Lesson 3: Without Male Heir. Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn
Anne as Queen.
This segment aims to provide students with a better appreciation of Anne's final days as queen of England.
January, 1536 saw the death of Catherine of Aragon, the first wife of Henry VIII. The year's beginning also saw the second wife of Henry VIII, Anne Boleyn, 'big-bellied' with child, trying hard to remain hopeful of the future.
Married now for three years, and very aware of Henry's wandering eye, Anne was intelligent enough to realise her current pregnancy — most likely her third — needed the result of a living son. That and only that would secure her position as Henry's Queen. She also probably knew that, with Catherine out of the picture and a question mark lingering even to this day over the legality of her marriage to the King, one more failure in the birthing chamber would mean the death knell of her marriage.
For King's great love affair with Anne Boleyn, a love affair that turned his kingdom upside down and cut England's strong ties to the papacy, had not lasted longer than the early days of their marriage. Henry Tudor's passion now exhibited very little signs of life.
But the son Anne hoped to be her marriage's saviour and thus her own protector was born dead on the very day that Catherine's body was brought to its last resting place. After the king visited his grieving wife, he proclaimed, "I see God will not give me male children." Anne's unforgivable failure in the royal birthing chamber began the King to think of ways to free himself from her. Freed, the King could then seek to make a 'bon fide' marriage to another woman; his lustful gaze and hands had already rested on Jane Seymour the previous year.
Anne Boleyn, I believe, receives a lot of bad and undeserved press from the Tudor propaganda machine. The bad press remains in place even today. Henry VIII said, not long after the last of Anne's abortive pregnancies, 'I was seduced into this marriage and forced into it by sorcery'. Anne Boleyn was no wicked witch. She was a woman who loved her daughter; a woman who said children are the greatest consolation in the world. When she suspected her husband's red tide wrath was about to sweep her away beyond saving, she asked her chaplain to care for her daughter's spiritual welfare.
Anne made sincere efforts to be a good queen. Like Catherine, she had a reputation for piety, albeit one of a Lutheran nature — she did her best to encourage the reformist religion to take root in England. She gave alms to the poor;(1) many people thought the world of her. Hearing about her arrest, her friend and the ‘about-face talking’ Cranmer wrote to the king:
If it be true that is openly reported of the Queen's Grace... I am in such perplexity that my mind is clean amazed; for I never had better opinion in woman than I had in her; which maketh me to think that she should not be culpable... Next to Your Grace, I was most bound to her of all creatures living... I wish and pray for her that she may declare herself inculpable and innocent... I loved her not a little for the love which I judged her to bear towards God and His Gospel.
Nevertheless, there were times when Anne was not ‘nice’ — as exhibited by the way she acted towards her step-daughter Mary. I believe a lot of this bad behaviour stemmed from living on her 'nerves', plus the immense insecurities of her position as consort to the king. Poor Anne also lacked the training of Catherine of Aragon, who had been taught to take on a Queen's mantle from time she was in her swaddling clothes. But Catherine and Anne shared one strong similarity. Both of them behaved like lionesses with claws out when it came to ensuring their daughters' rights.
Anne also knew she had many enemies, one her own uncle (the duke of Norfolk) who didn't take kindly to her Lutheran leanings and independent spirit. And I believe most wives would not behave well if their spouse expected them to put up with mistresses, saying - like Henry VIII did when she was heavily pregnant with Elizabeth- "Shut your eyes, do as your betters had done, and endure."
Yes - she had a temper and a very strong personality, a person who liked to and did speak her mind - but as the mother of Elizabeth could we expect any less? But witch she was not, despite the excuses flung by Henry VIII to his subjects in 1536, inferring his main reason for marrying her, and a reason to rid himself of her. His words prepared the ground for her juridical murder on trumped up charges of adultery, making Anne Boleyn history's 'Anne sans-tete.'
(1) Antonia Fraser; The six wives of Henry VIII; Arrow Books, 1998; page 214
Reference: Antonia Fraser; The six wives of Henry VIII; Arrow Books, 1998
American edition:
Henry VIII and Wives, by Antonia Fraser. Although many books will be referred to during this course, Henry VIII and Wives will be used as the main 'text.' Written in a very readable manner, this book is a very sensitive account of the six women who became the consorts of Bluff King Hal. Antonia Fraser's research is always excellent.
Questions:
Do you think Anne Boleyn guilty of adultery?
What you think of Alison Weir's theory that Anne Boleyn was pregnant at the time of her death?
In Henry VIII, the King and the
Court - a wonderfully researched book - Alison Weir brings alive Henry VIII in all his glory and his magnificent court, not fearing a bit of controversy along the way. This is another must read for people interested in the period.
