On 19th July 1553, thirteen days after the death of her half-brother Edward VI, Mary, eldest daughter of Henry VIII, was proclaimed queen in London in place of Queen Jane, who had been proclaimed queen on 10th July.
The Chronicle of the Grey Friars of London records:
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Today we have an article by Sarah Bryson, author of Mary Boleyn: In a Nutshell and a regular contributor to the Tudor Society.
Mary Boleyn is most certainly a woman of mystery. Her younger sister was Anne Boleyn, second wife of Henry VIII and Queen consort of England. Mary’s brother was a well-known member of Henry VIII’s court, who was evangelical in his religious beliefs and who, like his sister Anne, ended up on the scaffold. Mary’s father was also an important member of Henry VIII’s court. Thomas Boleyn was a talented man, who was fluent in French and who was sent on many missions as an ambassador for England. He was cunning and smart and used his skills and wits to provide a fantastic education for his children, as well as to further himself and his family at court. And yet when we look at Mary’s life compared to her famous siblings and father so little is known.
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After declaring herself queen the previous day, in front of her household at Kenninghall, Mary Tudor, daughter of Henry VIII and half-sister of the late King Edward VI, wrote the following letter to the privy council:
“My lords, we greet you well and have received sure advertisement that our dearest brother the King and late sovereign lord is departed to God. Marry, which news, how they be woeful unto our hearts, He wholly knoweth to whose will and pleasure we must and do humbly submit us and our will.
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Mary Tudor, Queen of France, and Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk.[/caption]Mary Tudor, Queen of France, was the younger sister of King Henry VIII. Born to King Henry VII and Queen Elizabeth of York in 1496, Mary was one of eight children and one of only three to survive to adulthood. Tragedy struck Mary at just seven years of age when her older brother and heir to the throne, Arthur, died in 1502. Less than a year later, Mary’s mother Elizabeth of York died trying to give Henry VII another son. Then, when Mary was eight years old, her older sister Margaret, then fourteen, left England for Scotland to marry King James IV. Mary and her older brother Henry were the only two siblings left in England and it has been suggested that during this time, growing up together, they formed a close bond which survived until Mary’s death.
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Lacey Baldwin Smith has written that “Tudor portraits bear about as much resemblance to their subjects as elephants to prunes.” A slight exaggeration, maybe. But it is true that the historical accuracy of the depictions in Tudor portraits, particularly of royalty, was often at war with “symbolic iconizing”—the use of imagery to represent the person’s character, position or role.
The symbolism could include inscriptions, emblems, mottos, relationships with other people, animals, or objects, and it could also be written into the body itself. A famous example is Hans Holbein’s sketch of Henry VIII—the painting itself was destroyed in a fire—with the king posed to emphasize his power, authority, and resoluteness: legs spread and firmly planted, broad shoulders, one hand on his dagger, and a very visible codpiece (larger, art historians have noted, than portraits of other men at the time.) His stance, as Suzanne Lipscomb points out, “mimics the stance of a man standing in full armour…sparking associations with martial glory.” Lipscomb also points out an interesting detail: in the draft sketch, Henry’s face is turned to a ¾ angle. But in the final painting, as we know from 16th century copies done within Henry’s lifetime, Holbein has Henry looking straight ahead, confronting the spectator with an unblinking stare that is still symbolic of masculinity today.
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William Somer (Sommers) served as Henry VIII’s fool from June 1535 and just a month later got into trouble with the King. In July 1535, Eustace Chapuys, the Imperial ambassador, recorded that Henry VIII was so angry with Somer that he nearly killed him:
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The Field of Cloth of Gold was an historic meeting between Henry VIII and Francis I of France to solidify the Treaty of London. It ran from 7th June 1520 until 24th June 1520 and was held on a field between the English stronghold of Guînes and the French town of Ardres, to solidify the Treaty of London.
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The Field of Cloth of Gold was a spectacular meeting between King Henry VIII of England and King Francis I of France. The meeting lasted from the 7th June to 24th June 1520 and was one of the most impressive, lavish meetings to ever be held between the two Kings. The meeting was held between the English stronghold of Guînes and the French town of Ardres, on a piece of land which was referred to as the Field of Cloth of Gold.
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In today’s Claire Chat’s video I talk about the visit Charles V made to England in 1522, to make an alliance with Henry VIII against France, and all the pageantry and entertainment that he enjoyed.
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Just a reminder that Claire Ridgway will be in the chatroom tonight (29th May) to answer questions on her recent talk on Thomas Cromwell, Henry VIII and the Fall of Anne Boleyn, or anything you want to ask her. The chat will be at midnight UK time on Friday, which works out as 1am Central European time on Saturday, 7pm in New York on Friday, 4pm in Los Angeles on Friday and 9am on Saturday in Sydney.
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Edward VI was born on 12 October 1537 at Hampton Court Palace. He was the son of Henry VIII and his third wife Jane Seymour, who died twelve days after giving birth to him, probably of puerperal fever. He was tutored by scholars such as John Cheke, Richard Cox, Roger Ascham and Jean Belmain, and it appears that he was an intelligent child. By the age of twelve he was undertaking work on religious issues and controversies and had written a treatise about the Pope being the Antichrist.
Henry VIII, died on 28th January 1547, making Edward King Edward VI of England. Edward was only nine years old and far too young to rule over the country himself so a Council of Regency was set up, according to Henry VIII’s will. Sixteen executors had been named by Henry to act as a regency council until Edward came of age. The council members had been appointed as equals, but Edward’s uncle, Edward Seymour, took the lead and became Lord Protector of the Realm. Seymour was not content with just being Lord Protector, by 1547 he had convinced the young King to sign letters patent giving him the right to appoint members of his choosing to the Privy Council and to only consult them when he himself chose to.
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Mary, Queen of Scots, was born at Linlithgow Palace in Scotland on 8th December 1542. She was the daughter of James V of Scotland and his second wife, Mary of Guise, and the granddaughter of Margaret Tudor (Henry VIII’s sister) and James IV of Scotland. On the 14th December, when she was just six days old, Mary became Queen of Scotland after her father died of a fever. She was crowned Queen on 9th September 1543 at Stirling Castle. As Mary was a baby, James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran, acted as regent until 1554 when he surrendered the regency to Mary’s mother, Mary of Guise, who acted as regent until her death in 1560.
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Elizabeth I was born on 7 September 1533 at Greenwich Palace. She was the daughter of Henry VIII and his second wife Anne Boleyn. Her mother was executed for alleged adultery and treason in May 1536 and within two months of her mother’s death Parliament had confirmed that Elizabeth’s parents’ marriage was invalid and that Elizabeth was illegitimate.
In 1547, following her father’s death, Elizabeth moved in with her stepmother the Dowager Queen Catherine Parr, and her husband Thomas Seymour. There, she became involved in a scandal with Seymour, who would visit Elizabeth’s chamber, dressed only in his night-gown, and proceed to tickle and stroke the teenaged girl. Eventually, Catherine arranged for Elizabeth to go and live with her good friends, Sir Anthony Denny and his wife at Cheshunt. Catherine died in September 1548, following the birth of her daughter, and Seymour was executed in March 1549 for allegedly plotting to control his nephew Edward VI and to remove his brother, Edward Seymour, Lord Protector, from power.
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Mary was born on 18 February 1516 at Greenwich Palace and was the daughter of Henry VIII and his first wife Catherine of Aragon. She was an intelligent girl, was known as a linguist and loved music and dancing. Mary was made illegitimate and removed from the succession after the annulment of her father’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon in 1533 and the subsequent birth of her half-sister Elizabeth, daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. She and Elizabeth (who had been removed from the succession in 1536 after the fall of her mother) were restored to the line of succession, after their half-brother Edward, by Parliament in 1543 but Edward VI chose to remove his half-sisters from the succession as he lay dying in 1553 and chose Lady Jane Grey as his heir. Mary was forced to fight for the throne and was proclaimed queen on 19 July 1553.
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In today’s Claire Chats video I talk about what the children of wealthy families wore in Henry VIII’s reign.
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Elizabeth I is one of England’s most well-known monarchs. She was the daughter of the infamous King Henry VIII and his second wife the illustrious Queen Anne Boleyn, who was executed when Elizabeth was just two years old.
Elizabeth reigned for almost forty-five years and was the last monarch of the Tudor Dynasty, having died childless. Her reign is famous as ‘The Golden Age’, for its blooming of the arts with the origins of Renaissance drama and for producing the most famous playwrights of the era, such as William Shakespeare and Christopher Marlowe.
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Hans Holbein the Younger is one of history’s most famous painters and it is thanks to his great skill and talent that we have so many paintings of the people of Henry VIII’s reign, including the great King himself. But who exactly was Hans Holbein the Younger and how did he come to the English court and catch the eye of Henry VIII?
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Our March talk is by Natalie Grueninger, author of “In the Footsteps of Anne Boleyn”. Natalie takes us through the reasons why the Tudor court went on progress and gives us many interesting facts and tales about some of the different progresses that Henry VIII went on.
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Every aspect of Anne Boleyn’s life is controversial. Her birth date, her personality, her relationship with Henry VIII, whether she was guilty of the crimes attributed to her – all of these, and more, arouse fierce debate. But it is Anne’s physical appearance that is perhaps the most lingering and heated of controversies about her.
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Katherine Parr was different to Henry VIII’s other consorts. She was several years older than his previous wives, she had been married twice before, and she had not spent considerable time in royal service. Above all, however, Katherine differs to her five predecessors by virtue of her status as an author. She was the first Queen of England to publish her own work.
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Hampton Court has origins far older than Henry VIII. Originally Hampton Court was a settlement belonging to the Saxon period; its original name was ‘Hammton’ meaning ‘a settlement by the river’. In the early 12th century the land was owned by Reginald de St Valery, a crusader in Jerusalem. He allowed the Knights Hospitallers of St John to rent the land. The Knights built the House of Hampton and the land was primarily used to manage the Knights agricultural estates.
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Thanks this month goes to historian Elizabeth Norton for her expert chat all about the Boleyn Family. It’s very easy to be absorbed in the fascinating life of Queen Anne Boleyn and her marriage to Henry VIII, but the Boleyn family has a much longer history. In this Expert Talk, Elizabeth Norton explains to us where the Boleyns came from and how they rose high enough for Anne to become Queen Consort. Fascinating stuff!
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We had a wonderful live-chat session with author Sandra Vasoli (author of “Je Anne Boleyn”) last night. The questions were coming in thick-and-fast and Sandra had some amazing additional stories to tell us about her visit to the Vatican Archives to see the love letters of Henry VIII.
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Happy 481st birthday to Queen Elizabeth I who was born at 3pm on 7th September 1533. She was, of course, the daughter of Henry VIII and his second wife, Anne Boleyn.
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On this day in Tudor history, 21st November, John Bale, Protestant playwright, historian and bishop, was born (1495); and Frances Grey (née Brandon), Duchess of Suffolk and mother of Lady Jane Grey, died (1559)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 20th November, Elizabeth I’s Lord Chancellor and favourite, Sir Christopher Hatton, a man she called her “mouton”, died (1591); and her godson, author, courtier and a man who invented a flush toilet, Sir John Harington, died (1612)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 18th November, Ralph Baynes, Bishop of Coventry and Lichfield, died while imprisoned in the Bishop of London’s home, and his fellow clergyman, Cuthbert Tunstall, Bishop of London, died in prison at Lambeth Palace (1559)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 17th November, Queen Mary I died at St James’s Palace, London, and her half-sister, Elizabeth, became Queen Elizabeth I. Elizabeth would reign for over forty-four years (1558)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 13th November, mercer and member of Parliament Robert Packington was shot to death by an unknown assailant (1536); and Lady Jane Grey and her husband, Lord Guildford Dudley, two of his brothers, and Archbishop Cranmer were tried for treason…
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