Wolf Hall Companion

by Lauren Mackay

  Culpepper rose through the courtier ranks, becoming a favourite of Henry VIII’s, despite a shocking accusation that he had raped the wife of a park keeper and murdered her husband (though this may have been his older brother, also called Thomas). In any event, Culpepper was elevated to the coveted Privy Chamber. Mantel’s Cromwell would not be alive to witness the scandal which engulfed Henry’s fifth Queen, Catherine, who was executed for (alleged) adultery with Culpepper and another man, Francis Dereham, who she had known prior to her marriage to Henry. Culpepper met his end at Tyburn, suffering a traitor’s death.

  FRANCIS WESTON

  Sir Francis Weston was one of the younger members of Henry’s inner circle and came from a respectable family – his father, Sir Richard Weston, had served as Under-Treasurer of the Exchequer and his mother had served as one of Katherine of Aragon’s ladies-in-waiting.

  Like Norris and George Boleyn, Weston began his career at court serving as a page, but his love of hunting, gambling and other sports quickly endeared him to a king who was beginning to age, and he was appointed as a Gentleman of the Privy Chamber. In 1533 he was knighted at Anne Boleyn’s coronation, and would likely have had a long career in Henry’s service, had he not been caught up in the violent events of 1536.

  WILLIAM BRERETON

  William Brereton was of a well-to-do family – his father, Sir Randle Brereton, had served as a knight under Henry VII. By 1521 he had become a Groom of the Chamber, and several years later, was promoted to the Privy Chamber. But Brereton had an unsavoury reputation according to George Cavendish, who accused him of persecuting innocent people – there was a story of one John ap Griffith Eyton who was hanged in 1534 because Brereton believed he killed one of his retainers. Eyton had been acquitted but Brereton persuaded Anne Boleyn to intervene, and the man was arrested once more and executed, despite Cromwell’s efforts on his behalf.

  Indeed, it would seem that Cromwell had issues with almost every member of the Privy Chamber:

  I have probably, he thinks, gone as far as I can to accommodate them. Now they must accommodate me, or be removed.

  (Bring Up the Bodies)

  THE CARDINAL’S DESCENT

  At Hampton Court in the great hall they perform an interlude; its name is ‘The Cardinal’s Descent into Hell’. (Wolf Hall)

  In this scene the ‘entertainment’ features men dressed as devils stabbing a scarlet-clad figure with tridents. This is a pivotal moment in Wolf Hall; Wolsey is dead. Weeks prior, on 1 November 1530, the commission for Wolsey’s arrest was given to Henry Percy, now Earl of Northumberland. Wolsey had not yet reached York when Percy visited him at Cawood in North Yorkshire, greeting him with the warrant. He was to return to London and to the Tower; Anne had got her way at last. But Wolsey’s enemies would be denied the pleasure of seeing the once-great Lord Chancellor executed – he fell ill on the journey south and died near Leicester Abbey where he was buried, metres from the grave of Richard III. We do not know how deeply Cromwell mourned his master, but we can speculate. Certainly Mantel’s Cromwell finds it unbearable to hear of Wolsey’s last days from an equally distraught George Cavendish, with feelings of guilt surging through him that he had been preoccupied with court matters, and was not there at such a time.

  He cannot openly lament, but he goes to his drawer and opens a package the Cardinal had given him before he left for the north. In it is the Cardinal’s turquoise ring, which Cromwell had always admired, the very ring we see in Cromwell’s famous portrait. Eyes at court also recognize the ring, and though he doesn’t say it the meaning is clear: he will always be Wolsey’s man. Wolsey’s death weighing on him, Cromwell watches with the court as they shriek in amusement at the play.

  Historically, however, the details of the farce are lost, and it is unclear just what it entailed, whether it was it a dance, a monologue or a play. Originally it was ambassador Chapuys who reported that Thomas Boleyn ‘caused a farce to be acted of the Cardinal going down to Hell’. But far from a public display, this was a private scene of entertainment for Boleyn’s guest – the French ambassador, Gabriel de Grammont, during a private dinner. It was, however, the Duke of Norfolk who then had the farce printed and publicized. In Wolf Hall, Cromwell quietly moves behind the curtains and takes note of the actors – George Boleyn, Henry Norris, Francis Weston and William Brereton. He will remember their positions in that play for years to come.

  Despite his heartbreak at Wolsey’s demise and death, Cromwell smoothly made the transition from Wolsey’s service to that of the king, and by the beginning of 1531, when Cromwell was sworn in as a royal councillor, he must have felt he had reached the pinnacle of his career. In Wolf Hall, Thomas More warns, ‘Now you are a member of the council, I hope you will tell the king what he ought to do, not merely what he can do. If the lion knew his own strength, it would be hard to rule him.’

  The years between 1530 and 1533 were fraught with difficulty as Henry battled two women – his queen, Katherine, who he was determined to be rid of, and his mistress, Anne, who he struggled to please. Now, finding himself a part of the Privy Council, Cromwell would spend his time trying to extricate Henry from his first marriage. Mantel breezes through the details of certain events, for the marital landscape barely changed from 1527–31, but for Cromwell his career was going from strength to strength.

  THOMAS MORE

  Mantel’s More is cruel, ‘fussily pious’, enjoys flogging beggars in his garden and sending people to the stake. Perhaps this is how Cromwell saw the man who would change neither his religion, nor his loyalty to the woman he considered to be queen, Katherine. But certainly Mantel’s More has polarized opinion – for many he is almost unrecognizable from the traditional interpretation, especially in Robert Bolt’s play, A Man for All Seasons. Perhaps that is the issue – Mantel’s More is quite unlike the Thomas More of Robert Bolt’s play, but that More is also a fictional construct, perched at the other end of the spectrum. Somewhere in between the fanatic and saint lies the real Thomas More. Of course, in Wolf Hall what Mantel has done is to capture some critical elements of the real More – from his use of profanity in his pamphlets against Luther:

  You would not think that such words would proceed from Thomas More, but they do. No one has rendered the Latin tongue more obscene.

  To his uncompromising approach to scripture:

  He would chain you up, for a mistranslation. He would, for a difference in your Greek, kill you.

  More was born in 1477, the same year as Thomas Boleyn. The son of John More, an attorney who later became a judge, More benefitted from his father’s influence, and at the age of 12, More served as a page in the household of John Morton, Archbishop of Canterbury, who sent More to Oxford at the age of 14.

  It is in Morton’s household that Mantel imagines Cromwell and More meeting. Cromwell helped his uncle, who served in the kitchens of Bishop Morton’s palace at Lambeth. Cromwell, only a young boy, had heard of the child prodigy about to leave for Oxford, and serves the 14-year-old More wheat bread. More has a book open, which arouses Cromwell’s curiosity, and he asks what is in the book, to which the young More replies with a slightly patronizing smile, ‘Words, words, just words.’ For his part, More has no memory of the event, but Cromwell will not forget it.

  Like Cromwell, More trained as a lawyer, working at the New Inn, as opposed to Gray’s Inn where Cromwell was a member. More was torn between professions – he had a passion for literature and religious scripture and also entertained the notion of becoming a monk. Mantel’s Cromwell speculates that he decided not to, however, for:

  More would have been a priest, but human flesh called to him with its inconvenient demands.

  It may be that More simply opted for a career in civil service. More entered Parliament in 1504, and began to work his way up. In 1514, he was elevated to Henry’s Privy Council, and then to secretary and advisor to the king. Wolsey also helped facilitate his career, recommending that More be elected as Speaker in the House of Commons. Durin
g this time he wrote his famed Utopia, establishing himself as a scholar, but he was also an exceptional negotiator, and was part of a delegation dispatched to Bruges and Antwerp by Henry VIII to the court of Charles V, to secure protection for English merchants, and by 1521, More held the important post of Under-Treasurer of the Exchequer. Historically, More was well respected at court, was deeply liked and admired by many who considered him a friend and had a tremendous influence on Henry’s own spiritual ideology (until More’s ideology favoured Katherine) – we see More’s influence in Henry’s strongly worded rebuke of Martin Luther’s teachings.

  More married Jane Colt in 1505, and together they had four children. Unfortunately Jane died in 1511, and with peculiar speed, More married Alice Middleton a month later. More had no children from this second marriage, but he raised Alice’s daughter from her previous marriage (also named Alice) as his own. More gave the girls the same classical education as his son, which was unusual for the time, and is a decision that can only be admired. He was immensely proud of his children, and Margaret in particular, whose command of Greek and Latin delighted her father, who boasted of her linguistic skills. Mantel draws on the family theme, but it is somewhat twisted to suit her portrait of More. This More invites his guests to mock his wife and daughter-in-law, Anne, to the embarrassment of his guests, insulting his wife’s looks and character, and also patronizing his children. But from the surviving correspondence between More and his children it is clear that they were a close-knit family.

  Historically, More enjoyed the same close relationship with Henry that Wolsey did, though there is not the same degree of friction between More and Cromwell as is shown in Wolf Hall, nor is it clear how the real Cromwell felt about him – Mantel has fleshed out their relationship. Mantel’s Cromwell dines with More on occasion, once both as guests at the house of their mutual friend, the Italian merchant, Antonio Bonvisi. The scene is tense, not just because fish is the only item on the Lenten menu, but because More was one of the prime movers against the Cardinal. Historically, More was highly critical of the Cardinal, addressing Parliament shortly after Wolsey’s fall. In his address, More described Henry as a good shepherd and the Cardinal as a castrated male sheep, fraudulent and crafty. Apart from sending evangelicals to the stake, More has been accused of zealously torturing and flogging countless individuals he deemed as heretics. He denied such claims, and they cannot be substantiated, though Mantel’s Cromwell believes it.

  Later, Cromwell visits More at his house in Chelsea. As he enters he notes the now famous portrait of More and his family:

  You see them painted life-size before you meet them in the flesh; and More, conscious of the double effect it makes, pauses, to let you survey them, to take them in.

  Like Wolsey, More takes an interest in carpets, and invites his guests to admire his new purchase. More is pleased, but Cromwell’s hands roam the knots and wefts, knowing its price immediately. Wolsey would not have paid a shilling for it.

  More remained deeply loyal to Queen Katherine, and believed Henry’s marriage was valid. In the first years of Henry’s pursuit of a divorce, More remains silent, which he hopes will be enough for Henry. It is a stance that will backfire, as Henry begins to explore the depths of his power, aided by Anne Boleyn. The real Thomas More said it best when he compared having Henry’s favour to playing with tamed lions – ‘often it is harmless, often he roars in rage for no known reason, and suddenly the fun becomes fatal.’

  THE AMBASSADOR

  If we were to see Cromwell as he would want to be seen – that is, through his own papers – we would not get an inkling of the man. The intelligence, certainly, the ruthlessness, to be sure, and we owe a debt to his contemporaries, Cavendish and Hall. But there is another source – the Imperial ambassador, Eustace Chapuys. The relationship between Charles V’s ambassador and Thomas Cromwell was most unexpected and complex, and it lasted right up until Cromwell’s death.

  Eustace Chapuys was born sometime around 1489 in the bustling market town of Annecy, which at the time belonged to the state of Savoy, and is now part of France. The eldest of six children, his parents, Louis and Guigone, had great ambitions for Eustace and ensured that he was well-educated, firstly in Annecy and later at the prestigious Turin University, where he completed his doctorate. Turin University had a sound reputation for legal training and was a lively centre of the emerging philosophy of humanism. History has tended to label Chapuys as devoutly – even zealously – Catholic, so it might come as a surprise to learn that he was actually part of an intellectual, humanist network that included well-known reformers, such as fellow Turin University student François Bonivard, the Swiss ecclesiastic religious reformer. He was also close to theologian Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa, as well as the scholar and humanist Erasmus, with whom he communicated for over a decade.

  At some point, Chapuys went to Geneva, which was then an important political and religious centre and part of the Duchy of Savoy, where he was ordained. Geneva was a crucial stage for Chapuys, for it was here that the still relatively young lawyer would prove his strong work ethic and grasp of political and religious affairs. Most importantly, he would serve his apprenticeship in the art of diplomacy.

  While in Geneva, Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, invited Chapuys to his court in Barcelona where he soon proved himself to be an invaluable diplomat (and why he became known as ‘the Spanish Ambassador’). But what made him particularly valuable to Charles was his legal training because Charles V’s aunt was Katherine of Aragon, Queen of England, and in 1529, she was under siege. Charles needed someone like Chapuys in England where unprecedented events were unfolding at Henry VIII’s court.

  Chapuys arrived in England in 1529, ready to do battle as the new resident ambassador and Katherine of Aragon’s divorce lawyer, and for the next 16 years he witnessed some of the most dramatic events of Henry VIII’s reign. Chapuys became fiercely loyal, and his respect and admiration for Katherine far surpassed the requirements of his ambassadorial duties. As for Katherine, her admiration of her ambassador was evident in her correspondence with her nephew Charles.

  ‘You could not have chosen a better ambassador; his wisdom encourages and comforts me, and when my councillors through fear hesitate to answer the charges against me, he is always ready to undertake the burden of my defence ... I consider him deserving of all your favour.’

  We first glimpse Mantel’s Chapuys at the same dinner attended by Cromwell and Thomas More, at the home of Italian merchant Antonio Bonvisi, where Chapuys is a late arrival:

  He stands poised on the threshold ... a little crooked man, in a doublet slashed and puffed, blue satin billowing through black; beneath it, his little black spindly legs.

  We cannot remark with any certainty the state of Chapuys’ lower extremities, but his portraits suggest he was slender, with dark, beady eyes and short cropped hair. But from his dispatches, which number in the thousands, we see the elegant turns of phrase of a talented ambassador.

  In Mantel’s books we do not get a sense of just how much Cromwell fascinated the ambassador – Chapuys spent many reports simply detailing all he knew about Cromwell, and from these an interesting portrait of Cromwell emerges: an astute man who had a rather disarming nature, shrewd, frank, ambitious and highly intelligent.

  At the dinner described in Wolf Hall, Chapuys has no interest in Cromwell, choosing to speak to Thomas More instead. Historically Chapuys did spend more time with conservatives at court including the Duke of Norfolk, but he must have started to notice Cromwell as the latter’s responsibilities grew, and soon he began to see Cromwell as a friend and ally, someone whom he was determined to keep on side. In his first years at court, there was tentative communication between the two, with Chapuys attempting to gain Cromwell’s trust slowly. Cromwell, it seemed, had exactly the same idea. Nevertheless, Chapuys told Charles V hopefully that he was determined to ‘set the net, and see if I cannot catch him; I will nevertheless keep a good look-out ahead and risk nothi
ng without being well prepared, knowing, as I do, that in these matters one cannot be too cautious.’

  Mantel’s Cromwell looks on Chapuys with humour, and there is something comical about the way he is portrayed, seemingly naive and unaware when he is being played. In reality, Chapuys usually knew exactly what was happening, but openly chose to engage. Perhaps then Mantel’s description is not far off the mark:

  He is like a man who has wandered inadvertently into a play, who has found it to be a comedy, and decided to stay and see it through.

  Nevertheless, the two men – the radical lateral thinker and conservative ambassador – had much in common. They were both lawyers who had lived in Italy, and they shared similar tastes and ideals, and quite fortuitously, they were neighbours, living at St Katherine’s, now known as St Katherine’s Docks, near the Tower of London; the two households often came together when Chapuys and Cromwell dined – something Chapuys does very well in The Mirror and The Light. Surprisingly, they hunted together, lent each other books, and walked together in various palace gardens discussing tapestries, art, scholarship, Italy and wider European politics. Mantel suggests that Chapuys never learned English, and could only rely on those conversations in French, which he could understand, but here she does not give him enough credit.

  After four years in England Chapuys claimed he still could not entirely follow a rapid conversation in English. However, he was a shrewd diplomat and rather suspiciously made much fuss about having trouble with understanding English at court. In fact, Chapuys was linguistically gifted – he spoke German, Spanish, Italian, Flemish, Latin and a little Greek – and French was his native tongue. Chapuys is often described as rather gossipy, but his invaluable letters and reports give life to this period. Mantel clearly thought so too, for she plucks scenes for her books from Chapuys’ own dispatches.