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Tudor Consorts: The Politics of Matchmaking, 1483–1543

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Queens Matter in Early Modern Studies

Part of the book series: Queenship and Power ((QAP))

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Abstract

When early modern kings wed, because their choices had national and international implications, their subjects expected them to make decisions based on appropriate dynastic, political, and hierarchical criteria. This essay examines the process by which Henry VII and Henry VIII chose and wed their seven different consorts. It highlights how special circumstances, the Wars of the Roses, the death of Henry VII’s heir Arthur, Prince of Wales, and the Reformation led them to adopt strategies that deviated from the usual patterns of royal matchmaking, both in terms of their choices and in the use of religious and royal ritual.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    J. L. Laynesmith, The Last Medieval Queens: English Queenship 1445–1503 (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2004), 45, 58. For a comparative study of the Tudor consorts’ reigns, see Retha M. Warnicke, Elizabeth of York and her Six Daughters-in-Law: Fashioning Tudor Queenship: 1485–1547 (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, forthcoming).

  2. 2.

    William Campbell, ed., Chronicles and Memorials of Great Britain and Ireland During the Middle Ages, 2 vols. (London: H.M.S.O., 1858), I, 115.

  3. 3.

    Some contemporaries disliked the claim of victory on the battlefield, explaining in Elizabeth’s “person … could be found whatever appeared to be missing in the king’s title”. They did not suggest joint rule: Nicholas Pronay and John Cox, eds., Crowland Chronicle 1459–1486 (London: Sutton for Richard III and Yorkist History Trust, 1986), 195.

  4. 4.

    Michael Jones and Malcolm Underwood, The King’s Mother: Lady Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992), 69, 86, 161.

  5. 5.

    John Ives, ed., Select Papers chiefly Relating to English Antiquities (London: M. Hingeston, 1773), 147.

  6. 6.

    C. A. J. Armstrong, “The Inauguration Ceremonies of the Yorkist Kings and their Title to the Throne”, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, fourth series, 30 (1948): 51–73; 52; J. L. Laynesmith, “The King’s Mother”, History Today 56 (2006): 38–44, argued that Cecily provided a model for Margaret.

  7. 7.

    Janet Backhouse, “Illuminated Manuscripts Associated with Henry VII and Members of his Immediate Family”, The Reign of Henry VII, Proceedings of the 1993 Harlaxton Symposium, edited by Benjamin Thompson (Stamford, UK: Paul Watkins, 1995), 175–187; 181.

  8. 8.

    Jones, King’s Mother, 69.

  9. 9.

    Nancy Lenz Harvey, Elizabeth of York: The Mother of Henry VII (New York: Macmillan, 1973), 124.

  10. 10.

    Pronay, Crowland, 191.

  11. 11.

    Arlene Okerlund, Elizabeth of York (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2009), 49–52. For André, see James Gairdner, ed., Memorials of King Henry the Seventh (London: Longman, 1858), 38.

  12. 12.

    William Wilkie, The Cardinal Protectors of England: Rome and the Tudors Before the Reformation (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1974), 13–14; Isabel Thornley, “The Destruction of Sanctuary”, Presented by the Board of Studies in History in the University ofLondon to Albert Frederick Pollard, ed. R. W. Seton Watson (Freeport, NY: Books for Libraries Press Reprint, 1969), 182–207.

  13. 13.

    Sean Cunningham, Henry VII (London: Routledge, 2007), 42.

  14. 14.

    Pronay, Crowland, 191.

  15. 15.

    Cunningham, Henry, 52–53.

  16. 16.

    National Archives (hereafter NA) E 404/79, fo. 98 (also numbered 375); see also Campbell, Chronicles, I, 220, for her addressed as queen in December 1485, and II, 84, for coronation preparations in 1486.

  17. 17.

    Samuel Bentley, ed., Excerpta Historia or Illustrations of English History (London: Samuel Bentley, 1831), 86.

  18. 18.

    Francis Bacon, The Historie of the Reigne of King Henry the Seventh (London: W. Stanley, 1622), 8.

  19. 19.

    M. L. Bush, “The Tudors and the Royal Race”, History, n.s. 55 (February 1970), 48.

  20. 20.

    William Camden, Annales: The Historie of the Most Renowned and Victorious Princess Elizabeth, Late Queen of England, trans. Robert Norton, 2nd edition (London: Thomas Harper for Benjamin Fisher, 1635), Sig. D1–3; see also Retha Warnicke, The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn: Family Politics at the Court of Henry VIII (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989).

  21. 21.

    Muriel St. Clare Byrne, ed., The Lisle Letters, 6 vols. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1981), IV, 863, for example.

  22. 22.

    For historiography, see Retha Warnicke, Wicked Women of Tudor England: Queens, Aristocrats, and Commoners (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012), 15–26.

  23. 23.

    Journal, 5 de May, MS de Brienne, fo. 30, quoted by John Lingard, The History of England. 10 vols. (Dublin: Duffy, 1878), IV, 237.

  24. 24.

    British Library, Add. MS. 6,113, fo. 70.

  25. 25.

    It probably forbade a man to have sexual relations with his brother’s wife.

  26. 26.

    NA, E 101 42 l/13, fo. 3d.

  27. 27.

    Charles Wriothesley, A Chronicle of England During the Reigns of the Tudors, from A.D. 1485 to 1559, ed. William Hamilton, 2 vols. (New York: Johnson Reprint Corp., 1965), I, 43.

  28. 28.

    Calendar of Letters, Despatches, and State Papers Relating to the Negotiations Between England and Spain Preserved in the Archives at Simancas and Elsewhere, ed. G. Bergenroth, et al., 13 vols, 2 supplements (London: Longman, 1862–1954), XI, 64 (hereafter CSP Span).

  29. 29.

    Barrett L. Beer, “Jane [née Jane Seymour] (1508/1509) queen of England, third consort of Henry VIII”, Oxford Dictionary of National Biography (hereafter ODNB), www.dnboxforddictionary.com (accessed May 27, 2013); Antonia Weir, The Six Wives of Henry VIII (London: Weidenfeld and Nicholson, 1992), 235.

  30. 30.

    Byrne, Lisle, IV, no. 895.

  31. 31.

    Henry Clifford, The Life of Jane Dormer, Duchess of Feria, trans. E. E. Estcourt, ed. Joseph Stephenson (London: Burns & Oates, 1887), 40–42, claimed the Duchess believed Jane was in Anne’s household; Simon Adams, “Radcliffe, Mary (c. 1550–1617/1618) courtier”, ODNB (accessed May 27, 2013).

  32. 32.

    Luke McMahon, “Ughtred, Sir Anthony (d. 1534), soldier”, ODNB (accessed June 13, 2013); J. D. Alsop, “Smith, Sir Clement (d. 1552), administrator”, ODNB (accessed June 13, 2013).

  33. 33.

    Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, of the Reign of Henry VIII, edited by J. S. Brewer, J. Gairdner, and R. H. Brodie, 21 vols. in 35 (London: HMSO, 1862–1932), X, 901. (hereafter, LP).

  34. 34.

    LP, X, 915, 1147.

  35. 35.

    Warnicke, Wicked, 45–76.

  36. 36.

    LP, XVIII–I, 740.

  37. 37.

    NA SP 1/177, fos. 123–25v; David Starkey, Six Wives: The Queens of Henry VIII (New York: HarperCollins, 2003), 814–815, note 51; Susan James, Katheryn Parr: The Making of a Queen (Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 1999), 90.

  38. 38.

    James, Katheryn, 404.

  39. 39.

    Keith Dockray, “Neville, John, third Lord Latimer [1493–1543], nobleman”, ODNB (accessed May 24, 2013).

  40. 40.

    LP, XVIII–i, 854, 873.

  41. 41.

    Lucy Wooding, Henry VIII (London: Routledge, 2009), 49.

  42. 42.

    50. CSP Span, II, 17.

  43. 43.

    CSP Span, II, 18, states that each crown was worth 4s 2d.

  44. 44.

    Wooding, Henry, 49.

  45. 45.

    Edward Hall, Henry VIII, edited by Charles Whibley, 2 vols. (London: T.C. & E.C. Jack, 1904), I, 4.

  46. 46.

    Hall, Henry VIII, I, 5.

  47. 47.

    Retha Warnicke, The Marrying of Anne of Cleves: Royal Protocol at the Tudor England (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000).

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  1. Arizona State University, Phoenix, USA

    Retha M. Warnicke

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  1. Auburn University, Auburn, USA

    Anna Riehl Bertolet

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Warnicke, R.M. (2018). Tudor Consorts: The Politics of Matchmaking, 1483–1543. In: Bertolet, A. (eds) Queens Matter in Early Modern Studies. Queenship and Power. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-64048-8_7

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