Read Tudor Queenship: The Reigns of Mary and Elizabeth Online
Authors: Alice Hunt,Anna Whitelock
Tags: #Royalty, #Tudors, #England/Great Britain, #Nonfiction, #Biography & Autobiography
IV
LOVE AND WAR
CHAPTER 9
“SPES MAXIMA NOSTRA”: EUROPEAN PROPAGANDA AND THE SPANISH MATCH
Corinna Streckfuss
I
When we think about the marriage of Mary I and Philip of Spain, “spes maxima nostra / our greatest hope” is a far from obvious description.
1
In terms of greatness, it rather tends to be seen as a “great mistake.” Its political circumstances were difficult: the bride was queen regnant of a country that had forsaken allegiance to the papacy twenty years before, and the bridegroom was a prince from a devout Catholic country within the Habsburg Empire. Due to English fears of “foreign dominance,” the marriage had been controversial ever since Mary’s intentions had leaked out in the autumn of 1553, and its critics were finally proved to have been right four years later when England lost Calais, her last possession on the continent, in Philip’s war against France.
2
No wonder, then, that traditional historiography has not grasped the positive aspects of Mary and Philip’s union for contemporaries in England and on the continent. Although a fair amount of scholarly attention has recently been focused on how royal wedding celebrations were publicized in early modern festival books, Mary and Philip’s wedding has not been discussed in this context.
3
Given the Marian court’s reputation for a lack of splendid festivities in comparison to the Elizabethan court, this neglect is hardly surprising. But how does it fit in with the so far unnoticed fact that the marriage of Mary and Philip of Spain received much more attention abroad than any other royal union of the 1550s, such as the marriage of Mary Stuart to the French Dauphin and Philip’s third marriage to Elizabeth Valois?
This essay is aimed at filling this gap in Marian historiography by investigating how and why this marriage was made known all over western Europe. Going beyond the usual Anglocentric perspective in Marian historiography, it will place her marriage in the wider context of European dynastic and religious politics of the time. It will show that authors with very different backgrounds were interested in promulgating news about this union and employing it for wider propaganda purposes.
4
And it will explain what made it such a “great hope” to contemporaries.
II
A first indicator can be found by looking at the numbers and languages of publications related to the marriage of Mary and Philip as well as their authors, places of publication, and literary forms. At least twenty contemporary printed publications dealt exclusively or predominantly with the marriage. Even more striking than their number is the fact that they were written in six different languages. Taking into consideration the difficulties involved in persuading the English to accept the marriage, it is surprising to find only three English texts celebrating the final conclusion of this union.
5
However, there were seven publications in Italian, four in Latin, and two each in Spanish, German, and Dutch.
6
With the significant exception of French, this variety covered all the main western European languages of the time.
The European dimension of these publications can also be deduced from their authors and their places of publication. The ten identifiable authors include a wide variety of Europeans from quite different backgrounds and affiliations: the English playwright John Heywood; John Christopherson, the master of Trinity College Cambridge and later Bishop of Chichester; John Elder, the Scottish tutor to Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley; Andrés Muñoz, the Spanish lackey of Philip’s son Don Carlos; Pedro Enriquez, one of Philip’s Spanish stewards; Giovanni Paolo Car., an Italian servant of the marquis of Pescara (a member of Philip’s entourage); Giovanni Alberto Albicante from Milan and Nicolaus Mameranus from Luxembourg, two scholars who had written other celebratory works about the Habsburgs; the Netherlandish scholar Hadrianus Junius; and a scholar from Poland called Leonard Gorecki.
7
While six texts were printed in London, four came from Rome, two from Milan, and one each from Antwerp, Augsburg, Cologne, Nuremberg, Seville, and Zaragoza—all cities within Tudor, Papal, and, especially, Habsburg dominions.
8
With regard to literary forms, the following pattern evolves: eleven publications are foreign eyewitness reports giving a detailed account of Philip’s journey to England, the actual wedding ceremony, and his first weeks in his new country.
9
In most cases, the writer does not reveal his identity and the account assumes the form of a printed newsletter based on handwritten letters from London. Another publication with a similar claim to authenticity is
La vera Capitulatione
, an Italian translation of the marriage treaty. The seven other publications are more artistic in form, being eulogistic poems and orations in celebration of the wedding.
10
Furthermore, there was one scholarly tract—Christopherson’s.
Thus, publications related to the Tudor-Habsburg union in 1554 covered a wide range of languages, authors, and literary genres. But how unusual was such a European-wide publication of a royal marriage in the mid-sixteenth century?
III
Looking at the marriage of Mary Stuart and the French Dauphin Francis Valois in 1558, it is striking that there are only nine related publications—less than half the number that had celebrated Mary I’s wedding. Five are in French, three in Latin, and one in English.
11
Seven of these publications are plays and eulogistic poems of the couple and the Valois family; some of them were performed during the actual wedding celebration.
12
Only two texts are reports about the wedding and they are so similar in wording that one can safely assume that the English report published in Edinburgh is a translation of the French report published in Paris. Paris is also the only identifiable place of publication of the other works and their authors are, with the exception of George Buchanan, Frenchmen with a link to the Valois court. There is thus a striking French dominance in the publicity of the Stuart–Valois union—written in France, and (mainly) for the French.
Publications about the marriage of Philip II and the French Princess Elizabeth Valois in 1559, however, are more numerous and varied with regard to authors and places of publication. Out of the sixteen printed texts, nine are printed in French, four in Italian, two in Spanish, and one in Latin.
13
With one exception, all the French and Latin texts are printed in Paris and their identifiable authors are scholars who had published other texts on Valois celebrations. The predominant genres are, again, plays and eulogistic poems. The Italian and Spanish publications, however, are all reports and, with the exception of one publication from Venice, do not refer (like most of their French counterparts) to the wedding celebrations in Paris but to celebrations welcoming the bride in Spain. Their places of publication range from Alcalá de Henares and Toledo in Spain to Milan and Bologna in Italy. Unlike Philip’s marriage to Mary I, his marriage to a Valois princess received far less attention in the Habsburg lands or the Papal State and was predominantly presented in the “Valois style” of “marriage propaganda” for a French audience that we encountered in connection to the Stuart–Valois union. Clearly the Tudor–Habsburg union was considered more important, and we need to understand why.
IV
Four dominant themes can be identified from looking at the contents and rhetoric of the twenty texts on the marriage of Mary I and Philip of Spain:
The first theme, stressing the splendor and uniqueness of the event, is very conventional in the presentation of early modern festivals. Although the wedding festivities in Winchester were rather modest in comparison to those in Paris in 1558 and 1559, the detailed description of all the splendor displayed is the main focus of nine of our texts, most of them being reports on the events from Philip’s departure from Spain in July 1554 to his life in London until the beginning of October that year.
With different emphases, they describe Philip’s arrival in England and his first encounter with Mary, the wedding ceremony in Winchester on July 25, the couple’s journey to London via Basing House, Reading, Windsor, and Richmond, and finally their royal entry into the capital and Philip’s first weeks as King of England.
Several publications dwell in great detail on Philip’s creation as a member of the Order of the Garter.
15
Not only was this presented as the highest honor Philip could receive from England, it was also the first opportunity for Philip to present himself to his new subjects and to make a “most satisfying” impression.
16
But not only did the prince himself impress, the highest ranking members of his train and the English nobles who accompanied them, often mentioned by name, also conveyed the importance of Philip’s coming: he had the honor to be cordially welcomed by the highest representatives of England.
17
The smoothness of his arrival was also underlined by mentioning the good, even “perfect” order in which he and his train moved from place to place and arrived in Winchester on July 23.
18
The actual wedding ceremony two days later, on the feast of St. James, proved to be the best occasion for detailed descriptions of splendor, which dwelled in particular on the clothes and jewelry worn by the participants, on decorations of churches and palaces, and on meals, music, and spectacles. These descriptions could span several pages in some of the more elaborate reports and provide a vast amount of detail, as if standing for visual records of the event. The author of the
Narratione assai piu particolare
, the most detailed account of the wedding, mentions elaborate details of all the clothes Philip wore during his first days in England and lingers on his wedding outfit: Philip was dressed
in brocade, covered with white velvet, rich in gold and pearls, with a very rich brocade collar, a ruby robe, richly decorated with gold and pearls and diamond buttons, on his head a black velvet beret with a little bit of gold inside...on his side his sword and dagger, on his feet white shoes and on his leg the Order of the Garter and that of St George at his collar with the most splendid diamond.
19
Mary, however, is described by the same author as dressed
in silver cloth with a cloak and golden
rizzo
above...a very rich collar and hair decoration in the French, or Flemish, style of inestimable value, with most charming ornaments, and a belt of richest gold, with jewellery on the breast with a diamond in the centre, which the Prince had sent from Spain as a present, worth 60.000
scudi
, sparkling on all sides, to which was attached a pearl pendant, estimated to be worth 5.000
scudi
.
20
Other authors kept such descriptions rather short and to the point. Elder in
The copie of a letter sent in to Scotland
describes the couple at dinner wearing “two most pri[n]cely, & most rich Abilimentes...of betin gold upo[n] golde, and so riche set with precious stones, as no man coulde esteme the value thereof.”
21
Describing the value of clothes and jewelry as “inestimable” was a common feature in reports on festivals. Some Italian authors, however, obviously rather preferred to estimate a—naturally—high price for particularly outstanding items.
22
What interested the general continental audience was not only the couple itself but also the guests. Lists of guests, sometimes even with short descriptions of their clothes, were incorporated into or attached to three of the reports written in Italian.
23
Guests were listed by rank within groups defined by the country of origin, with the Spaniards always mentioned first, followed by the Italians, the Flemish, and finally the English. They were meant to impress by their number and social position as well as by the uniqueness of their attire, which was reported to be outstanding by English and Habsburg standards alike.
24
These rather common presentations of perfection and uniqueness were marred only by one passing remark in one Italian report, which noted that although Philip was received with “as much love as one could say,” triumphal arches had been missing.
25
More common again was the device of suggesting splendor by describing the reaction of the audience. Many authors mention signs of the people being particularly impressed and stress their general joy over the marriage, which allegedly filled the entire country.
26
After the strong opposition initially voiced against this marriage in England, emphasizing the people’s joy was obviously more important than in the other two royal marriages.
Another means of conveying general satisfaction with a royal wedding and adding to the splendor of the event was to publish eulogies of the couple and their families. The forms of these eulogies range from remarks within a report and annexes to reports (such as odes or sonnets) to independent publications such as longer poems and orations, often written in Latin. The most elaborate texts on the wedding of Mary and Philip, by Nicolaus Mameranus and Hadrianus Junius, were clearly written on behalf of Philip and the Habsburgs.