modern retellings, has been used to explore themes of female agency, protest, and visibility, although similar scrutiny must be employed. Practices such as historical cosplay, artistic reinterpretation, and civic rituals—like Coventry’s Godiva procession—can be seen as examples of exclusive Anglo-Saxon historical fandom. Yet these acts reshape memory and myth, turning Godiva’s ride into a symbolic performance that invites ongoing, inclusive reinterpretation beyond historical location. Godiva’s image operates within consumer culture, often as a spectacle of the female body. Scholars argue that her nudity functioned as a form of cultural exchange—offering her body for the townspeople’s freedom while simultaneously becoming an object of the male gaze (Yılmaz 372–373). Her image has been commodified globally, most notably by the Godiva Chocolatier brand, which associates its products with values like nobility, courage, and freedom (Yılmaz 375). In this sense, Godiva is not only objectified—she is literally consumed. Yet the Godiva legend resists static interpretation. It remains a dynamic text, open to adaptation and participation. Over the past two centuries, communities have formed around her perceived significance, including local groups in Coventry, tourism initiatives, cultural events, and international activist movements. These engagements transform her fandom into a social and cultural phenomenon, echoing Jenkins’s vision of fans as interpretive communities (137). Fandom also operates as a site of political expression and cultural negotiation. Katherine French argues that Godiva’s ride functions as a rite of passage, marking a shift in authority and social order: “Godiva as liminal figure articulates the changing status of the city of Coventry through her ride” (French 11). As a transformative agent, Godiva embodies both rebellion and contradiction—affirming and challenging structures in pursuit of freedom and identity (French 11, 19). While she may be commodified, the ongoing reinterpretation of her legend through fandom offers a counter-narrative. Each recreation becomes an act of resistance against the commodification of female bodies and stories (Blakemore), revealing not just nudity, but courage. Each recreation forms a new Godiva. Herstory and Contemporary Cosplay: The Historical Godiva Although Lady Godiva is a globally recognised figure, the historical details of her life remain elusive. Born around 990 and dying sometime after the Norman Conquest, Godiva—originally Godgyfu, meaning “God’s Gift” in Old English—was a noblewoman associated with the early development of Coventry (“Countess Godiva”; “Historic Coventry”). Despite the scarcity of records, her name appears in the Domesday book as one of the few female landowners of the time, and she is credited with founding a monastic site that would become Coventry’s original cathedral (Liber Eliensis 93). Fandom, particularly in its modern form, is often characterised by active participation, and cosplay (costume play) is one such expression. Dressing as Lady Godiva in public events—parades, festivals, and reenactments—can be understood as a form of historical cosplay that aligns with fan practices (Lenning). In Coventry, Godiva’s legacy continues to attract international tourism. Visitors engage with her story through archaeological sites, guided walks, and landmarks such as Godiva’s Trail, Coventry Cathedral, and her putative burial site (“The City of Coventry: The Legend of Lady Godiva”; “Godiva’s Cathedral Quarter Walk”; “Lady Godiva’s Burial Claim”). Some tours even feature guides in period costume, blending education with performance (Coventry Guild of Tour Guides). The Godiva legend experienced a revival in the seventeenth century, coinciding with Coventry’s struggle for civic independence. As French notes, this period saw communities actively reimagine and participate in the Godiva story through various media, including portraits, medals, mottos, and coins (3). Fig. 1: England, Conder Token, Coventry Halfpenny 1792. Public celebrations of Godiva’s ride became institutionalised through the annual Godiva Procession, held from 1678 until the 1960s as part of Coventry Fair. The procession featured a woman portraying Godiva—sometimes nude, semi-clad, or dressed in flesh-coloured garments—riding through the city on horseback (Donoghue 45). This tradition has evolved but persists today in events such as Godiva Day, also known as “Dame Goodyver’s Day,” where the city’s official Lady Godiva leads a cosplay-style parade with traditional costumes, music, and community activities (“Dame Goodyver’s Day”; Coventry Society; Harris; “Queen Remembered at Coventry’s Godiva Day Parade”). The Godiva Festival, a three-day event typically held in June, further demonstrates the blending of historical memory and contemporary fan culture. Featuring performances, reenactments, and public engagement, the festival continues to celebrate Godiva’s legacy as both a historical figure and a cultural icon (“Godiva Procession Glory of 2002”; “Godiva Procession”; Godiva Festival; Gardner). Through these events, Godiva’s story is not only preserved but actively reinterpreted by modern communities, reinforcing her place in both local heritage and global fandom. The Godiva Cult: Pagan Goddess and Pious Saint The Godiva legend, though often associated with the historical Countess Godgifu, may draw from much older mythological traditions. Scholars have connected her story to ancient Greek and Celtic rituals involving sacred, semi-clad female processions. Robert Graves, in The White Goddess, interprets Lady Godiva not merely as a historical or saintly figure, but as a medieval manifestation of a pagan goddess, re- or rather unclad, whose symbolic nudity and ritualistic ride echo earlier fertility rites and goddess worship (Graves 395). This mythic framing positions Godiva as more than a passive subject of legend; she becomes a figure of cultural power and continuity, capable of inspiring devotion and reinterpretation across centuries. This mythic resonance aligns with Nicolle Lamerichs’s understanding of fandom as a space of “transformation, creativity, influence and activism”, where fans engage deeply with cultural texts and reimagine them in ways that reflect contemporary values and identities (Lamerichs 147). From this perspective, the continued celebration, adaptation, and performance of the Godiva legend—through art, literature, civic ritual, and even branding—can be understood as a form of historical fandom. These practices do not merely preserve the legend; they actively reshape it, allowing Godiva to function as a living symbol of protest, femininity, and cultural memory. In the Middle Ages during the age of courtly love, romance, and chivalry, Godiva’s ride gained further followers, appearing first in Roger of Wendover’s Latin chronicle (Wendover). Its medieval romancing saw numerous versions of the tale, with various twists such as a retelling by Matthew Paris in the mid-thirteenth century, while the addition that Godiva ordered the townsfolk to stay indoors and not view her nude appears in Grafton’s 1569 chronicle (Paris; Grafton). Oral traditions including ballads are also from this period (“The City of Coventry: The Legend of Lady Godiva”). Within confines of race and class, such stories can reveal accurate insights into navigating medieval femininity, sexuality, and power (Archer 15). The Godiva narrative has also undergone spiritual reinterpretation. Like many pagan myths, her story was absorbed into Christian tradition. The tale of the naked rider was gradually associated with the philanthropic Countess Godgifu, and the original folkloric elements were reframed as a Christian procession celebrating her piety. Sara Maitland and Wendy Mumford include Godiva in their hagiography, noting that her story—composed of “elements of folk story, local tradition and memory of her exceptional piety”—resembles the lives of many canonised saints from the same or earlier periods (Maitland and Mumford 325). However, as Donoghue points out, “saintliness is not the first thing that springs to mind in the context of her ride because it clashes with the anecdote’s worldly motives (tax-relief) and not-so subtle erotic details” (Donoghue 8). The legend’s enduring appeal may lie precisely in these contradictions: Godiva is both sacred and sensual, submissive and subversive, a figure whose power lies in her ability to transcend and transform the meanings imposed upon her. New Godivas: Political and Feminist Activism In the 19th century, the Godiva legend gained renewed popularity in literature, music, and art, particularly among the Pre-Raphaelites and suffragists. This period saw a shift toward a more saintly and modest portrayal of Godiva. She rode forth “clothed on with chastity” (Tennyson 15). She is nude but covered by her hair in Collier’s well-known 1898 painting (fig. 2) though in Leighton’s early nineteenth-century portrait she rides fully clothed (Collier; Stevengraph; Leighton). Such was the admiration of Godiva around that time that Queen Victoria gifted her husband, Prince Albert, a Lady Godiva statue as a birthday present (Royal Collection Trust). Fig. 2: John Collier, Lady Godiva, 1897. Dorothy Mermin makes a case for the significance of Godiva to women writers and activists of the Victorian period. In Godiva, Mermin suggests, “a woman writer’s virtue is one with transgressive power”, and her ride an image and inspiration for their bold, often solitary, and social goal in writing (21). Mermin also cites nineteenth-century activist Harriet Martineau, who told female audiences fearing exposure and condemnation in taking up controversial causes such as campaigns against the Contagious Diseases Act to ‘think of the Lady Godiva!’ (21). Josephine Butler, the Victorian British suffrage and social reform leader entitled her political play ‘The New Godiva’: Compare her to Godiva, staking something dearer than life in the high emprise, stripping herself bare of the very vesture of her soul. … From the new Godiva a harder thing than the mere laying down of one’s life has been required. From her … it has been exacted to place upon the altar her reputation, exposing herself to something worse than mere physical torture, to a species of misconception more exquisitely agonising than the most ingenious refinement of bodily suffering. (Butler 27-28) In 1940, while Coventry city was extensively bombed during World War Two, philanthropist Mrs A. Lloyd had a statuette made in the Alexander Archipenko studio in which the horse and Godiva fuse together, with the horse looking around at her in sympathy. Mrs Lloyd later gave the statue to the city as a token of America's admiration for the courage of the people of Coventry (Aquilla and Day 36; Lancaster). Coventry city’s official Lady Godiva, Pru Porretta, aims to “reimagine the role of Godiva as a strong female leader seeking social justice and working with other female heroines from different cultures to empower their communities and to celebrate diversity across those communities collaboratively” (Coventry Society). Fourteen ‘Modern-Day Godivas’ were selected as representatives in events while Coventry was UK City of Culture in 2021.  Women activists have long “helped shape a city of justice” in Coventry (Pearce). Pearce cites acts of female rebellion and resistance that have included fights for suffrage, animal rights, and clothing freedom for schoolgirls—in the form of the right to wear trousers. The Godiva chocolatier-sponsored Lady Godiva Initiative supports women’s empowerment by funding women’s organisations globally (Lady Godiva Initiative). In an ironic twist, Godiva chocolatiers took on some anti-consumer activism on behalf of young women in Japan, campaigning against the custom of giri-choko that sees women (only) on Valentine’s Day expected to gift chocolate to a wide range of family and friends, risking female impoverishment (Adelstein 2018). While “it is usually forgotten that Lady Godiva was a political activist” (Button 1), Godiva’s symbolic ride continues to bind together strands of leadership and activism. Tucker has charted the phenomenon of women posing nude in calendars for good causes: “every group of activists sooner or later discovers the usefulness of the birthday suit as a uniform of rebellion, and a visual rallying cry.” As recently as International Women’s Day March 2020, Extinction Rebellion activists took up naked protest for climate justice (Upton Clark). Godiva Fever: Fanning the Flame Reinterpreting the Godiva legend can be viewed as a continued opportunity for creative artists and activists to assert their own voices, values, and perspectives, as well as to reflect contemporary issues. Renewed cultural interest in Lady Godiva in the twentyfirst century has been dubbed ‘Godiva fever’ (“The Legend of Lady Godiva: Why Her Story Still Resonates Today”). In July 2012, a six-metre model of Godiva awoke in Coventry in multimedia celebrations during its city arts festival and carnival (Digital Bywater). The puppet was transported to London in time for the opening of the 2012 Olympic Games (Imagineer Productions). Recent creative reinterpretations of Lady Godiva’s legendary ride demonstrate the enduring appeal of her story across diverse media and genres, particularly when viewed through the lens of fan-history. Twentieth-century adaptations include Dr. Seuss’s satirical The Seven Lady Godivas and Raoul C. Faure’s pulp-style paperback (Geisel; Faure). Her image resurfaces in popular television, such as The Simpsons (season 15, episode 11) and Charmed (season 7, episode 2), where Godiva is portrayed by actress Rose McGowan—later a prominent #MeToo activist and author of Brave (McGowan). Godiva also appears in the DC Comics universe (“Godiva (comics)”), in a children’s Golden Book by Duplaix, and in a historical novel by Lynne Cullen (Duplaix; Cullen). Her influence extends to a surrealist sculpture by Salvador Dalí featuring butterflies as symbols of rebirth (Dalí), and a French play by Canolle that emphasises female resistance. In the young adult novel Blue Sky Freedom, Godiva becomes the namesake of an anti-apartheid resistance leader (Halberstam). The twentyfirst century has seen a wave of retellings by female authors (Galland; Jones; Randolph; Redgold), each offering unique variations in setting, tone, and theme. Notably, Godiva appears as a witch in a Harry Potter fanfiction story hosted on The Petulant Poetess (Celestial Melody) and has been reimagined as a dual-timeline narrative video game, available on platforms such as Steam and Grouvee, where she is portrayed both as a medieval warrior and a futuristic bounty hunter (Lady Godiva). Riding On: Movement across Time In 2001, an archaeological dig in Coventry made a breakthrough discovery of a woman with golden hair that archaeologists believe could have been an early image of Godiva. The medieval glass shards are now on display for the first time in centuries. In Coventry, a monument is also planned to house the giant puppet model of Lady Godiva (“A Monument to a Legend”). The image of a fixed, immovable statue offers a striking contrast to the dynamic, evolving nature of Godiva’s legend when viewed through the lens of fan-history. While monuments suggest permanence and tradition, fan reinterpretations emphasise movement, creativity, and participation. Retelling a legend shares many characteristics with fanfiction, such as imaginative riffs on familiar characters and plots—but there are key distinctions. Legends often serve to preserve cultural memory and reinforce tradition, whereas fanfiction typically thrives on reinterpretation, remixing, and the engagement of interpretive communities through modern media. By analysing the Godiva legend as fan-history, I argue that it can function as both: a vessel of tradition and a site of transformation. This duality does not erase the problematic objectification of Godiva’s naked body as spectacle or consumer brand, but it does offer an alternative reading—one that foregrounds agency, creativity, and resistance. This is particularly important when contrasted with predominantly masculinist fandoms surrounding figures like King Arthur or Norse and Viking heroes. Godiva’s tale is not set in stone. It is a living legend—continually reshaped through interpretation, participation, philanthropy, artistic expression, and activism. When Godiva rides, she signals not just protest, but possibility. 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