#era: 16th century

[about-suffering]

Bathers at San Niccolò, 1600 Domenico Passignano [Domenico Cresti] (1559-1638)

[melpomeneprose]

send me  ‘🃏 !’  and i’ll write you a starter using a tarot card as the inspiration

Anne Boleyn for visiting v: phoenix queen Relta?

From here. / @joyfulmagic

The Magician - Upright: power, influence, resourcefulness, intellect, and skill. Reversed: a warning to be careful and 'mind where you step or step on.'

Admittedly Lady Anne B.oleyn hadn't been in England long, still, somehow she got H.enry the E.ighth's attention. Almost without saying a word. It would be tedious if it didn't benefit her and her family. She's made her way to court with her sister, Mary. Hoping at least one B.oleyn girl would have some staying power. Silently, Anne thinks, 'Is it not enough? The man is married, I bear Catherine of Aragon no ill will, I am merely a reformed P.rotestant, and he does have my sister and several others already.' but Anne doesn't voice such words, it would only get her in more trouble with her father.

She was new at court, as new as one educated keenly at French Court could be and already Catalina saw her as a challenge. Was her summons so much to bear? Well, she's determined to make this difficult. She will be no mistress.

Anne had almost gotten lost in her train of thought when I bright haired woman approached, she seemed respectable enough, though really -- respectability be damned. At French court she was taught to be memorable.

"Bonsoir, Madam, I am Lady Anne B.oleyn, at your service, a pleasure to make your acquaintance."

[fashionsfromhistory]

Jacket

1590-1630

Great Britain

This simple unlined jacket represents an informal style of clothing worn by women in the early 17th century. Unlike more fitted waistcoats, this loose, unshaped jacket may have been worn during pregnancy. A repeating pattern of curving scrolls covers the linen from which spring sweet peas, oak leaves, acorns, columbine, lilies, pansies, borage, hawthorn, strawberries and honeysuckle embroidered in coloured silks, silver and silver-gilt threads. The embroidery stitches include chain, stem, satin, dot and double-plait stitch, as well as knots and couching of the metal threads. Sleeves and sides are embroidered together with an insertion stitch in two shades of green instead of a conventionally sewn seam. Although exquisitely worked, this jacket is crudely cut from a single layer of linen, indicating the work of a seamstress or embroiderer, someone without a tailor's training. It has no cuffs, collar or lining, and the sleeves are cut in one piece. The jacket was later altered to fit a thinner person. The sleeves were taken off, the armholes re-shaped, the sides cut down, and the sleeves set in again.

The Victoria & Albert Museum (Accession number: 919-1873)

[jamesfrain]

Wolf Hall + Art Anne of Cleves by Bartholomaeus Bruyn the elder

The portrait was purchased in c.1734 by the then President and major benefactor of St John’s, William Holmes, for his private collection, and then acquired for the College by his successor as President, William Derham, in 1748. The sitter was only identified in print as Anne of Cleves as late as 1855, in J. W. Burgon’s Arms of the Colleges of Oxford. The date and authorship of the painting long remained debatable. Following major conservation work on the portrait in 1989/90, the conservator Candy Kuhl and the then Keeper of Pictures at St John’s, Professor Peter Hacker, persuasively argued in the Burlington Magazine for the date in the 1530s at the court of Cleves, before Anne came to England to marry Henry. (source)

link (wolf hall + art series)

thanks to @english-history-trip to point it out.

[melpomeneprose]

It is rather unfair, Lady Anne Boleyn thinks... bitterly, that she has been put in such a position, given such a proposition, largely against her will, or the current Queen's. For, despite what the gossip rag says, she respects her majesty she waits on immensely, still, the world is cruel and ironic and one must survive through cunning and occasional cruelty. Boleyn is exercising remarkable restraint at this moment. An easier more floozy of a woman would bend by now. But she is not. In England everything is an exchange, she will have hers... one way or another. She listens, the entire time, running equations in her head, thinking tirelessly of what exactly to say.

"I am sorry for your loss, Your Majesty," Anne said. she doesn't add, and Catherine's.

"But, I still won't be your mistress."

Open Starter — Muse: King Henry VIII — Verse: Young King — Open To: Historical muses

“I see the ghost of the ruler Arthur would have been, and I just try to make him proud,” the King confessed, “he was my big brother, even if we weren’t the closest. I want to know the Tudors that came before me approve of how my reign is going.”

He sighed, the ‘ghost’ being a metaphor for his guilt for being the son that survived, the burden of being second choice for king, second choice for Catherine…or so he feared. The competitive man Henry was did not sit well with being second in anything, and sought to prove himself the most successful king in England’s history.

[elephantlovemedleys]

Elizabeth + Robert Dudley's bear and ragged staff emblem chain ELIZABETH (1998) dir. SHEKHAR KAPUR

[jaehaeryshater]

England’s Pearl and Their Beloved Queen

Mary I and Katherine of Aragon by @francy-sketches

Guys. I have not been so excited for a commission in my life. I know it’s not ASOIAF so definitely not as anticipated among my friends, but it’s just so well done. I adore Katherine and Mary and this turned out so beautifully. I cannot sing Francy’s praises high enough; after the initial reference pictures I sent her, I did not need to correct anything at all, she completely got the vision.

As anyone who has ever encountered me before will have known, I am incredibly particular about commissions and therefore very involved. I usually like to give pieces I pay for extra thought and historical authenticity. For this piece, I went and looked for available quotes and contemporary accounts of Katherine’s fashion choices. I wanted to make sure from the base of the dress (the farthingale underneath) to the jewelry were all as accurate as was reasonably possible. I did even learn a thing or two, despite my initial intention of just checking to make sure everything I had previously believed was true. For example, I learned that Katherine sometimes wore a flemish hood, which I wouldn’t have thought that would align with her fashion sense; I was proven wrong. I have seen practically all the artworks available to the public that have been confirmed to be Katherine, so I had already guessed black was her favorite color to wear. But I did learn that her other favorites were purple and red. I decided to keep it simple with the black. It’s elegant and regal, black was an expensive color but still is not obnoxiously ostentatious. The jewels around her neckline as taken directly from portraits of her. The pearls seem a mainstay for her, but I did learn that her dresses had many other colored jewels tied into them. I just thought black looked the best. Her dresses were fur-lined, although I would definitely say we took some liberties on what the fur looked. The fur she wore was pretty much exclusively ermine. The sleeves also have true gold, which Spanish royalty traditionally loved (for hundreds of years, by this point, at least). Katherine’s Spanish outfits, of which she had many, definitely collected dust in favor of more traditional English outfits. There’s no indication that she was forced into this, as she did sometimes dress in the Spanish style when it struck her fancy, but it was important for her to present herself as English with English loyalties and priorities in mind. That being said, something as innocuous as gold embroidery, which was not completely foreign to the English court, was definitely something she could implement from back home without seeming like a foreigner. I have pomegranate embroidery on her sleeves, which is more of symbolism rather than something accurate. There’s no proof she ever wore pomegranate embroidery on her sleeve, but her official symbol was of a pomegranate, so I figure that was something important to her.

Katherine’s necklace is obviously a direct copy of the necklace she wears in several of the contemporary artworks depicting. This is pure speculation, but I personally believe that this necklace could have come from old English jewels that had been melted down and repurposed for her. Generally, people weren’t as sentimental in the same way we are today, nor worried about these aspects of preservation, so jewels were melted down and used for other purposes all the time. She also usually wore many strings of pearls, but it just would have looked like too much and would take away from the piece overall, so we decided just to do the necklace. Her gabled hood is also directly taken from her contemporary portraits, the gold and black with the red jewels was what she usually wore. She has a girdle belt with a long string of pearls. Sometimes she would wear a cross at the end or some black jewels that matched her necklace. What’s depicted in this is actually a pomander that turns into a rudimentary clock when it is opened. Katherine is recorded as having one of these; I thought that was very cool. I also asked for her to have some rings. She did have a wedding ring, but I found no description of it, so the artist just did basic gold. She’s wearing two which I think is pretty funny considering she was married twice, of course she wouldn’t have worn two wedding rings, but imagine if she did have the audacity to. Katherine had so much jewelry, more than any of Henry VIII’s wives. She had the royal collection available to her, pieces from Spain, and gifts from Henry specifically made for her. She usually decked herself out as expensively as possible.

Unfortunately, there is basically no information on how Mary dressed as a child. We know her mother dressed her and was having the clothes ordered herself, but beyond that, there’s really nothing available that I could find. I felt that Mary would be dressed similarly to her mother, but I wanted to give her a purple dress because purple fabric was generally the most expensive thing you could buy. I wanted to illustrate how loved and well taken care of she was. She has matching rings with her mother, but no girdle belt or necklace because I’m envisioning her as being 6-9 in this, so I wanted to give her something she could play in. She’s wearing a French hood. Katherine ordered her one in 1520, when she was four. My references on how hers should look is from portraits of her aunts Mary and Juana. I felt that Katherine would probably want to buy a style she was familiar with. Mary’s embroidery is of the Tudor rose. It turned out so beautifully. Similarly to Katherine, there’s no evidence that she actually wore that embroidery, but I wanted some symbolism in there.

My intention with this piece was to show the closeness between Katherine and Mary. Katherine loved Mary with all her heart and showed no outward indication of disappointment that Mary was a girl. She spent more time with Mary than any other highborn individual in this time period that I know of. I wanted to show that Katherine is someone that Mary deeply and completely trusted, even when court could be over the top and crowded, frightening for a child. I feel as if people other themselves from people in the past. People often feel as if people 500 years ago did not care as deeply about their children or weren’t attached to them. I believe this is true in some instances, but generally we are more like the people of the past than we like the believe. As far as any research I’ve done has shown, Katherine loved Mary as much as any mother of our time loves her children.

I believe Francy did a beautiful job, so all compliments go to her, I hope everyone checks out her page to see her amazing work. The caliber of this is unlike the commissions I’ve done in the past. I cannot thank her enough.

I hope this ended up being relatively historically accurate, I’m sure someone will let me know if it’s not haha.

[cy-lindric]

La Reine Margot - Charles IX, Henri de Navarre, and Marguerite de Valois

I.III - Un roi poète

I.XXXI - La Chasse à Courre

II.IV - La Nuit des Rois

[pencake07]

Sooo I watched the spider-verse movie and because I'm me I had to draw a historically inspired spiderperson :)

[wolfhalledits]

Thomas Cromwell Introduction Scene.

WOLF HALL | S01E01 'Three Card Trick'

+bonus:

[the-tvdors]

"Why should that surprise you, Henry? You have not always been kind to her. I have wept so often to see her alone, abandoned by her father."

JONATHAN RHYS MEYERS and MARIA DOYLE KENNEDY as HENRY VIII and KATHERINE OF ARAGON The Tudors | 'Death of a Monarchy' — S03E10

[about-suffering]

Hunters in the Snow (Winter) [Jagers in de Sneeuw], 1565 Pieter Bruegel the Elder (c. 1525/30-1569)

[melpomeneprose]

“you clearly needed help.”

henry tudor, duke of cornwall for anne of cleves

@officerwaltons

Anna thought for a moment. Were she permitted a policy of truth, as her Christianity so often demanded. She’d question why she was here. What with Henry VIII’s four children. Two sons. Two daughters. Elizabeth, Mary, Edward and Henry Tudor. All of whom had taken her as a stepmother so well. She only prayed the King’s firstborn legitimate son didn’t know that she was soon to be but a ‘beloved sister’ to his majesty, Henry VIII.

Still, she had indeed needed help. It’d be wrong to deny as much. She knew, of course, why she was here at all. At least initially. She was to bare the King more sons. Secure the Tudor line. After all, the War of the Roses had happened a mere fifty years before. All because the English royals couldn’t act accordingly and the line of succession was unclear. That and some unlucky children died young. It was a fact of life. Anna had survived to 24. But her mother had lost at least two babies before her and Amelia, and her brother, the now Duke of Cleves.

“I… thank you, my Lord,” Anna managed awkwardly.

She had no interest in baring sons and the acts it required and she much preferred the soft touch of women. An aunt perhaps, but not a mother. A flirt, in words, but not a lady of Greensleeves.

“Should you and your siblings need anything, I am here, you know. I don’t intend to leave England. Despite the ‘divorce’, I should know. I won’t be denied my dues and payment. I love your father, as a sister protects her brother. But as marriages go. Declare me but a well-to-do titled spinster! I fancy myself a Pallas Athena, or better still, Artemis of the hunt!”

[fashionsfromhistory]

Miniature English Great Room of the Late Tudor Period, 1550-1603

Narcissa Niblack Thorne & Unknown Artisans

c.1937

Art Institute of Chicago (Reference Number: 1941.1186)

[jamesfrain]

Lilit Lesser as Lady Mary Tudor Wolf Hall: The Mirror and The Light | Episode one 'Wreckage'

[etherealyearning]

Hardwick Hall