As Eric Ives points out in The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn, the dates of the indictments simply don't make sense. In many cases, Anne was not actually in the locations it was alleged she had been, let alone, committing such offences there.10 In this instance, Anne was actually in Windsor with her husband, the King, on both the 2nd and 5th November, and not at Westminster with George. Of course, the Crown was careful in adding the phrase "and several times before and after"; by including a catch-all phrase like that, they didn't need to be accurate.
Metrical Visions
Then we have George Cavendish's "Metrical Visions", in which he gives his account of George Boleyn's execution speech:
"My life not chaste, my lyvyng bestyall;I forced wydowes, maydens I did deflower.All was oon to me, I spared none at all.My appetite was all women to devoure.My study was both day and hower. My onleafull lechery how I might it fulfill.Sparing no woman to have on hyr my will."11
Despite the old English, we can make out that Cavendish was of the opinion that George was "bestial" and that the latter was also deemed to be promiscuous and lustful. Warnicke and Weir have both read the word "bestial" and the phrase "unlawful lechery" as referring to George's homosexuality. However, Clare Cherry, who has been researching George Boleyn for nearly a decade, points out that Cavendish "has Thomas Culpepper [Catherine Howard's alleged lover] warning his fellow courtiers of their bestiality, and in his verses regarding Henry VIII he also talks of Henry's unlawful lechery."12 Here is Cavendish's verse on Henry VIII:
"My lusts too frequent, and have by them experience,Seeking but my lust of unlawful lechery,Whereof the slander remains still in me;So that my willful and shameful trespass Does all my majesty and nobleness deface."
Since Cavendish uses the same phrases here to refer to Henry VIII and his courtiers (who have not been cited as being homosexual), it is clear that Cavendish is talking about adultery, not homosexuality, when he employs this turn of phrase.
Another Cavendish verse which Alison Weir uses to back up her theory regarding George's sexuality is:
"Alas! To declare my life in every effect,Shame restrains me the plains to confess,Least the abomination would all the world infect:It is so vile, so detestable in words to express,For which by the law, condemned I am doubtless."13
Warnicke believes that the "abomination" that George can't even put into words to confess is "buggery". She writes, "As he had stoutly denied charges of incest, the likelihood is that he was referring to other sexual practices then regarded as perversions"14, but, as Clare Cherry points out, "if you read the whole verse, it says he is too ashamed to confess the crime for which he was condemned. He was condemned for incest with his sister, not for buggery, and it is incest with his sister which he never confessed to, neither in court nor on the scaffold."15
George's Execution Speech
George preached a bit of a sermon at his execution, what Eric Ives describes as "the language of Zion",16 urging those witnessing his death to "stick to the truth and follow it", and not to make the mistakes that he had. However, one particular part of his speech has been used by Warnicke and Weir as evidence of George's homosexuality:
"And I beseech you all, in his holy name, to pray unto God for me, for I have deserved to die if I had twenty (or a thousand) lives, yea even to die with more shame and dishonour than hath ever been heard of before. For I am a wretched sinner, who has grievously and often time offended; nay in truth, I know not of any more perverse sinner than I have been up till now. Nevertheless, I mean not openly now to relate what my many sins may have been, since it were no pleasure for you hear them, nor yet me to rehearse, for God knoweth them all."17
As I said earlier, Weir believes that George's description of his sin went beyond the usual execution confessions of original sin and that he must have been referring to "unnatural sexual practices". Warnicke is of the opinion that because George emphasised just how bad his sins were but did not specify what they were, this suggests that he committed "unnatural"18 sexual acts, which included buggery. However, people convicted of a crime "did not doubt that they deserved to die"19 and felt that it was a punishment from God for their sinful lives, even if they were innocent of the crime of which they were convicted. The belief in original sin was very strong and I think that Weir is reading far too much into George's words, particularly as the latter was using his execution speech as an opportunity for evangelism.
We cannot actually call "Metrical Visions" and the execution speech two different pieces of evidence because Cavendish's poetry is based, loosely, on George's execution speech; it is Cavendish's own interpretation of the speech put into verse. We also have to take into account that Cavendish's rendition of George Boleyn's speech is just one version of George's last words. Furthermore, it differs considerably to the accounts in The Spanish Chronicle, The Chronicle of Calais and Letters and Papers, as well as in an anonymous Portuguese account, none of which use the words "bestial" or "unlawful lechery". George Cavenish was writing poetry and he was also not a Boleyn fan, so his words really should be taken with a pinch of salt.
Another piece of evidence which Warnicke uses to back up her theory regarding George Boleyn's sexuality is his ownership of a manuscript which contained a translation by Jean Lefèvre of Mathieu of Boulogne's 13th century satirical poem Liber lamentationum Matheoluli ("The Lamentations of Matheolus"). The poem is an attack on women written by a man betrayed by one. In the poem, Mathieu likens women to basilisks, "a chimaera with horns and a tail" and " the mother of all calamities", and writes how "all evil and all madness stem from her". The manuscript, which can now be found in the British Library, is inscribed, "Thys boke ys myn, George Boleyn. 1526". Near the end of the volume is inscribed, "Amoy m marc S", showing that the book had also belonged to Mark Smeaton, one of the men executed alongside George Boleyn. Warnicke writes that "it is extraordinary that a manuscript, attacking the institution of marriage, should belong within the period of one decade to two of the five men executed for illicit sexual relations with the queen", particularly as such manuscripts would have been expensive. She concludes, therefore, that Smeaton "was the one most likely to have been Rochord's intimate friend"; it is clear what she means by "intimate".20 I find it a huge leap of imagination, however, to draw the conclusion that George and Smeaton were lovers based upon George passing a manuscript on to Smeaton, even if that manuscript was an attack on women and marriage. In my own research into "The Lamentations of Matheolus", I have found that the text was widely circulated amongst scholars in Europe and "quickly became one of the most seminal examples of medieval antifeminist and antimatrimonial discourse".21 It has been suggested that Chaucer knew of this poem, and drew on it heavily for "The Wife of Bath's Prologue",22 and that Christine de Pizan was inspired to refute it in her "Cité de Dames".23 George Boleyn was keen on French literature and it is likely that this satire was simply part of a wider collection of popular works in French. He may simply have passed it on to Mark because it was popular at the time, or perhaps as a joke if Mark was becoming involved with a woman. We don't know the facts and therefore cannot make a judgement.
If there had been rumours of homosexuality surrounding any of the men then they would certainly have come up in their trials in 1536. Moreover, Eustace Chapuys, the imperial ambassador, would have gleefully shared these rumours with Charles V. Three years prior to the Boleyn family's fall, Parliament had passed "an Acte for the punysshement of the vice of Buggerie" making the "abominable vice of buggery committed with mankind or beast" a capital crime punishable by hanging(1533-4, 25 Hen. 8 c.6), yet none of the men were charged with buggery. Norris, Weston, Smeaton and Brereton were charged with treason and adultery and George was charged with treason, adultery and incest; no mention of buggery. George, as a zealous evangelical, would have been mortified by the idea of buggery, let alone the practising of it. The homosexuality theory really cannot be taken seriously and belongs to the realms of fiction and fantasy, where it should stay. It was never used to
blacken the Boleyn name in the sixteenth century, when it was illegal, and it should not be given any credence today.
Figure 41 - Tower Hill Scaffold Memorial, London
The Real George Boleyn
So who was the real George Boleyn? What do we know about him?
Well, we do know that he was a fervent religious reformer. After their deaths, a number of heretical evangelical books were found amongst George and Anne's belongings and we know that George completed two beautiful presentation manuscripts of evangelical literature for Anne, both based on the work of the evangelical scholar, Jacques Lefèvre d'Étaples. These were The Ecclesiaste and Epistres et Evangiles des cinquante et deux semaines de l'an, or "Epistles and Gospels for the 52 weeks of the Year", a collection of Epistles and Gospel readings for the year followed by a short homily. Epistles was based on the principle that the Gospel should be accessible to the laity, the general people, and The Ecclesiaste was the Book of Ecclesiastes with a commentary by German evangelical Johannes Brenz. The commentary was derived from Martin Luther's writings and emphasised the pre-eminence of the Bible over the traditions and sacraments of the established church. George translated the commentary into English for Anne but kept the French the same.
Historian James Carley also believes that George may have persuaded Anne to show a copy of Simon Fish's Supplication for the Beggars to the King.24 This was an evangelical and revolutionary sixteen page pamphlet attacking the Catholic Church and accusing it of many crimes. Simon Fish contested the existence of purgatory and the sale of indulgences, and also accused the Church of holding half of England's wealth, something which would have keenly interested Henry VIII.
George's execution speech is also evidence of his religious views. George spoke of how he was "a setter forth of the Word of God", that he was "a great reader and a mighty debater of the Word of God" and stated that if he had followed the Word of God he would not "be in the piteous condition wherein I now stand". He drew his speech to a close by saying "Wherefore I do beseech you all, for the love of our Lord God, that ye do at all seasons, hold by the truth, and speak it, and embrace it, for beyond all peradventure, better profiteth he who readeth not and yet does well, than he who readeth much and yet liveth in sin." Evangelicals put God's Word first over the rituals of the Church, and George's scaffold speech shows just how important the Bible was to him and how it should be to others - words fit for a Sunday sermon.
George was also a renowned poet. He loved music and poetry and although we think of Henry Howard, the Earl of Surrey, and Thomas Wyatt as the poets of that age, we know that George Boleyn was actually just as talented. Raphael Holinshed, the chronicler, wrote that George "wrote divers sings and sonnets";25 George Cavendish described how nature had endowed him with "gifts of natural qualities" and that "Dame Eloquence" had also taught him "the art in meter and verse, to make pleasant ditties".26 Playwright Jon Bale wrote of his "rythmos elegantissimos".27 George's only biographer, Edmond Bapst, wrote of George and Henry Howard, Earl of Surrey, bringing the Renaissance to England with their beautiful poetry;28 and in 1575 Richard Smith included George's name in a list of poets which included the likes of Chaucer, Surrey and Wyatt. Clare Cherry also points out that when imprisoned, in the Tower in May 1536, Anne Boleyn heard that the men had to make their own beds. She suggested that they make their pallets as they made their ballads, but said that only her Lord Rochford had the skill to do so. She had to be reminded that Thomas Wyatt, who was also in the Tower, was equally skilled at verse.
So if George Boleyn was such a renowned poet, where on earth is this poetry? Well, either destroyed or attributed to someone else are the likely answers. After all, George died a convicted traitor and a man who allegedly committed incest with his sister, the Queen. A reader of the 16th century "Tottel's Miscellany", a collection of poems from the era, including those by Wyatt and Surrey, may well be reading the works of George Boleyn without even realising it. John Harington, John Bale and Horace Walpole all attribute one particular poem to George, although Tottel assigns it to Wyatt. It is called The Lover Complayneth the Unkindnes of his Love and the first verse goes:-
"My Lute awake, perform the last Labour that thou and I shall waste.And end that I have now begun!And when this song is sung and rest,My Lute be still, for I have done!"
As well as being a poet, George was also a royal favourite. In The Tudors series, George is actually conspicuous by his absence in Season One; in this series, the King spends all his leisure time with Charles Brandon, Sir William Compton and Anthony Knyvert. However, George was a gentleman of the privy chamber until Cardinal Wolsey weeded him out in 1526 via the Eltham Ordnance. Even before Anne came on the scene, George was receiving grants, offices and land. For example, he was awarded the keepership of Penshurst in 1522, after the fall of Stafford, the Duke of Buckingham, and in 1524 he was given Grimston Manor in Norfolk. George's name is also mentioned frequently in the Privy Purse Expenses, showing that he played dice, bowls and cards with the King and also accompanied him hunting. He was clearly a close friend of the King.
Then we have George the diplomat. Like his father before him, he was an important diplomat and carried out many missions to France on behalf of the King, including those in December 1529, March 1533, Summer 1533, April 1534, July 1534 and May 1535. Those are all recorded in Letters and Papers. He was also very influential in Parliament. It is noted that his attendance rate was higher than many others, possibly because of his reformist persuasions and his desire to push Reform.
Of course, we'll never know who the real George Boleyn was. Although I can argue here against the theories of Warnicke, Weir and Gregory, because there is a lack of evidence to support them, we just cannot know for sure what George was like. Evidence has been twisted to fit theories, fiction has taken over and the majority of the public probably believe that what they see or read in The Tudors and The Other Boleyn Girl is fact-based. George Boleyn the poet, reformer and diplomat just isn't remembered.
George Boleyn was executed on 17th May 1536 on Tower Hill and was laid to rest in the chancel area of the Chapel of St Peter ad Vincula, Tower of London.
Notes and Sources
1 Hirst, "The Tudors."
2 Gregory, The Other Boleyn Girl.
3 Chadwick, The Other Boleyn Girl.
4 "The Anne Boleyn Files."
5 Warnicke, The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn: Family Politics at the Court of Henry VIII, 4.
6 Ibid., 218.
7 Weir, The Lady in the Tower: The Fall of Anne Boleyn, 100.
8 Ibid., 243.
9 "Letters and Papers, Foreign and Domestic, Henry VIII, Volume 10 - January-June 1536," n. 876.
10 Ives, The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn, 344.
11 Cavendish, The Life of Cardinal Wolsey, Volume 2, 2:22.
12 Cherry, "George Boleyn's Sexuality."
13 Cavendish, The Life of Cardinal Wolsey, Volume 2, 2:22.
14 Weir, The Lady in the Tower: The Fall of Anne Boleyn, 101.
15 Cherry, "George Boleyn's Sexuality."
16 Ives, The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn, 278.
17 Gruffudd, "Gruffudd's Chronicle."
18 Warnicke, The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn: Family Politics at the Court of Henry VIII, 218.
19 de Lisle, The Sisters Who Would Be Queen, 49.
20 Warnicke, The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn: Family Politics at the Court of Henry VIII, 218–219.
21 Gray, Gender, Rhetoric, and Print Culture in French Renaissance Writing, 17–18.
22 Thundy, "Matheolus, Chaucer, and the Wife of Bath."
23 Percival, Chaucer's Legendary Good Women, 106.
24 Carley, The Books of King Henry VIII and His Wives, 131.
25 Holinshed, Holinshed's Chronicles of England, Scotland, and Ireland, 6:1613.
26 Cavendish, The Life of Cardinal Wolsey, Volume 2, 2:20.
27 Walpole, A Catalogue of the Royal and Noble Authors of England: With Lists of Their Works, 64.
28 B
apst, Deux Gentilshommes-Poetes de La Cour de Henry VIII.
21. Jane Boleyn (née Parker) – History's Scapegoat
I once saw a Tumblr "confession" which said "Jane Parker deserved her execution more than any woman Henry VIII put to the block". Many people seem to agree with that sentiment. She's seen as the devil incarnate, a jealous and spiteful woman who was implicated in the deaths of her husband and two queens. Not a week goes by when I don't read a comment online suggesting that Jane Boleyn got "what was coming to her" when she was executed in February 1542, that it was karma and that she got her just desserts. But where does this view come from?
Well, let's take a look first at the Jane Boleyn of popular culture: Philippa Gregory's The Other Boleyn Girl and The Boleyn Inheritance, and The Tudors TV series.
Jane of The Other Boleyn Girl
As I said in my chapter on George, Jane is referred to as a "monster" and Gregory writes of her "avaricious desire for scandal".1 George and his sisters hate her and the way she snoops around. The name "nosy parker" fits her well because she listens at doors and looks through keyholes. She is drawn to gossip "like a buzzard to carrion", and is always the first to know things and pass them on to others. The Jane of Gregory's novels is also the woman who betrays her husband and her sister-in-law by giving evidence against them in May 1536. The "despised" wife gets her own back on the Boleyns who made fun of her.
In The Boleyn Inheritance,2 which tells Jane's story after the fall of the Boleyns, she brings down another queen. She is used by the plotting Duke of Norfolk, who wants Jane to gather evidence against Anne of Cleves, Henry VIII's new queen. The Duke reminds Jane how she has played the traitor before and so she signs a statement regarding Anne of Cleves. In the false statement, she tells that, although she and the other ladies advised Anne on sexual matters, Anne didn't want to know; it appears to be all Anne's fault that the King could not consummate their marriage.
The Anne Boleyn Collection II: Anne Boleyn & the Boleyn Family Page 22
