Damian Lewis fans line up for Wolf Hall tonight

[Travelledtheworld]

Wednesday 21st January BBC2 Channel 4

lush costumes.

www.telegraph.co.uk/culture/tvandradio/bbc/11358197/Damian-Lewiss-inspiration-for-Wolf-Halls-Henry-VIII-Wills-and-Harry.html

That's one of the Pastons, isn't it, Jeanne?

It's funny how our understanding of 'traditional' marriage and weddings in England is actually entirely shaped by the 1751 (? - on phone so can't check) Marriage Act.

Yes, it is.

It is funny, isn't it? I love how much ambiguity there is about it before that. Funny for a society where you'd think women had no freedom - I mean, they don't, but it's remarkable how autonomously you can get yourself hitched. You don't need a male priest to do it for you.

Fiderer Right, I get you, sorry. I thought you meant it was a marriage in a foreign land.

Jeanne Yes, you're right, I worded it badly. I meant that Calais belonged to England so wasn't 'foreign' soil, as such. But since they didn't marry there, the question doesn't arise.

Sorry for complicating matters, everyone. I'll just go back to reading. It's a fascinating thread.

Oh, no! Please don't go back to reading.

I'll feel as if I shut you up by wittering.

Yes, do stay LadyGlen (is that a Pallisers reference?).

Henry never ended his marriage to Catherine in any way, did he - just said it had never been valid in the first place. So however one looks at it, either Mary or Elizabeth must have been illegitimate, yet they both became queen.

No you haven't at all. I'm just not competent to talk much about this era.

I might have more to contribute if it was a Civil War / Charles II thread. But I'm enjoying the discussion very much and learning a lot.

is that a Pallisers reference? Indeed it is.

LadyGlen - don't! I hadn't even thought of the legality re France, was more the private nature of the wedding I was thinking of.

One of the great things about this thread is that I can ask whatever daft question I want to without ever feeling daft

The "contracting a marriage" is interesting. Doesn't protect either side though, if one decides they want out for whatever reason before they set up house.

Yep, it's really dubious in terms of protection. You do get fed up husbands and wives going to the law and demanding that their other half be forced to come and live with them, because they've done a bunk.

'So however one looks at it, either Mary or Elizabeth must have been illegitimate, yet they both became queen.'

I might be misremembering but didn't he have laws passed declaring at least one of them legitimate at some point?
Because he was king and he could

Countess - yes I think Henry added both Mary and Elizabeth back into the succession, perhaps a safety measure to have back-up heirs when Edward was so young.

Presumably it was a case of rather a future Queen who was his own child, even one whose mother had been cast aside, than a pretender on the throne (and as history proves, Edward was persuaded to name Jane Grey as successor rather than either of his sisters...)

Hmm yes. After all, only a couple of generations previously Henry's grandfather Edward IV had taken the throne on a dubious pretext, followed by Henry VII doing something very similar. So a certain degree of flexibility was the name of the game, and if Henry VIII's illegitimate son the Earl of Richmond had lived then Henry might well have added him to the succession, and had less need to marry Anne as a result.

Irene, I doubt any king would have done that until in a position of no choice - that would've made an illegitimate son the definite next king.

Even if he hadn't divorced Katherine, there's a fair chance she'd've died and left him free to remarry (which actually would've happened if he'd waited another couple of years!)

I've just found a passage in the Tracy Borman book which heartily amuses me: when Henry was casting about European nobility for a new wife after Jane Seymour died, he was "delighted" by Holbein's commissioned portrait of the Duchess Of Milan, but

"The lady herself was somewhat less enraptured with the idea of marrying the English king, and was reputed to have sent word that if she had two heads, one should be at his disposal."

Sensible woman.

Very sensible woman!

I do love that, BOF.

I wish we could see his response to it.

Henry passed the Act of Succession which named his heirs as Edward, Mary then Elizabeth in that order.

Having said that I still don't think he ever legally declared Mary or Elizabeth as legitimate.

I would think that Henry held off marrying Anne until he knew she was definitely pregnant. It was a huge gamble for both of them.

I bet Anne was terrified she might not conceive and paranoid that he'd shag her then change his mind about marrying her. And Henry had no guarantee that Anne would get pregnant or have a successful pregnancy.

I expect the sex was pretty shit

The Tracy Borman book says he was quite taken aback by Anne's "French practices", and a bit suspicious, so I'm assuming his repertoire was on the pedestrian side .

Actually, didn't Mary Boleyn say in last week's Wolf Hall that she'd been giving Anne tips? I wonder if that was her cover story...

You don't think Henry was one of the world's great lovers then VestalVirgin?

Do French practices = oral sex?

Anne was always rumoured to be highly experienced and skilled in everything except actual penetrative sex, IIRC.

Mind you, there's something a bit sinister about the way the history books (and I include historical fiction) tend to frame the sexual reputations of Henry's wives.

I'm up to the part in Tracy Borman's TC biography where Catherine Howard has been 'talent-spotted'. Apart from how physically repulsive Henry must have been by that point, it's creepy the way she was basically delivered to him by Norfolk and Gardiner to garner themselves brownie points. It sounds to my modern ears like her teenage years were spent being semi-neglected and probably sexually abused- apparently she had "an inappropriate liaison" with her music teacher at the age of 12, and a full sexual relationship with her relative Francis Dereham soon afterwards. I've seen it described as "poor supervision", but surely "protection" would be a better word?

Yet she is portrayed as flirtatious and "knowing" by many writers, and described as silly and dim, with a haphazard education. The more I think about it, the more I wonder if that might not have more likely to have been a reluctance to engage with teachers on her part, than any inherent "superficiality"?

I don't know- the whole thing just strikes me as rather sad.