The Boleyn Women: The Tudor Femmes Fatales Who Changed English History (37 page)

20. Francis I of France. The French king is reputed to have been Mary Boleyn’s lover, referring to her as a great whore and infamous above all others.

21. Sir Thomas Wyatt, who wanted to be the lover of both Anne Boleyn and her cousin, Mary Shelton.

22. Henry VIII in his youth. The king was renowned as the most handsome prince in Europe, although there is no truth in the rumours that Elizabeth Howard Boleyn served as one of his mistresses.

23. Mary Boleyn was the mistress first of Francis I and then Henry VIII.

24. Anne Boleyn’s dark eyes captivated the king when he had tired of her sister, Mary.

25.
The Clouds that Gather Round the Setting Sun.
Anne Boleyn was instrumental in bringing about the fall of Thomas Wolsey, with the cardinal referring to her as a ‘serpentine enemy’.

26. Henry VIII gave Anne a fine clock during the years of their courtship.

27. Thomas Cranmer, from his memorial in Oxford. The Archbishop of Canterbury annulled the marriage of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon and crowned Anne Boleyn.

28. Hans Holbein’s design for a Coronation pageant for Anne Boleyn, with her falcon badge prominently displayed.

29. Anne Boleyn’s falcon badge without its crown, carved as graffiti at the Tower of London.

30. A rare survival of the entwined initials of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn from King’s College Chapel, Cambridge.

31. The entwined initials of Henry VIII and his third wife, Jane Seymour, from Hampton Court. Henry tried to erase all memory of his second wife, Anne Boleyn.

32. A romantic depiction of the execution of Anne Boleyn. The queen was beheaded with a sword – a kinder death than a clumsy axe.