I am going to a Halloween party this year, the first in ages! I am planning to go as Anne Boleyns ghost, with blood around my neck. I've bought a dress and currently bidding on a black wig. You probably get sick of me talking about the Tudors etc so I decided to tell you why I like (no love!) Anne Boleyn so much....
Well where do I start? Firstly I would like to point out I do not claim to be an Anne Boleyn expert, or expert in the 16th century atall. However I do have an interest (call it an obsession if you like) and here are the points I know (or think I know!), some might be incorrect, I’m just speaking form my head, not using an references or anything So here I go!
Anne Boleyn changed the history of England, if it wasn't for her there is a high chance we might all still be Catholics and the Church if England wouldn't exist. Big wow you are probably thinking, but the reform of the churches helped remove superstition, control and abuse of powers. I’m not saying it still doesn't exist, but it was a start. In those days people lives were ruled by religion, you said the wrong thing and you were a dead man, you also thought you were probably going to hell. You had to accept things and not question them because it was the word of ‘God’. She was the catalyst for change, good or bad I don’t know, but she made one hell of an impact for a little lady in waiting. She showed Henry VIII Tyndale's "The Obedience of the Christian Man”, Anne Boleyn had an English bible in her apartments, this was practically here say in itself at the time but it let people actually be able to read the bible that they were supposed to live by.
Fair enough there were drawbacks, as a result Henry VIII took over the church and eventually became a tyrant, thinking he was basically God however that’s a different story!
Henry married Anne Boleyn for love, not many Kings did that, they usually married for political reasons, infact I think he may have been the first to marry purely for love. He separated from the Catholic Church for her, a MASSIVE thing for him to do. Isolating his country, all for one woman who was basically abit of a nobody!
Anne Boleyn kept Henry going for six years before they finally got married, you try keeping a man for that long when he is the King and could have any woman at court he wanted. What makes it even better is Anne wasn't a typical beauty for her time, she was dark and not very curvy. It was her personality that men fell in love with, from what I have read I think she was intelligent, opinionated and charming, not attributes women had in those days and perhaps why she was labelled as a witch during her downfall. She wouldn't become Henry's mistress (unlike her sister Mary, some people believe Henry even fathered Mary's children) and she often had arguments with him, pretty brave if you ask me. She was definitely no doormat, a feminist for her time perhaps?
It seems pretty obvious to me that she was innocent of her crimes. Why would an intelligent woman who had fought for so long to become Queen commit adultery? There is little evidence against her, I believe she was conspired against (mainly by Thomas Cromwell) and most articles/books I have read agree to this as well. There is barely any evidence and the executioner from France had been called for before her trial had even started! They needed to get rid of her and divorce wasn't an option after all the farce from his first marriage. If the so called evidence was presented in a court now, I think people would just laugh!
She was a patron of the arts and was very fashionable, she was famous for introducing the French hood as she was raised in France and dared to show some more of her head (oh the horror!). I don’t believe she had a sixth finger on one hand, people were so superstitious those days I doubt Henry would have pursued a woman with six fingers on one hand which they thought was the sign of a witch.
Finally, she was the mother of one of the greatest Queens that ever existed. Elizabeth I who displayed a lot of her mothers attributes and carried a little picture of her in her locket. Its quite ironic that Anne probably died because she couldn't provide Henry with a living son, however in the end the child they had together was arguably the greatest ruler out of his three legitimate children
Well where do I start? Firstly I would like to point out I do not claim to be an Anne Boleyn expert, or expert in the 16th century atall. However I do have an interest (call it an obsession if you like) and here are the points I know (or think I know!), some might be incorrect, I’m just speaking form my head, not using an references or anything So here I go!
Anne Boleyn changed the history of England, if it wasn't for her there is a high chance we might all still be Catholics and the Church if England wouldn't exist. Big wow you are probably thinking, but the reform of the churches helped remove superstition, control and abuse of powers. I’m not saying it still doesn't exist, but it was a start. In those days people lives were ruled by religion, you said the wrong thing and you were a dead man, you also thought you were probably going to hell. You had to accept things and not question them because it was the word of ‘God’. She was the catalyst for change, good or bad I don’t know, but she made one hell of an impact for a little lady in waiting. She showed Henry VIII Tyndale's "The Obedience of the Christian Man”, Anne Boleyn had an English bible in her apartments, this was practically here say in itself at the time but it let people actually be able to read the bible that they were supposed to live by.
Fair enough there were drawbacks, as a result Henry VIII took over the church and eventually became a tyrant, thinking he was basically God however that’s a different story!
Henry married Anne Boleyn for love, not many Kings did that, they usually married for political reasons, infact I think he may have been the first to marry purely for love. He separated from the Catholic Church for her, a MASSIVE thing for him to do. Isolating his country, all for one woman who was basically abit of a nobody!
It seems pretty obvious to me that she was innocent of her crimes. Why would an intelligent woman who had fought for so long to become Queen commit adultery? There is little evidence against her, I believe she was conspired against (mainly by Thomas Cromwell) and most articles/books I have read agree to this as well. There is barely any evidence and the executioner from France had been called for before her trial had even started! They needed to get rid of her and divorce wasn't an option after all the farce from his first marriage. If the so called evidence was presented in a court now, I think people would just laugh!
She was a patron of the arts and was very fashionable, she was famous for introducing the French hood as she was raised in France and dared to show some more of her head (oh the horror!). I don’t believe she had a sixth finger on one hand, people were so superstitious those days I doubt Henry would have pursued a woman with six fingers on one hand which they thought was the sign of a witch.
Finally, she was the mother of one of the greatest Queens that ever existed. Elizabeth I who displayed a lot of her mothers attributes and carried a little picture of her in her locket. Its quite ironic that Anne probably died because she couldn't provide Henry with a living son, however in the end the child they had together was arguably the greatest ruler out of his three legitimate children