The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn (38 page)
Read The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn Online
Authors: Eric Ives
Mary’s failure to accept Anne was one problem, but it was linked to another: an increasing opposition to the queen among the nation at large and among the elite. There is no doubt that a good deal of Anne’s unpopularity was on account of Mary and the repudiation of Katherine. The sentiment was frequently found among women, for obvious reasons.
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Margaret Chanseler, from Bradfield St Clare in Suffolk, demonstrated a particularly personal line in invective when she said that Anne was a ‘goggle-eyed whore ... God save Queen Katherine.’
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Feelings were usually more circumspect among the elite, but no less real. Anne could not but notice the readiness of courtiers who accompanied her to see Elizabeth, to slink off at the same time to pay their respects to Mary.
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Margaret Chanseler, from Bradfield St Clare in Suffolk, demonstrated a particularly personal line in invective when she said that Anne was a ‘goggle-eyed whore ... God save Queen Katherine.’
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Feelings were usually more circumspect among the elite, but no less real. Anne could not but notice the readiness of courtiers who accompanied her to see Elizabeth, to slink off at the same time to pay their respects to Mary.
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Much of the hostility to Anne was, however, also associated with a dislike of Henry’s recent policies: in the first place taxation, but even more, interference with the Church. The abbot of Whitby declared comprehensively that ‘the king’s grace was ruled by one common stewed [professional] whore, Anne Bullan, who made all the spirituality to be beggared and the temporalty also.’
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The less educated could be just as direct, in their own way. On Monday, 4 May 1534, a certain Henry Kylbie was attending to his master’s horse in the stables of the White Horse in Cambridge. Perhaps the horse was lame; we do not know. At any rate, Kylbie had arrived with his Mr Pachett the Saturday before on the way from London to Leicester, and he was heartily sick of waiting. The ostler of the inn strolled over and the two got into conversation. Did he know, the ostler asked, that there was no longer a pope, only a bishop of Rome? As a man who may well have stabled the horses of the Cambridge Reformers when they met in the inn for their evenings of convivial but risky debate, the ostler evidently was well up in religious gossip. Not so Henry Kylbie. There was a pope, he insisted, and anyone who said contrary was ‘a strong heretic’. When the ostler, playing his ace, said that ’the king’s grace held of his part,’ Henry lost his common sense and his temper. Both ostler and king were heretics, and ‘this business had never been if the king had not married Anne Bullen.’ Angry words became blows, and ended with Henry breaking the ostler’s head.
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The less educated could be just as direct, in their own way. On Monday, 4 May 1534, a certain Henry Kylbie was attending to his master’s horse in the stables of the White Horse in Cambridge. Perhaps the horse was lame; we do not know. At any rate, Kylbie had arrived with his Mr Pachett the Saturday before on the way from London to Leicester, and he was heartily sick of waiting. The ostler of the inn strolled over and the two got into conversation. Did he know, the ostler asked, that there was no longer a pope, only a bishop of Rome? As a man who may well have stabled the horses of the Cambridge Reformers when they met in the inn for their evenings of convivial but risky debate, the ostler evidently was well up in religious gossip. Not so Henry Kylbie. There was a pope, he insisted, and anyone who said contrary was ‘a strong heretic’. When the ostler, playing his ace, said that ’the king’s grace held of his part,’ Henry lost his common sense and his temper. Both ostler and king were heretics, and ‘this business had never been if the king had not married Anne Bullen.’ Angry words became blows, and ended with Henry breaking the ostler’s head.
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Those at court in the forefront of the battle for the papal headship did their best to exploit such plebeian sentiments. When two of the Observant Friars on the run from Greenwich were asked whether Elizabeth had been christened in cold water or in hot they replied, ‘hot water, but it was not hot enough.’
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When the Blessed Richard Reynolds, ‘the most learned monk in England’, went to the scaffold with the Carthusian martyrs in May 1535, he took with him John Hale, a Cambridge Fellow and vicar of Isleworth in Middlesex, who was part of a cell which Reynolds had been feeding with gossip about the morals of the Boleyn family and the falseness of Henry’s claim to be supreme head.
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It was Hale that confessed that Mary Boleyn’s son by William Carey had been pointed out to him as the king’s son. The group also dabbled in the cryptic prophecies that circulated widely in moments of crisis - that a queen (Anne) would be burned, that Henry was the cursed Mouldwarp prophesied by Merlin, and so forth.
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When the Blessed Richard Reynolds, ‘the most learned monk in England’, went to the scaffold with the Carthusian martyrs in May 1535, he took with him John Hale, a Cambridge Fellow and vicar of Isleworth in Middlesex, who was part of a cell which Reynolds had been feeding with gossip about the morals of the Boleyn family and the falseness of Henry’s claim to be supreme head.
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It was Hale that confessed that Mary Boleyn’s son by William Carey had been pointed out to him as the king’s son. The group also dabbled in the cryptic prophecies that circulated widely in moments of crisis - that a queen (Anne) would be burned, that Henry was the cursed Mouldwarp prophesied by Merlin, and so forth.
We know of all these cases, and more, because of the tireless efforts of Thomas Cromwell. to monitor every possible source of discontent. He also put together an armoury of statutory weapons for use if necessary.
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The Succession Act required every person to take an oath to support the Boleyn marriage, and a massive attempt was made to swear all adult males in the country.
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The Act also made it a treasonable offence to write or act against the marriage with Anne, with lesser penalties for gossip or for refusing to take the oath specified, while the clergy and Church institutions were also forced, in a variety of ways, to abjure the power of the pope. Another Act, passed later in the year, extended the definition of treason to cover anything spoken, written or done which deprived the king of his title or seriously defamed him.
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And as the Acts came into force the popular voice was clear - Anne was responsible. When George Cavendish wrote his Verses in Mary’s reign he has Anne saying:
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The Succession Act required every person to take an oath to support the Boleyn marriage, and a massive attempt was made to swear all adult males in the country.
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The Act also made it a treasonable offence to write or act against the marriage with Anne, with lesser penalties for gossip or for refusing to take the oath specified, while the clergy and Church institutions were also forced, in a variety of ways, to abjure the power of the pope. Another Act, passed later in the year, extended the definition of treason to cover anything spoken, written or done which deprived the king of his title or seriously defamed him.
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And as the Acts came into force the popular voice was clear - Anne was responsible. When George Cavendish wrote his Verses in Mary’s reign he has Anne saying:
I was the author why laws were made
For speaking against me, to endanger the innocent;
And with great oaths I found out the trade [method]
To burden men’s conscience: thus I did invent
My seed to advance; it was my full intent
Lineally to succeed in this Imperial crown:
But how soon hath God brought my purpose down!
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She was assumed to be encouraging her husband’s brutality, particularly the deaths of the Carthusians and of Fisher and More.
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‘The people, horrified to see such unprecedented and brutal atrocities, muttered in whispers about these events and often blamed Queen Anne.’
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Since Sir Thomas More himself had, according to a report circulating on the continent within weeks of his death, said at his trial that the real reason for condemning him was his refusal to assent to the Boleyn marriage, it was all too plausible to present Anne as a latter-day Salome demanding the head of a new saint.
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‘The people, horrified to see such unprecedented and brutal atrocities, muttered in whispers about these events and often blamed Queen Anne.’
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Since Sir Thomas More himself had, according to a report circulating on the continent within weeks of his death, said at his trial that the real reason for condemning him was his refusal to assent to the Boleyn marriage, it was all too plausible to present Anne as a latter-day Salome demanding the head of a new saint.
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More dangerous than popular gossip was opposition was within the political establishment. How much Anne, or for that matter Henry, knew of this, it is impossible to say. Henry was aware of the possibility. He said of Katherine: ‘The lady Katherine is a proud, stubborn woman of very high courage. If she took it into her head to take her daughter’s part, she could quite easily take the field, muster a great array, and wage against me a war as fierce as any her mother Isabella ever waged in Spain.’
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Such evidence as we have is hidden deep in the correspondence of Chapuys. If we are to believe him, a majority of the magnates - in importance, if not in numbers - were critical of the way matters were going. Many were even talking of actual revolt against Henry. But as with most magnate conspiracy, it was only talk. Apart from the initial psychological effort needed to break free from the chain of loyalty to the king, the odds against a successful concerted rising were high, and dissatisfaction with affairs had to compete with the very real desire not to come into the open before success was assured. Much of the conversation and messages reaching Chapuys were, indeed, attempts to avoid that decision by having Charles V take the first step.
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Such evidence as we have is hidden deep in the correspondence of Chapuys. If we are to believe him, a majority of the magnates - in importance, if not in numbers - were critical of the way matters were going. Many were even talking of actual revolt against Henry. But as with most magnate conspiracy, it was only talk. Apart from the initial psychological effort needed to break free from the chain of loyalty to the king, the odds against a successful concerted rising were high, and dissatisfaction with affairs had to compete with the very real desire not to come into the open before success was assured. Much of the conversation and messages reaching Chapuys were, indeed, attempts to avoid that decision by having Charles V take the first step.
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The duke of Norfolk’s increasing dissatisfaction was of a different kind. Anne and her supporters were leaving him behind. He had been prepared for her to be a Boleyn when taking risks, but he fully expected her to be a Howard when enjoying success. The queen, however, had a good memory. Despite the fact that his mistress was one of her ladies-in-waiting, the duke found himself in much less favour than he felt was his due. Perhaps Anne felt that she had paid her debts to the Howards by persuading Henry to marry his illegitimate son, the duke of Richmond, to her cousin Mary without the large payment the king would normally have expected for disposing of so valuable a match.
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Norfolk, however, was soon complaining that the sweets were going elsewhere.
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Perhaps even more than by Anne, Thomas Howard was put out by Cromwell, who was now in effective and obvious charge. The secretary’s usefulness and record of success were, in fact, taking him out of the Boleyn clientage and making him an independent political figure in his own right, but he maintained his links with the queen and to outward appearances was still her man - perhaps Anne herself did not recognize the change.
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Yet Norfolk, though sometimes goaded into grumbling in public, remained loyal to Henry and acquiescent towards the Boleyn marriage. And this was not only because his only known principle was self-advantage ensured by spaniel-like sycophancy to the king, or because there was still some advantage in having a niece on the throne. The point was that Anne had only a daughter and a miscarriage to her credit; for Norfolk to have the king’s only living son as a son-in-law was too good a hand to throw away. And it was one which made Anne and her brother increasingly suspicious.
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Norfolk, however, was soon complaining that the sweets were going elsewhere.
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Perhaps even more than by Anne, Thomas Howard was put out by Cromwell, who was now in effective and obvious charge. The secretary’s usefulness and record of success were, in fact, taking him out of the Boleyn clientage and making him an independent political figure in his own right, but he maintained his links with the queen and to outward appearances was still her man - perhaps Anne herself did not recognize the change.
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Yet Norfolk, though sometimes goaded into grumbling in public, remained loyal to Henry and acquiescent towards the Boleyn marriage. And this was not only because his only known principle was self-advantage ensured by spaniel-like sycophancy to the king, or because there was still some advantage in having a niece on the throne. The point was that Anne had only a daughter and a miscarriage to her credit; for Norfolk to have the king’s only living son as a son-in-law was too good a hand to throw away. And it was one which made Anne and her brother increasingly suspicious.
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The problems facing Anne - the lack of a son, the intransigence of Mary, increasing unpopularity - were compounded by the international situation. As always, the controlling reality was the hostility between Francis I and Charles V. It was one of the periods of ‘cold’ rather than ‘hot’ war, with the antagonists each regarding Henry and his quarrel with the pope as one extra circumstance to be exploited or contained, as appropriate. Henry’s principal reliance continued to be on his ‘good brother Francis’, but he was never confident that England’s interests were wholly safe there. Thus, in a relationship which has rightly been described as ‘ambiguous’, Henry and Francis each tried to exploit their alliance in a thoroughly selfish fashion.
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The result was a great deal of suspicion, one of the other, and with Anne personifying to the English the French connection, the opprobrium fell on her.
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The result was a great deal of suspicion, one of the other, and with Anne personifying to the English the French connection, the opprobrium fell on her.
Plate 1
Anne Boleyn,
by an anonymous painter. Hever Castle, Kent.
Anne Boleyn,
by an anonymous painter. Hever Castle, Kent.
Plate 2
Anne Boleyn,
by an anonymous painter. Private collection. Courtesy Bradford Art Galleries and Museums.
Anne Boleyn,
by an anonymous painter. Private collection. Courtesy Bradford Art Galleries and Museums.
Plate 3
Anne Boleyn,
attrtibuted to John Hoskins. Duke of Buccleuch and Queensberry.
Anne Boleyn,
attrtibuted to John Hoskins. Duke of Buccleuch and Queensberry.
Plate 4
Anna Boloenia Henrici VIII Coniunx,
by Reynold Elsrack. Henry Holland,
Bazilowlogia
(1618).
Anna Boloenia Henrici VIII Coniunx,
by Reynold Elsrack. Henry Holland,
Bazilowlogia
(1618).
Plate 5
Unknown Lady
, by Hans Holbein the younger, inscribed
Anne Bullen decollata fuit Londini 19 May 1536. ©
The British Museum.
Unknown Lady
, by Hans Holbein the younger, inscribed
Anne Bullen decollata fuit Londini 19 May 1536. ©
The British Museum.
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