Of my defence,
Toward my death I drive.
Heartless, alas, what man
May long endure?
Alas, how live I then?
Since no rescue
May me assure,
My life I may well ban.
Thus, doth my torment go
In deadly dread.
Alas, who might live so,
Alive as dead,
Alive to lead
A deadly life in woe?
Days passed as if I lay in deepest fog. I cannot even remember food or drink passing my lips. My only next, clear memory is of my father, when he arrived in my prison cell, coming through my dungeon door as if frightened of what he would find within. Without a word, my father took me in his arms and there I cried… I cried until there were no tears left for me to cry. Anne once said that it was her heart that wept… my heart… this heart breaking afresh with every beat with grief… It hurt so much, aye, my heart hurt so much that every living moment was an agony.
At length, my father gently shook me, saying as he did so: “Come on, Tom, I know… Oh, my poor boy, I know, but my lad, there is nothing more we can do for them. Let us get your things together.”
He went from me, and began gathering up some of my possessions. He turned to face me, speaking each word slowly as if he doubted my full understanding.
“I have come to take you home, my son.”
In due course, he was able to escort me out of the Bell Tower, back into the world I had left what seemed to me so very long ago. Indeed, it felt to me as if an eternity had passed since the day of my arrest.
*
The mirror in my chamber tells me that I am an old man now. My once dark hair is thick with grey. Lines, not there before, bite deep into my face. Yea, all youth has flown from me. Anne, George, and my dead friends have all taken it with them.
I know what I saw from out the grate of my prison’s cell will remain with me until the day I die. Day and night the smell and vision of blood comes to sicken me. Day and night my aching heart, lying bleeding and broken in my chest, reminds me of all that I have lost. Especially of my loss of Anna. Yea, especially my loss of the woman I loved.
Anne. My beloved Anna. You, Anna, haunt me.
Yesterday, I looked into my bedroom’s mirror and it seemed to me that I could see you. Aye, see you, Anna! There you stood, clearly there behind me, your hair unloosed, its fine, ebony tresses streaming down your back, smiling as only you could smile. Then you beckoned to me, and I turned swiftly to find myself yet alone.
It was the same when I sat by the evening fire. The red and gold embers revealed to me your laughing face. I think I go mad with grief. Anne… Anna… My dark Lady love. ’Tis all finished.
Farewell my lute,
this is the last
Labour that thou and I shall waste,
For ended is what we began,
Now is the song both sung and past.
My lute be still, for I have done.
CONTENTS
* * *
References
I have put the books used as references for this novel in categories; for example, books used in relation to Anne Boleyn will be grouped simply under the title ANNE BOLEYN, and so forth.
ANNE BOLEYN
Antonia Fraser, The six wives of Henry VIII, Arrow Books, 1998
Retha M. Warnicke, The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge, 1989
E.W. Ives, Anne Boleyn, Basil Blackwell, U.K., 1986
Hester Chapman, The Challenge of Anne Boleyn, U.S.A., 1974
Marie Louise Bruce, Anne Boleyn, Collins, London, 1972
Norah Loft, Anne Boleyn, G.B., 1979
J. Ridley, The life and times of Mary Tudor, G. Weiden Field and Nicholson, 1973
J.J. Scarisbrick, Henry the Eighth, University Press, Berkley & Los Angeles, 1968
Francis Hackett, Henry the Eighth, The Reprint society, this Edition, 1946
Robert Lacey, The life and times of Henry VIII, General Editor: Antonia Fraser, George Weidenfeld and Nicolson and Book Club, London, 1972
Neville Williams, Elizabeth I, Cardinal; London, 1975
Jasper Ridley, Statesman and Saint, Viking Press, N.Y., 1982
Alison Weir, Henry VIII, King and Court, Random House, 2001
SIR THOMAS WYATT
Kenneth Muir, Life and letters of Sir Thomas Wyatt, Liverpool University Press, Liverpool, 1963
Patricia Thompson, Wyatt, the critical heritage, Routledge and K. Paul, Publishers, London, 1974
Stephen Merriam Foley, Sir Thomas Wyatt, Twayne Publishers, Boston, 1990
Collected Poems of Thomas Wyatt, edited by Kenneth Muir, Routledge & Kegan Paul, London and Henley, 1949
Patricia Thompson, Sir Thomas Wyatt and his background, Routledge and Kegan Paul, London, 1964.
General editor: Christopher Ricks, Sir Thomas Wyatt, the complete Poems, Penguin books, 1978.
Lisle Letters, edited by Muriel St. Clare Byrne, selected and arranged by Bridget Boland, The Folio Press, London, 1983
ROME (1523–1528)
Benvenuto Cellini, The Autobiography of Benvenuto Cellini, translated and with an introduction by George Bull, Penguin Books, 1956
Hugh Ross Williamson, Catherine de’ Medici, The Viking Press, N.Y., 1973
Christopher Hollis, The Papacy, Weidenfeld and Nicolson, London, 1964
Andre Chastel, The Sack of Rome, 1527, Translated from the French by Beth Archer; The A.W. Mellon Lectures in fine Arts, U.K.,1983
Christopher Hibbert, Rome; the biography of a city, Penguin books, 1985
TUDOR ENGLAND
Roger Hart, English life in Tudor times, Wayland Publishers, London, 1972
FRANCE
Desmond Seward, Prince of the Renaissance, Constable and Company, London, 1973
MISCELLANEOUS
W.D. Rouse, translator, Great Dialogues of Plato, The New American Library, New York, 1956
CONTENTS
* * *
Author’s Note
It is well known to people interested in this period that it is likely Sir Thomas Wyatt the Elder wooed Anne Boleyn during her first years at court. It also has been suggested that Sir Thomas wrote some of his best love poetry for her. This suggestion cried out loudly to my imagination, and I believed for a long time before beginning this novel that his poem “Dear heart, how like you this?” would make a good basis for an intriguing book.
There is a story that Wyatt told the King at a Privy Council meeting “the truth” regarding his relationship with Anne Boleyn, saying that the King could not marry a woman who had already been bedded by one of the King’s Servants—meaning Wyatt himself.(i)
As Wyatt was an Esquire to the body of Henry VIII, I find it hard to believe he would have been so foolish as to make such a confession. Indeed, surely this would have meant that Thomas would have been one of the men to be executed along with Anne in 1536 when the King finally convinced himself that his grand passion was the result of some type of witchcraft. Remember, one of the men (Francis Dereham) to be executed with Catherine Howard was a lover she had prior to her marriage to Henry the Eighth.
Despite my efforts to respect documented history whenever possible, I do not claim that my novel is a true interpretation of events as they happened, rather I have shaped my fictional love story around these events, a fictional love story based on people who were once flesh and blood. Herodotus wrote (many, many long centuries ago): “Many things do not happen as they ought; most things do not happen at all. It is for the conscientious historian to correct these defects.” Historians in those ancient times had a much easier employment than do our present day historians! Let me just say here that I have not written this book as an historian, but simply as a conscientious writer.
Nevertheless, these following facts are safely documented and helped give me a structure to flesh my imaginings around: Anne and Thomas did form some sort of strong bond at an early stage in their lives. Indeed, some of Anne
’s last thoughts had to do with Tom. This, I believe, one can safely assume, since at her execution she passed to one of the women assisting, her own treasured prayer book,which was to be given to Tom after her death.(ii) Anne and her brother George did have an especially close relationship but, like the Thomas Wyatt I have created, I do not accept incest ever came into it. Rather it was a relationship strengthened by common loves and interests.
Wyatt was imprisoned in 1536, during the same month that saw the arrest of Anne and her alleged lovers. Some historians even claim that his arrest took place the day after the arrest of Anne. The Lisle Papers, a series of documents written by people who lived during this period, make a strong insinuation that his arrest was the result of his involvement with the Queen. Furthermore, a letter written by John Husee to the Viscount Lisle seems to imply that Husee had high expectations that Thomas’ execution would shortly follow the others.(iii) Thomas himself said five years later, when he was again arrested, this earlier imprisonment had been due to the interference of the Duke of Suffolk, the brother-in-law of Henry the Eighth and described as the King’s “alter ego.”(iv)
As a writer, it is interesting to speculate on the reasons behind these arrests; obviously there was little love lost between the Duke and Wyatt.
Finally and not surprisingly, I believe with all my heart in Anne Boleyn’s innocence. Henry the Eighth has a lot to answer for. My works in progress continue to hold him to account.
Notes
(i) Muir (editor); Collected poems of Sir Thomas Wyatt; p. ix
(ii) Patricia Thomson,Wyatt, the critical heritage; p. 47
(iii) Muriel St. Clare Byrne (editor); selected and arranged by Bridget Byrne; Lisle letters; London; 1983; p. 165
(iv) J.J. Scarisbrick; Henry VIII; p. 52.
CONTENTS
* * *
The Age of Anne Boleyn
by Wendy J. Dunn
At time of canvasinge this matter so,
In the courte (newe entred) theare dyd frequent
A fresche young damoysell, that cowld trippe and go,
To synge and to daunce passinge excellent,
No tatches shee lacked of loves allurement;
She cowlde speake Frenche ornately and playne,
Famed in the cowrte (by name) Anne Bullayne
—William Forrest
At the birth of Anne Boleyn, if a seer had predicted her important role on the stage of English History, I feel certain her father, Sir Thomas Boleyn, would have scoffed. Indeed, of all possible futures for this girl-child, it would not seem conceivable that Anne’s destiny lay as a crowned Queen of England, consort of Henry VIII. At best, her father probably thought of a future where one of his daughters, surviving the perils of infancy and childhood of this period, achieved a marriage strengthening Boleyn’s own status at court.
Later Earl of Ormonde and Wiltshire, Thomas Boleyn—or Bullen as the family was known then—was but a knight at the time of Anne’s birth. A son of a man whose own father, Sir Geoffrey Boleyn, stood even lower on the rungs of English society—a self made man who became a Mayor of London and gained an heiress, the daughter of Lord Hoo and Hastings, as his wife (Warnicke 1989, p. 8).
Thomas Boleyn, the ambitious father of Anne Boleyn, continued building upon what his grandfather first built and rarely—that is, until his daughter Anne had the misfortune to miscarry the King’s son in 1536—missed a step to raise his family higher in the Tudor hierarchy. Indeed, Thomas Boleyn had done well enough for himself when he married Lady Elizabeth Howard, a daughter of Thomas, Duke of Howard, head of a prolific family, with bloodlines stretching back to Edward I, through his second marriage to Margaret of France.
At Anne’s birth, Sir Thomas Boleyn—with his daughter’s future as mother to one of England’s best-loved monarchs hidden from him—had no reason to leave documentation about the date of her birth. This being the case, Anne’s birth year, as indeed the place of her birth, is shrouded in the deepest mist of history, and has long been fodder for lively debate amongst Tudor historians. My reason for entering this fray is a belief that the arguments for Anne’s birth in 1507 are much stronger than the other suggested years of 1502, 1501, or, indeed, as early as 1499.
For many historians, the crux of the matter appears to revolve around Anne Boleyn’s sojourn over on the Continent. Thomas Boleyn, using the contacts he made abroad during his time as a successful diplomat, sent Anne first as a fille d’honneur at the court of Margaret, Duchess of Burgundy. After a brief stay in Burgundy, Anne’s father arranged for her to go onto France, perchance to join her sister Mary as attendant to Mary Tudor, the youngest surviving sister of Henry VIII, on her marriage to Louis XII of France.* Because the first sojourn occurred in 1514, historians have argued that Anne Boleyn must have had reached either the age twelve or thirteen, usually the youngest ages considered for a fille d’honneur.
I believe Retha Warwicke, in her Rise and fall of Anne Boleyn, argues a very good case that Anne Boleyn was no more than seven on her arrival at Margaret’s court. Not only does she cite the example of Anne Brandon, six years old in the same time period as Anne Boleyn, placed also in Margaret’s care but in addition she cites a letter from the Regent to Thomas Boleyn. This letter comments how Anne was “so well spoken and so pleasant for her young years” (Warnicke 1989, p. 12).
These words imply that Anne was younger than twelve or thirteen, because it is extremely unlikely that the Regent would have commented on her “young years” if Anne had neared or reached her teenage years. In this period, though admittedly not a common occurrence, girls of twelve were unlikely to be regarded in their “young years,” as they could be legally wed, as well as have their marriages consummated. There is even a letter that Anne herself wrote to her father, in obviously immature handwriting, during her stay with the Regent, in which Anne blames her mistakes and poor penmanship on the fact that this letter was the first she had written by herself (Warnicke 1989, p. 15). Surely by twelve or thirteen this would not likely be the case.
We also have evidence pointing to what happened to Anne after her arrival in France. That Anne made acquaintance of Renée of France (Warnicke 1989, p. 21), the French Queen’s young sister, born 1510 (Britannica Online 2009), who was still in the Royal nursery, shows us that Anne was not made part of the licentious court of François of France. Rather, because of her extreme youth, Anne spent her first years in France in the nursery of the royal children, at the court of Claude, the Queen and consort of François. Where François’ court had a reputation for “free-living,” if not depravity, his wife’s court was deemed almost as good as a good convent. A court very suitable for a young, gently-bred girl, especially if she is to be returned to her family not as “spoiled goods,” but with all her prospects of achieving a good marriage still in place; that is, her “good name” and virginity still intact.
Another confusion concerning Anne Boleyn is whether she was in fact the elder sister, rather than her evidently more flighty sister, Mary Boleyn. Before Anne’s involvement with the King, Mary briefly became mistress to King Henry VIII—some people from the period believed her son, Henry Carey, to be also the son of the King—perhaps after her marriage to William Carey. The confusion continues even over the timing of Mary’s relationship with the King. Warnicke believes it occurred after her marriage with William Carey (Warnicke 1989, p. 34) while Antonia Fraser states it happened before (Fraser 1992, p. 101). Retha Warnicke also believes Mary to be the younger sister and only twelve at her marriage to William Carey, which I believe unlikely.
Sir Thomas Boleyn’s decision to send Anne rather than Mary to the Duchess of Burgundy seems to offer evidence that Anne was the elder. But not necessarily so. It is possible that Sir Thomas Boleyn realised that his younger daughter, besides her obvious intelligence, had inherited his gift as a linguist—something that would one day be passed down to his grand-daughter, Elizabeth the First. His decision to send Anne rather than Mary to Burgundy could have been simply the result o
f a parent weighing up opportunities for their children, and deciding which child would benefit most from them. It is also possible that Mary may have already displayed characteristics of concern to her father. As an adult, Mary had a reputation for being rather free with her “favors” (Fraser 1992, p. 101), the King of France also remarked about her, per una grandissima ribala et infame sopre tutte.
During the reign of Elizabeth, members of Anne’s own family believed the Queen’s mother to be the younger sister, as shown when Mary Boleyn’s grandson attempted to claim the Earldom of Ormonde through this fact of his grandmother’s seniority. As Fraser comments, this seniority was not contested “although in the reign of Anne Boleyn’s daughter there were plenty who would have done so, if it had been untrue” (Fraser 1992, p. 119) There is another bit of evidence to sway my belief about how young Anne actually was during her time on the Continent. Anne spoke English with a French accent until the day her husband and Thomas Cromwell found a legal way to murder her. An accent natural to our speaking voice is something usually acquired at a young age. That Anne had a French accent on her return to England suggests strongly that she first came to the Continent as a child. Also, the very fact that Anne seemed so “French,” another thing not making her popular, either with the English court or with the common people, implies that she had been away from her family and England during the important character developing years of her childhood. Supporting this view are the words of George Cavendish, loyal gentleman usher of Cardinal Wolsey. Cavendish wrote in his Life and Death of Cardinal Wolsey, “This gentlewoman, Mistress Anne Boleyn, being very young was sent into the realm of France” (Sylvester, R. S., D. P. Harding, et al. 1962, p. 31).
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