#i'm just as tired of people in history who have a fair amount of suggestion of being aroace being broadly assumed gay

[aceredshirt13]

gang i have to share this P. G. Wodehouse quote with you all because ever since I found it I can't stop thinking about it. it's from a letter he wrote when he was 78 years old to his friend Guy Bolton (many thanks to P. G. Wodehouse: A Life in Letters)

I have been on the sick list myself, but am better now. Inflamed bladder or chill on the bladder or something, the symptoms being agony when I passed water, as the expression is. It brought back the brave old days when I used to get clap.

he really said "yeah the pain from my bladder issue reminds of the days when I used to have so much sex I repeatedly got venereal disease"

[fideidefenswhore]

🔥 Jane Seymour’s and Henry’s relationship.

Bad. 

The ‘good’ is limited to him asking for ‘fat quails’ for her while she was with child , allowing her some very limited charity during the same (all religious institutions that he nevertheless closed within a few years), and, (this might be a stretch), saying “it is thought we should not go further than 60 miles from her” during the same (except that ‘it is thought’ sounds rather like medical advice) . 

Ill-omened, almost? I know AB was not exactly popular, but it's miles and miles and miles of interesting to me that Tudors S2 portrays a failed assasination that actually ends up killing a yeoman during her coronation, when it was pageants for Jane the week of her official announcement as Queen that featured a literal accidental death case.

But that's just an aside. I'm tired enough of the 'you just think that because you're an AB stan' when it's like...no? I think that because of all the evidence. I'm a very analytical person, and once I've laid out all the evidence in a list, I draw my conclusions from that. To say ‘we can’t know’ because we only have a year of evidence seems like a cop-out to me, honestly... a) I think a year is enough to parse the true nature of a relationship, b) there actually is a fair amount of evidence that speaks to what this relationship was like, it just doesn’t paint a rosy picture (mainly, due to his lack of regard for her).

Considering she was Queen, it is quite instructive that Elizabeth Seymour asks Cromwell to intercede for her (even going so far as to write “I am the bolder to sue herein, and will sue to no other” ), not her sister, and that Mary asks Cromwell to intercede for her, not her “dearest mother” (both, in matters of finances). It suggests that Jane had little to no pull with Henry. 

I don't pay attention to material goods when assessing a royal marriage so much unless there seems a stark difference between a queen and her predecessor. With very few exceptions, all queens were materially taken care of, I have no doubts that Jane ever wanted (materially) for anything as Queen, I'm sure she had a sumptuous wardrobe, etc. That doesn't mean shit to me. There is so much more to how someone is treated by their spouse. This? Was a shit-show.

I am also, since this unpopular opinions meme, sick to death of this relationship being airbrushed because oh, *clutches heart* but he revered her memory! Jane did not get to experience much, if any, of that reverence in life. How he 'revered her memory’ is irrelevant outside of the dynastic image he wanted to present. History ‘fridged’ her, but history enthusiasts continue that by engaging in all the stereotypes that go along with that phenomenon.

I will preface this list with the caveats that probably most of my mutuals know, that ambassadors were not always reliable, that they were often playing the telephone game, that Cromwell (the secondary source for many of these I'm about to list) was a rather slippery figure, certainly not incapable of lying. However, I'm going to add that so many of these are corroborated by multiple sources, and that by the law of averages, at least some of them must have been true. Furthermore, that his insults towards her even passed to these ears in the first place suggests that they were given with an audience, and that humiliating her was thus not an issue or consideration for Henry. Even if only a few of these are true, it is a few too many.

I hear that, even before the arrest of the Concubine, the King, speaking with Mistress Jane Semel of their future marriage, the latter suggested that the Princess should be replaced in her former position; and the King told her she was a fool

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 people speak variously of the King; and it will not pacify the world when it is known what has passed and is passing between him and Mrs. Jane Semel��[...] for he has been going about banqueting with ladies

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After speaking to the Queen, the King, who had been talking to the other ladies, approached, and wished to excuse her, saying I was the first ambassador to whom she had spoken, and she was not accustomed to it (1)

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and the matter [against the Princess Mary] proceeded so far that, in spite of the prayers of this Queen, which he rudely repulsed, the King called the judges to proceed according to law to the inquest and first sentence which is given in the absence of the parties.

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The coronation of this Queen has been delayed till after Michaelmas. Suspicious persons think it is to see if she shall be with child; and, if not, and there is danger of her being barren, occasion may be found to take another. I am told on good authority that this King will not have the prize of those who do not repent in marriage; for within eight days after publication of his marriage, having twice met two beautiful young ladies, he said and showed himself somewhat sorry that he had not seen them before he was married.

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When the secretary came to [the King] with letters from the Signory addressed to him and the Queen in congratulation on their marriage, he was rewarded for his pains with reproaches, the King telling him [....] that the Venetians were very boastful, and were not Christians but worse than infidels [....] though all this was said in laughter, still the secretary did not take it well, and desired to know the cause which moved the King to break out in such a manner, but he could get no answer. (2)

I’ll finally add commentary for this one, I think most of these speak for themselves, but this is a very odd response to a foreign dignitary congratulating a king on his marriage. I never see this covered in Tudor books, either. 

(These-- (1) and (2) are the only records of response we have from Henry on the congratulations, and on both accounts-- 1) ushering her away, 2) berating the congratulator, they’re strange AF

Also, that Jane never had an audience with this secretary, given the sequential nature of events, it seems like Henry did not like the prospect of her speaking to another representative after he thought she had gone to far politically with Chapuys. Compare it to three years prior:

On the 21st received the Signory's missives of the 24th May. Had audience of the King this morning and thanked him for the love he bears the State, and did the like by the Queen, who said she knew that God had inspired his Majesty to marry her, and that he could have found a greater personage than herself, but not one more anxious and ready to demonstrate her love towards the Signory.)

Anyway, back to the timeline:

On leaving the company I took Cromwell apart, who assured me [...] the King had lately told him [...] he doubted whether he should have any child by the Queen

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The Queen's coronation which was to have taken place at the end of this month is put off till next summer, and some doubt it will not take place at all.  There is no appearance that she will have children. The delay of the coronation will do no harm except that the coming of the Princess to Court is put off till it takes place

Well, Mary came to Court in October and later December, and, if memory serves, after that in limited capacities. All were before any coronation, so if this was the reason given to Chapuys for the delay of Mary coming to court, it seems he was being lied to (by Cromwell? Henry himself? another of his informants? who can say/history’s mysteries), or lying himself, or this was his ‘best guess’ (but it does suggest that Mary was maybe promised she would come to Court earlier, which ties in with how often she writes that she wishes to hear of her father and stepmother, letters about how long it’s been since she's seen them last /heard from them...again, the ‘reconciliation’ seems very superficial, all things considered)

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At the beginning of the insurrection the Queen threw herself on her knees before the King and begged him to restore the abbeys, but he told her, prudently enough, to get up, and he had often told her not to meddle with his affairs, referring to the late Queen, which was enough to frighten a woman who is not very secure. (1A)

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The King and the Queen are in good health

Innocuous, yes? Well, it’s almost never ‘the king and queen are merry’, except at Christmas, and 2), while Jane is with child, and 3) the same. Worth note. 

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Hears the queen of England said to the King that perhaps God permitted this rebellion for ruining so many churches; to which he replied by telling her to attend to other things, reminding her that the last Queen had died in consequence of meddling too much with State affairs. (1B)

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Is told that there shall be a parliament at York and the Queen shall be crowned there.

Yeah, I don’t seen this brought up much (except in that horrific Ray Winstone miniseries/film [?]), but if Jane truly did sympathize with the rebels, this is particularly heinous; she was either asked to lie flatout to pacify the malcontents or lied to herself for that purpose, and its eventual--bloody--result. 

Promised to Aske himself:

The King is gracious sovereign lord to me and has affirmed his liberal pardon to all the North, by mouth. For further news: his grace has despatched the duke of Norfolk northwards and intends to hold Parliament and have the Queen crowned at York

Proclaimed, by Aske himself, to English subjects:

His Grace, for the love he bears to this country, intends to keep Parliament at York and have the Queen crowned there.

And by others, believing:

Parliament and Convocation are appointed to be at York at Whitsuntide and the coronation of the Queen the same time

And maybe Jane herself believed. Starkey believes she was knowingly complicit in the "fair words and deceit” against those that were soon to be arrested for their part in the uprising, but given that this comes after she had been warned not to ‘meddle’ in political affairs, I doubt that confidence would have been shared by Henry. 

and has pondered your petitions and intends to hold Parliament over them at York and to have the Queen crowned, as his Grace declared by mouth to me.

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I marvel that you assemble the commons, seeing the King's own mouth declared to Robert Aske how he intended to keep Parliament and the coronation of the Queen at York

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Seeing what the ambassador in England writes of the unlikelihood of the King having children by the present queen [...]

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Md. to entreat my lord of Rutland to get the Queen to sue to the King for my life, that I may all my life lament my offences and serve God.

My son Marmaduke to labour to lord Beauchamp to intercede with the Queen for my life.

Robert Constable, who wrote the above, was executed one month later. 

Besides this, Henry seems to have been living in separate households for several months before, and then throughout, her confinement? Which is strange, I don’t know what the explanation could be for that. He said he would be in Windsor with her in October [1537], and it seems he was. Skidmore said we should not ‘judge him too harshly’ for saying that if Jane didn’t recover in [x] amount of days he was going to leave, and if she did recover, he was going to leave, but, ah...I do and I shall.

There is some skepticism that the coronation was deliberately delayed, excuses given, etc. Yet this was not only the contemporary belief, but the belief sworn 20+ years later, “I take to witness Christ, Who shall judge the quick and the dead, that I am about to speak the truth:

Some days afterwards, when the landlord returned from the Court, before anyone asked him a question he called out with a loud voice, 'I have news to tell you.' The guests anxiously waited to know what he had to say, whereupon he added, that within a few days the King would be betrothed and shortly afterwards would be married, but without any state, in the presence of the Councillors only; for he wished to delay the coronation of his new spouse until he should see whether she would give birth to a boy.

She also, who succeeded your mother, and who gave an heir male to the King, died, (as I have before mentioned) in childbirth. As she was near her last breath she was crowned  ”

There’s no contemporary report that affirms the last, but God, if it’s true, that that was his last act towards her in life, really speaks volumes to the nature of their relationship.