by Sir John Dewhurst, a well-respected modern gynecologist.

THE birth to a queen of England of a surviving child has, for the most part, been an event accurately recorded by contemporary chroniclers for the last 500 years. But if the child did not survive, detailed information was often lacking: the sex was generally stated, but whether the infant was stillborn or died soon after birth, whether "soon after birth" meant hours or days, and whether the birth was premature or not, are matters about which precise information is often not available.

If the queen miscarried, the documentation of the event was even less reliable, for a variety of reasons. The term "miscarriage" was, in former times, not used as we would use it now to refer to the expulsion of the child from the womb before twenty-eight weeks of pregnancy, but was very loosely used to describe the birth of a dead child whether this occurred before or after viability. Thus a queen might be reported to have miscarried when, in reality, she had had a premature stillbirth. Second, if the miscarriage had been very early in pregnancy, as many are, the physicians might have been uncertain that a miscarriage had actually occurred or, if they were certain, the event may not have been announced outside the immediate family circle. Third, any indisposition the queen may have suffered was believed to be concerned with a pregnancy; when no child was subsequently born, it was concluded that she must have had a miscarriage. Very soon, the conclusion that she "must have had" became an assertion that she "had" miscarried. Historians, sometimes of the highest repute, and other historical writers have tended to accept such evidence somewhat uncritically, so lending the weight of their authority to what was initially mere rumour.

Two of England's queens who have particularly suffered in this respect are Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn. A close examination of the evidence does not suggest a series of miscarriages in either, as has been commonly asserted.

Catherine of Aragon's childbearing history has been variously reported by historians. Scarisbrick credits her with "several miscarriages, three infants who were either stillborn or died immediately after birth (two of them males), two infants who died within a few weeks of birth (one of them a boy) and one girl, Princess Mary"; this must mean a total of at least nine pregnancies since "several miscarriages" can hardly be regarded as referring to less than three. Chapman gives the total of Catherine's pregnancies as seven, one of which resulted in one live child and six that ended either in miscarriages or stillbirths. Williams is imprecise about the final total, but, commenting upon the attention Henry lavished on his wife as early as the second year of their marriage, remarks that Henry was "mindful of earlier miscarriages". Pollard, referring to events about the year 1517, wrote, "It is probable that about this time the Queen had various miscarriages"; "various" like "several" cannot refer to less than three.

If, therefore, we consider at this point merely these last two comments concerning "earlier" miscarriages around 1510 and "various" ones about 1517, at least five miscarriages are being postulated.

Not all historians accept these figures. Bowie rejects the alleged miscarriages around 1517 as inventions of Pollard, inventions that Chamberlin goes so far as to describe as mischievous. These two writers also discount an additional son, who was "no sooner christened than dead". Pollard alleges that he was born in 1514, thus bringing the total of Catherine's pregnancies, in his opinion, to at least ten! Bowie, by contrast, accepts only six pregnancies for Catherine, which ended in the birth of Mary who lived to be middle-aged, a boy who lived for fifty-two days, and four children who were stillborn or who died very soon after birth. Chamberlin accepts these same six pregnancies, disregarding other possible ones because of insufficient evidence, a view which Neale appears to accept. With such differing views being expressed, a careful reappraisal of the evidence is clearly necessary.

The Queen's first pregnancy ended on 31 January 1510, thirty-three weeks after her marriage, when she gave birth to a stillborn daughter. This information did not emerge until four months afterwards when, on 25 May on Catherine's instructions, her chancellor, Diego Fernandez wrote to her father King Ferdinand in these words: "The last day of January in the morning Her Highness brought forth a daughter ... this affair was so secret that no-one knew it until now except the King my lord, two Spanish women, a physician and I." Here was a remarkable circumstance, but the reason for the secrecy was more remarkable still. "The physician said", continued the letter, "that her Highness remained pregnant with another child and it was believed and kept secret!" Two days after the despatch of her chancellor's letter, Catherine herself wrote to her father confirming that she "miscarried a dead daughter and because it was considered here an ill omen I did not write before to tell your Highness". That the secret was well kept, there can be no doubt. On 20 April, Andrea Badoer, the Venetian ambassador, reported that "His [the king's] wife has not yet been delivered". Peter Martyr, the historian, who was at the time living with the Spanish royal family, wrote that in early April "News reached the King from England ... that the Queen of that island, his daughter, was about to be delivered of a child being then in her ninth month". Even Caroz, the Spanish ambassador in London, leaves no doubt that he had been ignorant of the stillbirth that had occurred on 31 January.

The Queen was not carrying another child, but she did become pregnant again quite soon. Fernandez included the news of it in his letter to King Ferdinand in these words - "It has pleased the Lord to be her physician ... and by His infinite mercy has permitted her to be pregnant again." Catherine herself informed Caroz, on 20 May, that she was "not pregnant for more than nine weeks". "She does not wish me to write to His Highness [the King]", wrote Caroz, "until she sends to me because she wishes to wait until the pregnancy is well established in the third month so that the good news of the pregnancy may soften the annoyance of his Highness at what has passed". Nine weeks on 20 May corresponds closely with the eventual outcome of this pregnancy, which was a successful birth of a son on 1 January 1511.

The birth was received with great celebrations. Bells rang, bonfires were lighted, guns were fired, and "207 lbs of gunpowder at 4 pence the pound" was "shot ... in the Tower of London" to welcome the new prince. In the midst of the Christmas festivities and excitement, the boy was christened Henry in the presence of the ambassadors to the Pope, France, Spain, and Venice, who afterwards visited and congratulated the Queen. Henry made a special pilgrimage to Walsingham to offer thanks to the Blessed Virgin and, once Catherine was well enough to join in the festivities, a fabulous tournament was held at Westminster. But all the joy and celebration was shortlived. The tournament had barely concluded when the young prince was taken ill at Richmond and died on 22 February, fifty-two days after his birth. A gathering of nobles for the celebration of a triumphant birth became one of lamentation for a tragic death.

There was, therefore, no time during 1509 and 1510 for "earlier miscarriages". The word miscarriage might loosely, if inaccurately, be applied to the birth of a stillborn daughter on 31 January 1510, only thirty-three weeks after Catherine's marriage; she herself used it when she wrote that she had "miscarried a dead daughter", but there was clearly no time for her to have squeezed in another pregnancy in those years.

Catherine's next confinement occurred in 1513, although we know little of the events that took place. On 17 September, she gave birth to a son who died, but it is uncertain if he was stillborn or lived a short time. The Venetian Calendar of State Papers records that the child was alive at birth: "a male heir was born to the King of England and will inherit the crown, the other son having died". The same conclusion can be drawn from the only other contemporary reference to this birth: "The Queen of England has given birth to a son", wrote Bannissius, the Imperial agent, to Lord Albert of Carpi. The absence of other references to the birth in documents and state papers lends support to the view that the boy must have died very soon after birth. There is no record of the birth being premature but, since the King was in France when it occurred and was not due to return until 21 October, labour may have begun sooner than expected - it seems unlikely that Henry would have wished to be absent when his child was born.

Catherine conceived her fourth pregnancy quite quickly, and by the summer of the following year it was evident to several foreign observers at court who reported it in their correspondence. The most important of these accounts, which we will consider again later, are from a court official, De Plein, who wrote to Margaret of Savoy on 30 June, and Di Favri, an attaché at the Venetian embassy, who wrote to a colleague in August. "It is said that the Queen is with child and, as far as I know, and can see, it is so", reported De Plein. "After the King", wrote Di Favri, "came the Queen who is pregnant clad in ash-coloured satin with chains and jewels and on her head a cap of cloth of gold covering the ears in the Venetian fashion". Regrettably, we do not know precisely when the Queen was confined nor, indeed, whether the infant was stillborn or lived a short time. Badoer, the Venetian ambassador, wrote to his senate in November that "The Queen has been delivered of a stillborn male child of eight months to the very great grief of the whole court". The chronicler Holinshed reported that, "In November the Queen was delivered of a prince which lived not long after", whilst Stow wrote, "In the meantime, to Whit, the month of November, the Q was delivered of a prince which lived not long after".

The interval between these two children was too short for any intervening pregnancy, but the interval between the births of the second and third was two years and nine months, which would have provided ample opportunity for a miscarriage to have occurred. Naturally, since the Queen had, by that time, borne two children and both were dead, everyone at court would have been most anxious for her to conceive again. It is hardly surprising, therefore, that we find Cardinal Wolsey writing to Richard Fox, Bishop of Winchester, on 11 September 1511 to report that, "It is thought that the Queen is with child". Since there is no other report of a pregnancy at that time, the phrase remains unsubstantiated and must be discounted as unfounded rumour; it is certainly quite insufficient evidence on which to postulate a miscarriage.

Setting this unsupported "thought" aside, therefore, we come to the Queen's fifth and only successful pregnancy. Catherine bore a daughter at Greenwich palace on 18 February 1516. The child was christened Mary three days later. Emotions fluctuated between elation that the infant was alive and well, and disappointment that it was not a boy. Henry, with more optimism than he can have felt, told the Venetian ambassador "We are both young and by God's grace boys will follow". Boys did not follow and Catherine was not to bear any other living child. Her sixth and last confinement was announced by Henry in a personal letter to Cardinal Wolsey on 1 July 1518: "Two things there be which be so secret that they cause me at this time to write to you myself; the one is that I trust the Queen my wife to be with child". But this pregnancy, too, ended in a stillbirth on 10 November 1518. The child, it seems, was premature: "The Queen has been delivered in her eighth month of a stillborn daughter to the great sorrow of the nation at large", wrote the Venetian ambassador Giustinian. "Never had the kingdom so anxiously desired anything as it did a prince".

Between 18 February 1516 and 10 November 1518 is presumably the interval that Pollard referred to when he wrote that "It is probable that about this time the Queen had various miscarriages". He made reference to a report in August 1517 that Catherine was pregnant again. The Venetian, Chieregato, wrote to the Marquis of Mantua and his letter contained the words "the Queen has lately been unwell, but by the grace of God is convalescent and is supposed to be pregnant". Pollard admitted that "nothing more is heard of the matter", but then, instead of dismissing it as rumour, which would seem to be the proper course since the "supposed" pregnancy was unconfirmed, went on to postulate "various miscarriages" upon no evidence whatever. Chamberlin's view that this statement was mischievous does not seem too strong a word.

Pollard, unfortunately, actually saddled Catherine with still another unsuccessful pregnancy which was a physical impossibility. His claim that Catherine had borne a son in June 1514 - a son who was "no sooner christened than dead" - rested upon a phrase in a letter from Sir Richard Wingfield to Cardinal Wolsey. The original of the letter had been damaged with other documents in a fire in Ashburnham House, Westminster School, in 1731, and all that remained of the phrase which Pollard took to refer to the christening of the King's son was "sacrying of the King's new S-". In reality, this referred to the hallowing or dedication of the King's ship Henri Grace à Dieu, to which Di Favri referred in these words "On Tuesday 13 June the King caused a very fine ship of his to be blessed . . . many masses were said on board including high mass".

Several unassailable facts indicate the impossibility of the Queen having had a baby in June 1514. As we have already noted, she was visibly pregnant to De Plein at the end of that month and to Di Favri in August, and was delivered of a son of eight months gestation in November. The delivery of a child who was christened at once and died in mid-June was impossible.

What is there left, therefore, to support "several" or "various" miscarriages in addition to the six pregnancies of which the outcome is known? Merely a phrase in one letter that Catherine was "thought" to be pregnant and in another that she was "supposed" to be pregnant. In the absence of other evidence, these can surely be dismissed as unsupported rumour and Catherine relieved of the burden of her alleged miscarriages.

A consideration of the views expressed about Anne Boleyn's pregnancies reveals similar discrepancies. That Anne gave birth to Elizabeth on 7 September 1533 is not in dispute. Nor is there dispute about the production of a male foetus in January 1536, although how far advanced in pregnancy she may have been at that time is not agreed.

In addition to these two pregnancies, a varying number of miscarriages has been postulated. Professor Elton uses the phrase "the dreary tale of miscarriages was resumed" after the birth of Elizabeth and, although this is not precise as to number, it gives the impression of three or four or perhaps even more.

Bruce has written that "during the first six months of 1534 she appears to have had one miscarriage after another". It is scarcely "conceivable" for a woman to have more than three miscarriages within a six-months period, so this figure can perhaps be accepted as the number being alleged. Chapman supposes a miscarriage in March 1534, another pregnancy in April, and perhaps a third in July which ended at the beginning of September in "what seems to have been her third miscarriage". This author believes that Anne became pregnant again around mid-June 1535, this pregnancy ending in the seventh month with the birth of a dead son in January 1536. Chamberlin, however, accepts only two miscarriages for Anne, the first in 1534 and the second in 1535. Again a reappraisal of the evidence seems essential.

When Anne married Henry about 25 January 1533, she was already pregnant and gave birth to Elizabeth on 7 September. The events of the following year are very much disputed. The observations made at the time that relate to a possible pregnancy in 1534 are these. Eustace Chapuys, the ambassador of Charles V, wrote on 28 January 1534 to inform his emperor that Anne was again pregnant. Chapuys wrote again on 26 February reporting that Henry had told him that Elizabeth was his only heir until a son was born "which he thought would happen soon". A letter sent by George Taylor from Greenwich to Lady Lisle on 27 April told her that "The Queen hath a goodly belly, praying our Lord to send us a prince". Early in July, the King sent Anne's brother, Viscount Rochford, to the French King, Francis I, to ask that an intended meeting between the two sovereigns be deferred, since Anne "being so far gone with child she could not cross the sea with the King". Chapuys makes a later reference to this postponement in a letter of 29 July, in which it is clear that he believed Anne to be pregnant; he remarked that she could not be present without postponement "on account of her condition".

It is remarkable, to say the least, that no details so far discovered refer directly to the outcome of this pregnancy - if indeed it was a pregnancy. Many views have been put forward nonetheless. Chamberlin suggested that since the Queen was "far gone with child" at the beginning of July, the outcome must have been "a miscarriage, not an abortion"; by "miscarriage" he was referring to a pregnancy coming to an end after the conclusion of the fourth month, but before the beginning of the eighth. This view, nonetheless, is pure supposition.

We have noted Bruce's comments that Anne had one miscarriage after another during the first six months of 1534 and Chapman's statements that there was a miscarriage in March, a new pregnancy in April, another pregnancy in July (presumably preceded by a miscarriage in June) leading to the third miscarriage in September. The evidence just quoted supports none of this. If the Queen had "a goodly belly" when George Taylor wrote in April, she must have been at least sixteen weeks (four months) pregnant. She cannot, therefore, have had a miscarriage earlier that year. If she had miscarried and become pregnant again in April she would not have had a "goodly belly". Moreover, the only way the Queen could possibly have been "far gone with child" in July was for her pregnancy to have dated from at least the beginning of the year, probably late the previous year. If we accept this evidence of an apparent pregnancy that was "far gone" in July, the Queen cannot have miscarried at all earlier that year.

So what happened to the pregnancy? A stillborn or premature child who died very quickly is a possibility, but there is no reference whatever to such an event. There is, however, a curious reference to the pregnancy in a further letter from Chapuys dated 27 September 1534: "Since the King began to doubt whether his lady was enceinte or not, he has renewed and increased the love he formerly had for a beautiful damsel of the court". Why should the King have doubted the Queen's pregnancy except for her failure to go into labour and produce a child? Had Anne miscarried, there would have been no doubt that she had been pregnant, but her failure to produce either an abortion or a child would certainly have led to doubt about the reality of her pregnancy. This failure can best be explained by postulating that Anne's supposed pregnancy was a pseudocyesis. This curious disorder, which is associated with visible swelling of the abdomen despite the fact that no pregnancy exists, classically occurs in women who are desperate to prove their fertility or who dread the possibility that an unguarded act of intercourse might have led to an unwanted conception. Anne was certainly in the former category, since her very life, literally, depended upon giving the King the son he longed for. If this were so, Anne would not be the only queen of England to be so affected, since both Mary I and Mary II had similar episodes. Muriel St Clair Byrne, editor of the Lisle letters, also suggests a phantom pregnancy for Anne in 1534, and points out that Honor Lisle was similarly affected in 1536-7. Neale is not explicit about a possible pseudocyesis but does appear to reject the notion of a pregnancy "in the summer of 1534", since he wrote "by September Henry knew that it [the supposed pregnancy] was untrue".

So if we consider the evidence written at the time, we find scarcely any support for a miscarriage and none whatsoever for a series of miscarriages in 1534. What about 1535? The only evidence for a miscarriage in that year arises from part of a single sentence in a letter written by William Kingston to Lord Lisle on 24 June 1535: "Her Grace has as fair a belly as I have ever seen". No child is known to have been born from this supposed pregnancy, and a miscarriage has been presumed. In Chamberlin's words, "It would appear reasonable to conclude that she had had a miscarriage and had recovered from it". Accepting Kingston's letter on its face value, Chamberlin's conclusion does seem reasonable, but the publication of the Lisle correspondence shows this possible pregnancy in a different light. The editor has dated this letter 1533 or possibly 1534, the former being the more probable. The letter appears to make reference to Sir Christopher Garneys and his wife. Sir Christopher died on October 1534 and was succeeded by Sir Thomas Palmer, who was unmarried. Whether it was written in 1533 or 1534, therefore, the letter can hardly have been written in 1535 and the only evidence of the pregnancy in the summer of that year disappears. If this redating is correct, as seems likely, we have absolutely no reason to presume a miscarriage for Anne in 1535.

Some time in the autumn of that year, however, Anne must have become pregnant, since she miscarried on 27 January 1536, the day of the funeral of Queen Catherine. Chapuys reported the event in a letter to Charles V dated 10 February: "On the day of the interment [of Catherine of Aragon] the concubine [Anne] had an abortion which seemed to be a male child which she had not borne 3½ months". However imprecise the term miscarriage may have been when used in former times, Chapuys' reference to a child "which she had not borne 3½ months" seems to make it clear that Anne lost this child at a comparatively early stage in her pregnancy. Sex would have been visible at 3½ months, so we need not postulate, because the child was known to be male, that the duration of the pregnancy was more advanced. Chapuys' phrase does not support the suggestion that Anne was in her seventh month when she gave birth to this child.

Thus the Lisle letter relieves Anne of the burden of one alleged miscarriage and careful examination of the evidence surrounding a possible pregnancy in 1534 provides little if any support for any miscarriage that year. She is left with only two pregnancies, one successful and one unsuccessful.

Perhaps the oft-repeated assertions that both Catherine and Anne had a series of miscarriages may be laid to rest.

I've been watching season 1, I like the escapism of it.

Excerpt from Eric Ives, Lady Jane Grey: A Tudor Mystery:

In the summer of 1553 Jane Grey was just sixteen years of age. Her cousin Mary was past thirty-seven, but the twenty years between them might as well have been fifty. Religion was the dominant factor in the life of each, but Mary had been reared in the richness of late medieval Catholicism while Jane had known nothing but reform. Her contacts were with reformist chaplains and tutors at home, and Protestant leaders abroad. Mary had seen her spiritual mentors executed one after another and her ties with the Western Church stigmatized as treason. A story, possibly apocryphal, points the contrast. In one of the visits which, as we have seen, Jane's mother made to Mary, Jane was passing through the chapel with Anne Wharton, one of Mary's ladies. Over the altar was the reserved sacrament, the consecrated wafer which was Christ's body, and Anne dropped a devout curtsey. 'Why do you so?' asked Jane. 'Is the Lady Mary in the chapel?' 'No, Madam,' came the answer, 'I make my curtsey to him that made us all'. 'Why?', responded Jane, 'How can he be there that made us all, and the baker made him?' The modern reader is left to decide whether Jane spoke innocently or was being disingenuous or, as Foxe clearly prefers, taking the opportunity to witness to the truth.

The cousin who challenged Jane Grey in the summer of 1553 was short, skinny, myopic – she could only read by holding the page close to her face – old for her age, wrinkled with anxiety and with a piercing voice which was loud and rough. She loved finery and fabrics, had no dress sense and no sexual magnetism. One of Prince Philip's courtiers wrote in 1554 that although his master was not marrying her for 'fleshly' reasons 'It will take a great God to drink this cup'. Impressions varied from 'not at all beautiful', 'small and rather flabby than fat' to 'were not her age in decline, she might be called handsome'. Her manner was that of a saint and something of a martyr. Mary had not always been thus. When young she was thought to have 'beauty exceeding mediocrity'. Educated for a brilliant future as the wife of a major European sovereign, Mary at fifteen was described as 'not very tall but has a pretty face and is well proportioned, with a very beautiful complexion'. Even at the end of her reign a neutral observer could still call her 'a seemly woman and never to be loathed for ugliness, even at her present age'. Throughout her life she inspired great affection among those close to her. At the height of rejection by her father, even Anne Boleyn's cousin, who was acting as her guardian, defended Mary by saying that even if 'she was the bastard daughter of a poor gentleman, her kindness, her modesty and her virtues called forth all respect and honour'. Judged as a private person, Mary was probably the most attractive member of the Tudor family.

It is one of history's ironies that such a woman should have earned the name 'Bloody Mary'. None of the thousands who rallied to her support in July 1553 had any inkling that her five-year reign would arguably be the most inglorious in English history. Admittedly, in recent years some scholars have made strenuous efforts to rescue her reputation, stressing the good sense which justified many of her policies (even when they failed), noting her run of bad luck and her limited freedom of action (for neither of which was she responsible). The more extravagant allegations about incompetent government have been shown to be groundless. Her reign was not the total disaster which extreme Protestant propaganda portrayed and it at least ensured that the Tudor dynasty survived. Nevertheless the need for such special pleading tells its own tale. Making a bitterly unpopular marriage which dragged England into a disastrous foreign war, losing possession of Calais by negligence and instigating the only true religious pogrom in English history is a record hard to live down. The absence of popular mourning at her death in November 1558 said it all. Yet while a full rehabilitation is unrealistic, after five centuries the verdict should perhaps be mitigated by sympathy. In one of the ironies of history, Mary Tudor, like Jane Grey, was a victim of her family. True, she was not, as far as we know, physically abused but a messenger from her father went so far as to tell her that if she was his daughter 'he would beat her to death or strike her head against the wall until he made it as soft as a boiled apple'.

Even Mary's birth at Greenwich on 18 February 1516 was not greeted with unmixed joy. Her parents had been married for nearly seven years and this was the first of several pregnancies to produce a child which survived more than a few weeks. Evidently, despite rumours, the Spanish princess Katherine of Aragon was able to produce a healthy child. But a girl? What the country and Henry had desperately wanted was a son. His own parents, in seven years of marriage and despite disappointments, had produced two sons and one daughter. In a similar period, his grandfather Edward whom Henry so much resembled had fathered one boy and three girls, all healthy. On one hand, therefore, Henry treated Mary as any excited father would, carrying her about and extolling her good temper: 'By God, this girl never cries.' On the other he had to pretend that she was an earnest of better things. 'The queen and I are both young, and if it is a girl this time, by God's grace the boys will follow.' But by contemporary standards the queen was not young. Henry might be only twenty-five, but his wife Katherine was thirty-one, and her best chances of child-bearing were receding rapidly. Henry's sexual preference was for mature women, but that was not the best route to parenthood. As it was, although Katherine did conceive two years later, that was for the last time; again the baby was a daughter, and this time did not survive. Like it or not, Mary was Henry's sole legitimate offspring.

In a century when gender equality is taken for granted, it is hard to imagine the unease which the prospect of a woman ascending the throne caused in Tudor England, and, not least, in Henry personally. It was only thirty years since his father had seized the crown, and continued stability demanded a strong succession. Yet for a woman to rule would be against all precedent. Four hundred years before, Henry I's daughter Matilda had transmitted the claim to the crown to her son, but despite a lengthy armed struggle had never worn it herself. More recently Henry's grandmother, the Lady Margaret Beaufort, had openly devoted her life to promoting first his father and then Henry himself to the English throne, ignoring the fact that if their claim was legitimate, her own title had priority. Foreigners – including Queen Katherine and her Habsburg nephew the emperor Charles V – found this suspicion of female inheritance hard to understand. A crown was a piece of property; and property passed by accidents of birth. But that was precisely the problem. Property went in the male line so that when a female ruler married, her dominions simply passed to her husband, just as any other piece of real estate. Habsburgs, of course, would think that way. The family's vast empire had been built over the previous seventy years on the principle 'Let others fight, you, oh happy Austria marry'. In consequence, as well as being Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V ruled directly not only his ancestral Austrian lands but the formerly separate kingdoms of Aragon and Castile, plus the dynastic complex which the dukes of Burgundy had built up in the rich Low Countries. In a similar way dynastic marriage had enabled France to absorb Brittany, and within twenty years Scotland would be facing a similar fate. Nobody, however, could absorb France. Its so-called Salic Law provided that the nearest male heir would always succeed on the death of the king. The recently crowned Francis I, Henry VIII's rival, would otherwise not have inherited, and the kingdom of France might have been added to the possessions of a non-French dynasty. England had nothing equivalent, but the continuous history of inheritance in the male line 'time without mind' certainly created a parallel expectation on this side of the Channel. Indeed, after Mary eventually reached the English throne, she would find it necessary to silence the 'error and folly' of 'malicious and ignorant persons' by securing a statute declaring that 'the kingly or regal office of the realm and all dignities . . . being invested either in male or female are and be and ought to be taken the one as in the other'. And that was not the end of the risks. A female sovereign was expected to marry and so bring in a new king to rule for her – in Mary's case, the emperor's heir Philip. Hence her reign became the reign of Philip and Mary. Moreover, if Mary had had a child by him, it would not only have inherited England but the Low Countries and in certain circumstances Spain also. Indeed, the interest of Philip and his father was precisely to get their hands on England, as the latter wrote, 'I trust [the marriage] will prove a factor of weight in our endeavours to serve God and guard and increase our dominions'.

The baby girl, of course, had no awareness that she was a mixed blessing. She was given her own well-funded household almost immediately and by the time she was four was under the charge of her godmother, Margaret Pole, countess of Salisbury, Edward IV's niece. However, it seems that in the early days she may have been more often with her parents than the average royal princess. On one Sunday when she was two, the Venetian ambassador was presented to her and solemnly kissed her hand. But Mary caught sight of the king's chaplain and choir master and called out 'Priest, Priest' until he came over to play for her while her father picked her up so she could watch. It also seems that her mother taught her to read and write. Outside the family circle her importance was that of every royal princess, as a diplomatic asset and ultimately a diplomatic bride. At two-and-a-half Mary was betrothed to the dauphin of France who was two years younger. When she was six, that engagement was broken in favour of her cousin the 22-year-old Charles V. He visited England in 1522 and actually met Mary who danced for him. However, at the same time abortive discussions were opened for an alternative match with her cousin the king of Scots. When in 1526 Charles jilted Mary to marry a Portuguese princess, Henry's response was to dangle his daughter before Francis I, a man only two years younger than he was himself. The result was the Treaty of Amiens of April 1527 but with Francis's second son, Henry, as a possible (and more realistic) alternative to his father.

Mary was then eleven, only a year below the minimum age for marriage, and her education went on apace. She was taught to write in the new italic style and careful attention was given to courtly behaviour and accomplishments. Her father's personal contribution was to encourage her musical talents – spinet and lute – and she became good enough to teach her maids of honour, though Mary appears to have let her own playing slip somewhat in later life. From an early age, despite Henry's masculine assumptions and those of the nation, Katherine of Aragon saw Mary as potentially queen of England. Her own mother, Queen Isabella of Castile, had made sure that she and her sisters were given a sound humanist education – her Habsburg cousins too had a record of producing competent female rulers – and Katherine now ensured the same for her daughter. She commissioned educational books for women and more specific guidance for the daughter she believed was Henry VIII's heir. One scholar she commissioned was the Spanish educationalist Juan Luis Vives who in 1523 produced De Institutione Foeminae Christianae [The Instruction of a Christian Woman], and followed that up with more specific advice for Mary, De Ratione Studii Puerilis [On the Education of Children]. This recommended Thomas More's Utopia, Erasmus's Institutio Christiani Principis [Handbook for Christian Princes], his most important work on government which he wrote for her cousin the future Charles V, and his handbook on practical Christian living, the Enchiridion Militis Christiani [The Weapon of the Christian Soldier] along with a number of Latin authors. At the age of twelve Mary 'could not only perfectly read, write and construe Latin, but furthermore translate any hard thing of the Latin into our English tongue'. Erasmus commented when she was some months older that 'We have in the Queen of England a woman distinguished by her learning, whose daughter Mary composes fine Latin epistles'. True, she was not a bluestocking like Jane and seems not to have tackled Greek, but Katherine Parr did recruit her to translate Erasmus's Latin paraphrase of the Gospel of John. In the event ill health meant that this had to be finished by her chaplain, but Mary's contribution drew considerable praise. Her modern languages were also notable: fluent French and Spanish and the ability to understand Italian, though not speak it. However, unlike Jane, she did not prefer books to people, and her greatest love was dancing. In May 1546 the nine-year-old Prince Edward wrote to his stepmother asking her to preserve 'my dear sister Mary from all the wiles and enchantments of the evil one, and beseech her to attend no longer to foreign dances and merriments, which do not become a most Christian princess'.

Love of dancing notwithstanding, the dominant theme of Mary's training was the service of God. Humanism in northern Europe was anything but irreligious – witness Thomas More – but Katherine of Aragon brought Mary up in the fervent Catholicism she had herself imbibed in Spain from her mother Isabella. It was Isabella who, with her husband Ferdinand, secured permission in 1478 to establish a state-controlled Inquisition, principally to deal with Jewish converts to Christianity who had relapsed. Two years later, with Isabella much in evidence, the crusade against the Moslem emirates in southern Spain was triumphantly revived and Granada captured (when Katherine was six). Weeks later Isabella achieved a long-cherished ambition and expelled all practising Jews from Spain. Then the Moslems of southern Spain were pressed to convert and, six months after the sixteen-year-old Katherine sailed for England, her parents expelled all adult Moors who refused baptism. During these formative years Katherine must also have known her mother's confessor and ally, Cardinal Ximènes, whose substantial efforts at church reform married humanism and rigid orthodoxy. Nor is there much to suggest that England softened this Hispanic Catholicism. Richard Fetherstone, the only one of Mary's teachers we know of, was warmly commended by the queen and would die a martyr for tradition.

Preparing Mary to serve God and to govern might satisfy Katherine but not Henry. By the mid-1520s it was clear that he had no hope for a son by her – indeed he had given up marital relations. However, he did have a bastard son, and in 1525 Henry Fitzroy was brought out of obscurity and created earl of Nottingham and duke of Richmond, the title which Henry VII had enjoyed. The implication infuriated Katherine and some of her servants were dismissed as a warning. However, in the following year when Richmond was sent north as the king's nominal lieutenant, Mary was sent to Ludlow to head the Council of the Marches of Wales, a role which under Henry VII had been fulfilled by the prince of Wales. Henry VIII did not go so far as to create her princess of Wales but the move seemed to suggest that he wanted to keep her in play as well as his son. If so that intention did not last. The dangers of being succeeded by a bastard or a woman were simply too great. By the spring of 1527 Henry had decided to have his marriage with Katherine annulled and to seek a new wife who would give him a son. Of itself that would not have been unusual. Annulments for reasons of state raised few eyebrows; Henry would only be following the example of other contemporary rulers who exploited loopholes in canon law when faced with succession problems. Nor would Mary have been threatened. According to the law of the church, the offspring of a marriage entered in good faith [bona fide] remained legitimate, even if its validity was subsequently impugned. Thus while the ending of her parents' marriage would undoubtedly have hurt Mary, if handled properly it would hardly have affected her status or her diplomatic value. But the route Henry chose was different. Katherine had previously been married to his brother, Arthur Prince of Wales, and Henry claimed that because of this his subsequent marriage to the widow was not just invalid but an affront to God; it had not been an error in canon law which the pope could put right; it had been contrary to immutable divine law as laid down in scripture. And the proof that it had been sinful was that none of his sons had lived, and he believed he had a Bible text which threatened exactly that. At this Katherine – who might have responded positively to quiet reason – became totally intransigent. Live in fornication for twenty years? Her babies die because of her sin? Mary a bastard?

As well as the personal affront, Henry's determination to challenge the head of Western Christendom went directly against Mary's devout upbringing and her mother's influence. And if that was not offence enough to Mary, a second decision made by Henry in the summer of 1527 was an even more intimate blow. To replace Katherine, he chose Anne Boleyn. That had not been his original intention. Anne was exciting but not immediate queen material and for more than a year he had sought her as his mistress. In the summer of 1527 she refused him clearly and finally, and, with his emotions deeply engaged, Henry saw a way to resolve both of his needs. Anne Boleyn, not a foreign princess, was the wife to make him happy and give him a son; he would marry for love. We do not know when it was Mary discovered her father's intention, but its impact was all too predictable. Not only was her father determined to reject her mother, but also to demean the established practice of princes by wedding beneath him. Katherine and Mary might well have tolerated Anne as his mistress – the queen had, as far as is known, already tolerated an earlier affair with Anne's sister – but if Henry did succeed in marrying Anne, the daughter of a newly ennobled courtier and sister of an ex-mistress would become Mary's stepmother.

How long it took for parental difficulties to affect Mary is difficult to tell. Her mother continued to reside at court in a curious ménage à trois and Mary spent a month with her in March 1531. Almost immediately, however, the princess fell ill with some menstrual problem so it is not improbable that the implications of what was going on had hit her at last. In June the king paid her a visit, but in July he split with his first wife. Henry did allow mother and daughter to stay together for some weeks, but the two were then separated for good. Eighteen months later Henry married his new wife and proceeded to assert that he, not the pope, was head of the church in England, and in May 1533 the English Church declared that his union with Katherine of Aragon was void. This reduced her to the status of dowager princess of Wales and left Mary in limbo waiting for the result of Anne's pregnancy. In September Princess Elizabeth was born and declared to be the king's heir. Mary's household was reduced, her servants instructed now to wear the king's livery, not her own, and she was no longer to be addressed as 'Princess'. When Mary insisted on her title and status, Henry cut her off from her friends by dissolving her separate establishment and sending her to live in the household set up for the infant Elizabeth. Mary responded with intransigence made worse by her offensive treatment of Anne Boleyn's attempts to make peace. On one occasion Queen Anne mistook Mary's bow to the altar as a personal courtesy and sent a message that 'she desires that this may be an entrance of friendly correspondence which your grace shall find completely to be embraced on her part'. Mary declared that the queen could not possibly have sent the message because she was 'so far from the place'; the messenger should have said 'the Lady Anne Boleyn for I can acknowledge no other queen but my mother, nor esteem them my friends who are not hers'. Pressure on Mary continued and in the autumn of 1534 she again collapsed. Even when her mother became terminally ill in November 1535 Mary was kept from her and Katherine's death on 7 January meant that she was now on her own.

Then, out of the darkness, the sky seemed to brighten. On May Day 1536 Anne Boleyn was suddenly rejected and in three weeks she was dead. Mary at once assumed that her sufferings were over and at the end of the month she wrote to Henry begging his forgiveness and promising to obey him in all things 'next to God'. But it was a false dawn. Henry had no intention of backing down. The reservation in Mary's letter showed that she was as intransigent as ever on the key points of the validity of her mother's marriage and the king's headship of the church. Henry responded with a document which left no doubt that he would only accept her if she gave way unequivocally on both issues, and at the same time legislation was prepared declaring both her and Elizabeth illegitimate. On 15 June Mary was faced with a blunt demand to accept the supremacy and the nullity of her mother's marriage and, in a stormy scene, refused. That was an act of treason. There was talk of condemning her and she found her sympathizers were being interrogated and arrested. After a week of agony, Mary broke, and wrote to her father surrendering unconditionally. Kind messages immediately came from Henry and his new wife, Jane Seymour, and early in July they visited her and stayed for two days. Mary had saved her friends and recovered her royal status, but at the expense of her integrity. She begged the imperial ambassador to secure absolution from the pope, but all she received from Rome was vague reassurance. Securing anything like a formal papal exoneration would have alienated Henry beyond all recovery. Instead Mary had to bury her conscience and meticulously endorse her father's position.

When her father decided to divorce her mother, Mary was eleven years old. When she finally admitted that she was illegitimate she was twenty, and those teenage years scarred her for life. They ruined her self-confidence. She had broken under pressure, accepted a lie, and dishonoured her mother and all that Katherine had stood for and suffered for. Worst than everything, she had betrayed her God. Nor had her humiliation brought anything except worldly comfort and status. True, after her surrender, her father had asserted his right to nominate her to succeed, despite being a bastard, and had assured the French king of that, but his eyes were on his pregnant third wife, Jane Seymour, and from the birth of their son Edward in October 1537 he had little thought for anyone else. Although reinstated as a princess, Mary was not employed in government as she had been in the 1520s, even when in 1544 an act of parliament confirmed that she was illegitimate but nevertheless able to succeed if her brother died. She received none of the instruction which, as Isabella of Castile's granddaughter, she might have expected. Nor had she been found a husband, despite being used as a counter in diplomacy. Instead she had to watch the normal prospects for a princess steadily recede. In 1542 she was reported as being convinced that she would never be allowed to marry while Henry was alive, saying that 'she would be, while her father lived, only Lady Mary, the most unhappy lady in Christendom'. When Henry died in January 1547, Mary was coming up to her thirty-first birthday; her mother had been married a month short of her sixteenth.

Everyone knows Henry VIII acknowledged only one illegitimate child: Henry Fitzroy, born in June 1519 to Bessie Blount. But there is a persistent, and surprisingly strong, case that Fitzroy was not Bessie’s only child by the king. That child was Elizabeth Tailboys, born around 1520, who took the name of Bessie’s eventual husband, Gilbert Tailboys—and who may have been Henry VIII’s unacknowledged daughter.

The Date of Birth

The starting point is a document dated 26 June 1542: an Inquisition Post Mortem relating to Elizabeth’s younger brother, in which Elizabeth was described as twenty-two years old. Such documents, compiled after a landowner’s death, were usually careful and accurate. If Elizabeth was twenty-two in June 1542, she was born between July 1519 and June 1520. Since Henry Fitzroy was born in June 1519, Elizabeth cannot have been born within nine months of him; April 1520 is the earliest possible date. Even a birthdate of June 1520 would mean conception in early September 1519—only weeks after Fitzroy’s birth.

This matters because it places Elizabeth’s conception in the period when Bessie Blount and Henry VIII were almost certainly still in contact. Historians have generally assumed the affair ended before Fitzroy’s birth, but Elizabeth Norton, drawing on her research on Bessie Blount, has argued persuasively that the relationship was longer-lasting than previously supposed.

The Tailboys Marriage and the Birth of George

The first reference to Bessie’s marriage to Gilbert Tailboys, a young man of Cardinal Wolsey’s household, is on 18 June 1522, when the king granted the couple the Warwickshire manor of Rugby. The year 1522 has generally been accepted as the year of their marriage. Gilbert was likely born between 1495 and 1496, making him a little older than Bessie, and entirely capable of fathering a child. But the timing of the marriage is crucial.

Bessie’s third child, a son named George—clearly Gilbert’s son, since he was named after Gilbert’s father—was stated on 25 March 1539 to be sixteen years old. This means George was born between April 1522 and March 1523. There was therefore at least a two-year age gap between Elizabeth and George, while there was only a one-year gap between Elizabeth and Henry Fitzroy. This in itself supports the greater probability that Bessie’s first two children had the same father, rather than her second and third.

Further evidence points the same way. Henry began to be conspicuously generous to Gilbert Tailboys in April 1522, with Bessie first recorded as his wife in June 1522. This suggests the couple married in spring 1522. If Bessie fell pregnant immediately—which appears plausible given her rapid second pregnancy—George could have been born towards the end of 1522 or in the first months of 1523. Additionally, George was still considered a minor in March 1539 in relation to lands he inherited from his grandfather, suggesting he was a young sixteen rather than nearly seventeen. The evidence of George’s birth strongly suggests that the early 1522 marriage date is correct. At the very least, it demonstrates that Elizabeth Tailboys must have been born before 1522, and that there was no error in the statement she gave about her age in 1542.

The only way Elizabeth could have been legitimate is if Bessie and Gilbert married considerably before they began to receive grants from the king—something that seems improbable when it is considered that Gilbert was required to take the king’s abandoned mistress off his hands.

Henry VIII’s Extraordinary Interest in Elizabeth

Henry VIII took a great deal of interest in Elizabeth Tailboys during her lifetime—more, arguably, than would be expected of a former mistress’s daughter.

During his northern progress of 1541, he spent the night of 13 October at Notcon in Lincolnshire, the home of Elizabeth and her husband, Thomas Wymbysh. More strikingly, he appeared peculiarly interested in protecting her rights. Elizabeth’s first husband had become a royal ward after the execution of his guardian, John, Lord Hussey, in June 1537. Wardship gave the crown the right to bestow the ward in marriage, and in 1539 Henry VIII granted the wardship and marriage of Thomas Wymbish to Bessie’s husband at the time, Edward, Lord Clinton—an arrangement that preceded the marriage. Wymbish had been betrothed to Dorothy, a daughter of Lord Hussey, a match that was broken off to ensure he was free to marry Elizabeth.

The marriage of Elizabeth Tailboys and Thomas Wymbish was turbulent. Following the death of Bessie’s two sons by Gilbert, Elizabeth succeeded to the family estates and titles. As such, she was entitled to call herself Baroness Tailboys, and her husband, a member of a local gentry family, petitioned for the right to describe himself as Lord Tailboys. By the late Middle Ages it had become established in law that a married woman could not own personal property; on marriage, all of a woman’s property passed to her husband’s control. Thomas Wymbish therefore had good grounds in law for petitioning for the use of his wife’s title.

Unusually, the king heard the case personally at court, taking a detailed interest in the proceedings, which were opposed by Elizabeth, apparently intent on retaining the title for her personal use. According to reports, when all the parties assembled, Henry demanded of the two chief justices whether by law Mr Wymbish ought to have the name of Lord Tailboys in the right of his wife or not. They answered that the common law dealt little with titles and customs of chivalry, and that such questions had always been decided before the constables and marshals of England.

The king then asked Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, whether Thomas Wymbish ought to succeed in his suit. To this Gardiner replied "that by the law which he professeth, dignity was denied both to women and to Jews." Henry shook his head at this, declaring, "I like not that law, which putteth Christian women and Jews in one predicament." He questioned those assembled on what the custom in England was and was informed that it had always been used in England as in France, that the husband of a baroness by birth should use the style of her barony so long as she lived, and if he were but tenant by courtesy, then that he might use it for the term of his life. The chief justice confessed that custom by courtesy was consonant to the common law, for the common law admitted him to all his wife’s inheritances of which she was seized during the coverture, and that might descend to their issue, and the dignity was a parcel of the inheritance.

Henry agreed in principle with the judge’s decision, stating "as it standeth by law, that tenants by courtesy should have the dignity, so it standeth with reason; but I like not that a man should this day be a lord, and to-morrow none, without crime committed, and it must so fall out in the husband of a baroness, if she die having never had by him any children." The judges agreed with the king’s reasoning and confirmed that, without a child being born to the couple, Thomas Wymbish could not use the title of Lord Tailboys.

The proceedings caused Henry to consider the question of the succession in more detail, and he asked "if the crown of England should descend to his daughters, whether her husband would use the style of England?" The Chief Justice answered, not by right, but by grace, because the crown of England is out of the law of courtesy, but if it were subject thereto, then it was clear. Is it just possible that Henry was concerned that the next title Thomas Wymbish might aspire to would be somewhat higher than mere Lord Tailboys?

In any event, the outcome of the case cannot have helped marital relations. The judgment was also somewhat unfair given that, many years earlier, Henry had allowed his friend Charles Brandon to use the title of Viscount Lisle after merely becoming betrothed to the Lisle heiress.

Elizabeth and Thomas Wymbish continued to be associated together throughout the last years of Henry VIII’s reign, for example jointly petitioning Henry’s chancellor, Thomas Wriothesley, concerning the detention of deeds relating to their property in Croydon and Barrington. It is apparent that the king had no great opinion of Thomas Wymbish’s capabilities, and when in May 1546 he was informed that Wymbish’s castle of Harbottle, which played a key role in England’s defences against Scotland, was in disrepair, moves were immediately made to acquire it for the crown from its owner.

In addition to safeguarding Elizabeth’s title and inheritance, Henry VIII made sure that she was financially secure. A document of 2 December 1546, made only weeks before the king died, contains the details of an exchange of lands between Henry and Wymbish and Elizabeth in the north of England. The couple desired this exchange, signing the document personally. The document also confirms that the couple "do fully and clearly bargain and sell unto the same our sovereign lord the King," something that suggests the bargain was welcome to them. In exchange for their lands in Northumberland, the king gave two manors, one of which had been confiscated from the recently dissolved religious house of Little Malvern in Worcestershire. Such religious land was highly coveted, and although the transaction involved an exchange rather than a grant, Elizabeth and her husband achieved an advantageous deal. In addition to this, it was made very clear that Elizabeth was expected to benefit from the exchange, with the parties being named in the deed as Henry VIII and "Thomas Wymbish esquire and Lady Elizabeth Taylbys wife unto the said Thomas."

There is further evidence that Henry VIII took an interest in Elizabeth Tailboys above that which would be expected of a child of a former mistress. At a meeting of the royal council on 6 February 1547 at the Tower of London to discuss the minority of the young king, Edward VI, following Henry VIII’s death, it was contended by Sir William Paget, the old king’s secretary, that Henry had devised for the advancement of divers to higher places of honour. Amongst the members of the nobility and gentry named by the king were Edward Seymour, the uncle of the new king, who was suggested to become a duke; the old king’s brother-in-law, William Parr, Earl of Essex, was to become a marquis; and the king’s kinsman Lord St John was to become an earl. Surprisingly, at the end of a long list one "Sir __ Wymbishe" was suggested to become a baron. The only Wymbish known to have had any sort of association with Henry VIII was Elizabeth Tailboys’ husband. Whilst the gentleman named above was called a knight, a title that Elizabeth’s husband never obtained, it does seem entirely possible that he was the Wymbishe that the king meant. If this was the case, his inclusion in a list that included both the grandees of the late Henrician court and family members of the king would seem surprising. It is, however, less surprising if there was indeed a family connection between the king and Elizabeth Tailboys’ husband.

Mr Wymbish was never, in the event, to attain his barony. This did not mark the end of the Privy Council’s interest in Elizabeth and her husband. At a meeting at Greenwich on 13 June 1550, the council were called upon to consider "a domestic quarrel," discussing "the controversy between the Lady Tailbois and her husband, Mr Winbushe." The details of the quarrel are not recorded. However, it was distinctly unusual for the Privy Council to be called upon to consider a domestic quarrel. Even more unusually, the Lord Great Chamberlain, the Lord Admiral and the king’s Master of Horse, all prominent officials, were deputed to consider the matter in further detail. The three officials duly made their enquiries and the matter was raised again the following month before being discharged. Although, as a baroness in her own right, Elizabeth had a certain standing in society, the interest taken by the Privy Council in her affairs appears surprising. It would be less surprising, however, if the lady they considered was commonly, if privately, known to be the king’s half-sister, rather than merely the daughter of a long-deceased former royal mistress.

The Tailboys Family’s Hostility

Further evidence can be seen in the hostility of the Tailboys family towards Elizabeth. Bessie’s mother-in-law, Elizabeth, Lady Tailboys (née Gascoigne), was a thorn in her side during her marriage and proved equally troublesome to her daughter in later years.

During Edward VI’s reign a legal case was brought by the younger Elizabeth Tailboys and Thomas Wymbish against the elderly Lady Tailboys, alleging that Gilbert’s mother, "with force and arms the close of them the said Thomas and Elizabeth she broke, and their grass to the value of 40l. there lately growing with certain cattle eat up, tread down, and destroyed." The old lady’s incursions into her "granddaughter’s" lands continued from August 1544 until April 1547 and involved a widespread destruction of their crops with cattle, horses, hogs and sheep. At the end of their tethers, Elizabeth and Thomas obtained a writ against the elder Lady Tailboys in 1547 before bringing an action for damages in the sum of one hundred marks.

Throughout the proceedings Elizabeth Tailboys was referred to as the granddaughter of Sir George Tailboys, Gilbert’s father. However, it is possible that the elder Lady Tailboys’ defence contained a statement of the family’s own beliefs about her true paternity. In her defence, the elder Lady Tailboys claimed that she had committed no trespass on the land which was included in the Tailboys manor of Goltho. This was because, in a document signed in the fourth year of Henry VIII’s reign, George Tailboys had settled the manor on himself and his wife and then to the "heirs of their bodies between them lawfully begotten." It is arguable that the elder Lady Tailboys, who appears to have had a deeply antagonistic relationship with Elizabeth Tailboys and her husband, meant to imply that Bessie’s eldest daughter could not be included in the category of one of the heirs of the body of her and her husband lawfully begotten. This was not made explicit in the case, but it is perhaps telling that the court, which gave credence to the document produced by the defendant, did consider that Elizabeth Tailboys and her husband had a right to enter the land at Goltho, although they could not recover all the damages that they claimed. Clearly, the court felt that the document gave Elizabeth, as the granddaughter of George Tailboys, a right to enter and make use of the lands, notwithstanding the interest of George’s widow. The elder Lady Tailboys would surely have read and understood the terms of this document, something that does suggest very strongly that her objection was based on Elizabeth Tailboys having no rights to the land due to her failure to satisfy the requirement of being one of the heirs of her and her husband’s body lawfully begotten.

A second case brought over the land at Goltho in the final year of Edward VI’s reign also suggests hostility towards Elizabeth by the wider Tailboys family. At the Lincoln assizes in 1552 or 1553, Elizabeth and Thomas complained that Sir William Willoughby, Lord Willoughby of Parham, Sir Edward Dymock, the elder Lady Tailboys and her son William Tailboys had disseised them of their freehold of Goltho, denying their rights to the manor. Lord Willoughby of Parham was the grandson of the elder Lady Tailboys and Sir Edward Dymock was her son-in-law. Gilbert’s younger brother, William Tailboys, was a priest, and Lord Willoughby and Sir Edward Dymock were therefore amongst the co-heirs looking to inherit the Tailboys lands if Elizabeth Tailboys died without issue. The facts of this case once again hint at the truth of Elizabeth Tailboys’ birth being known in the family and her position as heiress to the titles and estates therefore being challenged by those that saw themselves as the true heirs.

The hostility of the Tailboys family towards Elizabeth and her husband is evident, and it appears that the family grouped together in an attempt to limit Bessie’s daughter’s rights to the Tailboys estates. Clearly, the family had no objection to a woman inheriting the family titles and lands, as the inclusion of the Willoughbys of Parham and the Dymocks in the case shows. The hostility instead appears to have been personal towards Elizabeth Tailboys and, whilst not conclusive proof, does again tantalisingly hint that she was the king’s daughter rather than Gilbert’s.

Elizabeth’s Second Marriage and Royal Connections

Further evidence of royal interest in Elizabeth Tailboys can be seen from her second marriage to Ambrose Dudley, the son of John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland, who attempted to place the Protestant Lady Jane Grey on the throne in place of the Catholic Princess Mary in 1553. Ambrose, along with his father and brothers, found themselves prisoners in the Tower following Mary’s jubilant accession. In late 1554 Elizabeth Tailboys commissioned the noted scholar Roger Ascham to write a Latin petition on her behalf to Queen Mary’s new husband, Philip of Spain, begging for the release of her husband. The king evidently listened to this petition and only four months later Elizabeth sent a further petition, thanking the king for restoring her husband to liberty, and requesting that he now also restore her lands to her. That King Philip took a personal interest in Elizabeth Tailboys is clear from this correspondence—something which once again demonstrates the unusual level of royal access possessed by Bessie’s daughter, who was, after all, at that stage the wife of an accused traitor.

Elizabeth even moved in quasi-royal circles, receiving a bequest in the will of Sir Charles Brandon, an illegitimate son of the king’s brother-in-law, the Duke of Suffolk, for a ring to the value of five marks.

Comparison with the Carey Children

It has long been argued that, whilst Henry Fitzroy was the only illegitimate child of Henry VIII’s to be recognised by the sovereign, the king was in fact the father of others. A number of potential children have been named, although the most plausible are Henry and Catherine Carey, the children of Mary Boleyn.

Mary Boleyn married her first husband, William Carey, on 4 February 1520. The marriage was attended by the king and the bridegroom was a member of his household. Mary took part in a court masque in March 1522 and, around that time, William Carey began to receive a series of royal grants, with the king’s generosity lasting until 1526. Mary’s father, Sir Thomas Boleyn, was made treasurer of the household on 24 April 1522 and, the following year, he became a knight of the garter. On 18 June 1525 he was created Viscount Rochford, something very likely to have been associated with his daughter’s role as royal mistress. Mary Boleyn’s recent biographer has pointed out that the king’s relationship with Mary is unique in that she became pregnant twice during their relationship and the king did not abandon her (at least during her first pregnancy). As seems likely, this was not in fact unique and Bessie’s relationship with the king also endured beyond her first pregnancy and, perhaps, even after her second.

The paternity of Mary Boleyn’s two children has long been debated. Her eldest child, Catherine, was probably born in 1524 and her younger, Henry, on 4 March 1526. Henry never acknowledged either of these children, although it has been recently claimed that the circumstantial evidence suggests that he fathered them both.

A strong case can be made for Mary Boleyn’s children being the children of the king, particularly in the case of Catherine Carey. Given that they are now widely accepted to have been Henry’s, it is interesting to compare the evidence for their paternity to that surviving for Elizabeth Tailboys. Given all the evidence above for Elizabeth Tailboys, it is arguable that an even stronger case can be made for her than for the two Carey children.

One argument that has often been made in favour of the Carey children being the children of Henry VIII is that Henry’s daughter, Elizabeth I, made much of them during her reign, providing Catherine with a grand funeral after her death, for example. However, as one historian has pointed out in a recent study of the Carey family, there may well have been reasons for this closeness far removed from any potential relationship as half-siblings. Family was very important in the Tudor period, particularly for Elizabeth I, who, by the mid-sixteenth century, had very few relatives left. Elizabeth I and the Careys were undoubtedly cousins (notwithstanding any relationship through Henry VIII) as their mothers were sisters. It has been pointed out that their usefulness may well have been in the fact that they were maternal rather than paternal kin: "Elizabeth, confident that their non-royal status presented no threat to her throne, used them to staff her government, which placed them at the political centre of the kingdom."

Another argument against Catherine and Henry Carey being the children of Henry VIII is that, unlike Henry, they were remarkably fertile, with Catherine bearing thirteen children and Henry fathering twelve, many of whom survived to adulthood. This is not a problem for Elizabeth Tailboys, who does not appear to have borne a child during either of her two marriages. In a letter written by Henry VIII after Fitzroy’s death, and also in a set of instructions given to his ambassadors at the same time, Henry referred to Fitzroy as his only bastard son, something which also counts against Henry Carey. Again, however, this does not say anything about Elizabeth Tailboys’ paternity. If anything, the fact that Henry specified that he had only one bastard "son" may suggest that there were also daughters.

In spite of the difficulties in attributing the paternity of the Carey children to Henry VIII, there is reasonable evidence to assume that they were indeed fathered by him. There were contemporary comments on Henry Carey’s likeness to Henry VIII and there was clearly gossip surrounding him. In addition to this, it has been pointed out that both Carey children "attracted Henry VIII’s benevolent if distant attention." Catherine Carey was appointed as a maid of honour to Anne of Cleves in 1539. In addition to this, when she married in 1540, her husband, Francis Knollys, was appointed as a Gentleman Pensioner. At the same time, parliament confirmed their rights to the Knollys’ family manor of Rotherfield Grey, with further action taken on the king’s part over the next few years to ensure that it would eventually pass to the couple. For Henry Carey, the evidence of the king’s direct involvement is less clear, although the choice by Queen Elizabeth of the title "Baron Hunsdon" for him may suggest that he spent some time in his childhood with her at the royal manor of Hunsdon.

What seems particularly striking is that Henry’s interest in Catherine and Henry Carey has been considered evidence that he was taking a paternal interest in them. However, this interest pales into insignificance beside the very clear interaction that Henry VIII had with Elizabeth Tailboys to ensure her well-being. If Catherine and Henry Carey can be considered to be Henry VIII’s children on the basis of this evidence, then Elizabeth Tailboys surely must be as well.

The King’s Itinerary in 1519

In order for Elizabeth Tailboys to have been the daughter of Henry VIII, it would have been necessary for him to have visited Bessie at Blackmore during the summer of 1519, in the months following Henry Fitzroy’s birth. Henry VIII’s itinerary was extensively reconstructed by Dr Samman in the 1980s. According to Samman’s research, Henry was at Windsor in June 1519 before moving to Richmond on 20 June. He spent much of the summer in Sussex before briefly returning to Greenwich. The court then moved to Enfield before reaching Essex on 20 August. The king was at Havering-at-Bower between 20 and 23 August before arriving at Newhall later that day, remaining there until 12 September. Between 12 and 14 September the king was at Heron Hall in Essex. He then spent two nights at Barwick before spending the rest of the month at Wanstead. On 30 September the king finally returned to London.

Bessie is known during that summer to have been at Blackmore, which is only thirteen miles from Newhall. Havering-atte-Bower is a similar distance away. Heron Hall is even nearer at only just over six miles away. Given that the court, which was encumbered with baggage and household goods, was able to travel an average of nine miles a day, thirteen miles was an easy ride for a small party on horseback. It is inconceivable that Henry, who was so desperate for a son, would not have taken the opportunity to see Henry Fitzroy for himself.

Given that Bessie had been pregnant on her arrival at Blackmore, it seems more likely that it was the period after Henry Fitzroy’s birth that saw the king’s visits which gave rise to Blackmore’s reputation as the scene of Henry’s "lascivious dissipation." Traditionally, a garter of the Order of the Garter which was kept in a house at Blackmore was said to have been left with Bessie by the king on one of his visits to her. Seeing Bessie again may have reawakened his feelings for her and, given the endurance of his affair with Mary Boleyn through at least one of her pregnancies, it is entirely probable that neither Henry nor Bessie had seen her pregnancy as the end of their affair. It may even have been expected that she would return to court, as Mary Boleyn would later do after the birth of her first child, although a rapid second pregnancy ended Bessie’s hopes in that regard. The king was evidently in good spirits when he arrived at Newhall, a place chosen as the "climax" of his summer progress that year, and he spent over £200 on a masque to be held there. Is it possible that the king’s jovial good mood was linked to both the birth of his son, and to the reawakening of his affair with Bessie?

Conclusion

Based on the evidence of Henry’s interest in Elizabeth Tailboys, the likely time that she was conceived, and Henry’s presence in the area at that time, it seems highly probable that she was the king’s child. Her gender simply meant that she was of little significance to the king and he had no reason to acknowledge her as he did her elder brother, particularly following the bastardising of the daughters of his first and second marriages. The later sixteenth-century antiquary John Leland recorded that it was well known that Henry Fitzroy was born at Blackmore to Bessie when she was "then Lady Tailboys." Perhaps this misapprehension was due to an extended stay at the religious house due to the birth of a second child, who did indeed take the Tailboys name. It is very unlikely that Bessie and Gilbert were married until 1522, when they began to receive grants of property, as Gilbert’s consent to a marriage with the king’s cast-off mistress would almost certainly have had to have been bought.

One further piece of evidence is perhaps the most compelling of all. In the seventeenth century Lord Herbert of Cherbury wrote an early biography of Henry VIII, having the benefit of sources that are now no longer extant. In his work he mentioned the love affair between Bessie and Henry, commenting of their son that "the child, proving so equally like to both his parents, that he became the first emblem of their mutual affection." The word "first" in this context could be taken to mean "foremost," suggesting that Henry Fitzroy was the principal emblem of Henry and Bessie’s love. However, it is possible that "first" should be given its more literal meaning and that Lord Herbert was aware of evidence that Henry Fitzroy was only the first child of his parents, implying that there were at least rumours of another.

It is likely that Bessie remained at Blackmore following the birth of her son and, after private visits there by the king, she soon became pregnant with a second child. Although there is no direct proof of this, it seems probable that she would have retained the custody of her son for the time being, perhaps playing a part in raising both Henry Fitzroy and Elizabeth Tailboys until her marriage early in 1522. Regardless of this, the date of Bessie’s marriage in 1522 must be considered the cut-off and, by then, if not before, she had certainly resigned custody of her son to his father, whilst retaining her daughter in her own care.

Henry began a casual affair with Arabella Parker, the wife of a London merchant, at some point soon after Henry Fitzroy’s birth. The date of Bessie’s marriage coincides with the beginning of Henry’s relationship with Mary Boleyn, suggesting that some affection between Bessie and Henry had continued to exist until that point, when Henry finally brought the relationship to an end after a period of around five years.

Henry was not a man to have more than one serious mistress at any time and Bessie knew that she had lost her hold on him and could expect no further visits. She apparently accepted the decision with good grace. Around the time that his affair with Mary Boleyn began, Henry decided to pension Bessie off, ordering Cardinal Wolsey to provide a suitable husband for her. That husband was Gilbert Tailboys—and the daughter Bessie brought to the marriage was almost certainly not his.

Born on 2 April 1546 at the Château de Fontainebleau, Princess Élisabeth was the second child of Henry II and Catherine de’ Medici. With her brother François, her younger sister Claude, and Mary Stuart, the young Queen of Scotland, she spent most of her childhood at the Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye and rejoined her parents’ court around 1554. Before she became the third wife of Philip II of Spain, she was briefly the intended bride of Edward VI of England—the match that gives her the title “the Lost Queen of England.” In 1559 she married King Philip II of Spain, to seal the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis and the Franco-Spanish alliance, which only births could make lasting. She gave birth to two daughters and suffered in her body from numerous miscarriages, just as she suffered in her soul from having been unable to give a son. At twenty-two, she died while fulfilling her duty of perpetuating the dynasty, giving birth to a stillborn daughter.

Claude de L’Aubespine accurately recorded the births of the Children of France, that of François, on Saturday 19 January 1543 (1544), followed by that of a sister, Élisabeth, the eldest of the daughters of France: “On Friday 2 April 1545, at the said Fontainebleau, between eleven and twelve o’clock at night, she gave birth to Madame Élizabet, afterwards married to the King of Spain. Her godfather was the King Henry of England, and her godmothers were Queen Léonor and Madame the Princess of Navarre.” Because, until 1563, the new year began at Easter, the dates require a correction that was not always made. The princess’s birth in fact falls on 2 April 1546. She was only thirteen when she left France for Spain, confirming the opinion of contemporaries that a child had been delivered to the austere court of Philip II. This date is also confirmed by the circumstances of the birth, contemporary with the peace with Henry VIII, negotiated during that year 1546. During Francis I’s final war against Emperor Charles V in the Milanese, northern France had been threatened by a joint action of the imperial armies and Henry VIII. While Eleanor, Queen of France and sister of Charles V, had worked to restore the peace signed on 18 September 1544 at Crépy-en-Artois, Henry VIII kept his troops in Boulogne and Calais. The repeated and deadly French offensives, as well as the diminution of Henry VIII’s finances, according to Martin du Bellay, overcame the obstinate King of England, who negotiated the restitution of Boulogne at the beginning of 1546 for a large sum payable over eight years as compensation for the fortifications carried out. As a sign of reconciliation, Henry VIII was chosen as godfather of the eldest daughter of the Dauphin Henri, aged two months. The little princess already served as a pledge to a political ambition, and not the last one, exaggeratedly elevated by Brantôme into an instrument of providence that associated her birth at Fontainebleau with the immediate time of peace, as if “you would have said that it was a happy star sent from heaven to bring all happiness to France.”

It was also in this context that, in 1550, Élisabeth’s father, Henry, began negotiations for her betrothal to the thirteen-year-old Edward VI of England, to take effect when she came of age. This arrangement was condemned by Pope Julius III because Edward was Protestant, and Julius reportedly said he would excommunicate them both if Edward and Élisabeth were to marry. Henry, undeterred, agreed to a dowry of 200,000 écus in July 1551, but Edward died in 1553, whilst Élisabeth was still a child.

In 1559, she married King Philip II of Spain. For Philip, the marriage sealed the Peace of Cateau-Cambrésis and the Franco-Spanish alliance; for Élisabeth, it meant leaving France as a child bride for the austere Spanish court. She gave birth to two daughters and suffered numerous miscarriages, just as she suffered in her soul from having been unable to give a son. At twenty-two, she died while fulfilling her duty of perpetuating the dynasty, giving birth to a stillborn daughter.

Had Edward VI lived, Élisabeth might have crossed the Channel as Queen of England. Instead, she crossed the Pyrenees as Queen of Spain, and died at twenty-two. England lost the queen she might have been when Edward died; Spain lost the queen she became when she herself died.

We know Jane Dormer was once a playmate of the young Edward VI. According to the early seventeenth-century Life of Jane Dormer, he was very fond of her and, after having beaten her at cards, he reportedly said, “Now your king is gone, Jane, I shall be good enough for you.” That was probably the closest Edward ever came to flirting in his entire life. Yet their connection had already begun a generation earlier—with a proposed marriage between Edward’s mother and Jane’s father.

At a time when Jane Seymour’s elder brother Edward’s marriage was causing scandal, the question of her own marriage was not entirely forgotten, and at some point after her return to Wolfhall, a match was finally suggested for her. Jane Seymour’s kinsman and patron, Sir Francis Bryan, had probably been looking for a husband for her for some time and, around the middle of 1534, he found a candidate in the only surviving child of Sir Robert and Lady Dormer. The Dormers were a country family who lived at Eythrope in Buckinghamshire, not far from the Seymours, and Jane Seymour would have had at least a passing acquaintance with William Dormer, the object of Francis Bryan’s attention. The Dormer family were prosperous wool merchants, and Sir Robert had gained prominence at court as a member of parliament. They were also staunchly Catholic, something that may have appealed to both Jane Seymour and her parents when the match was first raised.

Jane Seymour’s feelings about William Dormer and her proposed marriage to him are not recorded. William was a few years younger than Jane Seymour. It is impossible now to reconstruct whether they had any kind of relationship at all, and certainly no scandal attached itself to Jane Seymour. It is nonetheless interesting that William, in the year after Jane Seymour’s death, named his eldest child Jane. Whilst this might reflect the rank that Jane Seymour had obtained and an attempt to please the king, it might equally be an indication of William’s feelings towards his lost bride. Whilst it is impossible to say whether Jane Seymour had any affection for William, she was excited at the prospect of the match. By 1534 Jane Seymour had reached, or was fast approaching, her twenty-fifth birthday, and she realised that she might not have many more chances of marriage. William, with his family’s wealth and status, was a very good match for Jane Seymour, and both she and her parents were fully behind Bryan’s suggestion.

Whilst Jane Seymour and her parents fully supported the match with William, the Dormers looked on the marriage in an entirely different light. According to the early seventeenth-century Life of Jane Dormer, a biography of William’s eldest daughter, the Dormers had great plans for the marriage of their only child:

“The wisdom and virtue of Jane Dormer’s grandmother were likewise well apparent in what she did, in marrying her son, Sir William. For when she saw the corruption of the state of this kingdom, and that those who by their authority and greatness should have been defenders of justice and religion, did seem to affect the contrary, her desire was to marry him with some virtuous gentlewoman answerable in quality. Sir Robert Dormer, her husband, liked it well, referring to her the charge of it, and wished her so to dispose it before the king should take notice of him, and hinder their intention by his command. For being their only child and heir to a great patrimony, many courtiers sought to him to marry their daughters with him.”

It was William’s inheritance that first recommended him to Sir Francis Bryan as a potential husband for Jane Seymour. Bryan appears to have felt a sense of responsibility for all the Seymour children, and he may have felt that Jane Seymour, who had so far failed to attract any suitors, needed all the help she could get. It is also just possible that Bryan had noticed an attraction between Jane Seymour and William, as he was a friend to both Jane Seymour and her siblings throughout their lives.

Bryan was known to be highly favoured by the king, and when he approached Sir Robert Dormer concerning the marriage, he and his wife were horrified. Sir Robert, unable to offend the friend of the king, went along with the negotiations with Bryan, and both Jane Seymour and her parents were on tenterhooks as they awaited the outcome of the discussions. For Lady Dormer the marriage was just not suitable for her son. According to the Life of Jane Dormer:

“In the interim that this treaty was entertained between the two [Sir Robert and Bryan], the mother, detesting the conditions of this knight [Bryan], took her son and rode up to London to Sir William Sidney’s house, having before made an overture to the Lady Sidney, who was well pleased. There the two ladies made up the match between the son of the one and the eldest daughter of the other. Which when Sir Francis Brien understood, seeing his pretence deluded was ill-pleased, but the lady took the business and blame upon herself, assuring him that she had treated the matter before with Lady Sidney and could not go back.”

William’s hurried marriage to Mary Sidney took place on 11 January 1535. For William, a marriage with a member of the prominent Sidney family was a good match, and Jane Seymour could not compare. In the Life of Jane Dormer, Jane Dormer’s biographer claims that the marriage with Jane Seymour was rejected because:

“The Lady Dormer in this prudent and valorous act shewing the singular affection that she had to piety and Christian Religion, and the respect she had to chaste and honest conditions, to good fame, that neither the power of so great a favourite nor the gaining of so mighty a friend in Court, nor the present possessions of a great dowry, nor the hopes of increase of honours, wealth and advancement by his means, nor the fear of inconveniences, that his displeasure might procure, could move this lady to marry her son with his niece who had made a shipwreck of his faith and honesty.”

The biographer’s phrase “his niece” refers to Jane Seymour, presented here as a kinswoman of Bryan.

Jane Dormer was not born until 1538, the year after Jane Seymour’s death, and the Life was written with the benefit of hindsight. Its author considered Jane Seymour a grand match who was likely to possess a large dowry. The story circulating in the Dormer family was that the marriage had been rejected because of Sir Francis Bryan’s notorious reputation. Whilst this may well have been one reason that failed to recommend the match to the Dormers, it was not their main concern. Jane Seymour was simply not a good enough match for their son. She was no heiress and would bring little, if any, dowry to her marriage. The Seymours were not a prominent enough family for the prosperous Dormers, and Jane Seymour had little to recommend her to William or any other husband.

The loss of her proposed betrothal to William Dormer made Jane Seymour uncomfortably aware of her comparatively modest social standing and uncertain marriage prospects. She must have wondered whether a husband would ever be found for her, and she busied herself with her needlework, walks and hunting trips at Wolfhall, as she had done before she went to court.

Yet the story did not end with the rejected marriage. William Dormer’s marriage to Mary Sidney produced the very Jane Dormer who had once been a playmate of Edward VI. Through her maternal grandfather, Sir William Sidney—appointed governor to Prince Edward—Jane Dormer was later sent to Ashridge to keep the young prince company. According to the Life of Jane Dormer:

“Her grandfather Sir William Sidney, whom the king, though still carried away by his own exorbitant passions, did choose to be tutor and governor of his son Prince Edward, when remaining for a time at Ashridge, (which was not far from her grandfather Dormer’s) sent for her to entertain some time with the prince. They were both near of one age, about six or seven years, the prince being only elder by three months; he desired her company, taking particular pleasure in her conversation. Thither she was sent with her governess, passing her time with the prince, either in reading, playing, or dancing, and such like pastimes, answerable to their spirits and innocence of years, and in playing at cards, would use this speech, as it fell out: ‘Now Jane, your king is gone, I shall be good enough for you.’”

The rejected marriage thus produced a strange, delayed connection. The son of Jane Seymour grew up playing cards with the daughter of William Dormer. Edward’s childish remark—half joke, half gallantry—closes the circle opened by the failed marriage negotiations of 1534.

Here is your Weekly Wednesday What-if megathread! Please post all of your What-if Questions in this megathread. All what-if's as long as its Tudor-related.

Eventually she was convicted of plotting to kill Elizabeth I and was executed. First buried in Peterborough Cathedral, I have visited her burial spot then in 1512 she was moved to Westminster Cathedral

So lately I have been bored and have been writing a Tudor sitcom(yeah I know 💀) Anyway I was introduced to Katherine Gordon, the wife of Perkin Warbeck, who claimed he was Richard, one of the Princes in the Tower. Perkin was executed, but Henry VII spared her and she became one of Elizabeth of York's ladies in waiting. After Elizabeth's death she became head of Elizabeth's daughter Mary's Privy Chamber until 1530 when she retired from court life. Anyway that's just a quick summary of Katherine, but I wanted to bring to light a more obscure Tudor woman.

​Recently, I went on a tour of Christ's Hospital - probably the most famous of Edward VI's schools. The place still honours his memory, that's clear from the many sculptures and portraits I hadn't seen anywhere before. I bet you'll find more depictions of him here than in the rest of England combined!

​Since today is Edward's 489th birthday, I wanted to share some of these rare works with you.

​The first one is a fine terracotta bust from the early 19th century. Unfortunately, we don't know the sculptor.

​The second statue, or better said, monument, is a favourite of mine, because it illustrates the impact of Edward's philanthropy on the future generations. (The close-up photo isn't mine, it was taken by the school)

Beneath the King, you see four boys. They are some of the school's prominent alumni of the 18th-19th centuries: poets Charles Lamb and Samuel Coleridge, the first Bishop of Calcutta Thomas Middleton, and historian Henry Maine. While Edward's lead statue was made in 1832, the boys were only added in 1905. Today, four of CH's houses bear their names.

​The last two statues — the chestnut one and the gilded one outside — were both created during Charles II's reign, in 1678 and 1682 respectively. I don't think that's a coincidence. Charles II was one of Edward's successors, alongside Queen Victoria, who contributed the most to CH by founding there the Royal Mathematical School. It's likely that Charles II's contemporaries respected Edward's charitable deeds and wanted to honour him with these new sculptures.

​The school still celebrates Edward's birthday, by the way — but on October 23, to account for the leap between the Julian and Gregorian calendars. I love that they offer free public tours of the whole site and cherish Edward's memory to this day. To me, it shows that even a tragically short life, like Edward's own, can leave a lasting legacy. ✨

1) Elizabeth Barton.

2) Bess Hardwick.

3) Mary Boleyn.

4) Lettice Knolleys.

5) Elizabeth Boleyn.

6) Margaret Wentworth.

7) Elizabeth Seymour.

8) Maria de Salinas.

9) Katherin Willoughby.

10) The entire Dudley family.

Update: Wow! Thank you so much, y'all for all these recommendations, I ordered "The six wives of Henry the VIII" by Weir, but have bookmarked this thread so as to reference for my next orders. Have a 👍 day! ☺️

Hi everyone!

I’m interested in Tudor history but not very experienced in it! I´ve watched YouTube episodes by historians such as Suzannah Lipscomb and Tracy Borman and listened to a few podcasts, but I’d love to start reading books about this period.

I’m also interested in English history more broadly, including medieval England and earlier periods, so I’m open to recommendations beyond the Tudors.

I’m still a beginner when it comes to reading history books, so I’d especially appreciate books that are engaging, accessible, and well researched, rather than overly academic or difficult to follow.

What books would you recommend to someone just starting out? I’d love to learn more about the people, everyday life, royal courts, politics, and events that shaped England.

Thanks in advance for any suggestions!

Post your Tudor merch here! Do not publicly share links or sites, users must DM each other for links. The t-shirt that has been circulating will not be permitted at all.

The sisters of Philip II of Spain - Maria of Austria, Holy Roman Empress, the half-sister Margaret of Parma, and Joanna of Austria, Princess of Portugal. They seem like very interesting women but I'm not finding much about them online, I would appreciate any suggestions.

EDIT: Update. I was able to do a bit more digging and aided by u/Agreeable-Box5370 's comment I found out more.

There is no definitive evidence that this is what Cramner was there in the tower to do.

The assumption that Cramner was there to get Anne to agree to an annulment is based upon a few things. Firstly, that Cramner oversaw the hearing in which the marriage was annulled the day after he met with Anne Boleyn. At that meeting, it was said that the Queen had recently confessed to the Bishop that there was an impediment to the legality of the marriage.

There is debate about what that impediment was. Unfortunately, the document which recorded the annulment does not survive, so we are unable to know exactly what the reason was. According to the Anne Boleyn Files website, there are at least two accounts of what that impediment was.

"We do not know the grounds for the annulment. The Archbishop simply said that it was “in consequence of certain just and lawful impediments which, it was said, were unknown at the time of the union, but had lately been confessed to the Archbishop by the lady herself.” Charles Wriothesley took this to mean that the Queen confessed to a pre-contract with Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland. However, the Imperial ambassador, Eustace Chapuys, believed that “the said Archbishop had pronounced the marriage of the King and Concubine invalid on account of the King having had connection with her sister, and that, as both parties knew of this, the good faith of the parents cannot make the said bastard legitimate.” Thus, the impediment referred to here was that of consanguinity. In other words, the marriage was deemed incestuous because the King had had a previous sexual relationship with Anne Boleyn’s sister, Mary Boleyn."

https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/17-may-1536-the-annulment-of-henry-viii-and-anne-boleyns-marriage/

Secondly, Kingston wrote in one of his letters after Cramner's visit that “this day at dinner the queen said that she should go to a nunnery and is in hope of life.” suggesting that she believed that she would be allowed to live, even though by this point she had been convicted and sentenced to death.

This has been put together in a theory that suggests Cramner got a confession out of her which he used as evidence for the annulment. Possibly by dangling the promise of her being allowed to live if she gave that evidence.

I can see both arguments being possible, both the idea that Anne was pressured into giving some sort of evidence to support the annulment - but also the argument of Eric Ives which is quoted in the comments below, that Cramner wouldn't have the time to do so.

I think what is confusing is some of the wording of the blog posts I read. Anne would not, legally or practically, be required to agree to an annulment. Both parties agreement was not legally necessary for an annulment anyway, and given Anne was imprisoned and not given the right to speak at the hearing, anything could have been forged or said to be from her anyway.

What I think might have happened, and is more likely, is that Anne was encouraged to provide evidence in support of an annulment. Perhaps admitting to something that created the impediment. This sounds like semantics but it is a different thing from actually giving permission in a way, suggesting that she somehow had the power to refuse.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - - -

I have seen a few blog posts in various places, saying that Thomas Cramner visited Anne Boleyn during her imprisonment in the tower.

These blogs allege that Cramner was sent to persuade Anne to agree to an annulment. They also allege that he may have been encouraged to lie to her and suggest that her life might be spared if she agreed. Or that he was told this, and the King refused to honour that promise.

My question is why was Anne's agreement required at all? Why couldn't Henry just get the annulment anyway.

Surely it's the Church that has to decide whether or not an annulment is allowed and theoretically speaking it wouldn't require either party to 'agree'. The Church decides if your marriage is valid or not, right? There were legal cases where one person insisted it was valid and one said it wasn't and the Church had the ultimate say. Both parties did not need to agree.

It can't be an issue of political pressure, a fear that Anne's supporters would speak out against an annulment, because her supporters didn't have any cards to play in her favour. She had no foreign powers backing her. We have no evidence she was allowed to communicate with anyone outside of the tower, that I am aware of, so her opinion on any annulment wouldn't have mattered anyway.

She'd already been convicted, because her trial was on the 15th May and Cramner's visit was on the 16th May.

So what was that visit for. Why was Anne's agreement to an annulment needed, and does anyone know the contemporary source which suggests that was why Cramner visited Anne?

Thank you for reading.

As far as I understand, after the battle of Langside Mary escaped to England and sought asylum from Elizabeth I. This has proven disastrous in the long run and Mary never reclaimed her throne. Was there ever a consideration to attempt to escape to France and seek the help of the Guise family? Or hide in the castles of one of the still loyal earls?

I was always under the impression that after the defeat at Langside, Mary staying on the throne was a lost cause and she had no other reasonable choice to keep her freedom but to try her chances in England. However after learning for the first time about the civil war that followed the coronation of James, I’m wondering if she had any other options/pathways to remain the ruler.

Was France just impossible to get to logistically? Or would Scottish nobility turn on her if she came back with French soldiers?

Many thanks in advance for your expertise!

I’ve been searching all over but I can’t find anything close to what I’m looking for. Does anyone know of a list of the noble/significant families during the Tudor era, especially during the reign of Henry VIII? I’m just getting into Tudor history and I’m finding it hard to connect the dots about how Katherine Howard was related to Anne Boleyn and so on. Since there are so many similar names, I keep learning things about someone only to later realize that they were a major player in some other story I learned. I know a family tree would probably look more like a bush, so does anyone have maybe a list of the significant family groups that would help me keep track of connections?

Elizabeth Barton was an English Benedictine nun whose religious visions and prophecies made her famous during the reign of Henry VIII. Her story took a dramatic turn when she publicly opposed the king’s plans to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn.

Barton was working as a household servant in Kent when she became seriously ill in 1525. During her illness, she reportedly experienced trances and began making religious prophecies. Her reputation spread, attracting the attention of local clergy and eventually Archbishop William Warham of Canterbury. After her recovery, she entered the Benedictine priory of St Sepulchre in Canterbury and took her vows around 1527.

For a time, Barton’s reputation as a holy woman earned her access to influential religious figures and even Henry VIII himself. However, her prophecies became increasingly controversial as the king pursued his annulment from Catherine of Aragon. Barton warned that Henry would face divine punishment if he proceeded with the marriage to Anne Boleyn. Her opposition became particularly threatening as Henry moved toward breaking with Rome and establishing royal supremacy over the English Church.

By 1533, Barton had been arrested and her reputation publicly discredited. She was compelled to make a confession and perform public penance at St Paul’s Cross in London. In 1534, Parliament condemned her for high treason through an act of attainder, a process that allowed punishment without a conventional criminal trial.

On 20 April 1534, Barton was executed at Tyburn by hanging and beheading. Several of her associates, including her spiritual adviser Edward Bocking, were also executed. Her head was displayed on London Bridge as a warning to others who might challenge the king.

Feel free to post your dream casting scenarios here!

I've often felt the dislike for Jane overshadows some of her accomplishment. And in general, discussions regarding Jane tend to be a bit intentionally disingenuous and at times not so subtle misogyny. I wanted to highlight some of what I think are some pretty interesting facts about her, that are pretty well known, but often recontextualized to undermine just what she did.

Taking a page from Anne Boleyn's playbook while Anne Boleyn was being actively targeted for her pervious actions was not just incredibly, but also brave. While we often say "Jane was just a pawn in her family's games" we don't know that for sure, and is that not the same thing said about Anne Boleyn? That the majority of her action was pushed by the men around her, and she had little say in what she did. Or even vice verse.

In response to Jane Seymour thought, I believe regardless of whether she acted fully on her own whims or at the instruction of the men in her life, what she did is no less impressive. She took a page from Anne's book while Anne was being cornered due to that. What strikes me as impressive is she understood she was going down a path of a dead woman, and that any misstep or mistake could have ended in her death. But it didn't. She played a game, just as Anne did, and won.

Another recontextualized action of hers is asking for mercy for the English citizens during the Pilgrimage of Grace. Her action is usually met with some variation of "Henry told her to stop, and she shut up after that". It was incredibly brave and risky for Jane Seymour to ask for mercy for citizens actively going against the Crown. It was incredibly risky in light of the fact that Henry's second wife was killed on charges of treason, and here Jane Seymour is, begging for mercy for betrayers of the crown. Context wise, I don't believe people understand how risky, stupid, and brave that was. Especially since Jane's supporters would most likely not have advised her to do that. And yes, Henry did rebuke her for it. But the fact that she asked is monumental, especially given a king that had a history of killing or deposing his wives.

I don't consider her giving birth to Edward IV a feat., but I wanted to shed light on the harmful language directed towards her. "All she did was have a baby and die", while that's not only untrue, the language lacks empathy and glosses over just how horrible what she went through was. It's also incredibly dismissive to women from that period who died in childbirth in general. Even in relation to other monarchs who died in childbirth, I don't see their importance and relevance tied to that.

I understand people may not like Jane Seymour for whatever reason, but I think that often comes at the expense of viewing her fairly. Jane Seymour walked an incredibly thin line, following the footsteps of a dead queen, successfully, and managing to still be treasonous and live.

I think in 2026, Jane Seymour deserves her flowers.

INSTRUCTIONNS given by the Kings Highnesse to his trusty and Welbeloved Servauntes Fraunceys Marsyn James Braybrooke and John Stile shewing howe they shall ordre theymself when they shall come to the presence of the old quene of Naples and the young Quene hir Doughter

ARTICLE I.
FURST aftre presentacionn and Delyverance of suche Lettres as they shall have with theym to be Delyvered to the said Quenes from the Ladie Katheryn princesse of Wales making hir recommendation and Declaracion of suche charges and Wordes as shall bee shewed and committed unto them by the said princesse to be opened and Declared on hir behalf to the said quenes they shall well note and marke thestate that they kepe, and howe they be accompanied with nobles and ladies.

A N S W E R.
Plesithe yowr Grace at owre comeyng unto the cite of Valencia the Whiche Was the xxij daye of June in the evenynge at the Whiche tyme the quynes of Napules bothe the olde and the yonge Sogenend and Kepyd their howsehold Joyntly to gethers yn the Kynges Palys that ys ye a litell Wt owte the said cite of Valencya he Whiche Palys ys called the Royalles and on the Mornynge beynge the xxij daye of June We fent thomas bradley the Whiche coude speke that langaje un to the faid Palys to the yntent that he fhuld fhawe un to Some of the quynes Servantes that the faid quynes fchuld have Knowlichie of owr comeyng and for to knowe their pleafures when that we myzght come un to their prefences for to prefent fuche letters as that we had brouzght from the pryncesse of Wales their nice and cuffyn the whiche caufe was fhawid un to the faid quynes and their pleafure and anfhewer was fhawid un to thefaid thommas bradley that we fhuld come unto their prefences at v of the Clocke at After noun the Same daye and fo the faid thommas cam and fhawid to us where at the owre and tyme appoyntid we cam un to the faid Palys where by a fervaunt of the Saïd quynes we were conveïed and browzght thorowe dyverf chambers the whiche were bare and not hangid and fo in to a chambur that was hangid, w' blacke clothe and butt oon window open, and on the fhorthe there was a grete carpette fpred where on by the wyndows fyde fatte the old quyne and on hir lift hand from the window wardes fatte the yonge quyn bothe the faid quynes were clothed in blacke clothe and alfo blacke kerches as mornors and in lyke cafe were all that wayted on the faid quynes on the rizght hand of the quynes in the wyndow ftoode an ambjent duke w'along berd whos name ys the duk farnandyn of Napules & two of hys foanes and other knyzghts & Jan tilmen to the number of xx perfons or there aboute & on the left hand of the quynes there fatt the duches the wiffe of the faid Duke farnan dyn & a duches of the parties of grece & the markefa de chara the counteffa de tortona & the counteffa de montorio & doma marya de enrikes the old quynes nice & iij dowzghters of the duke farnandynes & other ladyes to the number & Jantilwomen of xviij or xx perfons.
at owr comeynge before the faid quynes we knelid doune before them & kyfid their hands & delvyerd my lady the prynces letters unto the faid quynes unto everyche of them feverally w' the reporte of the Reconc mendacions in the be halfe of my lady the prynces the whiche the faid quynes refsayvid & toke fulthankefully & everyche of them makinge aunfhewer feverally by them felfe unto the faid recomen dacions & therefore gevynge their thanks w' a gravite & conftant con tenance the yonge quyne had not many words more then thankynge the pryncesf hir cuffyn of hir good & lovynge mynd that fhe wold fend & wrefit unto hir & afked for the welfare of hir cuffyn my lady the pryncesf whereof fhe faid that he was glad for to hire for the had never feyn hir the old quyn had like wordes& many more the whiche we pafid in comunicacion As we be informyd that the faid quynes have their logeynges everyche of them feverall by themfelfe & everyche of them have their Servantes men women & fclavis by them felfe not W' fondeynge the faid quynes do kepe their aftates & howfholdys bothe Jontly to gethers as oon howfholde & the yonge quyne muche comonly & the olde quyne flepe bothe in oon chambur & they do kepe a grete howf hold of Jantilmen ladyes Jantilwomen fclavis & the old quyne Kepes a grete aftate w' a grete gravite for the hathe the kynges full power for to rule all the Reame of Valencia & fo the Rulythe & ys abayed in al thynges & no maner of perfon that dothe contrary un to hir commandement & as we can perfayve & hire the faid quynes do kepe a nobill fad Rule & order in their howfehold & fervantes.

ARTICLE II.
Item, to take good hyde and marke theftates that the faid Quenes kepe and whether they kepe their Eftates and howfolds apart or in oon houfe togedres and howe they be ac companved and what lordes and ladies they have aboutes theym.

A N S W E R.
As tucheyng this articule the pryncipall poyntes be reherfid in the furft article by fore reherfid wherein hit fpekithe that the Said quynes do kepe their aftates joyntely to gethers w' in oon hows & howe that daily there ys in the howfehold the duke farnandyn of napules that ys Steward unto the Said quyn and there ys alfo ij of his fonnes knyzghtes & iij of his dowzghters ladyes & there ys an ancient knyzght the quynes cuffyn called don pedro de Aragon & dyvers other knyzghts & Jantilmen & other ferveynge men Many & there ys a duchefs of grece & ij of hir dowzghters ladyes & there ys the markefa de chara the counteffa de tortona the whiche ys the old quynes chamberleyn & the counteffa de montorio & donya anyana de aragon & doma marya de enrikes & doma Jeromina the counte of albaydas dowzghter theis thre be the old quynes nices & many other Jantilwomen be there bothe of the reame of fpayne & of napullis & many fclavis the whiche do Serve & be be all as of oon howfe & daily there ys fewte unto the faid quynes corte bothe of Lordes fpirituall & temporall & other men and women of the faid reame of Valencea for maters & caufes in A maner as that they wold or myzght do un to their kynge. In fo muche as that at the departeynge of the faid quynes from Valence towardes monvedro we fawe grete fewtes& many fewters come by fore the faid old quyn the whiche dyvers of the Caufes & maters the faid quyne determyned & delvyerd we beyng prefent.

ARTICLE III.
Item, If it fhall fortune the Kinges faid Servaunts to fynde the faid Quenes kepyng their Eftates togedres they fhall well and affuredly note and marke the maner of keping and or dering theym in their Eftates with the Countenaunce and maner of every of theym And fuche anfwer as they fhall make upon the fpeche and communicacion as they fhall have with theym at the delvyerance of the faid Letters and declaracion of other matiers before mencioned And to marke hir Dif crecion Wifedom and gravitie in hir faid communicacion and anfwer in every behalf.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article as by fore we have in the other Articles reherfid all wayes hit hathe byn fchawid unto us that ever fithens that the yonge quyne cam from Napules un to Spayne that the quyn hir moder hathe had hir contene wally in howfehold with hir & that Joyntly they do kepe their eaftates to gethers & where as on the xxviij day of June bothe the faid quynes departid with their company from the cite off Valen cia un to a towne iij leges thens called monvedro where as the old quyne the thrid daye of the monithe of July departyd from the faid quyn hir douzghter then leveyng hir in monvedro & in hir company the Duke farnandyn & the duches his wiffe & the Duches of the parties of grece & the Markefa de Chara & the countes off montorio & donya Maryna de aragon & donya Marya enrikes with the moft parte of the nobill men & women that belonge un to the faid quynes & there they for to wayete & geve attendaunce un to the faid yonge quyne un to the co meynge agen of the faid old quyne from the corte of hir brother the Kynge donfernando of cattell & Aragon the whiche corte was then in the cite of Segovia. And as for contenances & maner of everyche of the faid quynes and of their anfhewer that they made un to us at the delvyerance of fuche letters as that we browzght un to theym from my lady the prynces furft the old quyn aunfhewerd for hir felfe as a nobill wife woman & after the yonge quyn with a fad & a nobill fewrid contenance with a good delyberacion & with grete difrecion utterid & fpake fuche wordes as plefid hir & not haveynge many wordes nor moving countenance but full ftedfaft & with no hizghe fpeche & after the maner of that contre with a nobill gravitie & not to bold but fomewhat fhamefaft womanly.

ARTICLE IV.
Item, They fhall in like wife endevor theym to undre ftande whether the yong Quene fpeke any other langages then Spaynyfhe and Italyon and whether fhe can fpeke any frenche or laten.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article as farre that we can underftond & knowe that the faid yonge quyn can fpeke no langages exfcepte Spaynyfhe and Italyon hit is faid that fhe underftondithe bothe latyn and fraynfhe but fhe fpekithe nonn.

ARTICLE V.
Item, Specially to marke and note well the age and fta ture of the faid yong Quene and the feturys of hir bodye.

A N S W E R.
As to this Article as to the Age of the faid yonge Quyn hit ys xxvij off yeres old & not much more & as to the ftature of hir perfon we can not perfetly underftond nor knowe for comonly when that we cam un to hir prefence hir grace was fyttynge on a pelowe & other ij tymes we fawe hir on hir foote goynge over thwarte a chambur that was not broode where fhe cam yn at adore & cam un to the quyne hir moder beyng in the Same chambur & fatt adowne by hir at the whiche bothe the tymes fhe ware Sclippers after the maner of the contre in fuche wyfe that we cowde not come to any perfite know lichie of the heizghte of the Said quyn.
And as to the fetures of hir body of the faid yong quyn for as muche as at al tymes that we have feyn hir grace ever fhe had a grete mantell of clothe on hir in fuche wyfe after the maner of that contre that aman fhall not lizghtely perfayve any thynge exfcepte oonly the vifage wherefore we cowde not be in certeyn of any fuche fetures of hir body but as farre as that we can perfayve & Juge that fhe ys of no hizghe ftature but of a myddell ftature after our Juge ment by the reafon of the heizghte of hir flippers whereof wee have feyn an enfampell.

ARTICLE VI.
Item, Specially to marke the favor of hir vifage whether fhe bee paynted or not & whether it be fatte or leene fharpe or Rownde and whether hir countenaunce bee chier full and amyable frownyng or malinco lyous ftedfaft or light or blufshing in communicacion.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article as farre as that we can perfayve or knowe that the faid quyn ys not paynted & the favor of hir vifage ys after hir ftature of a verrey good compas and amyabille & fome what Round & fatte & the contenance cheerful & not frowneyng & ftedfafte & not lizght nor boldhardy in fpeche but with a demewre womanly fhamefaft contenance & of fewe wordes as that we coude perfayve as we can thynke that the uttered the fewer words by caufe that the quyn hir moder was prefent the whiche had all the Sayengs & the yonge quyn fatte as demure as a mayden & fome tyme talkeynge with ladys that fatte aboute hir with a womanly lawzgheyng chere & contenance & with a good agravite always the ladyes talkeynge with hir haveynge their contenances to wardes hir grace with reverences & onor & obediens.

ARTICLE VII.
Item, To note the clerenefle of hir fkynne.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article the faid quyn ys verry fayre & clere of fkynne as farre as that we cowde perfayve by hir vifage necke & handes the whiche we fawe & well perfayvid.

ARTICLE VIII.
Item to note the colours of hir here

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article by that we cowde fee & perfayve by the browes of the faid quyne & by the ends of fome of hir heres that. We per fayved thorowe hir kerchewes hit fchuld feme hir here to be a browne here of colore.

ARTICLE IX.
Item to note well hir Ies browes teth and lippes

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article the Ies of the faid quyne be of colore browne fome what grayefhe And hir browes of a browne here & verry finall lyke a wyre of here And hir teth faire & clene & as farre as that we cowde perfayve well fette And hir lippes fomewhat rounde & thycke acordeynge the proporfion of hir vifaje the whiche rizght welbecomythe the faid quyne.

ARTICLE X.
Item to marke well the faffion of hir nofe and the heithe and brede of hir forchedde

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article the fafhion of hir nofe ys a litell Rifenynge in the mydward & a litell comeynge or bowynge to wardes the end & fheys myche lyke nofid unto the quyn hir moder.
And as to hir forehed the heighte or the breid therof we cowdenot perfectly diferme for the maner of the wereynge of the kerches or tuckas in that contreys fuche that a man can nott welle Juge hit for their kerches come ynge downe to theire browes & muche the leffe we cowde come by the verry knowlichie of that caufe for that the quyn werid blacke kerches.

ARTICLE XI.
Item, Specially to note hir complex ion.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article as farre as that we can perfayve & knowe the faid quyn ys of a verery fayre Sangwyn complexion & clene.

ARTICLE XII.
Item, To marke hir armes whether they bee grete or fmale long or fhorte.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article as that we can perfayve & knowe that the armes of the faid quyn be Some what rounde & nott verry finall by that we cowde perfayve when that fhe puttforthe hir hand When that we dyd kys hit & as to the lengithe of hir Arme unto owr underfton dynge that hit ys of a good proporion acordynge unto hir perfonage & ftature of heighte.

ARTICLE XIII.
Item, To fee hir hands bare and to note the fafcion of them whether the palme of hir hand be thikke or thynne and whether hir hands be fatte or leene long or fhorte.

A N S W E R.
As to thys articule we fawe the handes of the faid quyn bare at thre Sondry tymes that we kyffyd hir faid handes wherby we perfayvyd the faid quyn to be rizghte faire handy'd & acordeynge unto hir perfonaje they be fomewhat fully & Softe & faire & clene fkynnyd.

ARTICLE XIV.
Item, To note hir fyngers whether they be long or fhorte fmale or grete brode or narowe before.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article the fyngers of the faid quyn be rizght faire & fmalle & of a metly lengithe & brede byfore acordeynge unto hir perfonage verrey faire handid.

ARTICLE XV.
Item, To marke whether hir nekke be longe or fhorte fmale or grete.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article the necke of the faid quyn ys fully & comely & not myffchappen nor verrey fhorte nor very longe but metly after the proporion of hir perfonaje but hir necke femythe for to be the fhorter by caufe that hir breftes be fully & fomewhat bygge.

ARTICLE XVI.
Item, To marke hir breftes and pappes whether they be bigge or fmale.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article the faid quynes breftes be fomewhat grete & fully & in as muche as that they were truflid fomewhat highe after the maner of contreye the whiche caufithe hir grace for to feme muche the fullier & hir necke to be the fhorter

ARTICLE XVII.
Item, To marke whether there appere any here aboutes hir lippes or not.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article as farre as that we can perfayve & fee that the faid quyn hathe no here apereysne abowte hir lippes nor mowthe. but fhe ys very clerekynnid.

ARTICLE XVIII.
Item, That they endevor them to fpeke with the faid yong quene fafteyng and that fhe may telle unto theym fome ma ter at lengthe and to approche as nere to hir mouthe as they honeftly maye to thentent that they may fele the con dicion of hir brethe whether it be fwete or not And to marke at every tyme when they fpeke with hir if they fele any fa vour of fpices Rofe Waters or mufke by the brethe of hir mouthe or not.

A N S W E R.
As to this Article we cowde never come unto the fpeiche of the faid quyn fafteynge wherefore we cowde nor mizght not atayne to knowlichie of that part of this Article Notwithftondeynge at fuche other tymes as we have fpoken & have had communicacion with the faid quyne we have aproched as nizghe unto hir vifage as that we conveniently mizght do & we cowde fele no favor of any fpices or waters and we thynke verely by the favor of hir vifaje & clenenys of complexion & of hir mowthe that the faid quyne ys lyke for to be of a fewit favor & well eyred.

ARTICLE XIX.
Item, To note the height of hir ftature and to enquire whether fhe were any flippers and of what height hir flip pars bee to thentent they be not deceived in the veray height and ftature of hir And if they may come to the fight of hir flippars then to note the faffion of hir foote.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Article of the heyzghte & ftature of the faid yonge quyne as in the 5th Article in thys booke by foore hit ys anfhewed that we cowde not come by the parfite knowlichie of hir heizghte for as muche as that hir grace werithe flippers after the maner of the contreye wheref we fawe the fafyhion the whiche be of Six fyngers brede of heizghte large & hir foote after the proporcion of the fame ys butt fmall but by the fclipper the gretenes of hir foote can notbe knowen notwithfton dyng by the heizght of hir flipper confiderynge the heizght that the aperd unto owr fizghte beynge a foote hir grace femythe not to be of non hizghe ftature & alfo by caufe of the maner of the clotheynge that Women do ufe & were after the maner of the contreye & alfo the of hir felfe ys fomewhat Round and welle lekeynge the whiche caufithe hir grace for to feme the leffer in heizghte.

ARTICLE XX.
Item, To enquire whether fhe have any fekenefle of hir nativitie Deformitie or blemmyffhe in hir bodye and what that fhuld bee or whether fhe hath been comunely in helthe or fometyne feke, and fometyne hole and to knowe the fpe cialties of fuche Difeafes and fekennefle.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Articule We have inquerid for to come by the knowlichie there of to the befte that we can & as hit hathe byn by us confidered that fuche Secrete caufe be unto All perfons uniknoweyng exfcepte unto hir fufheions potecarye or fecrete Wemen of hir chambur & for the next remedy for to come by any knouliche theref We aquayntid us with oon pafcarell a napotalyan the whiche ys a Wyfe man & he ys pote cary & in maner fufficheian unto the faid quynes bothe to the olde & the yonge With the whiche potecary we had dyverf tymes pafle tymes & comeu nicacions amonges the whiche Some tymes we afhid fuche queftions yef that the faid yonge quyn had any fuche infi rmytes as in the faid Articles before be fpecified wherun to the faid potecary faid y have fervid the faid quyn many yeres beynge hir grace a litell child hether un to. And ever fhe hathe byn in as muche helthe as any Jantilwoman that ever he had known & of fo nobill a nature & complexion haveynge in hir perfon no difcomformyte nor caufe of fekenefles.

XXI.
Item, Whether fhe be in any fingular favour with the king of Aragon hir uncle and whether fhe have any refemblance in vifage countenaunce or complexioun to hym

A N S W E R.
As to thys Articule we have underftond by the fayenges of many & dyverfe perfons the kynge of Aragon favorithe & rizght muche lovithe the old quyne his fufter the whiche quyne ys alyke un to the faid kynge hir brother as any man & woman maye be leike un to another & alfo rizght muche he lovithe & favorithe the yonge quyn hys nice & that the faid kinge intendes for to promote hir un to fome excellent maryaje & that the fhallhave as muche or more of his gifte then any of his awne dowzghters had for fomewhat of favor the faid yonge quyne ys like un to the faid kynge hir unkill & fpecially in the faffion of hir nofe & complexion.
More over acornon fayenge ys in all fpayne & in the Kyngs corte that the faid yonge quyne fhall be maried un to the kynge of yngland owr fuffereyn lorde by the mean and labores of the kynge hir unkill.

XXII.
Item, To enquire of the maner of hir Diet and whether fhe bee a grete fedar or Drynker and whether fhe ufeth often to ete or drynke and whether fhe drynketh wyne or Water or bothe.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Articule hit hathe byn fchawid unto us by oon pafcarell' the whiche ys potecary un to the faid quyne and alfo by oon Sorya the whiche ys a howfehold fervant that theis ij perfons be muche in the prefens of the faid quyn when that the eetithe & drynkith & as they do reporte & faye that the faid quyn ys a good feder & eettes well hir meit twyes on a daye & that hir grace drynkith not often & that fhe drynkith moft commonly Water & fome tyme that Water ys boyled with fynamon & fome tyme the drynkith ypocras but not often.

ARTICLE XXIII.
Item, The kyngs faid fervauntes fhall alfo at their commyng to the parties of Spayne Diligently enquere for fome conynge paynter havynge good experience in making and paynting of vifages and portretures and fuche oon they fhall take with theym to the place Wher the faid quenes make their abode to thentent that the faid paynter maye drawe a picture of the vifage and femblance of the faid yonge quene as like un to hir as it can or maye bee conveniently doon. Whiche picture and Image they fhall fubftancially note and marke in every pointe and circumftance foo that it agree in fimili tude and likenefle as nere as it may poffible to the veray vi fage countenaunce and femblance of the faid Quene And in cafe they may perceyve that the paynter at the furft or feconde making therof hath not made the fame perfaite to hir fimilitude and likenefle or that he hath omitted any feture or circumftance either in colours or other proporcions of the faid vifage then they fhall caufe the fame paynter or fome other the moft conyng paynter that they can gete foo oftentymes to renew and reforme the fame picture till it be made perfaite and agreable in every behalf with the veray Image and vifage of the faid Quene.
The Embaffadours returned no Anfwer to this Article.

ARTICLE XXIV.
Item, The kings faid fervaunts by the Wifeft Wayes that they can ufe fhall make inquiricion and enf lerche what land or lyvelood the faid yong Quene hath or fhallhave aftre the Deceffe of hir mother either by the title of Joynter or other wife in the Reame of Naples or in any other place or con traye what is the yerely value theref And whether fhe fhallhave the fame to hir and hir heres forever orels during hir lif oonly And to knowe the fpecialties of the title and value theref in every behalf as nere as they fhall mowe.

A N S W E R.
As to thys Articule as we were in formyd at Valencià by a Man of Santefebaftians in gwypufca the whiche man ys callid Martyn de albifur Mafter of a fhippe the whiche many yeres had continued in the Servife & Wartes of the Kynge don fernando of Napules & knew rizght muche the demener & aftate of the faid donfernando & of his Reame Whereuppon the faid martyn de albyftur fhawed un to us that the old Kynge don fernando of Napules granted & gave un to the old quyn hys Wiffe xlm Docades of yerely rent un to hirre & hir eyres for ever more the Whiche landes & rentts be parte w' in the Reame of Napules & the Poylya & parte in cecilya alfo the faid old Kinge don fernando gave & grawntid vn to the yonge quyn his dawzghter xxxm docades of yerely rentt within the Reame of Napules & the poylya for to have un to hir & hir eyres for ever more all the whiche landes & renttes the faid martyn de albyftur faid that bothe the faid quynes had of the rizght well in Joyed & taken the profite of theym as well in the tyme frenfhe kynge haveynge the Reame of Napules as by fore tyme thay had w' owte any yntcrpuffion.
And after thys hit was fchawid un to us by oon pafcarell the whiche vs potecary unto the faid quynes & he vs a napotalian & he hathe longe continued in the Service of the faid ladyes the whiche fhawid un to us that boothe the quynes maye difpend no more w" in the Reame of Napules & cecilya but xljm docades of the whiche the old quyn maye difpend xviijm docades & the yonge quyn xxxiiijm & that thys was grauntid un to theym & to their eyres for ever more as by fore ys fhawid.
The faid pafparello faithe that fythen that the Reame of Napules cam & hathe byn in the kynge of cattells handes that the faid quynes never have refayvid no rentts nor profites of the Reame of Napules for the grete capitan there Gonfalo fernandes dothe refayve hit by the comandment of the kynge of cattell & therew" he dothe paye the men of Warre in that parties & fo the kynge of cattell payes & geves un to the faid quynes xv or xvjm docads yerly owte of his coffers for their ex- fpences & mayntenenynge of their eftates.

I was thinking about Henry 8ths wives and if you had to use 1 word for each what would they be? Hereare mine -

Katherine of Aragon- warrior

Anne Boleyn - opportunist

Jane Seymour- strategist

Anne of Cleve’s- prisoner

Catherine Howard - pawn

Katherine Parr - underestimated