Over-Analyzing All the References in Six: "Heart of Stone"

August 03, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in English History, theater

All My Six Posts!
Over-Analyzing All the Historical References in Six- “Ex Wives,” “No Way,” “Don’t Lose Your Head” “Heart of Stone” “Haus of Holbein” “Get Down”
The Tudor Crown Inspiration in Six’s Logo; The Tudor Fashion Elements of the Costumes in Six (with Painting References)
Six the Musical Wives 1-3: Historical and Modern Costume Inspirations; Six the Musical Wives 4-6: Historical and Modern Costume Inspirations
The Ladies in Waiting of Six: Historical Inspirations and Costumes; Details from Six Costumer Gabriella Slade’s Instagram Takeover
The Early Costumes of Six the Musical: From Edinburgh to Cambridge to London
Updated Six the Musical Costumes for Broadway!; The Shoes of Six the Musical
The Alternate Costumes of Six the Musical; How the Six Alternates Change Their Styling for Each Queen
Virtual Dance Workshops and Q&As with Different Six Cast Members!

I’ve been meaning for a while now to write out analyses of all the songs in Six, looking at all the historical and pop culture references in them, but i’ve had a lot of trouble finding the focus and motivation to do so during all this self isolation. I started this series in like….April? But here we finally are. Hope you enjoy it. I plan on putting up one for each song, hopefully at least one a week for a while. I need a purpose!

Today, we’re looking at Jane Seymour’s featured song - Heart of Stone. This is a slow, evocative song in the style of Adele and the only ballad in the show. I don’t have a TON to say about the history here because it’s mostly just metaphors without much actual historical content.

Dialogue and lyrics in the show are in bolded font and my commentary is in italics. :) A lot of times, it’s really not relevant who said what line of dialogue, but I’ve inserted the queen’s name if it is.

An early photo of the Six queens on the West End, with Jane Seymour (played by Natalie Paris) front and center, by Idil Sukan.

Sketch of Jane Seymour, Hans Holbein the Younger ~1536-1537

Jane: Anyways, I'm pretty sure it’s my turn next.

You! Queen, please!

Are you joking?!

Yeah, weren’t you the one he truly loved? [echoing Jane’s line in “Ex-Wives”]

Oh yeah, didn’t you give him the son he so desperately wanted?

Anne Boleyn: Yeah, like, I had a daughter and he literally chopped my head off.

Jane: Yeah, I know. I was lucky in so many ways. Well, I had a beautiful baby boy and Henry got his heir to the throne, so of course I was going to be the one he truly loved. But you know, if Edward had turned out to be a little baby Edwina, well, I know that his love wouldn’t have lasted.

As I mentioned in “Ex-Wives” - he concept that Jane Seymour was Henry’s favorite wife and “the only one he truly loved” was forwarded by Henry himself, but doesn’t actually track with his actions at the time. Jane DID give Henry his only surviving son, the one he had wanted for so many years, which is probably why he viewed her with such fondness in later years. She WAS the only one of his wives who was given a queen’s funeral. There are all sorts of stories about how Henry wore mourned for Jane for years, but in reality, the search for his new queen began shortly after Jane’s death (as is discussed in Haus of Holbein]. He wore black for three months after her death, but this was pretty typical for the time.

Anne Boleyn: Wow, yeah, what a stressful situation. I’ve never had anything similar happen.

Catherine of Aragon: Yeah, babe, do you have any idea?

Jane: Okay okay, look, you’re right. You’re so right! You queens kicked some major Tudor ass! And that’s what everyone wants to hear about. You know, like, girl power, woo! What I mean to say is that, I wouldn’t do any of that. Instead, I stood by him. It didn’t matter how many stupid things he did. I was there, by his side. And that’s… not because I was weak or scared. It’s because… I loved him. So, Henry…

Jane draws a sharp distinction between her and the other queens in her opening dialogue by referring to how powerful and kickass they were, while referring to herself only in terms of her love of Henry. This is probably a reference to the fact that while Henry’s first two wives, Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn, were highly educated and strongly opinionated, Jane had a far more typical education for an English noblewoman of the time. She could read and write, but had really been trained more in tasks like, needlework and managing a household than in scholarly activities. She was described as very meek, sweet natured, and gentle. This probably highly appealed to Henry after dealing with his strong-willed first and second wives. She took the motto “Bound to obey and serve” upon their marriage and by all accounts, held to that.

You’ve got a good heart, But I know it changes. A restless tide, untameable.
You came my way, and I knew a storm could come too. You’d lift me high or let me fall.
But I took your hand, Promise I’d withstand any blaze you blew my way.
‘Cause something inside, it solidified. And I knew I’d always stay.

This first verse and how it’s talking about Henry as a “restless tide” and an unpredictable “storm” can be interpreted to refer to the tumultuous start to their relationship, which appears to have started while Henry was still married to Anne Boleyn. Jane took a cue from Anne Boleyn in her approach to Henry; when Henry showed interest in her, she refused his sexual advances and his offer of gold coins as a gift. This outward show of morals apparently impressed Henry. Henry was betrothed to Jane a day after Anne’s execution in May 1536 and married her less than two weeks after the execution.

Jane served as a maid-of-honour to Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn, so she had been around court since at least 1532, and possibly as early as 1527. She knew very well how Henry had treated his first two wives, and how poorly both of their lives had ended as a result. The “storm” was a very very real concern for her.

“But I took your hand, Promise I’d withstand any blaze you blew my way.” - This, of course, refers to their wedding vows, recited during the couple’s handfasting, or joining of hands. This was a remnant of medieval times, when couples could actually just get married by joining their hands and vowing that they were married before witnesses, without involving the church at all. The vows during Tudor times would have been very similar to today’s traditional vows (we know this because we have actual documentary records of the vows that Henry and his later wife, Katherine Parr, exchanged, from the king’s prothonotary, or principal clerk of court).

Henry: "I, Henry, take thee to be my wedded wife, to have and to hold from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer for poorer, in sickness and in health, till death do us part, and thereto I plight thee my troth."

Jane: "I take thee, Henry, to be my wedded husband, to have and to hold, from this day forward, for better for worse, for richer and poorer, in sickness and health, to be bonny and buxom, in bed and at board, till death do us part, and thereto I plight thee my troth.”

This song uses a lot more imagery and a lot fewer historical and pop culture references than most of the other Queens’ songs. This is likely because we really don’t know that much about Jane. We don’t know her birth date and she wasn’t particularly notable or well known before her marriage to Henry. Most of the descriptions of her during her time as Queen focus on her meekness and gentleness rather than giving us much indication of her personality or thoughts. She unfortunately died too early for us to really know much about her. The fact that it took Henry until 1536 to notice her possibly indicates how quiet she really was. It may also indicate how enthralled and absorbed he was in Anne Boleyn, but realistically, he’d already had at least one affair during his marriage to Anne before falling for Jane.

Co-writer Lucy Moss has said in interviews that this was the hardest song in the show for them to write, and this lack of information explains why. The writers did a brilliant job covering up this blank page in history by characterizing Jane in the show as a motherly, awkward figure and by centering her song around the ballad, a genre which is traditionally pretty vague on details.

The motherly characterization does seem to be supported by some evidence actually. Jane specifically advocated that Henry’s 20-year-old daughter with Catherine of Aragon, Princess Mary,be brought back to court. She started quietly suggesting this before they were even married, and continued working on Henry until he agreed. She also may have had a role in bringing three-year-old Princess Elizabeth (Anne Boleyn’s daughter) back into Henry’s life as well, as she was invited back to court for Christmas 1536. We have no idea what her reasons are for this, but she clearly wanted the royal children back with their father (she also suggested that they be added back into the succession, but this wouldn’t occur until Henry’s last Queen, Katherine Parr, persuaded him to do). This is also supported by the fact that she came from a large family herself - she was the 7th of 10 children, including 6 boys. Her mother’s obvious fertility may have strengthened her appeal to Henry as well, since he was still on the hunt for a son.

The writers of Six addressed the incompleteness in the record of Jane’s life directly in her first solo line in the show, which says “But I'm not what I seem or am I? Stick around and you'll suddenly see more.” (in Ex-Wives, which I analyzed in depth here). It reminds me a lot of how other musicals have used creative storytelling to deal with blanks in history. What comes to mind first is “Burn” in Hamilton, which addresses the lack of documentary evidence of Hamilton’s love letters to Eliza by explaining that she burned them all after the incident of The Reynolds Pamphlet. “The Room Where it Happened” is another excellent example of this, as it’s all about The Compromise of 1790, which we only know about from Thomas Jefferson’s POV. We don’t /really/ know what happened there, and that song took that fact and made it into an acerbic, brilliant observation on the nature of politics (sidenote, this is one of my favorite musical songs ever, can you tell? It’s so jaunty that it takes a few listens before you realize how dark and pessimistic it really is).

I asked friends for more examples of songs in historical musicals that use creative methods to talk about historical knowledge gaps as well. My friend Megan suggested “Someone in a Tree” from Pacific Overtures, which is about Commodore Perry coming to Japan and the westernization of that country. In this song, supposedly Stephen Sondheim’s favorite of everything he’s written, two witnesses talk about the little they saw of the negotiations between the westerners and the Japanese, noting that there’s no official Japanese version of events and they don’t trust the westerner’s version.

CHORUS:
You can build me up, You can tear me down, You can try but I’m unbreakable.
You can do your best, But I’ll stand the test, You’ll find that I’m unshakable.
When the fire’s burnt, When the wind has blown, When the water’s dried,
You’ll still find stone. My heart of stone.

The imagery in this song is so dark and discouraging in a way. It’s a love song, but there’s an edge to it, which I imagine is quite intentional. “Heart of Stone” is used as a positive attribute for Jane’s steadfastness here, but throughout history, a heart of stone, or a hard heart, has always been referred to as a negative thing. This goes back to even Biblical times. Job 41:24 (ESV) says “His heart is hard as a stone, hard as the lower millstone.” The Rolling Stones song “Heart of Stone” talks about the singer’s life as a womanizer and how he won’t let a specific woman break his “heart of stone.” It shows up as the name of countless other songs, all about hard-hearted lovers.

So its use here is really quite …unusual. I feel like it might be an allusion to several complicated factors in her relationship with Henry. Her husband was terrifying and could kill her pretty easily, and she knew it. She may love him but she sure as heck didn’t have any choice in whether to marry him or not. It also may refer to the fact that Jane watched Anne get falsely accused and executed, then got engaged to Henry a day later and married him less than two weeks later. It really does take a heart of stone to go through with that after serving said mistress for several years.

This entire chorus also really characterizes her marriage to Henry as a struggle and a battle, which adds a very sad undertone to it all.

The Family of Henry VIII c. 1545, unknown artist (previously attributed to Hans Holbein the Younger).

You say we’re perfect. A perfect family. You hold us close for the world to see.

Henry looked at Jane with a lot of fondness in later years. She was painted into a family portrait years after her death, even when Henry was married to other women, and Henry was indeed buried next to her when he died.

The above dynastic portrait of Henry VIII and his family was painted around 1545, when he had already been married to Catherine Parr for two years (and two years before his death). As you can see, Henry is front and center with his son and first heir, the future Edward VI, and Jane Seymour, who had been dead for about eight years at this point. His daughters Princess Mary (Catherine of Aragon’s daughter, on the left) and Princess Elizabeth (Anne Boleyn’s daughter, on the right side) stand on either side of the central arrangement. Furthest on the right is Henry VIII’s jester Will Somers (who had served the king for 20 years at the time of this painting and was apparently the only one who could lift Henry VIII’s spirits when he was troubled by his painful leg). The woman on the far left is unidentified, but may be Jane, a jester of Catherine Parr and later Mary I (possibly Anne Boleyn as well).

This family portrait of the Tudor kings was actually painted in 1669, long after all the Tudors had died. Clockwise from back left: Henry VII and Queen Elizabeth of York, Queen Jane Seymour, Edward VI, and Henry VIII.

And when I say you’re the only one I’ve ever loved, I mean those words to you fully.
But I know, without my son your love could disappear.
And no, it isn’t fair, But I don’t care. ‘Cause my love will still be here.

As I mentioned before, we really don’t know much about Jane, and unfortunately we really have no idea what she felt for Henry.

“Without my son your love could disappear” does seem like a pretty accurate statement. Henry started looking to annul his marriage to Catherine, his wife of 16 years, around 1525, when it became clear that she was past child-bearing age (her last pregnancy was in 1518). And after chasing Anne Boleyn for ~7 years before marriage, Henry began talking about divorcing her in Christmas 1534 (after around two years of marriage) after she’d had one girl (Elizabeth) and one miscarriage. His relationship with Jane Seymour was incredibly brief in comparison to his first two wives, as it appears that Henry’s interest first began in February 1536, they married in Mary 1536, and she died in October 1537.

CHORUS

Soon I’ll have to go. I’ll never see him grow.

Jane Seymour died shortly after giving birth to her son Edward, later Edward VI. She had a very difficult labor that lasted two days and three nights. Edward was born on October 12, 1537, and Jane lasted until October 24. Modern historians believe she probably died of either an infection from a retained placenta, puerperal fever following a bacterial infection, or a pulmonary embolism, but it’s hard to know.

If anyone ever tells you that she had a c-section and died of it, you should ignore then because they’re very very wrong. In renaissance England, c-sections were really only performed when someone had already died or was about to die and the baby had to be removed immediately. People just didn’t survive c-sections. An example of an actual c-section from that time period is the character of MacDuff from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, who was "from his mother's womb / Untimely ripped" (Act 5 Scene 10).

But I hope my son will know, He’ll never be alone.
‘Cause like a river runs dry And leaves its scars behind.
I’ll be by your side, ‘Cause my love is set in stone. ...Yeah!

I have nothing historical to examine here (I haven’t been able to find any discussion of Edward VI’s thoughts of his mother), so I’ll just mention one more possible “stone” reference. It was standard practice for Henry VIII to have his wife’s initials, arms, and badge carved in various of his palaces. Jane’s can still be found in Hampton Court Palace. You can also find a few examples of Henry’s initials intertwined with Anne Boleyn’s as well, as clearly some of these were missed in the hurry to erase Anne and put up Jane’s name.

Henry VIII’s arms combined with Jane Seymour’s arms at Hampton Court Palace.

Several CHORUSES to the end

Jane: Because what hurts more than a broken heart?

-Anne slowly walks up to her.-

Anne Boleyn: Severed head.

Over-Analyzing All the References in Six: "Don't Lose Your Head"

July 21, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in theater, English History

Today, we’re looking at Anne Boleyn’s featured song - Don’t Lose Your Head. This song is influenced by Lily Allen and has s a similar sassy wit and melodic structure to her early songs.

Andrea Macasaet (center, as Anne Boleyn) with the cast of “Six.”LIZ LAUREN

Hang on a sec. Who was that other one?

Aragon: I think you’re thinking of me!

No, there was definitely a really important one.

Aragon: Yeah, still me!

Yeah. I think she, like, overlapped with you. Yeah, the really important, controversial one that people actually care about. Yeah. You know…

The one you’ve been waiting for. The mystery, The one who changed history. The temptress. The one with the plan, The plan to steal the man!

Queens: Anne!

The one who chased the king, But paid the price with a swordsman’s swing.

Queens: Will she be the one to win? Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Anne Boleyn!

Boleyn: What? Oh… sorry.

She points to Maggie and she gives her a beat.

A German engraving c. 1830, showing Anne Boleyn’s execution.

I don’t know of any way to prove this with a study or anything, but Anne Boleyn is arguably the most famous of Henry VIII’s wives. If you talk to random people on the street and ask them to name the 6 wives, I promise you, Anne Boleyn is the one they’re most likely to get correct. She was notorious at the time and only grew more notorious after her death, as rumors about her being a witch and having six fingers grew and grew over the centuries.

Incorrect thing here - all the records we have indicate that Henry VIII actually chased Anne for a long time; she was definitely not the one pursuing him. The main thing distinguishing Anne from the other women Henry had already slept with outside of his marriage was that she refused to do so. She wanted to be married if she was going to be with the king. It’s a damn shame that she’s been called a whore for centuries because of that.

Anne was indeed executed by a French swordsman. Generally, those executed in England were killed by an axe wielded by an English executioner who could have a lot of experience or very little. An inexpert executioner could draw out the pain and death significantly (see: Margaret Pole, executed in 1541 - some reports indicate that an inexperienced axemen missed her neck the first time, hitting her shoulder instead, and had to hit her ten more times with the axe before she died.). So it was actually pretty merciful of Henry to summon an expert swordsman from Saint-Omer in France to perform the execution. She was killed very quickly and expertly and likely felt much less pain than she would have otherwise.

As I noted previously, Maggie the Guitar Player (in the band Ladies in Waiting) is named for Lady Margaret Wyatt, who served Anne Boleyn and was likely her closest friend. She served as chief mourner at her funeral. You can learn more about all the Ladies in Waiting in my previous post on them here.

VERSE 1
Grew up in the French Court, Oui, oui, bonjour

A portrait of Anne Boleyn by an unknown artist, copied from an original by Hans Holbein the Younger. — A portrait of Anne Boleyn by an unknown artist, copied from an original by Hans Holbein the Younger.

I’ve seen people misinterpret this line online as indicating that Anne Boleyn was French. That is NOT the case. Anne was an English woman, the daughter of Thomas Boleyn, a prominent diplomat who served both Henry VIII and his father Henry VII, and his wife Lady Elizabeth Howard (part of the powerful Howard family), but as was fairly common for the time, Anne was sent away from her family to complete her education in the households of various noble families. Those families just happened to be some of the rulers of the Netherlands and France.

Anne was sent to join the household of Margaret of Austria in 1513 (in the low countries, in modern day Belgium), when Anne was either 12 or 6 (Anne’s exact birth year is unknown and there are NUMEROUS debates about which year is more likely - 1501 or 1507). Margaret of Austria was the daughter of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor, and was serving as the governor of the Habsburg Netherlands at the time. Anne’s father Thomas had been sent as an envoy to Margaret the year before and got along so well with her that he managed to secure Anne’s place at the time. Margaret of Austria was highly educated and cultured and her court had a reputation for having an extremely well-stocked library and art collection. Scholars, poets, and artists were constantly around the court. Here, Anne gained a fluency in French, which led to Mary Tudor choosing her for her household in the French Court in 1514.

About a year after she went to Margaret of Austria’s court, Anne was sent to serve Mary Tudor, Henry VIII’s sister, who was marrying the French King, Louis XII. Anne’s sister Mary probably served Mary Tudor as well, but it’s a little unclear how long either of them served her, as many of her English attendants were dismissed the day after the wedding. Less than three months into the marriage, the French king died. Although Mary Tudor went back to England (and scandalously married Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, without Henry VIII’s knowledge or permission), Anne Boleyn stayed on in France and joined the household of the new Queen, the 15-year-old Claude. Queen Claude also loved scholarly manuscripts and art, so her court was full of such beautiful things and exciting people.

By the time Anne was recalled to England in January 1522, she had spent 7-8 years of her life on mainland Europe and almost that long in the French court. She would have been there from ages 12-20 OR ages 6-14. Either way, although she was English born, it’s more than fair to say that she “grew up in the French court.”

“Oui Oui Bonjour” means “yes yes, hello” in French.

Life was a chore so (she set sail), 1522 came straight to the UK - All the British dudes, lame (Epic fail)

Anne Boleyn was summoned back to England in January 1522 by her father to marry her Irish cousin, James Butler, in order to settle a dispute over a title and some land. This marriage fell through for an unknown reason.

At this time, Anne Boleyn’s sister Mary Boleyn was at Henry VII’s court. Historical records indicate that Mary Boleyn was Henry’s mistress, and rumors abound that one or both of Mary’s children were Henry’s, as opposed to her husband William Carey’s, but there’s no definitive evidence on the subject. Anne joined the court at least by March 1522 as a maid of honor to Queen Catherine of Aragon, and quickly became very well known there. She was described as being very intelligent, stylish, and quick-witted. Apparently she had numerous admirers among the men at court, including the poet Sir Thomas Wyatt. Anne actually entered into a secret betrothal with Henry Percy, son of the Earl of Northumberland, but this was broken off when Percy’s father and Cardinal Thomas Wolsey (who was acting as the king’s chief courtier at this time) both refused to support the match.

“The UK” and “British dudes” - Technically the UK (United Kingdom) wasn’t called that until 1800, when Parliament passed an act uniting Great Britain and Ireland as “The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.” In Anne Boleyn’s time, it was just called England and its inhabitants were only called English, not British (although the Romans called the British Isles Britannia and occasionally referred to the larger island as Great Britain, the name wasn’t widely used to refer to the kingdom on the British Isles until 1707, when the kingdoms of England and Scotland were officially joined into one political union).

Thomas Boleyn, Viscount Rochford, Anne’s father.

Ooh, I wanna dance and sing - Politics, not my thing

Anne was an extremely accomplished dancer, singer, and played numerous musical instruments. However, after Henry put her in a position of power, Anne actually wielded tremendous influence on his policy, particularly as it related to religion. There’s evidence that Anne persuaded Henry to read so called “heretical” pamphlets by Protestant writers about how kings had a responsibility to control the Catholic church and stop its excesses. She also was very influential in granting petitions, receiving diplomats, and was a patron to numerous nobles and artists, including the famed Hans Holbein.

I don’t love this line and some of the others in the musical because of the ditzy way in which Anne is portrayed, which is very different from reality. However, I try to remind myself that she’s just a character, and she isn’t meant to be historically accurate.

Ooo, but then I met the King - And soon my daddy said, you should try and get ahead

It appears that Anne caught Henry VIII’s eye in 1526. Having learned from her sister’s example though, Anne refused to sleep with him or become his mistress. She quickly gained the ability to influence the king.

There isn’t much evidence that her father Thomas Boleyn actually pushed Anne toward her relationship with Henry, but this is a common portrayal of the situation in books, film, and TV shows.

He wanted me, huh, obviously, Messaging me like everyday,
Couldn't be better, then he sent me a letter and who am I kidding, I was prêt-à-manger
Ooh, sent a reply, Ooh, just saying hi, Ooh, you're a nice guy, I'll think about it maybe, XO baby

Henry VIII wrote Anne many love letters which still exist today. You can read them here. These letters give us most of the information we have about their relationship, including the fact that Anne refused to sleep with him for much of their seven-year courtship.

Unfortunately, we don’t have Anne’s replies to Henry, but evidence indicates that she really did avoid his advances for a long time and

Prêt-à-manger literally means “ready to eat” in French.

Here we go (You sent him kisses), I didn't know I would move in with his missus (What?),
Get a life (You're living with his wife?), Like, what was I meant to do?

As I noted previously in the blog post on No Way, Anne Boleyn was already living in the same palace as Henry and Catherine even before Henry noticed her. Anne was Catherine’s maid of honor, and thus, lived at court along with many many other nobles and aristocrats. However, in December 1528, Henry set Anne up with her own “very fine lodging…close to his own,” as reported by a French diplomat of the time, and there are lots of reports that she basically had her own shadow court and was acting as a second queen at that time.

“What was I meant to do?” has a slightly humorous effect in this song, but it reflects the reality that Anne Boleyn really didn’t have many choices here. She was able to resist Henry’s sexual advances, but she couldn’t fend him off altogether because he was the king, and her livelihood and the rest of her family’s livelihoods really depended on his favor. She tried to make the best of the situation by refusing to sleep with him and insisting that he marry her, but she didn’t have much control over it beyond that.

CHORUS
Sorry not sorry 'bout what I said - I'm just tryna have some fun

In an interview with the Chicago Shakespeare Theater, co-writer Lucy Moss said that “Sorry, not sorry” was directly inspired by one of Anne Boleyn’s mottoes in life - “Let them grumble; that is how it’s going to be.” Anne very briefly adopted the Latin version of this motto in 1530, “Aisi sera groigne qui groigne.” She even had this motto embroidered on her servants’ livery coats! This demonstrates Anne’s feelings about those protesting her elevation and the king’s attempts to get rid of Catherine of Aragon. She didn’t end up using it very long - the imperial ambassador Eustace Chapuys, who /hated/ Anne, claimed that she changed it once she realized it was actually Margaret of Austria’s motto (Groigne qui groigne et, vive Bourgoigne). However, Anne spent several years at the court of Margaret of Austria as a child, so it seems unlikely that she wouldn’t have realized this. Another possible explanation is that she just realized the motto wasn’t doing anything to calm the tensions.

Don't worry, don't worry, don't lose your head
I didn't mean to hurt anyone - LOL, say oh well - Or go to hell
I'm sorry not sorry 'bout what I said - Don't lose your head

“Don’t lose your head” is a common colloquialism meaning “don’t lose your temper.” I tried to figure out where this saying came from and how old it is, but didn’t have much success. Some people do say that it actually originally specifically was referring to executions by beheading, so it works very well in this context.

The lyric obviously refers to Anne’s ultimate demise, but it also refers to Anne Boleyn’s infamous temper. Anne was brilliant, but it’s well documented that when angry, she often said spiteful, threatening things. One courtier said that she spoke to her uncle once in words that "shouldn't be used to a dog." It’s also reported that she said if Henry ever left her as Regent when he was away, she would have Princess Mary killed.

Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn at Cardinal Wolsey's, Library of Congress

VERSE 2
Three in the bed and the little one said, If you wanna be wed, make up your mind
Her or me, chum - Don't wanna be some Girl in a threesome, Are you blind?

Reports from the time indicated that Anne and Henry had a very stormy relationship and had a tendency to have huge arguments and then later would reunite blissfully. One report described their relationship as “storm followed sunshine, sunshine followed storm.” We also know from Henry’s love letters that Anne refused to sleep with him for most of their pre-marital relationship, so there’s definitely a lot of truth to the fact that Anne demanded things from Henry that really no other woman ever had.

“Three in the bed and the little one said” - refers to the nursery rhyme “Ten in the Bed,” which has an unknown origin.

Ooh, don't be bitter, Ooh, 'cause I'm fitter
Ooh, why hasn't it hit her? He doesn't want to bang you, Somebody hang you

“Somebody hang you” is both modern day slang for telling someone to kind of fuck off and also refers to an incident in 1531, before Anne was queen. Anne “said to one of the Queen’s ladies that she wished all the Spaniards in the world were in the sea; and on the other replying, that, for the honor of the Queen, she should not say so, she said that she did not care anything for the Queen, and would rather see her hanged than acknowledge her as her mistress.”

Here we go - (Your comment went viral)
I didn't really mean it but rumours spiral
(Wow Anne, way to make the country hate you)
Mate, what was I meant to do?

Anne really was pretty unpopular at the time. The English people really loved Catherine of Aragon; she had been their queen since 1509 and had seen the country through many tough times, including serving as regent while Henry was away at war and publicly begging for the King’s mercy for various subjects on several occasions. Records indicate that crowds shouted out encouragement to Catherine of Aragon whenever they saw her during the king’s “Great Matter.”

In addition, the entire concept that a man could set aside his wife really scared women, as it was an attack on traditional family values and a threat to their own security. At the time, women depended entirely on their husbands. If their husbands could set them aside, they would be ruined and destitute. In November 1531, a mob of women (supposedly 7,000-8,000) actually went after Anne while she was dining at a house on a river; she only narrowly escaped them by crossing the river in a boat. This wasn’t the last riot of women against Anne Boleyn either; another one happened in 1532.

Finally, apart from the common people’s general dislike of her, plenty of nobles hated her as well, as she had a temper and a sharp tongue and was known for being rather arrogant. She also played a large role in influencing Henry VIII and was very active in her support of or opposition to various policies.

CHORUS

Pope Clement VII, by Sebastiano del Piombo, c. 1531. He condemned Henry and Anne’s marriage and ordered Henry to return to Catherine of Aragon. — Pope Clement VII, by Sebastiano del Piombo, c. 1531. He condemned Henry and Anne’s marriage and ordered Henry to return to Catherine of Aragon.

VERSE 3
Tried to elope, But the pope said nope, Our only hope was Henry
He got a promotion, Caused a commotion, Set in motion the C of E
The rules were so outdated, Us two wanted to get x-rated
Soon, ex-communicated, Everybody chill, its totes God's will

“Tried to elope but the pope said nope” - Henry started asking Pope Clement VII for a dispensation to annul his marriage to Catherine of Aragon and marry Anne Boleyn starting around 1527. They likely thought this would be pretty easy, as there was precedent for royals getting annulments and marrying again. However, Catherine of Aragon just happened to be the aunt of the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, who sacked Rome in May 1527 and took the Pope prisoner. However, even after the Pope was released, he avoided issuing any sort of official ruling on Henry VIII’s petition. He did allow for Cardinal Wolsey (of England, and then Henry’s chief courtier) to hold an ecclesiastical court on the matter, but stipulated that another papal legate had to be there as well. This legate, Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio, had been instructed to delay things as long as possible, as the Pope was hoping that Henry would get sick of Anne and the issue would go away. Although the court case lasted from May 31, 1529 to July, Campeggio adjourned it for a summer recess. The court never met again. Wolsey was later arrested and likely would have been convicted and executed for treason if he hadn’t died from illness beforehand. Henry eventually left Catherine of Aragon completely, riding away one day without saying goodbye and having her moved to another household.

Henry and Anne married secretly in November 1532. She quickly became pregnant. The new Archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer (formerly Anne’s family chaplain) declared Henry’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon null and void in May 1533, and shortly thereafter, declared Henry and Anne’s marriage to be good and valid.

Thomas Cranmer by Gerlach Flicke. Cranmer was the Boleyns’ former family chaplain, married Anne and Henry, and declared Henry’s first marriage to Catherine of Aragon null and void.

“He got a promotion, Caused a commotion, Set in motion the C of E” In 1533, the English House of Commons (with encouragement from Henry) forbade all appeals to Rome and penalized those who tried to introduce papal bulls into England. This set up the modern Church of England, separate from Rome and the Pope’s influence. After this, Pope Clement VII finally acted, condemning Henry’s marriage to Anne, declaring the marriage to Catherine legal, and ordering Henry to return to Catherine in March 1534. The Pope also announced a provisional sentence of excommunication against Henry VIII and Thomas Cranmer. However,his excommunication wouldn’t be formally enacted until 1538, after Henry and his courtiers dissolved the monasteries in England, dismantled several of the shrines, and executed a ton of Catholic rebels involved in the Pilgrimage of Grace.

In late 1534, Parliament declared Henry the supreme head of the Church of England.

“The rules were so outdated” probably refers to Henry not being able to annul his marriage to his first wife.

[wedding march plays]

At this break, a section of Felix Mendelssohn’s Wedding March from A Midsummer Night’s Dream plays. This song was written in 1842 and is one of the most frequently used wedding marches.

Henry's out every night on the town, Just sleeping around, like what the hell

Keep in mind, before Henry got with Anne, he slept with her sister Mary enough that LOTS of people believed that Mary’s children were his. That’s gotta make you paranoid. And he already had an acknowledged illegitimate child with another noblewoman, Bessie Blount.

Henry started taking mistresses during Anne’s first pregnancy (couples at the time generally abstained from sex during pregnancy to avoid hurting the child). was almost certainly sleeping with Anne’s first cousin Margaret Shelton, who served as one of her maids of honor, for around six months in 1535. Finally, starting in February 1536, reports came out that Henry was super interested in another of Anne’s maids-of-honor, Jane Seymour. We all know how that turned out. Henry reportedly gave Jane a locket with a miniature portrait of himself inside; Anne ripped it off her neck when she saw it. Henry was betrothed to Jane a day after Anne’s execution in May 1536 and married her less than two weeks after the execution.

If that's how it's gonna be, Maybe I'll flirt with a guy or three, Just to make him jell

/sigh/ This is a vast oversimplification of the entire situation at hand, but yes, Anne was known for being flirtatious and charming throughout her time at the English Court in the tradition of courtly love. However, she was specifically accused of adultery with one of her musicians Mark Smeaton, courtiers Sir Henry Norris, Sir Francis Weston, and Sir William Brereton, and her own brother George Boleyn. Most historians believe that these charges and the evidence to support them were made up by Thomas Cromwell, a powerful courtier, in order to bring down Anne. Anne had argued with Cromwell over the redistribution of church revenues from the dissolution of the monasteries (Anne wanted the revenues distributed to charitable and educational institutions, Cromwell wanted to give it to the king and take his own cut as well) and foreign policy (they disagreed over whether to ally with France or the Holy Roman Empire).

Henry finds out and he goes mental, He screams and shouts, Like so judgmental, You dam-ned witch
Mate, just shut up, I wouldn't be such a b- If you could get it up
Here we go (Is that what you said?), And now he's going 'round like off with her head (No)

There’s a report of one argument between Henry and Anne after the investigation against her began, but most evidence seems to indicate that Henry just left a tournament one day and never spoke to Anne again. She was arrested soon after, taken to the Tower of London, and tried and convicted of adultery, incest, and high treason. However, Henry and Anne had definitely had some serious arguments before Anne was brought down. There are numerous reports of them fighting and shouting at each other.

“you damned witch” - It’s pretty common to hear that Anne Boleyn was a witch or engaged in witchcraft in some way now, but this wasn’t a real charge at the time. However, in later years, various people spread the rumor. One Catholic writer Nicholas Sander described Anne Boleyn as having six fingers on her right hand and having a projecting tooth (but he said this in 1585, so like - how would he know?). He also alleged that she miscarried a monstrously deformed child. None of Anne’s contemporaries actually mention her having an extra finger, projecting tooth, or deformed child- and considering how much they hated her, wouldn’t they have mentioned it at the time if she did?

“wouldn’t be such a b- if you could get it up” - As I noted before in the post on Wives, there’s no historical evidence about Henry’s abilities in bed to support this line. However, this may refer to one of the grounds for the annulment of his marriage to Anna of Cleves later in his life, as Henry claimed he could not consummate the marriage with Anna. It also just seems to further demonstrate Anne’s known habit of saying things in anger that she regretted later.

Yeah, I'm pretty sure he means it (Seems it) - What was I meant to do? (What was she meant to do?)
Like what was I meant to do? (What was she meant to do?) - No, but what was I meant to do?

[dialogue break] Boleyn: No guys, seriously, he’s actually going to chop my head off.
I guess he just really liked my head.

[back to music] CHORUS

(Sorry not sorry 'bout what she said), Sorry not sorry 'bout what I said
Don't lose your head - Haha sorry

Boleyn: So yeah. What a weekend.

Wait, did you actually die?

Boleyn: Yeah, it was so extra. Anyway, I’m obvs the winner, so I think I’ll do another solo. My next song is one I wrote about the moment I found out Catherine of Aragon had tragically died. It’s called “Wearing Yellow to a Funeral.” Please sing along if you know the words.

The day after Catherine of Aragon’s death, Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII appeared at court dressed “from to top to toe” in joyful yellow. However, different chroniclers differ on whether it was Henry /or/ Anne /or/ both of them appeared in yellow, and whether this was intended to be a celebratory gesture or not.

Boleyn: Catherine was a massive-

The queens shout and cry in a large uproar.

Who decided you were the winner? She wants another turn?

Aragon: Over my dead body!

Henry VIII's Jousting Accident Probably Didn't Change his Personality

July 08, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in English History

People citing this supposed jousting accident as changing Henry VIII into a tyrant is one of my PET peeves, y’all. It’s what everyone who knows just enough Tudor history to be dangerous and also WRONG cites. I originally wrote this as a long response to a comment referencing the accident on Ask Historians, but since I’m basically correcting someone with this entire thing, I won’t post a direct link to it. I’ll share it with you if you really want though.

Detail showing Henry VIII jousting in front of Katherine of Aragon, College of Arms (Westminster Tournament Roll), by Thomas Wriothesley, 1511

So about that jousting accident. The story of that accident actually comes from only three sources of various trustworthiness. This accident isn't mentioned elsewhere, although you would think that an accident resulting in the king losing consciousness for a long period of time would have definitely been reported by many many people.

Eustace Chapuys, the famous ambassador of Charles V, reported in January 1536, "On the eve of the Conversion of St. Paul, the King being mounted on a great horse to run at the lists, both fell so heavily that every one thought it a miracle he was not killed, but he sustained no injury."
The English chronicler Charles Wriothesley wrote, " …it was said she [Anne] tooke a fright, for the King ranne that tyme at the ring and had a fall from his horse, but he had no hurt; and she tooke such a fright with all that it caused her to fall in travaile, and so was delivered afore her full tyme, which was a great discompfort to all this realme.”
In March 1536, Dr Pedro Ortiz, Charles V's ambassador in /Rome/ (not England), said "Has received a letter from the ambassador in France, dated 15 Feb....The French king said that the king of England had fallen from his horse, and been for two hours without speaking. “La Ana” was so upset that she miscarried of a son."

(Thanks to the brilliant Anne Boleyn files blog for compiling these sources so well - https://www.theanneboleynfiles.com/24-january-1536-serious-jousting-accident-henry-viii/ )

So as you can see, the sources in England at the time of the incident said that it was a very hard fall but that Henry VIII was in fact, not injured. Although Wriothesley might have glossed over an injury to the king's head, Chapuys certainly had a vested interest in conveying completely accurate information to the emperor - so we can trust that his reports of "no injury" are likely to be true. The only source that claimed that the king didn't speak for two hours after his accident was a man who had heard the information second or third hand and was in a completely different country at the time.

It does appear that this jousting accident was bad enough to burst an earlier leg ulcer, leaving him with lasting, constant pain in both of his legs for the rest of his life. This likely made him very cranky. But there is no sign that he actually suffered from any brain injury.

In addition, although people DO often cite this as the source of his "changing personality," in fact, there are actually numerous examples of Henry VIII’s brutality before 1536 as well.

Specific incidents indicating his brutality prior to this:

Shortly after taking the throne, Henry VIII executed Edmund Dudley and Sir Richard Empson for "constructive treason" in their financial dealings for the previous king, even though both men had just been doing the bidding of his father Henry VII.
He brought down Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, a man who essentially ran the country for him from 1515-1529, just because he couldn't convince the Pope to give him an annulment. Wolsey was stripped of his government office and all his property and was later arrested for treason, but became ill and died in November 1530 before he could be tried. He reputedly said " if I had served God as diligently as I have done the King, he would not have given me over in my grey hairs."
He had Thomas More, his former chancellor and a man who had worked closely with him since 1517, executed in 1535 for refusing to sign the Oath of Succession which repudiated the authority of the Pope (and outlined the new line of succession, which he did not object to).
He treated Catherine of Aragon, his companion of 21 years, shamefully for refusing to accept the invalidity of their marriage. After she was banished from court in the summer of 1531, Catherine was moved from estate to estate and forced to live in increasingly poor lodgings and with fewer and fewer servants. Her friends were not allowed to visit her and she was not allowed to see her daughter for the last 4-5 years of her life, even when Mary was very sick and when Catherine herself was actively dying in January 1536. Mary was also forbidden from attending her mother's funeral.

To claim that his personality changed significantly after this supposed jousting accident is to ignore these many examples of his tyrant like behavior beforehand.

Over-Analyzing All the References in Six: "No Way"

July 05, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in theater, English History

Today, we’re looking at Catherine of Aragon’s feature - No Way. The entire song has a heavy Latin beat. The Spanish background is probably why Maria is the drummer in the band specifically. The writers of Six said at BroadwayCon that this was the first song they wrote for the show, but it’s also the song that’s gone through the most revisions.

Dialogue and lyrics in the show are in bolded font and my commentary is in italics. :)

The UK Tour cast of Six, with Catherine of Aragon (played by Lauren Drew), at the center. (Credit: Johan Persson)

Aragon: But there’s only one you need to hear from tonight. (City name), I’m about to win this competition. Maria, give me a beat.

So, since the day I arrived in England, let’s just say my faith had been tested on more than one occasion.

This refers to Catherine’s famed religious faith. Catherine was the youngest daughter of Isabella of Castille and Ferdinand of Aragon, the joint rulers of Spain, who famously pushed out the Muslim Nasrid dynasty from the Emirate of Granada in Spain. Although they promised that the Muslims and Jews of Granada would be allowed to live in peace in the Treaty of Granada, this was broken later after an uprising in 1499, and Muslims were forced to either become Christians or leave Spain. So with that public background, Catherine’s intense religious faith is pretty understandable.

Isabella was also known privately for living an austere, temperate lifestyle, which must have affected her daughter as well.

First things first, I was shipped off from Spain on the night of my sweet sixteen to marry some prince called Arthur and I’m like “okay”.

Catherine was betrothed to Arthur, Prince of Wales (the son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York), when she was three years old and married him in November 1501, when they were both 16. Apparently the couple had written letters to each other in Latin, but found out when they met that they couldn’t talk, as they had learned different Latin pronunciations.

After their marriage, the couple moved out to Ludlow Castle on the border of Wales for Arthur to rule as Prince of Wales and preside over the Council of Wales nad the Marches. However, after only a few months, both of them became ill and Arthur died in April 1502.

Portrait of either Mary Tudor or Catherine of Aragon by Michael Sittow (usually attributed as Catherine of Aragon)

Arthur, prince of Wales, painted during Arthur's marriage negotiations, c.1500

But then Arthur died, so naturally I’m imprisoned for seven years. Really helped with the grieving process, you know, but I’m still like, “okay.”

After Arthur’s death, Catherine faced a lot of trouble. By the terms of her marriage contract, if she returned home to Spain, King Henry VII had to return her 200,000 ducat dowry (half of which he hadn’t even received yet).

King Henry was broke and totally couldn’t afford this, so he would not allow Catherine to leave England. He briefly considered marrying her himself (after his wife Elizabeth of York died in 1503 after trying to give him another son to replace Arthur), but eventually it was decided that she would marry Arthur’s younger brother, Henry, Duke of York. However, he was five years younger than her, so they had to wait for him to grow up. His father also continually delayed their marriage.

For the next seven years, Catherine lived in near-poverty in London. She had to sell many of her goods to survive and was not often seen at court due to the shabbiness of her clothes. So although she wasn’t literally imprisoned, her father and father-in-law’s squabbles basically led to her living in really terrible conditions for many years.

A 1509 woodcut of the coronation of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon. Henry’s heraldic badge, the Tudor Rose, is shown above him, while Catherine’s, the pomegranate, sits above her. (Joyfull Medytacvon to All Englande, Stephen Hawes)

But thank God they rescued me just in time to marry Prince Henry… my dead husband’s brother. Okay, so I’m thinking “bit weird”, but if you’d seen him back in the summer of ‘09. Let me tell you he was okay.

She finally married Henry after his father’s death and his ascension to the throne in 1509. They were married for the next 24 years and for many years, they appeared to be quite in love.

So seven years later, we’re still trying for an heir. He’s trying really hard and I’m like “okay”, and he starts coming home late. “I was just out with my ministers!” But there’s lipstick on his ruff. And I’m like “okay”.

Records indicate that Catherine of Aragon was pregnant at least six times and possibly up to nine times between 1509-1518, but most of her children either were miscarried or stillborn (so they were DEFINITELY still trying for that heir); only three survived the birth, and only one, Princess Mary, survived past two months of life. Catherine was always known as a highly intelligent and religious woman, but as more and more of her children died, she became increasingly devout and more interested in academic matters, particularly in ensuring the education of her daughter.

Although Henry VIII is notorious today for having six wives and sleeping with lots of women, for the time period, he really wasn’t too terrible. His grandfather Edward IV, for example, had many documented mistresses and at least five illegitimate children. Henry, in contrast, only had three confirmed mistresses and one acknowledged illegitimate child, and was fairly discreet about his extramarital affairs. He did indeed have a romantic relationship of some sort with three of his wives before marrying them (Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, and Katherine Howard), but it’s unclear whether sex was involved with these relationships before marriage.

The timeline of the show “seven years later” points to Catherine becoming aware of Henry cheating on her in 1516. We DO know that Bessie Blount’s relationship with Henry lasted many years and may have actually started in 1514, when she was 16 years old, Henry was 23, and Catherine was 29. It’s unclear what Catherine knew about Henry’s affairs historically, but she definitely was aware of them by 1519, when Henry Fitzroy, Henry’s son with his mistress Bessie Blount (yes, Bessie on the bass), was born and formally acknowledged by Henry.

Suddenly, he wants to annul our marriage, move some side chick into my palace and move me into a convent! Now, now, now, now, I just don’t think I’d look that good in a wimple, so I’m like “No way.”

The timeline here is of course being very shortened. Catherine’s last pregnancy was 1518, Henry only began to pursue Anne Boleyn seriously around 1525, and he didn’t start trying to annul his marriage until probably around 1527. He did not succeed in getting an annulment until 1533, after he’d established his own church of England.

Henry’s request for an annulment wasn’t really that unusual, and such requests were often granted. In fact, Louis XII of France had had his marriage to his first wife Joan annulled by the Pope in 1498 just so he could marry the widow of the FORMER king of France, even though the grounds for his annulment were apparently very weak. Joan then joined a convent, just as Henry suggested for Catherine. Honestly, the Pope would likely have granted Henry his annulment if Catherine’s nephew were not the Holy Roman Emperor, Charles V, who during all this literally sacked Rome and captured the Pope. So the Pope was obviously under serious pressure to not annul the marriage.

The Pope did send a legate, Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio to England to hear the case for the annulment, and Campeggio actually advised Catherine to join a convent. However, Catherine refused, partly because of her own belief that she was Henry’s true wife and queen and also likely for fear that her daughter Mary would be illegitimized. Her actions were also motivated by her religion, as she truly believed that it would be a sin to deny that she was Henry’s wife. Even in her very last letter to Henry before her death, after he abandoned her and had put her in increasingly terrible housing for years and kept her from seeing her daughter, referred to him as her husband and herself as his wife and queen.

“move some side chick into my palace” - There are a few things to dissect here. First, Anne Boleyn was already living in the same palace as Henry and Catherine even before Henry noticed her. Anne was Catherine’s maid of honor, and thus, lived at court along with many many other nobles and aristocrats. Second, “my palace” - the court actually was constantly on the move and usually spent a few months at one palace or house before moving on to another. This was pretty practical, as modern plumbing didn’t exist and after the large court had been in one place for a while, the palace would get rather, ah, smelly, and need lots of cleaning.

What Catherine likely is referring to here is the fact that in December 1528, Henry set Anne up with her own “very fine lodging…close to his own,” as reported by a French diplomat of the time.

Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon before Papal Legates at Blackfriars, 1529, by Frank O. Salisbury (~1910)

You must agree that, baby, In all the time I’ve been by your side,
I’ve never lost control, No matter how many times I knew you lied.

This is one of many references in the song to Catherine’s famous speech before the Legatine court in June 1529. The purpose of this court was to listen to testimonies and rule on the validity of Henry and Catherine’s marriage. Catherine literally got down on her knees in front of Henry and gave an amazing speech straight to him about her innocence. Afterward, she got up, curtsied to Henry, and walked out of the court. She would not return no matter how many times she was called back.

In the speech, she specifically said:

“I have been to you a true, humble and obedient wife, ever comfortable to your will and pleasure, that never said or did any thing to the contrary thereof, being always well pleased and contented with all things wherein you had any delight or dalliance, whether it were in little or much. I never grudged in word or countenance, or showed a visage or spark of discontent.…”

Have my golden rule, Got to keep my cool. Yeah, baby.

“The Golden Rule” usually refers to the maxim that you should treat others the way you want to be treated. This actually makes a lot of sense in this context, as Catherine clearly wanted Henry to treat her with the love and humility she showed him. In fact, the Spanish ambassador Eustace Chapuys described Catherine as “the most virtuous woman I have ever known and the highest hearted, but too quick to trust that others were like herself, and too slow to do a little ill that much good might come of it.”

Here, it’s also a reference to the wealth of Spain and her royal credentials. There’s also gold throughout Aragon’s Six costume and her historical portraits.

And even though you’ve had your fun, Running around with some Pretty, young thing.

This refers to Anne Boleyn, who was 16 years younger than Catherine of Aragon and 10 years younger than Henry. This is also a possible reference to the Michael Jackson Song “Pretty Young Thing,” although the phrase has shown up many times before and since that song.

And even though you’ve had one son With someone who don’t own a Wedding ring.
No matter what I heard, I didn’t say a word. No, baby. (You know she never said a word.)

As I noted earlier, Henry’s only acknowledged illegitimate offspring was Henry Fitzroy, with Bessie Blount. FitzRoy was a common surname of the illegitimate offspring of royalty, as it literally means “son of the king.”

I’ve put up with your Sh... Like every single day. But now it’s time to Shh, and listen when I say...

I like that Catherine never actually curses in her song, although she gets close to it. It seems to be a nice touch for a character known to be so pious.

Joanna of Castille, by Master of the Legen of the Magdalen, ~1495-1496

You must think that I’m crazy, You wanna replace me, baby there’s N-n-n-n-n-n-no way.

This may be a reference to Catherine’s tragic older sister, Joanna, who is known historically as “Juana la Loca,” or Joanna the Mad. Joanna was the heir presumptive to the crowns of Castille and Aragon after her brother, elder sister, and nephew all died young. She technically became Queen of Castille in 1504 upon the death of her mother Isabella. However, her father Ferdinand had her declared insane and imprisoned; poor Joanna was imprisoned from 1506-1516 by her father (who ruled as regent in her place). Her son Charles I, who ascended to the throne, kept her in prison for the rest of her life. She was in prison from 1506 to 155, when she died at 1575, even though there was no sign that she was insane before her confinement (she later did get a bit paranoid and insane, as anyone would if you’d been confined unjustly for many decades).

If you think for a moment, I’d grant you annulment, just hold up there’s N-n-n-n-n-n-no way.
No way. No way. There’s N-n-n-n-n-n-no way.

Catherine steadfastly refused to agree to the annulment of her marriage despite intense pressure from Henry and various priests and nobles.

So you read a bible verse that I’m cursed ‘cause I was your brother’s wife,
You say it’s a pity ‘cause quoting Leviticus, I’ll end up kiddy-less all my life.

Well, daddy, weren’t you there When I gave birth to Mary? Oh, you don’t remember? (Daughters are so easy to forget.)

Henry based the case for his annulment on Leviticus 20:21: “And if a man shall take his brother’s wife, it [is] an unclean thing: he hath uncovered his brother’s nakedness; they shall be childless.” A Cambridge university lecturer in Hebrew, Robert Wakefield, wrote a letter in favor of the divorce in which he interpreted that the original Hebrew of the Leviticus verse stated that the marriage would specifically without “sons” rather than being childless. Wakefield also argued that the pope had no authority for the dispensation for Henry and Catherine’s marriage, since it violated scriptural law rather than church laws. Henry clung to this interpretation rather fiercely.

You’re just so full of Sh... Must think I’m naive. I won’t back down, Won’t Shh, And no, I’ll never leave

You must think that I’m crazy, You wanna replace me, baby there’s N-n-n-n-n-n-no way.
If you thought it’d be funny To send me to a nunnery, honey, there’s No way.

It’s quoted all over the place that when a convent was suggested to Catherine, she said “God never called me to a nunnery. I am the King’s true and legitimate wife.” However, I can’t find any primary sources supporting this, so it’s possible this is just a myth. However, it’s a great and memorable line that clearly illustrates Catherine’s viewpoint that she was actually Henry’s wife and that lying about that would be a sin.

As I mentioned earlier though, the sources seem to indicate that Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio actually advised Catherine to join a convent - it might not have been Henry who said it first.

18th-century copy of a lost original portrait of Catherine of Aragon

You’ve got me down on my knees,

As I noted earlier, Catherine really did get down on her knees in front of Henry VIII at the Legatine Court to plead her innocence.

There’s a double meaning to this though, as there was a long tradition of English queens consort begging for the king to be lenient toward one person or another on their knees. This was usually a planned charade, which allowed the king to look strong while also merciful. In 1331, Philippa of Hainault famously begged her husband Edward II to forgive the builders of a scaffold that had broken under her feet and sent her and numerous other noble women tumbling. Edward was furious, but his wife’s plea struck him, and the builders were not punished. In 1347, Philippa successfully begged for leniency for the six burghers of Calais after the city finally surrendered to Edward II. Edward had planned to behead the men, but released them into her custody instead; she fed and clothed them and returned them to Calais.

Catherine of Aragon herself had performed this function years earlier, in 1517. For a lot of reasons which I won’t dwell on here, over 1,000 citizens in London rioted and attacked a ton of foreigners and shops throughout the city. 14 of the main instigators were hung, drawn, and quartered. However, when 278 men, women, and children were charged with high treason for their actions in the riots, Catherine of Aragon went on to her knees before Henry to beg for lenience. Afterward, nearly of all of these people were pardoned.

Therefore, by going down on her knees before Henry, Catherine was not just pleading to him as a woman and a wife but as a queen to her king. Both of them would have recognized the importance of this gesture.

Please tell me what you think I’ve done wrong.
Been humble, been loyal, I’ve tried to swallow my pride all along.
If you could just explain a single thing I’ve done to ‘cause you pain, I’ll go…No?

You’ve got nothing to say? I’m not going away, There’s no way.

Here are several more references to Catherine’s speech at the Legatine court:

Alas! Sir, wherein have I offended you, or what occasion of displeasure have I deserved?… I have been to you a true, humble and obedient wife, ever comfortable to your will and pleasure, that never said or did any thing to the contrary thereof, being always well pleased and contented with all things wherein you had any delight or dalliance, whether it were in little or much. I never grudged in word or countenance, or showed a visage or spark of discontent. I loved all those whom ye loved, only for your sake, whether I had cause or no, and whether they were my friends or enemies.

If there be any just cause by the law that ye can allege against me either of dishonesty or any other impediment to banish and put me from you, I am well content to depart to my great shame and dishonour. And if there be none, then here, I most lowly beseech you, let me remain in my former estate…

You must think that I’m crazy, You wanna replace me, baby there’s N-n-n-n-n-n-no way.
You made me your wife, So I’ll be queen till the end of my life!

Catherine was true to her word and referred to herself as queen and to Henry as her husband to the very end of her life. She wrote a letter to him before she died which reportedly said (there are some authenticity questions around the letter, but everyone seems to agree that this tracks with Catherine’s general beliefs and attitude at the time of her death):

Catherine’s grave at Peterborough Cathedral

My most dear lord, king and husband,

The hour of my death now drawing on, the tender love I owe you forceth me, my case being such, to commend myself to you, and to put you in remembrance with a few words of the health and safeguard of your soul which you ought to prefer before all worldly matters, and before the care and pampering of your body, for the which you have cast me into many calamities and yourself into many troubles. For my part, I pardon you everything, and I wish to devoutly pray God that He will pardon you also. For the rest, I commend unto you our daughter Mary, beseeching you to be a good father unto her, as I have heretofore desired.

….Lastly, I make this vow, that mine eyes desire you above all things.

Katharine the Quene.

So clearly, I had the most to deal with from the king. And I hit that top C so you know, donde está my crown?

Over-Analyzing All the References in Six: "Ex-Wives"

June 26, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in theater, English History

I’ve been meaning for a while now to write out analyses of all the songs in Six, looking at all the historical and pop culture references in them, but i’ve had a lot of trouble finding the focus and motivation to do so during all this self isolation. I started this blog post in like….April? But here we finally are. Hope you enjoy it. I plan on putting up one for each song, hopefully at least one a week for a while. I need a purpose!

We’re starting off today with the opening song of the show, Ex-wives. Lyrics in the show are in bolded font and my commentary is in italics. :)

Abby Mueller (Jane Seymour), Samantha Pauly (Katherine Howard), Adrianna Hicks (Catherine of Aragon), Andrea Macasaet (Anne Boleyn), Brittney Mack (Anna of Cleves) and Anna Uzele (Catherine Parr) in  the Broadway production of Six - Joan Marcus… — Abby Mueller (Jane Seymour), Samantha Pauly (Katherine Howard), Adrianna Hicks (Catherine of Aragon), Andrea Macasaet (Anne Boleyn), Brittney Mack (Anna of Cleves) and Anna Uzele (Catherine Parr) in the Broadway production of *Six* - Joan Marcus from WhatsonStage

Divorced, Beheaded, Died, Divorced, Beheaded, Survived, And tonight, we are...Live!

So I’ve actually been trying to find the origin of this rhyme for a while and haven’t had any luck. At some point I want to do an in-depth search of a lot of old texts to try to see when it was actually stated first. It appears that there are actually at least two other mnemonics for remembering the wives. I’m still researching the history on these as well, but here they are.

King Henry VIII, To six wives he was wedded.
One died, one survived,
Two divorced, two beheaded

Boleyn and Howard lost their heads,
Anne of Cleves he would not bed,
Jane Seymour gave him a son – but died before the week was done,
Aragon he did Divorce,
Which just left Catherine Parr, of course!

All of these rhymes are slightly inaccurate, in that technically, both Aragon’s and Cleves’ marriages to Henry were annulled. The word “divorce” WAS used in renaissance times, but it really just referred to annulment. The distinction? An annulment basically says that the marriage is null and void and was NEVER valid. A divorce recognizes that the couple was validly married at one time. Divorce in the modern sense simply did not exist in England in the 1500s; if you married someone, you were stuck until one or either of you died, unless there was some reason that the marriage was invalid from the beginning.

Grounds for annulment included:

one member of the couple was pre-contracted to someone else. A pre-contract was basically a formal engagement that was, in the eyes of the church and the law, as legally binding as an actual marriage. You could enter into a pre-contract just by promising to marry each other before witnesses. Fun fact: This is probably why, even though lots of Shakespeare’s plays feature weddings, none of them actually SHOW a wedding.
Example: This was one of the grounds for annulling Henry’s marriages to both Anne Boleyn (before her death) and Anne of Cleves.
a blood or spiritual relationship between the individuals. Basically, if the husband and wife were related or had some sort of prior spiritual relationship - like as a godfather and goddaughter, that could be a justification for an annulment. “Blood relationship” referred to both consanguinity (an actual blood/genetic relationship) and affinity, which is the kinship relationship created between two people as a result of someone’s marriage. Dispensations could be and were secured for familial relationships all the time though, as the nobles in England and Europe at large were VERY interbred. You see a LOT of first cousin marriages at the time. So frankly, marrying your cousin wasn’t a great idea at the time, as even if a dispensation was secured, the marriage could possibly be annulled later (although of course, it was easier for the king to get his marriage annulled than many other nobles).
Example: Although Catherine of Aragon and Henry were both descended from Edward III and John of Gaunt, the familial distance was enough that she didn’t need a dispensation to marry Henry’s older brother Arthur (if you’re curious, John of Gaunt was Catherine’s great-great-grandfather on one side and her great-great-great-grandfather on another side and Henry’s great-great-great grandfather on both his maternal and paternal sides. As you can see from this being on both sides, marriage between cousins was actually pretty damn common at the time.). She DID need a dispensation to marry her brother-in-law Henry after Arthur died, due to the rules of affinity. Henry’s argument
Other grounds that are less important to this current story: Impotence, the use of force/fear to obtain consent, the carrying out of a crime (usually adultery), marrying a minor, clandestine marriages, marriages entered under false pretenses.

Listen up let me tell you a story - A story that you think you've heard before
We know you know our names and our fame and our faces - Know all about the glories and the disgraces
I'm done 'cause all this time I've been just one word in a stupid rhyme

This refers back to the “divorced beheaded died” rhyme and speaks to the queens’ frustration at being reduced to just one word describing what Henry did to them.

So I picked up a pen and a microphone - History's about to get overthrown

Pun Watch: Overthrown - Overthroned**

Divorced, Beheaded, Died, Divorced, Beheaded, Survived, And tonight, we are...Live!

Welcome to the show, to the historemix - Switching up the flow as we add the prefix
Everybody knows that we used to be six wives

Pun watch: History- mix, remix - they’re literally telling the story from their own POV instead of the historical male-centric, Henry-centric view.

“The prefix” here refers to “ex.” Although the queens are collectively known as the six wives of Henry VIII, this line points out that they’re actually ex wives now.

Raising up the roof till we hit the ceiling - Get ready for the truth that will be revealing
Everybody knows that we used to be six wives - But now we're Ex-Wives

All you ever hear and read about Is our ex and the way it ended - But a pair doesn't beat a royal flush You're gonna find out how we got, unfriended

Innuendo and Pun watch: It took me way too long to realize that in this case, although the obvious reference of “pair” and “royal flush” is to poker, a “pair” also refers to the wives having breasts.
“A royal flush” refers to Henry being royal, and also puns on the fact that this hand in poker literally contains an Ace, King, Queen, Joker and 10, all of the same suit. It’s very rare and hard to achieve and is the strongest hand in poker. Similarly, as king, Henry VIII had all the power in his relationships with his wives.
”unfriended” is an obvious Facebook reference.

Tonight we're gonna do ourselves justice 'Cause we're taking you to court
And every Tudor rose has its thorns
And you're gonna hear 'em live In consort

Pun watch: “taking you to court” - this refers to both a court of law and the royal court.

Pun watch: “live in consort” refers to the fact that all of these queens were queens consort, which means they were married to the sovereign. A queen regnant would rule as sovereign in her own right, e.g., the Queens Elizabeth I, Victoria, and Elizabeth II.

“Every Tudor Rose has its thorns” - This one line has like three important references in it.

1. The Tudor Rose was an emblem that Henry VIII’s father, Henry Tudor, created when he married Elizabeth of York, effectively joining the houses of Lancaster and York and ending the long-running War of the Roses (which was referred to as the Cousins’ War at the time). Every noble used lots of different heraldic emblems at the time, and one of the York family’s was a white rose. The Lancasters DID have a red rose badge among their many emblems, but Henry Tudor himself probably used a red dragon (which signified his Welsh heritage) prior to his marriage. However, the Tudors were MASTERS of propaganda, and Henry VII revived the red rose as an emblem and combined it with the white rose of his wife to create “the Tudor Rose,” to signify the combining of the houses and the ending of the war. It bolstered his claim to the throne, which was actually fairly tenuous.

(I’m not going to get into it at length now, but basically, Henry Tudor was a descendant of Edward III and got his claim to the throne through Edward’s son John of Gaunt. However, he was a descendant of Gaunt’s long time mistress and eventual third wife Catherine Swynford; at the time, Gaunt’s children with Swynford WERE legitimized, but a clause was inserted by their half brother Henry IV at the time stating that these children were barred from the line of succession to the throne of England. If you want more info, I have a whole family tree of the Wars of the Roses and the Tudors here).

2. There’s a long history of historians claiming that Henry VIII called Catherine Howard, his fifth wife, his “rose without a thorn.” However, Claire Ridgeway of the Anne Boleyn Files did a deep dive on this topic and found that in fact, although there WAS a gold crown coin from Henry’s reign that included the Latin legend “HENRIC VIII RUTILANS ROSA SINE SPINA,” which translates as “Henry VIII - a dazzling rose without a thorn,” this crown was produced long before Henry ever met Catherine Howard and referred to him, not his wife. It appears that a victorian historian started this misattribution. However, the myth that Henry called Howard this is so well known that this line HAS to be a reference to that.

3. This also obviously refers to the 1988 song “Every Rose has its Thorns” by Poison.

Welcome to the show, to the historemix
Switching up the flow as we add the prefix
Everybody knows that we used to be six wives
Dancing to the beat till the break of day, once we're done we'll start again like it's the Renaissance

“Renaissance” - This is a French word meaning “rebirth” that refers to a cultural and artistic movement throughout Europe. The English Renaissance is sometimes said to have started in 1485 (when Henry VIII’s father Henry Tudor defeated Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth and became king), but is more often thought to have begun more in the 1520s, during Henry VIII’s reign. So by saying they’re literally going to start again after they’re done, they really are referencing the actual meaning behind the word “renaissance.” It’s also a probable reference to “party like it’s 1999,” from 1999 by Prince.
Although Six is always performed in the actor’s normal accents, this specific line is always pronounced in the British - Reh-nay-zance - to make the rhyme work.

My name's Catherine of Aragon, was married twenty-four years
I'm a paragon of royalty, my loyalty is to the Vatican,
So if you try to dump me, You won't try that again

Catherine of Aragon was a Spanish princess and the daughter of the famed and rich Ferdinand and Isabella (of “Columbus sailed the ocean blue”), so she really was a paragon of royalty.

Securing her marriage to Henry VII’s son Arthur was a huge achievement for his reign, as it garnered legitimacy to the fledgling Tudor dynasty. Catherine came to England in 1501 at age 15 and married Arthur, but alas, he died less than a year into their marriage. Catherine stayed in England in increasing poverty and instability over the next 8 years, the victim of a fierce disagreement between her father-in-law and her father (who wanted Henry VII to return Catherine’s dowry). However, when Henry VII died, the 18-year-old Henry VIII immediately married the now 23 year old Catherine, getting a dispensation from the pope to marry his former sister-in-law. Their marriage lasted until Henry VIII had it annulled in 1533.

Catherine was very religious throughout her life and was a steadfast roman catholic. The seat of Roman Catholicism was then, as it is now, in Vatican City.
I’ll get into all this more in depth when I talk about “No Way.”

I'm that Boleyn girl and I'm up next, See I broke England from the church
Yeah I'm that sexy, Why did I lose my head?
Well my sleeves may be green but my lipstick's red

“That Boleyn girl” likely refers to Philippa Gregory’s novel “The Other Boleyn Girl,” which told the story of Anne and her sister Mary and was later turned into a film starring Natalie Portman and Scarlet Johannson. Both the book and the film were incredibly successful.

Henry VIII notoriously broke away from the Roman Catholic church and founded the Church of England, with himself as its Supreme Head, in order to get his marriage to Catherine of Aragon annulled so he could marry Anne Boleyn. Henry was likely motivated at least a bit by several things - his love/lust for Anne, his frustration with not getting his dispensation from the Pope (who actually usually issued such dispensations to European kings pretty easily, but in this case, was under pressure NOT to issue such a dispensation from Catherine’s nephew, the Holy Roman Emperor, who literally held the Pope prisoner during a lot of this time), his lack of a son from his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, and perhaps even his own sincere religious belief that his marriage to Catherine was invalid.

The lyric “why did I lose my head?” obviously refers to Anne’s ultimate demise and her song in the show, but it also refers to Anne Boleyn’s infamous temper. Anne was brilliant, but it’s well documented that when angry, she often said spiteful, threatening things. I’ll get into this more when I talk about her song “Don’t Lose Your Head.”

Six makes GREAT use of the long standing myth that Henry VIII wrote “Greensleeves” for Anne Boleyn, both in this line and in its use of the Greensleeves melody throughout the show (in fact, I recently discovered while playing through Ex-wives on the piano that the entire damn song is built around the greensleeves chordal structure). However, Henry VIII did NOT write Greensleeves, which was partly based off of a romanesca, an Italian style of musical composition that did not reach England until after Henry VIII's death.

“My lipstick’s red” refers to the very long history of red lipstick as a symbol of a sexy, powerful, rebellious woman. There’s a whole article on the history here, but I particularly love that suffragettes specifically wore red lipstick for its ability to shock men, and prior to the 20th century, red lips were strongly associated with morally dubious women.
Makeup was not terribly fashionable during the reign of Henry VIII, however lipstick DID exist in a form during renaissance times, as crusaders to the middle east had brought back cosmetic products, including a type of rouge made from red ochre which was used to stain the lips. Henry’s daughter with Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth I, actually popularized makeup in her reign by famously wearing white makeup to cover her smallpox scars and yes, red stained lips. You can see that Elizabeth’s lips are stained red in this portrait.

Jane Seymour the only one he truly loved (Rude)
When my son was newly born, I died
But I'm not what I seem or am I?
Stick around and you'll suddenly see more

The concept that Jane Seymour was Henry’s favorite wife and “the only one he truly loved” was forwarded by Henry himself, but doesn’t actually track with his actions at the time. Jane DID give Henry his only surviving son, the one he had wanted for so many years, which is probably why he viewed her with such fondness in later years. She WAS the only one of his wives who was given a queen’s funeral. There are all sorts of stories about how Henry wore black and mourned for Jane for years, but in reality, the search for his new queen began shortly after Jane’s death.

Henry looked at Jane with a lot of fondness in later years. She was painted into several family portraits after her death, even when Henry was married to other women, and Henry was indeed buried next to her when he died. This was almost certainly because she gave birth to his longed-for heir, which is something she addresses in her song “Heart of Stone” later.

Jane Seymour did die shortly after giving birth to her son Edward, later Edward VI. She had a very difficult labor that lasted two days and three nights. Edward was born on October 12, 1537, and Jane lasted until October 24. Modern historians believe she probably died of either an infection from a retained placenta, puerperal fever following a bacterial infection, or a pulmonary embolism, but it’s hard to know.
If anyone ever tells you that she had a c-section and died of it, you should ignore then because they’re very very wrong. In renaissance England, c-sections were really only performed when someone had already died or was about to die and the baby had to be removed immediately. People just didn’t survive c-sections. An example of an actual c-section from that time period is the character of MacDuff from Shakespeare’s Macbeth, who was "from his mother's womb / Untimely ripped" (Act 5 Scene 10).

The mysterious ending line to Jane’s bit here refers to the fact that we don’t actually have a ton of information about Jane. We don’t know her birth date, she wasn’t particularly notable or well known before her marriage to Henry, and most of the descriptions of her during her time as Queen focus on her meekness and gentleness rather than giving us much indication of her personality or thoughts.

UPDATE: It’s been pointed out to me by commentor Blin4 that “suddenly see more” is also a reference to a song from Little Shop of Horrors! Brilliant.

Ich bin Anne of Cleves (Ja)
When he saw my portrait he was like (Ja!)
But I didn't look as good as good as I did in my pic
Funny how we all discuss that but never Henry's little-

Henry’s armor with his ah, little…codpiece.
(Credit: Gary Ombler / Royal Armouries)

Parts of this segment are in German because Anne of Cleves was in fact, German.

As described hyperbolically in Haus of Holbein, Henry VIII did really send Hans Holbein around Europe to paint pictures of eligible women so he could decide which one he wanted to marry, and this is indeed how Henry chose Anna. The “Anne of Cleves didn’t look like her portrait” story started very early on, but there are several facts that don’t support this story. 1. Holbein was specifically instructed not to flatter the women he was painted, but only to paint what he actually saw, and 2. Holbein kept his job and worked for Henry for years after his marriage to Anna was annulled. This indicates that the painting was a good likeness, but Henry didn’t like her for other reasons. I’ll get into this more later, but it’s likely that a VERY bad first meeting, in which Henry tried to surprise Anna without revealing his own identity and she didn’t react well, hurt Henry’s pride terribly.

”Henry’s little- …prick“ As far as I know, there’s no historical evidence about the size of Henry’s penis to support the joke at the end of this line. However, this may refer to two different related facts. One of the grounds for the annulment of their marriage was that Henry claimed he could not consummate the marriage with Anna, which of course, implicates his penis and his masculinity. In addition, codpieces were a HUGE trend during Henry’s reign and were also literally huge, so all of Henry’s portraits and armor from the time has a very large, uhm, groin area. It’s uh, very obvious.

Prick up your ears I'm the Catherine who lost her head (Beheaded)
For my promiscuity outside of wed - Lock up your husbands
Lock up your sons - K Howard is here and the fun's begun

“The Catherine who lost her head” - refers to the fact that Henry had three wives named Catherine/Katherine (spelling wasn’t standardized at that time).

”my promiscuity outside of wed - lock” - wedlock is of course, an old fashioned way of referring to marriage. I actually always thought that Catherine Howard’s adultery was pretty well supported by evidence (i mean, it’s certainly more supported than the allegations against Anne Boleyn), but it’s apparently more nebulous than I realized. Her relationship with Thomas Culpeper was supported by a “love letter” she wrote him found in his chambers; however, the phrasing in the “love letter” was actually pretty standard for letters between friends in that time, so it’s definitely possible that their relationship wasn’t a torrid love affair at all. The show alludes to this more in her song “All you Wanna Do,” which addresses the sexual abuse she faced throughout her life.

“Lock up your husbands, lock up your sons” was in the 2001 Martina McBride song “When God-Fearin’ Women Get the Blues.” This lyric itself referenced the more common “Lock up your daughters, lock up your wives,” which was featured previously in the AC/DC song “TNT.” From what I can tell, THIS actually originated from the phrase “Lock up your daughters,” which is a pretty old one and is referenced several times in other pop culture works, including a 1959 musical.

Five down I'm the final wife I saw him to the end of his life
I'm the survivor, Catherine Parr
I bet you wanna know how I got this far

Catherine Parr was Henry’s last queen and she was indeed Henry’s wife when he died in 1547.

Beyonce Watch: ”I’m the survivor” is written in a similar pattern and tone as the melody from Destiny’s Child’s 2002 hit Survivor. This is the first of several Beyonce references in this show.

Get your hands up, get this party buzzing
You want a queen bee, well there's half a dozen

Pun watch: “buzzing” “queen bee”

DIALOGUE:

We are… Six. We’ve got riffs to ruffle your ruffs!

Pun watch: Riffs are vocal embelishments by a singer. Catherine of Aragon does an actual cool riff right after this line.
”Ruffs” refers to Elizabethan ruffs, which actually weren’t worn at all until at least 13 years after Henry VII’s death, but show up in the show both in the Ladies in Waiting’s costumes and in Haus of Holbein.

Shimmys to shake up your Chemise.

Pun watch: A shimmy is a dance move in which the body is held still, xcept for the shoulders, which are quickly alternated back and forth. A chemise was a simple long undergarment worn during the English renaissance to protect clothing from sweat and body oils.

And a whole lot of history. Or as we like to call it… her-story. So obviously, you know who we are. Please, no portraits.

Pun watch: His-tory vs. Her-story. The word herstory was first used by feminists in the 1970s and was recently popularized by various nonprofit and youth campaigns to get the stories of women out in the news more often.
“No portraits” is a cheeky reference to modern day celebrities saying “no pictures” to their fans.

But give it up for our ladies in waiting! We got Maggie on the guitar! Bessie on the bass. And killing it on the keys, we’ve got Joan! And with drums so sick they’ll give you gout, It’s Maria in the drums!

I’ve written a lengthy blog post on the Ladies in Waiting of Six that you can read here, but in short, the Ladies in Waiting are all named after real life women who waited on the six wives. Maggie refers to Margaret Wyatt/Lee, who served Anne Boleyn, Bessie was Elizabeth “Bessie” Blount, who served Catherine of Aragon and Anna of Cleves (and also gave birth to Henry VIII’s only acknowledged illegitimate son), Joan was Joan Astley, who served Jane Seymour, and Maria de Salinas served Catherine of Aragon.

The gout reference is pretty funny, as gout was referred to as a disease of the lords, as it was strongly associated with intemperance in the form of over-eating and over-drinking that was really only possible to the very rich in 1500s England.

So you came here tonight to party with us old-school. Really, really old-school… But we’re not here to have fun! Uh-uh, we’ve got a serious score to settle. We’ve been in the shadow of one man for too long. And we came here tonight to step back into the spotlight! The problem is there’s Six of us, and we know you’ve all got your favourite.

Fun fact. From Henry VIII’s point of view, he actually only had three wives, not six.
He believed his marriage to Catherine of Aragon was invalid from the get-go because she was married to his older brother Arthur first.
He had his marriage to Anne Boleyn annulled before her execution, on the grounds that Anne Boleyn had been pre-contracted to marry Henry Percy, Earl of Northumberland (despite the fact that Percy had denied this pre-contract both in a letter to Thomas Cromwell in 1536 and by swearing on the Blessed Sacrament in 1532). Another reason possibly given for the annulment was Henry’s prior sexual relationship with Anne’s sister Mary Boleyn, although Henry had applied for a dispensation from the Pope in 1527 that would allow him to marry Anne even if there was an impediment of “affinity arising from illicit intercourse in whatever degree, even the first.”
He did believe his marriage to Jane Seymour was valid, so there’s one.
His marriage to Anna of Cleves was annulled on the basis of a pre-contract between Anna of Cleves and Francis of Lorraine (which was considered unofficial and cancelled five years before her marriage to Henry), Henry’s lack of consent to the marriage, and lack of consummation.
Interestingly enough, although Henry did order Katherine Howard’s execution, their marriage was not actually annulled before her death. This was likely because Howard didn’t have any children with Henry (so no one for Henry to care about rendering illegitimate) and Henry didn’t have an immediate next wife in mind yet.
Henry also believed his final marriage to Catherine Parr was valid, of course.

Everyone always wants to know who’s the most important wife. And they’ve been arguing about it for centuries. We’ve heard it all… “Who lasted the longest was the strongest.” “The biggest sinner is obvs the winner.” “Who had the son takes number one.” “Who was most chaste shall be first placed.” “Most inglourious is victorious.” “The winning contestant was the most protest-ant.”

Protestantism was really gaining ground in the early 1500s throughout Europe, and England itself became more protestant under Henry due to his founding of the Church of England, but Henry himself was Catholic in everything except the pope until the day he died. And of his wives, really only Catherine Parr would probably identify as a protestant. Anne Boleyn was a reformer and an evangelical, and was definitely painted as a Protestant Martyr by later authors serving their own purposes, but contemporary evidence indicates that although she was a reformer, she certainly wouldn’t have considered herself a protestant. And although Anne of Cleves makes all the protestant jokes in Six, and did indeed originate from a duchy that was protestant at the time of her marriage to Henry VIII, she herself didn’t appear to have very strong opinions on her religion. She was born and raised Catholic, became protestant later in life along wiht much of her family, and went back to Catholicism later in her life at the request of Mary Tudor when she became queen.

But we came here tonight to answer your questions once and for all! And tell ya whatcha want, whatcha really really want—...to know.

Spice Girls “Wannabe” reference!

That’s right, we’re gonna help you figure out which one of us is— The queen of the castle. The rose amongst the thorns. The Thomas Cromwell amongst the royal ministers between 1532 and 1540.

Queen of the castle - This references Anne of Cleves’ song later in the show and is taken from the classic children’s rhyme of “King of the Castle” (which goes back to at least 1850).

Rose amongst the thorns - previously explained above.

This royal ministers joke is so strange and hilarious to me. Henry VIII had four different chief royal ministers while he was king. Two of them (Thomas More and Thomas Cromwell) were executed for Treason, one died just after being arrested (Cardinal Thomas Wolsey) and one just managed to outlive Henry (Thomas Howard). The weird thing is - Thomas Cromwell was his ONLY chief minister from 1532-1540. There were other royal ministers of course, but that’s the only one we hear about during that time really. And he was EXTREMELY good at his job. So basically this is a fancy way of saying “who’s the best?”

But how the purgatory are they going to choose their leading lady?

This purgatory reference is very offhand (and replaces the modern phrasing of “how the hell”) but in fact, the existence or non-existence of purgatory was a pretty big religious issue during Henry VIII’s time. Catholics believed that after death, souls went to a place or state of suffering called Purgatory and are punished for their sins there before going to heaven. Protestants didn’t believe in Purgatory, as it wasn’t mentioned explicitly in the Bible. This is still a big difference among Catholicism and Protestantism today.

Hold up! If this is going to be a fair competition, they’re gonna have to judge us on the one thing we’ve all got in common. The one to take the crown should be the one who had the biggest, The firmest, The fullest Load of B.S. to deal with from the man who put a ring on it. So, (city name), we’re going to hold a little contest for you. And the rules are simple: The queen who was dealt the worst hand, The queen with the most hardships to withstand, The queen who everything didn’t really go as planned, shall be the one to lead the band!

Innuendo watch: “the biggest, The firmest, The fullest Load of B.S. “

Beyonce watch: “the man who put a ring on it” - There’s really nothing to analyze here except to note that this is the second Beyonce reference in the show and we haven’t even reached the second song yet, lol.

Musical Monarchs and Music Distribution During Renaissance Times

May 05, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in English History, writing

Pictured with Will Sommers- Royal MS. 2 A XVI, Henry VIII’s Psalter, British Library-London. — Pictured with Will Sommers- Royal MS. 2 A XVI, *Henry VIII’s Psalter*, British Library-London.

Apparently I answer Tudor and Shakespeare questions in way too much depth on Reddit for fun now. I’ve had trouble writing or revising fiction since the pandemic and self-isolation began, but researching and writing about history calms me down in a way nothing else does. And AskHistorians on Reddit has a wonderful supply of various questions that haven’t been answered yet.

So here ya go.

Original source of the question, which had several parts, indicated in italics below.

Christian and Muslim playing lutes in a miniature from Cantigas de Santa Maria of Alfonso X — Christian and Muslim playing lutes in a miniature from *Cantigas de Santa Maria* of Alfonso X

Was composition an expected skill of a monarch?

Musical knowledge, at least, was an important part of every noble's education in late medieval and renaissance England; royal children would have been given private lessons in various instruments, singing, and musical theory from a fairly early age. All of the Tudors, in particular, were interested in music and were highly trained. There are numerous records of Henry VII and his wife Elizabeth of York purchasing musical instruments both for themselves and their children. Henry VIII's children Mary, Elizabeth, and Edward were all described as excellent musicians during their lives. Mary and Edward were proficient at the lute, while Elizabeth was apparently quite good at playing the virginals.

At least two of the King Henrys were definitely musical composers, as we have some of their surviving music!

-There are two pieces in the collections of the British Library attributed to "Roy Henry"; scholars now seem to think this author was actually Henry V.

-Henry VIII's love of music stood out even among all the music lovers of his family. He played numerous instruments - at one point, records of his property showed that he owned 78 flutes, 76 recorders, 10 trombones, 14 trumpets, and 5 bagpipes! We also know that he played the organ, other keyboard instruments, viols, and lutes.

p 161 of the Old Hall Manuscript, ~1410-1420

"Twenty songs and thirteen instrumental pieces" attributed to "The Kynge H. viij" were compiled in the 1518 Henry VIII Songbook, which also included 76 pieces from other court musicians. Although some of the songs by Henry were arrangements of previously existing pieces, many of them are originals.

However, despite popular belief, Henry VIII did NOT write Greensleeves, which was partly based off of a romanesca, an Italian style of musical composition that did not reach England until after Henry VIII's death.

His daughter Elizabeth I was also a composer, although only one of her songs has survived to this day. This paper explores Henry and Elizabeth's compositions and musical education more in depth.

Detail of the Ghent Altarpiece, Chapel Cathedral of Saint Bavo, Ghent, Belgium, Hubert and Jan Von Eyck

What's more, how did the song become popular? Did the King simply compose it, order every musician to have a copy of the manuscript and play it a certain amount of times a week? How did compositions from the royal court reach the masses?

- Although Henry had at least 60 musicians on his staff when he died, he couldn't possibly have ordered every musician in the country to play it, and the fact that not of all his songs were big hits seems to support this. Based on the information I've already shared about the Henry VIII songbook, it seems likely that "Pastime with Good Company" was distributed around the country in written form. There are records indicating that it was actually popular in Scotland and even long after his death.

Finally, say I am at the median of medieval class society - your average joe - what would have been my likely interaction with this song, if any? Was music mostly an indulgence of the elites at that time?

Everything I've read and referenced throughout this answer so far indicates that music was popular at every level of society, although the level of musical education and the specific form of the music, of course, varied. While "Pastimes" may have been performed in Henry VIII's court by 60 musicians and a choir in four part harmony, it was also likely performed in villages and at fairs by solo minstrels accompanied only by a single instrument or small groups.

In addition, under Henry VIII, with further development of the printing press, more and more printers began to publish music, often in the form of single sheet broadsides that could be sold very cheaply.

(SIDENOTE: jstor is now offering free accounts that allow you to read up to 100 articles a month, due to COVID-19 shutting down all the libraries. This makes me SO HAPPY)

These single sheets continued in popularity through to Elizabethan times, and even make an appearance in Shakespeare's "Winter's Tale," Act 4, Scene 4 - in which the con artist/minstrel Autolycus touts various ridiculous sounding ballads for sale at a local festival.

And even apart from the printing press, people regularly wrote down any songs they liked and passed them around, much as you might have written down song lyrics to songs you heard on the radio so you and your friends could sing them together later back in the 80s or earlier. :)

FINAL NOTE: The best thing I learned while researching this whole answer was that Henry VIII and Cardinal Wolsey had rival in-house choirs and had a competition to see who had the best one. When Cardinal Wolsey’s choir won, he wisely “gave” one of his best singers to the king for his choir.

Hope y’all enjoyed that!

Disney Crowns and Tiaras: Historical and Modern Inspirations (Part I)

April 25, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in English History, TV and Film

Related Blog Posts:

Disney Crowns and Tiaras: Historical and Modern Inspirations (Part I) - Snow White, Alice in Wonderland (cartoon and live), Sleeping Beauty/Maleficent, Robin Hood, and the Great Mouse Detective
Disney Crowns and Tiaras: Historical and Modern Inspirations (Part II): Cinderella, Little Mermaid, The Princess and the Frog, and The Sword in the Stone!
Diadems, Tiaras, and Crowns, Oh My! - an overview of types, definitions, and purposes
The Classic Disney Influences in the Costumes of "The Descendants”

I’m going through all the crowns and tiaras shown in Disney animated films, analyzing their historical inspirations, and comparing them to actual crowns and tiaras worn by royals around the world! I’m not definitively saying that these original crowns/tiaras WERE inspirations for those in the films, but am just looking for similarities. There are so many though, that I’m just going to try to talk about 5 or so in each post.

Today, I’m going to look at crowns and tiaras in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, the various Alice in Wonderland films, the various Sleeping Beauty/Maleficent films, Robin Hood, and the Great Mouse Detective.

Uta von Ballenstedt evil queen inspiration.jpg

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(L to R): Evil Queen , “Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs” - 1937; Uta von Ballenstedt statue - ~1044; She Who Must be Obeyed, “She” - 1935; and Princess Kriemhild, “Die Nibelungen” - 1924.

Evil Queen (Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, 1937) - Only one character in the first full-length Disney animated film wears a crown: The Evil Queen. She sports a spiky gold “open” crown, with only a single pearl at the top. Keep an eye out for this style of crown, because we’ll see variations on it many more times in other Disney movies.

The queen’s look was mostly inspired by a statue of Uta von Ballenstedt at the Naumburg Cathedral in Naumburg, Germany. Uta was supposedly the most beautiful woman in medieval Germany. Many elements of the queen’s costume, including her headcovering, high cape, facial expression, and large pendant necklace are drawn from this. The character known as She Who Must Be Obeyed in the 1935 film “She” also is a likely inspiration for Snow White’s queen. Her crown, however, though gold like Uta’s and tall like the character in “She,” looks to be more inspired by Princess Kriemhild in the 1924 silent film “Die Nibelungen.”

I only found one actual royal crown with large spikes on it- the Danish king Christian IV’s coronation crown, made in ~1595 (below left, on the top). It does look pretty similar to the Eastern crown (also known as the Antique crown) in heraldry, except for the taller central front spike and the pearl at the top (below left, on the bottom).

It does have some similarities to the Diamond Festoon Necklace Tiara as well! (below center)

The Evil Queen’s tiara is much simpler than any of these real crowns and appears to be just solid gold, with only a single pearl on the top. Although the crown was probably designed this way to make the animation easier, historically, relatively simple gem-less metal tiaras became popular in the mid-1700s and through to the Victorian age. These cut steel tiaras were a less expensive way for women to obtain sparkly jewelry when they couldn’t afford diamonds or other precious gems. These were still time-consuming and beautiful though, as they were specifically cut and carved to shimmer as a diamond would. You can see an example below right.

Dutch Diamond Festoon Necklace Tiara - 1889

Swedish Cut Steel Bandeau - ~early 1800s
(Credit: Pascal Le Segretain / Wireimage)

Notes:

Quick Reminder:
- Crown – A full circle headpiece with an emblematic function associated with sovereignty and nobility.
- Tiara – An open semi-circular headpiece that usually does not encircle the head, but perches on the top. Worn by royal and noble women at white tie events, formal state occasions, and weddings.

Open crowns, without bands overhead, are the oldest crowns and leave the wearer’s head open to the sky. The vast majority of crowns in Disney animated films appear to be open. However, historically, closed crowns became the dominant design in sovereignty headgear in the middle ages and are the dominant type today.
Although the Evil Queen wears her crown throughout the movie (except when she’s disguised as an old woman), in real life, crowns would only be worn on special occasions, such as at coronations or upon other state occasions.

L to R: Queen of Hearts, “Alice in Wonderland” film - 1951; The Queen of Hearts, “Alice in Wonderland” book - 1865 (John Tenniel); Red Queen, “Alice in Wonderland” film - 2010; The Red Queen, “Through the Looking Glass” book -1871 (John Tenniel); and Elizabeth I - 1585 (portrait by Nicholas Hilliard).

L to R: The White Queen, “Alice in Wonderland” film - 2010; The White Queen, “Alice Through the Looking Glass” film - 2016; The White Queen, “Through the Looking Glass” book - 1871 (John Tenniel); and Elizabeth I, coronation portrait - 1559 (unknown artist).

The Queen of Hearts/Red Queen; The White Queen - All of the Queens in the Alice in Wonderland (both animated and live action) movies wear spiky crowns that are relatively small and sit on top of their head instead of encircling them. This reminds me a bit of a Swedish ducal coronet (right).

In the book “Alice in Wonderland” (1865), the Queen of Hearts is drawn as a playing card character and sports a gable hood rather than a crown. She’s actually a totally different character from the Red Queen, who appears along with the White Queen in the book “Through the Looking-Glass” (1871), but the characters are commonly confused or melded together like in the live-action film series. The red and white queen characters in the books are clearly based off of chess pieces, which explains the continued spiky crown theme.

What’s interesting is that both characters in the live action films have some similarities to Elizabeth I at different times in her life. The Red Queen’s red hair, the shape of her updo, and her use of white makeup all over her face is clearly based off of Elizabeth I’s later looks. However, the white queen’s pallor and long flowing locks have some similarities to the young Elizabeth I’s look at her coronation. Both queens’ costumes have some Tudor elements to them, but neither crown looks like the Tudor crown (shown in Elizabeth’s coronation portrait), apart from the general “perched on top of head” appearance.

Notes:

Coronet – Small crown generally worn by dukes and earls at coronations, and often worn by princes/princesses at formal events. These are standardized for various peers, with different designs for each rank (e.g., Duke, Marquess, Earl, Viscount, Baron).

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L to R: King Stefan and Queen Leah, “Sleeping Beauty” - 1959; Crown of Scotland (sans cap); King Stefan, “Maleficent” - 2014; Queen Leila, “Maleficent” - 2014; Stéphanie de Beauharnais, Grand Duchess of Baden's pearl-and-diamond tiara - 1830.

King Stefan (1959) and Queen Leah (1959) - Both of these crowns resemble the crown of Scotland without its velvet cap, minus the top arches.

King Stefan (2014) - This crown is very similar to the Swedish Ducal Coronet I talked about previously under the Red Queen/White Queen section, only larger, fitting around his entire head instead of perching on top like with the Alice Queens.

Queen Leila (2014) The shape of her crown reminds me of the pearl-and-diamond tiara of Stéphanie de Beauharnais, Grand Duchess of Baden, made circa 1830.

L to R: Princess Aurora, “Sleeping Beauty” -1959; the Braganza Tiara - 1829, Queen Rania’s diamond tiara (Credit: Tim Graham Picture Library / Getty), King Hubert, “Sleeping Beauty” - 1959; and the crown of Boleslaw I the Brave (replica made in 2001-2003 after originals were lost after 1036 and 1794).

Aurora (1959) - I couldn’t find any plain gold tiaras in this shape, but I did find a few modern silver and diamond that resemble it, such as the Braganza Tiara and Queen Rania’s Diamond Tiara.

King Hubert - I haven’t seen many crowns like this that don’t have arches but DO have a cap, but I DID find this one from the Polish crown jewels, which has arches but they’re so low to the cap that you can only see them from certain angles - The Crown of Bolesław I the Brave, which was the coronation crown of the Polish monarchs.

sleeping%2525252Bbeauty%2525252Blive%2525252Baction%2525252Bmaleficent%2525252B3.jpg

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L to R: King John and Queen Ingrith, “Maleficent: Mistress of All Evil” - 2019; George IV State Diadem -1820 (Credit: Royal Collection Trust); Aurora, “Maleficent: Mistress of All Evil” - 2019; Danish Ruby Parure Tiara ; Queen Ingrith, “Maleficent: Mistress of All Evil” - 2019; and the Spencer Honeysuckle Tiara - ~1858 .

King John and Queen Ingrith’s crowns both resemble the George IV State Diadem in their shape, color, and overall sparkliness.

Aurora’s gold vine crown bears a resemblance to the Danish ruby parure tiara.

Queen Ingrith’s silver tiara looks like the Spencer Honeysuckle Tiara in height and overall shape.

Queen Ingrith’s tall, thin tiara shares a lot in common with the tall small crowns worn by the red and white queens in Alice in Wonderland (as discussed earlier).

I’ve actually never seen Maleficent: Mistress of Evil, and now I really want to, if only to figure out why Queen Ingrith gets to wear three different crowns throughout it all!

L to R: Prince John, “Robin Hood” - 1973; King John of England’s tomb effigy; portrait of King John; King Richard, “Robin Hood” - 1973; Richard I’s tomb effigy; and Richard I .

Since the stories of Robin Hood include the historical figures Prince John (later King John I) and King Richard I as characters, we can actually look at portraits of them to see how similar the film’s crowns are to their historical counterparts’ crowns. Richard, of course, was known as Richard the Lion-Heart, so both he and Prince John are portrayed as lions.

The crown in Robin Hood appears to be a simplified form of the medieval crown used by King John and Richard I, as seen in their tomb effigies and portraits above. The animated and historical versions all appear to be gold, open crowns with alternating colors and sizes of gemstones, although the animated version has a much more simplified crenelation decoration than the fleur-des-lys/cross like decorations on the historical ones.

I’m fairly sure that the crown or crowns depicted (they LOOK awfully similar, don’t they?) are wearing their state crowns, the “working” crowns of monarchs that they wore regularly, rather than the coronation regalia, which was generally far older, heavier, and more valuable. Although the crown of St. Edward, the traditional coronation regalia for English kings, existed at the time of their reigns, Edward the Confessor wasn’t actually made a saint until 1161, and we don’t actually have any records that his crown was used again before Henry III’s in 1220. Both King Richard and King John reigned before than, from 1189-1199 and 1199-1216 respectively, so it seems likely that they were using different crowns. In addition, written records describing St. Edward’s crown describe it as having arches, while the crown seen in these effigies and paintings is clearly open and without arches.

queen victoria diamond jubilee 1897 mouse queen.jpg

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The Mouse Queen, “The Great Mouse Detective” - 1986; Queen Victoria - 1882 (photographer Alexander Bassano); Queen Victoria’s small diamond crown - 1870 (Credit: Royal Collection Trust); and the Imperial State Crown - 1932 (Credit: Royal Collection Trust).

The mouse queen in “The Great Mouse Detective” is clearly an homage to Queen Victoria, as the character appears to have a similar age, shape, and dress to the real life Victoria. Her small crown worn over a veil is the biggest giveaway, as Victoria herself wore such a miniature crown over her widow’s cap following the death of her husband Prince Albert. After Albert died in 1861, the Queen withdrew from public life. Though she eventually came back into the public view in 1870, she refused to wear the imperial state crown again, partly due to its weight and partly because she could not have worn it over her widow’s cap. The miniature imperial crown was created as a substitute. Victoria continued to wear black and white “widow’s weeds” until he death in 1901.

The mouse queen’s crown does appear to have a velvet cap and at least one gemstone in the base that aren’t visible in Victoria’s crown. Though I haven’t seen a crown /exactly/ like the mouse queen’s, it does appear to borrow some inspiration from the Imperial State Crown of the UK, which has a similar velvet cap and prominent gemstone in its base.

That’s it for now! I have many many many more crowns and tiaras to talk about in the future. :) These posts are very fun but oh man, they take a long time. Thanks for reading everyone!

Did Henry VIII Ever Pull a "Cask of Amontillado" ?

April 21, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in English History, writing

(If you don’t understand the reference, go read Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Cask of Amontillado”)

This one was a particularly out of left field one but I had fun figuring out how to answer it!

So here ya go.

Original Question on r/AskHistorians - Is there any evidence of Henry VIII walling his enemies in buildings?

I've never heard of any English monarch pulling a "Cask of Amontillado" before, and I've been obsessively reading about English history between 1400-1620s for several years now. I dug into this a bit more to see if I could find an answer, but I could not find any sources that indicate that there have been any bodies buried in walls in England. However, as we all know, just because there isn't a source saying it DID happen, doesn't mean it definitely /didn't/ happen.

Human bodies are commonly found buried all around London and England in general, but honestly, that's true of most cities with at least a couple hundred years of history under their belts. It's just something that happens when a place has a very long history dating back before modern regulations on where bodies can be buried. If a house was unknowingly built on top of a burial site, the bodies may be found in the cellar You can read more about that in Smithsonian Magazine here: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/dead-beneath-londons-streets-180970385/

I think it's very unlikely that Henry VIII in particular would have engaged in this practice though, for a few specific reasons:

Woodblock by Michael Wolgemut (1434 – 1519) of A Danse Macabre.

-Henry VIII was quite notoriously terrified of illness and sickness, and specifically the Sweating Sickness, likely due to his brother Arthur's death from it in 1502 ( https://www.history.com/news/the-mysterious-epidemic-that-terrified-henry-viii ). He studied medicine and tried to make his own potions to protect him against disease. (http://cms.herbalgram.org/herbalgram/issue42/article546.html?ts=1586114679&signature=51f561c9c7014194d1a849cdaac3de68 ) He also founded the Royal College of Physicians in 1518, made improvements to England's public health services, and ushered in legislation regulating the licensing of medical practitioners (Source: Publishing and Medicine in Early Modern England, by Elizabeth Lane Furdell).

At the time, the miasma theory was one of the dominant theories of disease, which basically said that bad smells cause disease ( http://broughttolife.sciencemuseum.org.uk/broughttolife/techniques/miasmatheory ); decaying corpses, rumor has it, smell pretty foul. Given his obsession with medicine and health, not just for himself, but also for his people, it seems unlikely that Henry would have approved of interring a body into the walls of any building or structure in England.

- He also was a very religious man, who heard mass 3-5 times a day and even wrote a theological argument against some of the teachings of Luther in 1521 ( https://www.christianitytoday.com/history/people/rulers/henry-viii.html ). There were numerous religious rites around death and dying, which require last rites, funeral rites, a vigil for the deceased, and ceremonies by the graveside. Thus, it also seems unlikely that a religious man like Henry VIII would have approved of such mistreatment of a body after death.

"How Accurate Were Shakespeare's Histories?"

April 20, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in writing, English History

Lithograph depicting a scene from Henry V.

So here ya go.

Original source of the question

“How accurate were Shakespeare’s histories?”

Shakespeare's English history plays were based on a variety of historical sources, so he made /some/ attempt at having /some details/ correct, but he certainly also embellished some facts and highly simplified or deleted other facts to increase drama and simplify plot. His sources themselves were often very biased toward a version of history that supported Tudor legitimacy (although I'm unclear on whether that bias was widely known in Shakespeare's time or not). He also definitely shaded some facts and characters one way or another in order to keep the political leaders and censors of his time happy.

Important Sources for Shakespeare:

Basically every English history play - Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland (1587 - 2nd edition) - This was a highly dramatized version of English history that is apparently just really inaccurate in a lot of places. I really need to read it someday. [also a source for Macbeth and King Lear]

Richard III - Thomas More's History of King Richard the Thirde (1513) - More's portrayal of Richard III as deformed, to the point of causing his mother a particularly troublesome birth, is probably the most famous bit that Shakespeare took from that source. In actuality, though Richard III's skeleton showed that though he had significant scoliosis and likely had visibly uneven shoulders, he wouldn't have had a hunchback.

Simplification -

Shakespeare HIGHLY simplified a lot of the events of the Wars of the Roses in his Henry VI Parts II and III. And honestly....you can't really blame him. I made a simplified timeline of the main events of the Wars of the Roses in November and it's still incredibly complicated (and honestly, it took forever). You can see it on my blog here - https://www.rachaeldickzen.com/blog/2019/11/11/the-wars-of-the-roses-a-timeline-of-main-events

Examples:

- In Henry VI Part 3, as soon as the Earl of Warwick discovers that his protege Edward IV had secretly married Lady Grey (Elizabeth Woodville) while Warwick is off trying to organize a French alliance and marriage for Edward IV, he joins forces with Margaret of Anjou, marries his daughter Anne to her son Edward, and frees Henry VII. This all happens in the space of two acts.

IN ACTUALITY, Edward married Elizabeth Woodville in 1464, but Warwick didn't rebel against Edward IV until April 1469 (rebellion #1). He joined forces with Edward's brother George, Duke of Clarence, and actually captured Edward IV, but eventually released him when it became clear that Parliament wouldn't cooperate with his plan to rule the country through Edward. He and George/Clarence rebelled AGAIN in July 1470 (rebellion #2), but this one didn’t go so well and their plan quickly falls apart. Warwick flees to France, plots with Margaret of Anjou (rebellion #3), marries his daughter to her son Edward, and goes back to England in October 1470 to put Henry VI back on the throne.

I mean. It's easy to understand why Shakespeare cut out a few rebellions there, just for the sake of time and to keep things from being super confusing.

- Richard III portrays Richard marrying Anne Neville immediately before the death of his brother Edward IV and becoming king not too long after. In actuality, Richard and Anne married in spring 1472, Edward IV didn't die until April 1483, and Richard III didn't become king until July 1483.

"Plucking the Red and White Roses in the Old Temple Gardens" after the original 1910 fresco painting by Henry Albert Payne (British, 1868-1940) based upon a scene in Shakespeare's Henry VI.

Dramatic alterations:

Various examples:

- Henry IV Part 1 - Sir Henry Percy (Hotspur) is portrayed as a young man the same age as Prince Hal, but in reality, Hotspur was actually three years older than Hal's dad Henry IV. This increases drama by placing pressure on Hal to behave more like the ambitious leader Hotspur.

- Henry V - In the play, it's stated that the English had fewer than 30 casualities while the French had 10,000! In actuality, about 112-600 of the English and about 6,000 of the French were killed.

- Henry VI Part 1 - The famed "roses" of the Wars of the Roses are a bit of a Tudor invention, which Shakespeare expanded on. Although the Yorks did use the white rose as a symbol from early on in the conflict, the Lancastrian red rose wasn't used until after Henry Tudor defeated Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth. These two roses were combined to form the "Tudor Rose," a symbol of the unity of the two houses.

In addition, it also just isn't accurate to imagine that only one symbol was used by each noble family. Just among the York brothers alone, in addition to the white rose, Edward IV used the sun in splendor, a falcon, a black dragon, and a white lion (among several others), while Richard used a white boar and "a white falcon with a virgin's face holding a white rose." But again, portraying that in a play would make things very confusing (and Shakespeare’s histories are already confusing enough when it comes to names, since he often refers to characters by their titles, which often change!).

- Henry VI Part 2 - Richard of Gloucester (the eventual Richard III), and his brother Edward (eventual Edward IV) are both portrayed as adults at the time of the first battle of St. Albans. Historically, Richard was only 3 years old and Edward was only 13 when this battle occurred.

- In addition, a TON of the events in Richard III are inserted for dramatic effect. There is zero evidence that Richard killed his wife Anne (she probably died of tuberculosis), and he definitely didn't seduce her at the funeral for her father-in-law Henry VI. Henry VI died in May 1471 and Anne and Richard didn't marry until the spring of 1472. There's also good evidence that Richard and Anne actually really had a lovely romance; he was determined to marry her and may have rescued her from his brother Clarence's attempts to hide her away. Anne and Richard were crowned in the first joint coronation in almost 200 years. But this doesn’t suit the Tudor propaganda need to portray Richard as a villain.

George Duke of Clarence is portrayed very sympathetically in Richard III, but in reality, he was kind of a jerk who rebelled against his own brother 2-3 times and continually tried to start up trouble. The play also shows Clarence being murdered by Richard's (hilarious) henchmen, but in actuality, Clarence was put on trial for treason, and privately executed on the order of his brother Edward IV.

The disappearance of the Princes in the Tower was blamed on Richard III at the time, but there's no actual evidence connecting him (or really anyone) to their deaths.

Propaganda Elements:

Shakespeare was writing and producing plays under Queen Elizabeth I and King James I, only a few generations away from the intense violence of the Wars of the Roses, so obviously, he needed to represent Elizabeth's famous ancestors as being on the right side of history. Even after her death, Elizabeth I remained incredibly popular with the people, so Shakespeare had to be careful with portrayals of her ancestors and lineage.

Henry VIII is perhaps the best example of Tudor propaganda. This play covers Henry VIII's break from Catherine of Aragon and joining with Anne Boleyn (Elizabeth's mother) and covers the downfall of Cardinal Wolsey, but strategically ends right at Elizabeth's birth and doesn't discuss, oh, Anne's downfall and beheading, or Henry's four other wives. The play is remarkably stilted and boring compared to all of Shakespeare's other plays, likely because he felt inhibited by the restrictions and expectations of the time (in fact, plenty of people have speculated that Shakespeare didn't write Henry VIII or wrote it with a co-writer because it's so different from his other plays). The play also ends with huge adulation of the baby elizabeth and what a blessing she will be upon her people; as the second daughter of the king who already had a bastard son (Henry Fitzroy) he was in the process of making legitimate, she was not expected to inherit at her birth so this is just obvious propaganda here.

Tudor propaganda elements are also obvious in Richard II, in which John of Gaunt is portrayed very differently than he is in Holinshed's Chronicles, Shakespeare’s primary sources for his histories. Holinshed didn't portray Gaunt in a terribly flattering way, but in Richard II, he's the wisest, most reasonable, and most patriotic character in the play. This is likely because Queen Elizabeth traced her lineage directly back to John of Gaunt. (Gaunt's characterization in the play is much closer to his portrayal in Froissart's Chronicles.)

Richard II is also an interesting play to look at, as it portrays the rebellion against and downfall of a king, who was believed to be divinely anointed by god as the country's leader. That's not the type of idea you want to put in your subjects' heads (The deposition scene in the play is missing from most printed editions of the play until the fourth quarto, well into the reign of James I). But the play is written to make it very clear that Elizabeth's own ancestors disagreed with the rebellion. It's an interesting tightrope to walk- as the next few history plays basically emphasize how awesome Henry IV and Henry V are, and just sort of strategically ignore that the only reason they were in power was because of Henry Bolingbroke's rebellion against the rightful king.

Richard III is portrayed as an outright villain in Shakespeare's histories for propaganda reasons as well. Queen Elizabeth's grandfather Henry VII killed Richard on the battlefield at Bosworth and took his crown by right of conquest. Since this was again, a divinely anointed sovereign, Tudor writers really wanted to portray Richard III as just the WORST of the worst to justify the Tudors' actions in overthrowing him. The Tudors' claim to the English throne was not terribly strong, so this propaganda against Richard III was also necessary to increase their own legitimacy.

Diadems, Tiaras, and Crowns, Oh My!

April 06, 2020 by Rachael Dickson in English History, Just for Fun

Other Posts about Crowns and Tiaras:

Disney Crowns and Tiaras: Historical and Modern Inspirations (Part I) - Snow White, Alice in Wonderland (cartoon and live), Sleeping Beauty/Maleficent, Robin Hood, and the Great Mouse Detective
Disney Crowns and Tiaras: Historical and Modern Inspirations (Part II): Cinderella, Little Mermaid, The Princess and the Frog, and The Sword in the Stone!
The Medals, Sashes, and Tiaras of The Crown; Tiaras/Crowns Overviews: Season 1 ; Season 2

*The Diadem of Ravenclaw from Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows*

Princess Eugenie of the UK wearing the Greville Emerald Kokoshnik Tiara (1919)
(Credit: WPA Pool / Getty)

*The Crown of Saint Wenceslas (Bohemia, 1347)*

So I’ve been hosting virtual lecture parties lately, since we’re all self-isolating and cooped up. At the most recent one, I presented on Diadems, Tiaras, and Crowns - talking about the different types and specific examples of each type. I had a lot of fun pulling together this slideshow and included as many pictures from around the world as I could. My specific examples though, are all English/UK in origin, as that’s my passion and it’s frankly just a lot easier to find information on these than many of the other crowns and tiaras out there.

I will be putting all the information into blog post format at some point, but that’s going to take me a while because - lots of formatting and image upload! For today, I’m just loading up the slideshow so y’all can look through it at your leisure. Enjoy! If you have any questions, feel free to ask; I love talking about this sort of stuff!

Diadem of Princess Sit-Hathor Yunet (19th century BC, Egypt) — Diadem of Princess
Sit-Hathor Yunet
(19th century BC, Egypt) (Credit: Hans Ollermann)

Greco-Roman bust (100 BC-100 AD) — *Greco-Roman bust* *(100 BC-100 AD)*

*17th Dynasty diadem (1580-1550 BC, Egypt)*

*Diodotus of Bactria on a coin, (first century AD, around modern Afghanistan)*

Diadems:

• Diadem – refers to any circular piece worn on the head to symbolize status and power.

• Name originates from the Greek diadein - “to bind around”

• Early diadems were just ribbons or laurel wreaths.

• Crowns, tiaras, coronets, and other royal headpieces all fall under the diadem umbrella.

• Very few crowns are known by this title today. I could only find one modern one.

*Replica, Imperial Crown of Russia (1762-1917)*

*Holy Roman Empire (11th century – 1806)*

Crown of Japanese Emperor Kōmei (1846-1867) — Crown of Japanese
Emperor Kōmei (1846-1867)

*Crown from Kathmandu Valley (13th century, Nepal) (Credit: Sepia Times / Getty)*

*Silla (5th-7th centuries, modern day Korea)*

*The Iron Crown of Lombardy (4th-5th century, modern day Italy)*

Crowns:

• Crown – A full circle headpiece with an emblematic function associated with sovereignty and nobility.

• Open crowns, without bands overhead, are the oldest crowns, but closed crowns became the most popular ones in the middle ages and are the dominant type today.

*Margaret of York (sister of Edward IV and Richard III) (1454, England)*

Charles, Prince of Wales (1969, UK)
(Credit: Royal Collection Trust)

Coronets:

Coronet – Small crown generally worn by dukes and earls at coronations, and often worn by princes/princesses at formal events.

• These are standardized for various peers, with different designs for each rank (e.g., Duke, Marquess, Earl, Viscount, Baron).

• Very often seen in heraldry on coats of arms and shields

• I really couldn’t find evidence of actual coronets outside of Europe, so it may just be a weird Europe only thing. It looks like they’re more often used in heraldry, like on coats of arms, then in real life – I struggled to find any pictures of them.

• Charles’s coronet for his investment in 1969 was controversially modern and abstract. A new one had to be made after his great-uncle, the former Edward VIII, took his into exile after he abdicated the throne. The designer used electroplating to make the crown, which hadn’t been used before, and was unsatisfied with how the orb kept coming out until a technician suggested electroplating a ping pong ball. It worked.

*The Gandikj Diraja Tiara for the Raja Permaisuri Agong (1957, Malaysia)*

*A Pearl and Emerald tiara (420–589, China)*

*Queen Rania’s Boucheron Emerald Leaves Tiara (2003, Jordan)*

*Cameo Tiara of Empress Josephine (1804, France)*

Queen Margrethe II’s Aigrette (~19th century, Denmark)
(Credit: Pascal Le Segretain / Getty)

Tiaras:

• Tiara – An open semi-circular headpiece that usually does not encircle the head, but perches on the top.

• Worn by royal and noble women at white tie events, formal state occasions, and weddings.

• Traditionally, the wearer must be a bride or already married.

• Some tiaras are versatile and have elements that can be switched out or worn differently, such as brooches and different types of brooches.

• Really haven’t found many dating to before 1800 except this one from china in the top right corner

• They’re not worn before 6 pm except for weddings.

• Though tiaras used to be brightly colored, modern tiaras tend to be neutral colored.

• Parure – a jewelry set which usually includes tiara, necklace, brooch, sometimes a bracelet.

*Queen Letizia floral tiara (1879, Spain)*

Princess Mary’s Midnight Tiara (2009, Denmark)
(Credit: Pascal Le Segretain / Getty)

*Princess Lalla Salma’s Tiara (2002, Morocco)*

*Part of the Nine Provinces Tiara (1926, Belgium)*

*The Ruby Olive Wreath Tiara (~1870s-1880s, Greece) (Credit: Pascal Le Segretain / Getty)*

*Princess Hisako’s tiara (modern, Japan)*

*Princess Tsuguko’s tiara (modern, Japan)*

*Queen Sirikit’s traditional tiara (1960, Thailand)*

*Dutch Aquamarine Parure Tiara (1927, The Netherlands)*

*Kinsky Honeysuckle Tiara (1870, Liechtenstein)*

*Citrine and Pearl Tiara (~1980s, Luxembourg)*

A couple of specific examples! These are all English/UK in origin because that’s the history I know most about and frankly, it’s way easier to find details and information on these then most of the others.

diadem 2.jpg — Credit: Royal Collection Trust

George IV State Diadem:

• Made 1820 to be worn by George IV during his coronation procession.

• Traditionally worn by Queen Consorts at coronations and the state openings of Parliament, but Queens Regnant Victoria and Elizabeth II have worn it as well.

• Gold and silver frame, with strings of pearls, 1333 diamonds (over 320 carats), including a 4-carat yellow diamond, positioned on alternating crosses pattée and florals. The four florals represent roses, thistles and shamrocks, the flowers of England, Ireland, and Scotland.

• Crosses Pattee – type of Christian cross that appears very early in medieval art – extremely common in crowns in Christian countries

• Open Crown, in which the the head is open to the sky.

• Commonly appears on stamps and currency.

*Queen Victoria, Queen Alexandra, Queen Mary, and Elizabeth II (both young and old), all wearing the diadem.*

St. Edward’s Crown:

• First hereditary coronation regalia in Europe. The monks at Westminster Abbey claimed that Edward the Confessor asked them to look after his regalia for the coronations of all future English kings (although they probably just took it from his grave when he was reinterred there).

• A 1660 replica of Edward the Confessor’s crown, which was sold during the English Civil War. The medieval Crown dated to 1043. It was used in Richard II’s abdication in 1399, and was used to crown Anne Boleyn in 1533 (unprecedented for a consort).

• St. Edward’s Crown is 11.8 inches tall and 4.9 pounds. It’s made of gold, embellished with 444 stones, including amethysts, garnets, peridots, rubies, sapphires, topazes, tourmalines, and zircons.

•It has a closed Crown with high arches and a velvet cap trimmed in ermine

• From 1689-1911, monarchs chose to be crowned with a lighter, bespoke coronation crown personalized to each sovereign, while st. edward’s crown rested on the high altar.

• It’s currently used on royal arms of the UK, royal badges of England, the badges of the police forces of England and wales, the coastguard, british army, royal marines, royal airforce, and royal mail.

• This is a closed crown have bands around the temples and one or two bands over the head. Crowns with two bands or more usually for sovereigns; the prince of wales’ coronet only has one band. High arches in crowns are a symbol of sovereignty demonstrating that the king of England owed obedience to no one but God.

• The bottom is trimmed in ermine, which is very commonly seen in crowns, coronation cloaks, and peerage caps. Ermine comes from the winter coat of the stoat, which is a species of weasel with white fur and a black-tipped tail.

Imperial State Crown:

•Worn by the English monarch during the coronation when leaving Westminster Abbey and at the annual state opening of Parliament.

• A mere 2.3 pounds, compared to the 4.9 pound St. Edward’s Crown.

• It contains 2,901 precious stones, including the Black prince’s ruby and the Cullinan II on the front, St. Edward’s sapphire at the top, and the Stuart sapphire on the back.

St. Edward’s sapphire on the top cross is the oldest gemstone in the royal collection. Thought to have come from the coronation ring of Edward the Confessor from 1042.

Black Prince’s ruby – 170 carats = one of the oldest parts of the crown jewels, given to the black Prince in 1367. Henry V wore a gem-encrusted helmet that included this ruby. Mayyyy have been worn by Richard III on his helmet at the Battle of Bosworth, in which he died.
Stuart Sapphire on the back (lower left picture) – 104 carat - Probably belonged to Charles II and was definitely among the jewels that James VII took with him when he fled to France after the glorious revolution in December 1688.

• Fun fact: the arches are detachable, so the crown can also be worn as an open crown/circlet.

Queen Mary’s Fringe Tiara:

• The tiara’s diamonds came from an 1893 necklace and the tiara was made in 1919.

• Diamond fringe tiaras were incredibly popular after they became fashionable at the imperial court of the Romanovs. There are numerous fringe tiaras like this in the royal collection and many of them can also be worn as necklaces.

• Worn by both the Queen and Crown Princess Anne at their weddings.

Vladimir Tiara:

• Originally owned by Duchess Marie, a German princess who married Grand Duke Vladimir Alexandrovich in 1874.

• When the Grand Duchess fled from Russia in 1917, her jewels, including this tiara, remained in a hidden safe in Vladimir Palace. Later, her son and his friend disguised themselves as workmen, sneaked into the palace, and smuggled out the contents of her safe. This tiara was later sold by her daughter to Queen Mary of the UK, along with numerous other Russian imperial jewels.

• It can be worn with hanging emerald or pearl drops or it can be worn “widowed,” that is, without any drops.

Queen Mary, Diana, Princess of Wales, and Kate, Duchess of Cambridge

Queen Mary’s Lover’s Knot Tiara:

• This tiara is commonly referred to as the Cambridge Lover’s Knot Tiara, but in fact, it was only based off of that tiara. Queen Mary had this tiara created as a copy of the Cambridge tiara, which was owned by her cousin, using elements harvested from several other tiaras in her existing collection.

• In 1981, when Prince Charles married Diana Spencer, Queen Elizabeth presented her with several pieces of family jewelry, including this tiara, as lifetime loans. Diana wore this tiara very often and it became highly associated with her. In more recent times, the tiara has been sported most often by Diana’s daughter-in-law, Kate, the Duchess of Cambridge.

Queen Mary’s Diamond Bandeau (left):

• The Diamond Bandeau was made for Queen Mary in 1932 and specifically was made to feature the detachable brooch in the center. This brooch was given to Queen Mary in 1893.

• Meghan Markle wore the tiara for her wedding to Prince Harry in 2018. It was the first time the tiara had been worn in public in over 50 years.

• There are actually several tiaras in the royal family’s possession that haven’t been seen in public for 50-100 years!

The Girls of Great Britain and Ireland Tiara (right):

• The Girls of Great Britain and Ireland Tiara is one of the Queen’s most commonly worn tiaras.

• This was given to Queen Mary for her wedding in 1893 by a committee of women, which is where it gets its name. She presented it as a gift to then-Princess Elizabeth on her wedding day; the Queen still refers to it as “Granny’s Tiara.”