#james didn't have buttsex theory but that's a ramble for another time

[james-vi-stan-blog]

How true was it, that James never washed his hands, or was very unhygienic in general? Looking at his fingernails in M&G teaser, it seems like they’re going for the unhygienic look for him. It‘s especially noticeable when he’s smearing blood on George’s face. I know everyone wasn’t super clean in that era, but James was said to be especially dirty by some historians. I can’t remember if he was described as such in the King‘s Assassin, or not though.

IMO, it's possible.

As you said, this is a time period when reckless bathing was regarded as injurious to the health. Which doesn't mean that people didn't bathe, but that hygiene was imagined differently from our time. The question to answer is whether James was more unhygenic than his contemporaries.

AFAIK the only primary source that directly describes James as particularly dirty or never washing is Weldon. Weldon's account (if it was even actually written by Weldon) has a lot of problems with it. (Check out these introductory pages for an idea of what kind of slant is associated with the publication of Weldon's work.) However, the common story that Weldon was dismissed from court and so held a grudge against James when he was writing itself has problems with it. So, Weldon may or may not be accurate; it's got a very pronounced agenda, though.

A single diary entry from Anne Clifford has snowballed through the centuries into an image of James as filthy and lice-infested, but what she actually said was "we were all lowzy by sittinge in Sir Thomas Erskin's chamber", which is a far cry from saying James stunk. Fakehistoryhunter did a deep dive on this. (Though, I do think, based on their closeness, if Thomas Erskine did have lice, James would have, too.)

There's some better evidence than that. George Villiers once signed off a letter to James, "So, craving your blessing, I kiss your dirty hands, Your majesty's most humble slave and dog, Steenie." Does this mean James's hands were especially dirty? It could just be Buckingham's signature saucy writing style to James. He also used a very similar construction once to Charles, "I kiss thy warty hands". So, maybe James was especially dirty, or maybe not.

There's other side contributors I haven't really seen discussed a lot. Like, James had lifelong digestive problems, including bowel problems. This could have contributed to an aura of "grossness" around James. He loved poop and butt jokes (which, idk maybe I'm projecting, but seems very, very normal for someone who has medical issues). James let dogs on the bed. James was always partying at the hunting lodge and drank very heavily, which would heavily feed an air of slovenliness. Etc.

And, you know, we can't forget that historians over the past 400 years have been overwhelmingly homophobic straight men who go "of course James was gross... homosexuality = buttsex = the worst form of uncleanliness there is".

Tudor Times did a long analysis of "dirty James" that's worth reading, too.

So tl;dr my own opinion is "quite probably James was dirty but the popular narrative is exaggerated and we can't trust a lot of these accounts".