Final Post

This subject has really captivated my interest since “The Tudors” came out in 2007. The drama, backstabbing, lust and love just makes me want to listen for hours. I’ve learned what Elizabeth I wore when she got dressed in the morning, and that if she didn’t leave her room, she would wear the same nightgown for days at a time. Another thing i learned was her past times included bear baiting, which is absolutely horrific. Her father, King Henry VIII, was actually a faithful husband and not what the show implied. Researching this topic showed me that the real life of the Tudors was actually more interesting than the show. Anne Boleyn was a key character in the history of England, and was the first queen to be beheaded. What was most interesting to me was the history of all of King Henry VIII’s wives. They were not all mistresses at one point (like the show implied), and one of them was used to get Henry over his true love, Jane Seymour, who he ended up being buried next to after he died. This helped me realize actual history is worth researching, and that not all historical shows are accurate.

Elizabeth I’s favorite pasttimes!

Elizabeth was a very smart and very cultured woman. She loved to ride horses, but her council were afraid that she might fall off the horse and hurt herself (http://www.elizabethi.org/us/pastimes/). Robert Dudley ,the closest man she had to a husband, would be her riding companion on many trips. Even though she claimed she had no romantic involvement, it is hard to believe because she was so close to Dudley. She also enjoyed “violent animal sports, such as bear baiting, cock-fighting, and dog fighting (http://www.elizabethi.org/us/pastimes/). This is unusual for our times, but in elizabethan times, this was a normal activity for women to enjoy. She not only liked watching animal tortures, she also enjoyed watching tennis. She loved music and played many instruments. On top of loving music she loved to dance as well and would dance as much as she could. Literature and arts were also one of Elizabeths many interests and loved to watch plays and other performances (http://www.elizabethi.org/us/pastimes/). Elizabeth also wrote her own poems, “On Moneieur’s Departure” and “Now Leave And Let Me Rest” are the two most famous poems she wrote. These were her favorite past times, as disturbing as some of them are, it helps us to see what Queen Elizabeth was really like.

Queen Elizabeth I’s Wardrobe

Elizabeth was a fashonista of her time and kept up with the latest styles, while in the public eye at least. Since clothing was a status symbol in Elizabethan times, all royalty had the nicest clothes. Elizabeth had to have the most significant and most noticeable clothing because she was the queen. Her maids wore bland and boring clothing to show they were not as equals to Elizabeth. “The Queen’s gowns would be gorgeously hand embroidered with all sorts of colored thread, and decorated with diamonds, rubies, sapphires, and all kinds of jewels. A book entitled Queen Elizabeth’s wardrobe unlocked, details some of the jewels that fell off the Queen’s gowns when she wore them” (http://www.elizabethi.org/us/wardrobe/). Not only were her outfits unbelievable, Elizabeth had to accessorize with fabulous jewelry as well. Her “lover” Robert Dudley gave her a “watch encased in a bracelet” which was to be the first known wrist watch in history. Outside, Elizabeth would have cloaks, cloth or leather gloves and hats. No queen was complete without her makeup. Elizabeth had to cover her small pox scars with a white lead and vinegar based cover up and wore rouge on her lips and cheeks. This was obviously unhealthy for anyone and slowly poisoned the Queen until the day she died.

Queen Elizabeth I (Part 1)

Elizabeth was the second daughter of King Henry VIII and the first child of Anne Boleyn. Her life was a little complicated at first because he mother was beheaded and then Elizabeth was declared a bastard for the early years of her life.  Kathryn Parr was the second most important person, next to Anne Boleyn, because she reunited Henry with his children which made Elizabeth legitimate, and allowed her to be in the line of succession. After her sister Mary died, Elizabeth was crowned Queen on January 15, 1559. She was only 25. She was one of the most important figures in English history because of all she did for the country while she was queen (which i will talk about in my next post).  She had never been betrothed to a man, she was proposed to many times after she became queen.  The closest she ever came to marriage, was to Robert Dudley, but could never marry him because it would have been a bad political move. Elizabeth never ended up getting married and was nicknamed “The Virgin Queen”. This name also came to be because she claimed she had never had romantic relations with a man.

King Henry VIII

King Henry VIII was the youngest of three to King Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. He was born on June 28, 1491. His father died April 22, 1509, which is the same day he became King of England. He married his brothers widow, Catherine of Aragon and had one child with her, Princess Mary. Since Catherine couldn’t mother a son, he divorced her. Henry is most famous for his six wives. He beheaded two, divorced two,  one died and the last outlived him. He had three children all together, Catherine mothered Mary Tudor, Anne Boleyn mothered Elizabeth, and Jane Seymour mothered Edward. He had trouble fathering surviving sons. That was the main reason for his numerous wives. He was the main influence on English history and if were not for him, our world would be completely different. He died on January 28, 1547 because of fading health. His throne went to his daughter Mary, then Edward and finally Elizabeth, who was the other leader of England who change the course of history for the better.

The real Tudors and the Showtime Tudors

The Showtime Network released a show based on King Henry VIII and his family called “The Tudors”. It’s a great show but it has its flaws. The main one being, it’s a little more risqué than what actually happened.There are many more affairs happening in the show than in real life. Tudorhistory.org states he was a “devoted husband. He had at least two mistresses that we know of: Elizabeth “Bessie” Blount and Mary Boleyn“. In the show he has about 6 or 7 mistresses and sweeps all of them off their feet. The main problem with the show and the actual events that took place would be some of the sides stories with the other characters. A character named “Cardinal Wolsey” was the Kings adviser and did become imprisoned for treason. However, in the series he committed suicide in jail, when in reality, ” he set out for London to answer the charges and died en route in Leicester. Wolsey’s death came in 1530, three years before the death of Henry’s sister Mary; in the series, the two events are juxtaposed” (IMDB.com). Another false story line would be Mary, Henry VIII’s daughter and his sister were combined into the same character in the show. This was the biggest mistake the story line has. Since Princess Mary and Henry’s sister Margaret are two obviously different people, there should be two different characters for them, not a “composite” character (IMDB.com)
 

 

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0758790/

http://tudorhistory.org/henry8/

“Bloody Mary” Tudor

Mary Tudor was the first surviving legitimate daughter of King Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon born in 1516. She was raised a catholic and was very well educated. By 1533 Mary was stripped as her title of princess, was declared a bastard child, and was to be renamed “The Lady Mary’. She was very bitter towards Boleyn, and resented her greatly because she was the cause of all of Mary and her mothers suffering. She never recognized Boleyn as Queen of England. When Elizabeth was born, Mary became a lady in waiting to her young half sister. When Henry married Jane Seymour, Mary was allowed back into court, and Jane urged her husband to acknowledge his daughter. However Jane died soon after the birth of her son, Edward, and Marys title of princess was not restored until Katherine Parr came along. After the King had died, Edward was first in line to be king, but died shortly after becoming king. Mary was crowed Queen of England in 1553. Her first act of Queen was restoring her mothers name and taking away all of the silly laws her half-brother passed in his short reign. Mary got the nickname “Bloody Mary” for prosecuting protestants. Since she was a Roman Catholic, she believed England should only be Catholic, and murdered 300 protestants by burning them at the stake. Her erratic, unstable behavior and false pregnancies were the death of Mary. She died in 1558 and left the throne to her sister, Elizabeth.

The 6 Wives of King Henry VIII

Catherine of Aragon- Widow of Prince Arthur (King Henry VIII’s older brother). She married Henry immediately after King Henry VII died. She was pregnant six times over the course of their marriage, but only one child survived, a little girl named Mary. In those times, women were blamed if they became pregnant with a girl, stillborn or the child died after birth. So Henry became frustrated with Catherine and pressured the Pope into giving him an annulment. The Pope obviously didn’t want The King to divorce his wife, so he said no. This started a whole other problem I’ll discuss in another post. Catherine was much too old to conceive, so Henry fell out of love with her, and fell in love with her mistress, Anne Boleyn.

Anne Boleyn- The second wife, and possibly the most famous of King Henry VII. She started out as a mistress for Catherine of Aragon and slowly moved into her spot as Queen of England. Henry was infatuated with her, but she didn’t give into any of his demands (aka – no sexual contact between them until they were married). Henry finally separated from the Pope and formed The Church of England, divorced Catherine in 1522, and married Anne in 1533. She became pregnant with their first child Elizabeth. After that she was pregnant two more times and miscarried both times. She blamed the King for the second miscarriage, which angered him and he secretly started to despise Anne. He also started to fall in love with one of her mistresses, Jane Seymour, A catholic blond haired, blue eyed beauty. In 1536, King Henry VIII accused her of treason and having sexual affairs with numerous men. She was found guilty on all accounts and was beheaded on May 19, 1536 in the Tower of London.

Jane Seymour- The third wife of Henry and probably the most beloved of him. They met while he was on a hunting trip and stayed the night at the Seymour’s home in Wiltshire, England. Jane and Henry were married 11 days after Anne was beheaded. Early in 1537, Jane became pregnant with Henry’s first legitimate son, Edward. This joyous moment was cut short because Jane fell ill because of complications in the pregnancy. She died two weeks after Edward was born in October 1537.

Anne of Cleves- Two years after Jane passed, Henry acquired a ‘mail order bride’ if you will. She was anything but attractive, but they got married in 1540. Henry wasn’t happy with the marriage because she was apparently awful to look at. He ended their marriage because the Duke of Cleves and the Roman Empire were heading towards war. At some point during their marriage, Henry fell in love with Kathryn Howard.

Kathryn Howard- The 5th wife of Henry. He came out of an unwanted marriage and fell in love with Kathryn. They married in 1540, she was 19, he was 49. Since she was so young and beautiful, she had many admirers. Rumors of her having affairs swirled around her and she was eventually found guilty the the accusations and was beheaded in 1542.

Katherine Parr- The last wife of King Henry VIII. She wanted to marry Thomas Seymour, but she felt she had to marry Henry, so she did in 1543. She was close to all 3 of Henry’s children, Mary, Elizabeth and Edward. She was the one to get Henry to bring them back into the line of succession, which was very important and allowed Elizabeth to do what she did. King Henry died in January 1547. Katherine was the only one of his wives to escape with her dignity, and head in tact.

 

The Tudors

History is a boring topic to most people, but to me history is a window into the past showing us how the future came to be. My favorite part of history is King Henry VIII and his 6 wives. It all started because King Henry VIII wanted a son more than anything in the world. He married a woman named Catherine of Aragon and she became pregnant, but she birthed a baby girl named Mary. Unhappy with the baby girl, they tried to have more children to produce an heir to their throne. Catherine had multiple miscarriages and eventually became infertile, so Henry accused her of adultry and wanted a divorce.  The Pope really didn’t support the idea of divorce, so he wouldn’t grant the king an anullment of his marriage to Catherine. So Henry tried to seperate from the Catholic Church, thus starting this long journey of just trying to produce and heir to his throne. This is obviously a very short summary of what happened, so I’ll get into further detail about his wives in another post. Their lives were like a modern day reality show, minus the cameras and scripts. I’m writing this blog because I love history but I’m mostly interested in the time period from King Henry VIII to Queen Elizabeth I. I love the clothes, the love stories, the wars, and most of all the scandals, and I’ll be covering all of these topics and more in the following 9 posts. I don’t think most people will be interested in this blog, but for those who are and want a brief summary of the history of The Tudors time period, I hope this will give you more interest in the topic and make you want to keep reading.