#although elizabeth blount's primary biographer has said that she had no court presence after the birth of henry fitzroy suggests a frosty
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fideidefenswhore · 9 months ago
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Had circumstances been just a little different, Anne Boleyn might still have lived. Had she produced a son, Jane would have been a passing distraction, Anne's enemies would have been silenced, and her fiery character might again have seemed, at least at times, beguiling to Henry. During the course of their brief marriage, which lasted just over three years, there had been many fluctuations. After the final miscarriage, Anne fought back, saying she had been frightened by Henry's accident, but also broken-hearted at his paying attention to another woman. This kind of criticism was not something Henry was prepared to tolerate in a wife; one of Katherine's strengths, as she herself acknowledged, was that she had never shown any sign of animosity or distress in response to the king's infidelities. Henry and Anne's relationship had been a genuine love-match, however, and the volatility which helped bring about the extraordinary events of the break with Rome remained a part of their relationship ever after.
Henry VIII, Lucy Wooding
#'never' is doing a lot of heavy lifting/ obfuscating here lol#(it's traditionally thought that she never had harsh words about bessie blount-- and indeed there's no record of this--#although elizabeth blount's primary biographer has said that she had no court presence after the birth of henry fitzroy suggests a frosty#dynamic... just about the elevation of fitzroy#however there's the hastings drama)#also 'her enemies would have been silenced' is overly simplistic#unpopular queens having sons might have reduced overt hostility#but it didn't annihilate it. more realistically might have 'bridled' her enemies#and yet i still find this excerpt compelling so . here we are#lucy wooding#last part of sentence 2 tho...eminently plausible#prior to this storms always melted into sunshine . stormclouds gathered on the horizon and storms began again. then repeat.#and as reviled as the assertion 'genuine love-match' has been as of late. there is evidence which supports it .#would jane have been a passing distraction? again we don't know. their periods of 'royal mistress' (although there needs to be a better ter#maybe...object of king's affections?) are different in that there is only record of anne's in hindsight via cavendish etc#and also in their actions. in 1526 there was no royal watcher that believed the withdrawal of one of the queen's ladies was significant#in 1536 there was one who believed jane's meetings with henry were highly significant and they proved to be...#altho as wooding underlines here they proved to be mainly due to circumstance#it's not to say there weren't discussions behind closed doors of anne becoming queen among the boleyns circa 1526. but they were not known#and wouldn't have been guessed due to lack of precedent
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