by Tracy Borman
Blanche Parry’s memorial at Bacton Church, Herefordshire. Blanche is shown on the left, kneeling in adoration before her royal mistress. (photo credit i1.6)
Katherine Astley, Elizabeth’s long-standing governess and confidante. (photo credit i1.7)
Elizabeth’s sister, Mary, in her youth (ca. 1544). (photo credit i1.8)
Jane Seymour (ca. 1536–37), beloved third wife of Henry VIII. (photo credit i1.9)
Anne of Cleves (ca. 1539), whose marriage to Henry VIII lasted for just six months. (photo credit i1.10)
Katherine Howard (ca. 1541), Henry VIII’s youngest—and shortest lived—bride. (photo credit i1.11)
Katherine Parr (ca. 1545), the last wife of Henry VIII and Elizabeth’s most influential stepmother. (photo credit i1.12)
Queen Mary Tudor (1554), whose relationship with her half sister, Elizabeth, became increasingly stormy. (photo credit i1.13)
CHAPTER 7
The Queen’s Hive
When Elizabeth was proclaimed queen in the city of London, there was great rejoicing. All across the capital, church bells were rung, and at night bonfires were lit, around which thousands of people gathered to drink and make merry, just as they had a little over five years ago to welcome Mary’s reign. The new queen proceeded to order a lavish funeral for her late sister, entrusting the Marquess of Winchester with the arrangements, which in total cost some £7,763 (equivalent to more than £1.3 million or $2 million today). A magnificent procession bore the coffin, on top of which was a life-sized effigy of Mary, through the city of London.
But it was with the epitaph to Mary that Elizabeth’s mask of respect began to slip. Upon reading it, she furiously decreed that it was too praiseworthy, and, worse, that it made no mention of herself. Upon her orders, the following lines were therefore added:
Marie now dead, Elizabeth lives, our just and lawful Queen
In whom her sister’s virtues rare, abundantly are seen.
She also spared herself the expense of erecting a tomb above the unmarked vault in which Mary was interred, and during the course of her reign, pieces of stone from the alteration work within Westminster Abbey were piled on top of it.1
Just days after Mary’s death, Elizabeth ordered her ladies to take a thorough inventory of the royal jewels to insure that there were none missing, and also sent a message to Philip II demanding that he hand over the jewels that he and his father, Charles V, had given to the late queen. Elizabeth also failed to honor any of the provisions of her half sister’s will, or the three requests that Mary had made as she lay dying.
In government, too, Elizabeth made it clear that there would be no harking back to the past. Although she published an edict declaring her intention not to change anything “which had been ordained and established by the Queen her sister during her reign,” it was soon clear that she would do nothing of the sort.2 Less than a month later, the Count de Feria reported to Philip II: “The kingdom is entirely in the hands of young folks, heretics and traitors, and the Queen does not favour a single man whom Her Majesty, who is now in heaven, would have received and will take no one into her service who served her sister when she was Lady Mary. On her way from the Tower to her house where she now is, she saw the marquis of Northampton, who is ill with a quartan ague, at a window, and she stopped her palfrey and was for a long while asking him about his health in the most cordial way in the world. The only true reason for this was that he had been a great traitor to her sister.” He concluded that Elizabeth was “as much set against her sister as she was previous to her death.”3
As well as favoring those who had opposed Mary’s regime, Elizabeth also promoted the former allies of her late mother. Matthew Parker, in whom Anne had confided her hopes for her daughter’s future, was appointed Archbishop of Canterbury. Baron Norris of Rycote, son of Henry Norris, who had been executed on the charge of adultery with Anne, was given great honors by Elizabeth because, it was said, she was mindful that his father had “died in a noble cause and in justification of her mother’s innocence.”4 Henry Carey, son of Anne Boleyn’s sister and therefore a cousin of Elizabeth, was created Baron Hunsdon immediately after her accession. She demonstrated a real affection for him throughout his life, calling him “my Harry,” and signing her letters “Your loving kinswoman.”5
The Howards, who were related to Anne Boleyn on her mother’s side, occupied key posts in government throughout the reign. William Howard, Lord Effingham, was appointed Lord Admiral by Elizabeth. As her mother’s first cousin, he was one of her nearest maternal kinsmen and became one of her most influential advisers. His credit was further enhanced by the fact that he married the Queen’s other Boleyn cousin, Katherine Carey. Meanwhile, the son of George Boleyn, Anne’s brother, was appointed dean of Lichfield. Various other Boleyn relatives were promoted during Elizabeth’s reign, including the Sackvilles, Staffords, Fortescues, and Ashleys.
Now that she herself was queen, all of the suppressed outrage that Elizabeth had felt toward Mary during the latter’s reign found full expression. Even as Mary lay dying, Feria observed that her half sister was “highly indignant about what has been done to her during the queen’s lifetime.”6 Elizabeth seemed determined to right these wrongs by becoming a much greater queen than Mary had ever been. The years of fear and uncertainty had fostered within her a considerable strength of purpose, as well as a formidable authority. “She seems to me incomparably more feared than her sister and gives her orders and has her way as absolutely as her father did,” observed Feria just weeks after her accession.7 This still held true the following year, when the Venetian ambassador remarked that Elizabeth “insists upon far greater respect being shown to her than was exacted by the late Queen Mary.”8
Elizabeth consciously set out to distance herself from her late sister. In the propaganda of her reign, she was the “clear and lovely sunshine” that dispersed the “stormy, tempestuous and blustering windy weather of Queen Mary.”9 True enough, by the time Elizabeth inherited the throne, England was racked by religious division, political uncertainty, economic hardship, and disastrous foreign wars that had resulted in the loss of Calais, her last stronghold in France. But this in itself presented the new queen with a distinct advantage. Surely anything now would be preferable to Mary’s brief but catastrophic reign? According to one contemporary chronicler, this was exactly what people thought. “And it was not without ground, that the nation concluded such great hope of being happily governed under this lady, both in regard of her mild and serene beginnings: whereas the former Queen’s first steps into her government, was nothing but storm and ruffle, violation of laws, terrors and threatenings, imprisonments and executions.”10 Elizabeth made sure that throughout her reign, she would always be compared favorably to her half sister. This served to remind her subjects, at times of crisis, that no matter what they faced, it was as nothing to the sufferings inflicted upon the English people by her dogmatic, pro-Spanish predecessor.
Attractive, charismatic, and vivacious, Elizabeth had already won the love of her new subjects. The Spanish ambassador remarked that she had “many characteristics in which she resembled her mother.”11 Sir Robert Naunton, who wrote an account of notables at Elizabeth’s court, believed that she had inherited all her best traits from Anne. “Her mother was … as the French word hath it, more debonaire, and affable, virtues which might well suit with majesty and which descending as hereditary to the daughter did render her of a more sweet temper, and endear her more to the love and liking of the people, who gave her the name and fame of a most gracious and popular prince, the atrocity of her father’s nature being allayed in hers by her mother’s sweet inclination.”12 This account is a rare, almost exceptional, example of Elizabeth being compared favorably with her mother, as opposed to her father. It is telling that it was published after Elizabeth’s death, for Naunton would not have got away with such criticism of her father in her lifetime.
But he did have a point. The magisterial arrogance that Elizabeth had
inherited from her father was tempered by the charm and charisma that had been so much a part of Anne’s character. It was these qualities that won Elizabeth the love, as well as the respect, of her people. She had as keen an instinct for public relations as her mother had, and unlike Anne, she had the opportunity to exercise this instinct to staggering effect. While Anne may have charmed a throng of (largely male) courtiers and had a gift for political ostentation, the fact that—in most people’s eyes—she had usurped the rightful queen put her at a disadvantage from which she never had time to recover. Elizabeth had no such weakness. She succeeded a deeply unpopular queen whose religious fervor and pro-Spanish policies had caused widespread resentment and unrest. Against the aging, barren Mary, Elizabeth was a shining symbol of youth, hope, and prosperity. Little wonder that she ascended the throne on a wave of popular support and rejoicing. That she was able to sustain this beyond the temporary euphoria that almost always accompanies a new reign is at least in part a testament to the charisma and acumen that she had inherited from her mother.
Beneath the euphoria at her accession lay the deep-seated prejudices against female rulers that had existed for centuries. Her sister’s reign had strengthened these. In 1558 John Knoxe published The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstrous Regiment of Women, in which he argued that it was abhorrent to nature for women to rule over men, and pointed to all the examples of disastrous female sovereignty, including Mary Tudor and Mary, Queen of Scots. “It is more then a monstre in nature that a Woman shall reigne and have empire above a Man,” he argued, and decried “howe abominable, odious, and detestable is all such usurped authoritie.”13 In a similar vein, Thomas Becon, a Norfolk clergyman, vehemently complained in a prayer to God: “Thou has set to rule over us a woman, whom nature hath formed to be in subjection unto man … Ah, Lord! To take away the empire from a man, and give it to a woman, seemeth to be an evident token of thine anger towards us Englishmen.”14
The vast majority of Elizabeth’s subjects firmly believed that the proper role of women in society was to be subservient to fathers, husbands, and brothers. They had neither the intelligence nor the strength of character to make their own way in the world. If they could barely manage a household, then how on earth could they rule over a kingdom? These sentiments were echoed by the leading Elizabethan writer Sir Thomas Smith, who claimed that women “can beare no rule,” and should not “mingle with public affairs; for they were by nature weak and fearful, and easily forced into obedience and submission by men with their superior strength and courage.”15 Such prejudices went right to the heart of Elizabeth’s new government. Even her closest adviser, William Cecil, was furious when one of the Queen’s messengers discussed with her a dispatch for her ambassador in Paris, exclaiming that it was “too much for a woman’s knowledge.”
Whereas Mary had confirmed such prejudices during her own reign, Elizabeth set out to confound them. Although she shared her male subjects’ views on the inferiority of women, she saw herself as an exception and was determined to stamp her authority upon all aspects of her court and government. But she knew that to win the respect of her ministers and subjects, she must first win their love. She therefore set about planning a series of carefully crafted public relations exercises.
The first and most important was her coronation. Elizabeth’s inspiration was that staged by her mother some twenty-five years earlier. This would be the first demonstration of the elaborate symbolism and image cultivation for which Elizabeth, the Virgin Queen and Gloriana, would become so famous. Like Anne, she ordered the preparation of Latin verses that would be sung as her procession made its way to Westminster Abbey. Lavish scenery was constructed, much of it in the same classical style that Anne had ordered to line her own processional route. One of the vignettes included a representation of Anne as queen, which Elizabeth would have seen as she passed by. As a further tribute to her mother, she adopted the same manner of dress, with a heavily brocaded silk surcoat and a mantle of ermine. The final touch was to commission a special crown to be made that was lighter than the one that would be used in the coronation ceremony itself and therefore more comfortable to wear during the procession. This idea had been borrowed from Anne, who had done exactly the same thing for her own coronation.
Elizabeth had studied the account of her mother’s coronation with meticulous care, judging by the similarity with her own ceremonials. But the influence extended far beyond that brief episode; indeed, the symbolism used by Anne Boleyn in her coronation pageantry would be adopted by her daughter throughout the latter’s reign. One of the most obvious examples was Anne’s emblem, the white falcon. Elizabeth now adopted this as her own, and it became ubiquitous in her palaces, adorning swords, fireplaces, virginals, and books.
But by far the most significant imagery borrowed by Elizabeth from her mother’s coronation was the notion of the queen as a Virgin Mary on earth. As with so many of Anne’s other ideas and influences, she would make it her own, but better. The image of her as a divinely appointed sovereign would be invaluable to her at a time when many still harbored doubts about the legitimacy of her claim to the throne. But her use of this symbolism would go far beyond that. Elizabeth did not just mimic the Virgin Mary; she became her: untouched and untouchable, a divine presence here on earth. This, more than any other, was the image that would win her the love and devotion of her subjects, and secure her a place in history.16
Watching all of this from the sidelines were Elizabeth’s adoring old servants, Kat Astley and Blanche Parry, both of whom had been accorded places of honor at the coronation. While the crowds that thronged to see their new queen were presented with her public persona, Blanche and Kat witnessed her private one, as they clustered around her in the curtained enclosure behind the altar of St. Edward’s Chapel in Westminster Abbey, which had been assigned as Elizabeth’s changing room. It was an immensely proud moment for the two women who had stood by her in the greatest danger and had shared her hopes for the future.
Elizabeth’s lavish coronation was just part of her strategy to gain popularity. “She lives a life of magnificence and festivity such as can hardly be imagined, and occupies a great portion of her time with balls, banquets, hunting and similar amusements with the utmost possible display,” observed a Venetian envoy with some astonishment a year after Elizabeth’s accession.17 The new queen had certainly made a point of establishing her court as a spectacle of glorious, ostentatious display; a theater of art, music, dancing, and lavish dress. The cultural and political heart of England, it was the place to which all of the principal men of the realm flocked to pay reverence to their sovereign and clamor for her favor. Elizabeth, like her father, had a natural gift for public relations and fully appreciated how politically important it was to stage an obvious display of wealth and majesty at her court. “They are intent on amusing themselves and on dancing till after midnight,” exclaimed one foreign visitor, who was shocked by such “levities and unusual licentiousness.” Another described the May Day festivities at court, which had included “decorated barges, gunpowder, performers falling into the Thames … the Quen [Queen’s] grace and her lordes and lades lokyng out of wyndows,” and later remarked: “ther was grett chere tyll mydnyght.”18
Elizabeth’s banquets were always spectacular. Her reign saw the introduction of many exotic foods from the New World. These included rich spices such as cinnamon and ginger, as well as pineapples, chillies, potatoes, tomatoes, and chocolate. The food was prepared as much for visual effect as for taste, and there was a strong sense of theater throughout. A host of different colors, materials, and props were used to make and serve the food. Peacocks were reared for consumption, but their feathers were also used to decorate cooked foods. The Queen had a famously sweet tooth, and her cooks let their imaginations run wild when it came to preparing the confectionery for her banquets. On one occasion, an entire menagerie was sculpted in “sugar-worke,” including camels, lions, frogs, snakes, and dolphins, along with more fantastic
al figures like mermaids and unicorns.19
Elizabeth would be offered tens, if not hundreds, of separate dishes during the course of one banquet. Her first course might comprise a choice of beef, mutton, veal, swan, goose, or capon, while the second provided lamb, heron, pheasant, chicken, pigeon, and lark. Baked fruits and custards would be served with each course, rather than as dessert, and the pièce de résistance would be the exquisitely crafted confectionery.
All of this was washed down with wine and ale—water rarely being clean enough to drink. Even breakfast would be accompanied by ale, which was brewed with malt and water, sometimes with flavors added such as mace, nutmeg, or sage. Wine was generally imported, although some fruit wines were produced in England. A form of cider referred to as “apple-wine” was also prepared, along with mead, an alcoholic drink sweetened with honey. Elizabeth was as sparing in her consumption of drink as she was of food, and never overindulged in either. The same could not be said of her courtiers and guests, who made the most of all the sumptuous fare on offer.
However decadent and carefree the court entertainments might seem to the casual observer, they were all carefully controlled by Elizabeth, who quickly established a strict etiquette and ceremony from which no courtier was allowed to stray. Ever watchful of her reputation as a young, unmarried queen, she was determined to insure that merriment would never descend into drunkenness, or flirtatiousness into sexual transgression. Thus a contemporary was able to recall: “The court of Queen Elizabeth was at once gay, decent, and superb.”20
All of this was played out against the backdrop of some of the most magnificent palaces in Europe. The new queen’s chief residence was Whitehall Palace in the heart of London, a vast maze of buildings that sprawled over twenty-three acres. The exteriors of the main buildings were decorated with elaborate paintwork, while principal rooms within were decked out with rich gold fabrics and carvings. The Queen’s bedroom, which overlooked the river Thames, was the most sumptuous of all, complete with a gold ceiling and a bed “ingeniously composed of woods of different colours with quilts of sik, velvet, gold and silver embroidery.”21 Another of Elizabeth’s London palaces was Greenwich, the place of her birth. Built on the banks of the Thames, it was conveniently accessed by barge, and when the Queen chose that method of transport, she ordered that perfumed oil be burnt to disguise the noisome smells of the river. The inside of the palace was adorned with the many expensive gifts that Elizabeth received during her reign, including a tablecloth made from peacock feathers.