Since the sixteenth century, Queen Anne Boleyn of England has fascinated people. But time can sometimes blur the lines between what is fact and fiction, creating countless myths about this infamous woman.

By Gisele Eme – 10th grade.

Anne Boleyn’s name has been vastly exploited for decades. From historians who painted her as a witch who had seduced her husband, leading him away from his “true” wife, to Hollywood producers who sought to portray a similar image of her so as to provide drama and seductiveness to their project. Most recently, her name was lent to a musical, currently touring North America. This play, Six, is about the wives of Henry VIII. While the title suggests that it focuses on the true lives of each of these women, it only serves to emphasize the one-dimensional image we have of them already. For Anne Boleyn, this means that of an ambitious temptress. The first song contains a brief introduction of each of these queens; for Anne’s, it consists of the lyrics “I broke England from the Church, yeah I’m that sexy. Why did I lose my head? Well my sleeves may be green but my lipstick’s red.” So who was this infamous queen? Was she really the power-hungry home-wrecker history has painted her as? Or was she a pawn used by her family for their gain? 

Anne’s date of birth is unknown, but estimated to be around the year 1500. She was one of three children born to Thomas Boleyn, a wealthy courtier, and Elizabeth Howard, the daughter of one of the country’s leading politicians. Lauren Mckay, a historian, explains that Anne’s father “intended his daughter to become an imposing woman in her own right, poised to take a prominent place at the English court.” It is thanks to his ambition that, in 1513, Anne was given the opportunity to accompany the young Mary Tudor to France, where the English princess would solidify an alliance between the two countries through her marriage to the French king, Louis XII. 

Anne served as Mary’s lady-in-waiting for the duration of her marriage, which was to last only a few months. Instead of returning to her home country, however, Anne remained in France for another seven years as a member of the new French queen’s household. During her stay, she acquired skills such as dancing, singing, playing cards, and holding conversation that would aid her to stand out at the less sophisticated English court. By the time she returned to England in 1520, historian Gareth Russel says she had obtained “chic European glamor and great confidence.”

Around the time Anne was born, a much more important event was going on in England: the arrival of a certain Spanish princess by the name of Catherine of Aragon. Then aged 15, this devout Catholic was promised to the heir to the English throne, Arthur, Prince of Wales. Shortly after her marriage to him however, he died of an illness, generally assumed to be the infamous Sweating Sickness. In 1509, she married again, this time to her deceased husband’s younger brother, the newly crowned Henry VIII. Throughout their nearly 24 year marriage, the couple produced 6 children, only one of whom, a daughter named Mary, would survive to adulthood. Catherine had benefited from an excellent education, and proved to be a competent regent during Henry’s six-month absence in 1513. Already very pious in her youth, Erasmus having described her as a woman “as religious and virtuous as words can express” the spanish-born Queen became increasingly devout as she aged, eventually becoming nearly manic in her following of religious customs. 

Throughout his first marriage, Henry had a slew of mistresses in the hopes of them providing him with a male heir. One of these women was Mary Boleyn, Anne’s sister. It was through her position as the king’s mistress that the Boleyn family became more prominent at court, something which certainly helped Anne join Catherine’s entourage in 1522 upon her return to England. While there is little to no concrete evidence which points out a specific date or event during which Anne managed to catch Henry’s attention, historians speculate that it was around 1526. At that time, the young woman actually fled court, returning to her family home. Many speculate that the reason for this was to try to avoid Henry’s advances, as she could not simply turn him down point blank. As historian Hayley Nolan points aout, this is sadly considered to be “the ultimate example of ‘when a girl says no, she really means yes,”a dated point of view, yet one that still manages to haunt this former Queen. 

The following year, Henry made his first request to the Pope that the latter annul his marriage to Catherine, on the grounds that she had consummated her relationship with Arthur (something which she had denied at the time of her wedding to Henry, and continued to do so until her death). He decided that their lack of sons was due to God’s disapproval of the union, basing this theory off of a section in the Bible which states that a man should not wed his brother’s widow. 

There was, however, a catch to this, which historian Alison Weir explains “Henry VIII relied on Leviticus, which forbade a man to marry his brother’s widow although the ban in Leviticus did not apply when the brother had died childless, as Arthur had.” Because of the weaknesses in his argument, few contemporaries genuinely believed the impatient King’s claims to be true, knowing that they were simply the excuses of a man in want of another woman. Keep in mind, history has a habit of repeating itself…

As Henry’s frustration in his marriage grew, Anne was raised higher and higher in the English peerage. By 1531, she was named Marquess of Pembroke, and was generally accepted as queen in all but name. This was made more or less official when Henry had Anne accompany him to his meeting with the French king the following year. Henry finally brokered a divorce from his Spanish wife in 1533, thanks to the Act of Supremacy, which created the Church of England of which Henry was the head. Anne was generally blamed for this schism, and thus for driving the beloved Catherine of Aragon off her throne. After all, how could the blame fall on their God-anointed King? 

This false assumption caused her to assume power with a very tarnished reputation in the eyes of not only the court, but also of the general population. The following testimony from the Abbot of Whitby, in 1530, accurately describes the world’s general opinion of Anne at the time: “The King’s Grace is ruled by one common stewed whore, Anne Boleyn, who makes all the spirituality to be beggared, and the temporality also.” 

Despite her increasing unpopularity, the couple were quickly married in secret on January 25th of the same year, and she was crowned Queen of England on June 1st, at Westminster Abbey. Historians assume that the reason the union was so quickly established was because Anne had gotten pregnant with their daughter Elizabeth, who would be born on the 7th of September, out of wedlock. The latter’s birth was met with disappointment by Henry, and no doubt great anxiety by Anne, who had promised her husband a son and heir. Though Anne, who was in fact very pious despite her reputation, prayed for the safe delivery of a boy, it was not to be: over the course of the next two years, the ill-fated Queen miscarried two babies, the second of which was documented by the Spanish Ambassador Chapuys, who wrote “[Anne] had an abortion which seemed to be a male child which she had not borne 3½ months, at which the King has shown great distress.” This was to be the beginning of the end for her. 

As historian Maria Dowling states, “Anne was, according to all her panegyrists, outstandingly generous to the poor.” While she reigned, the young mother made an effort to be charitable and benevolent, distributing alms, providing for impoverished widows, and even sewing shirts for the poor. These philanthropic endeavors culminated in her involvement in drafting a bill which had a goal of finding jobs for the homeless. This involved creating a new governing council, one which would effectively go against that led by Cromwell. Until recently, her contribution to the Act for Punishment of Sturdy Vagabonds and Beggars, which, despite its name, did have the noble aim of lowering unemployment and helping the homeless, had gone unnoticed, thus erasing such an interesting part of her life.

Sadly, Henry’s eye had started to drift away from Anne after her failure to produce a son, eventually landing on Jane Seymour, one of Anne’s ladies in waiting. Already, we can see history beginning to repeat itself. This courtier, who had also attended to Catherine of Aragon, was born in 1508 to noble parents. When she caught the King’s eye, she was, as historian David Starkey writes, “demure [and] quiet [woman] without an idea in her head,” and, when contrasted with Catherine and Anne, comparatively uneducated. In other words, this meek, pale courtier was the polar opposite of the mercurial and “swarthy” Queen. 

Her reputation was carefully crafted from the first, painting her as pious, subservient, and chaste. When the King began to eye her, he sent her a letter and a purse of gold. Jane sent the gift back to him and responded by saying that she “had no greater riches in the world than her honor, which she would not injure for a thousand deaths.” Be this a ploy or her genuine reaction, it endeared her to Henry, who had begun to tire of Anne’s passionate temper. The latter caught wind of the situation, resulting in a very tense atmosphere in her chambers. While Anne tried to dismiss Jane from her household, and send her away from court, Henry forbade her from doing so, ensuring that his new pet would be safely under his nose. Ultimately, however, it was Anne who had ensured that she would not simply be another royal mistress; once one got into the business of unmaking queens, it was all too easy for the precedent to continue. 

Anne Boleyn knew her days of glory had ended, her fate sealed with the miscarriage in 1536. Just a few months later, on the second of May, Anne would be arrested on charges of adultery with a number of courtiers, namely Mark Smeaton, Henry Norris, William Brareton, Francis Weston, and her own brother, George Boleyn. She was taken to the Tower of London to await her trial, the verdict having been almost certainly predetermined. Ironically, Anne was kept in the same apartments as she had been three years earlier, as she awaited her coronation. 

She was tried on May 15th, along with her brother. They professed their innocence, and were said to have defended themselves admirably, though in the end, it did them no good. Both of them, along with the four other men who were also accused, were found guilty and condemned to death. Mark Smeaton, a court musician, is the only one who confessed, though it is thought that he did so under torture, which removes some validity from his admission. The men were initially sentenced to being hung, drawn, and quartered, and Anne was to burn at the stake. However, “the King in his mercy” instead declared that they would be beheaded on Tower Green. A specially skilled swordsman was sent from Calais for Anne, as it was thought that this would result in a quicker death than the often boarish axemen typically used in England. 

In the days leading up to her execution, the former Queen kept a calm demeanor, with the constable of the tower noting that “this lady has much joy in death.” Her confessor came on the morning of her death to administer final rites, and hear her last confession. During this last part, she swore on her eternal soul that she was innocent of the charges laid against her. When it was finally time for her to make her way to the scaffold, her courage prevailed, and she delivered a final speech to the spectators. She declared her devotion to the King and swore that to her he had always been “a kind, a gentle, and sovereign lord.” 

This was probably done with the intention of protecting her daughter, and attempting to keep her in the King’s favor. After asking the crowd to pray for her, she knelt on the platform and died quickly, without any pain. On May 19th, the canons rang out to announce the death of a Queen of England. And perhaps the arrival of a new one, as Jane Seymour picked out her wedding dress on the same day. A week and a half later, she was married to Henry. 

Anne’s true character died with her, leaving room for salacious rumors to perpetuate. While much of this slander has been sadly accepted as true, it is easy to doubt whether or not they accurately reflect this revolutionary woman. After all, many contemporary descriptions of her stem from the Spanish Ambassador to England, Eustace Chapuys, an ardent Catholic and dedicated ally of Catherine of Aragon; hardly an unbiased judge. And the myth that Anne had a sixth finger? It was created by a Catholic man during her daughter’s reign, who sought to discredit his Protestant Queen, and remove her from the throne. His way of doing this was by attacking Elizabeth’s legitimacy, through making her mother sound like a devilish witch. 

Even beyond this however, there is a great deal of evidence that proves that her reputation as an adulteress at least was entirely fictitious. Henry simply had tired of her, and fancied Jane instead. As he had already annulled his union to Catherine based on claims that were weak at best, he needed a concrete reason to be able to invalidate his and Anne’s marriage while still maintaining a good reputation. 

The issue was that he became slightly too eager; the charges became nearly laughable. While accusing one high-ranking courtier might have been believable, Henry chose five men, one of which was her own brother! Queens were consistently surrounded by an entourage, which would have made conducting any affair difficult, but nearly impossible with five men. Another fact that disproves this was that even Anne’s friends admitted that she was haughty, which makes her supposed relationship with the untitled Mark Smeaton highly unlikely. But perhaps the most convincing factor in all of this is her confession. Anne was very religious, as was almost any person at the time, and thus would not have risked burning in Hell for eternity simply to preserve her reputation. 

It is easier for us to place people into categories, instead of acknowledging nuance. Sandwiched between the popular and obsessively pious Catherine, whose motto was “Humble And Loyal,” and the submissive and obedient Jane, who bore Henry his long-awaited son and took “Bound To Obey And Serve” as her motto, it is easy to see how “The Most Happy” fell into the role as capricious home-wrecker. Considering all this, it is up to you. Was she a conniving seductress who bewitched the King into making her Queen? Or was she an ambitious young woman who was pushed to impossible heights by her family, only to lose her head at the end, a victim in the deadly game of court intrigue?