Even in 1535, more than two years into Anne’s tenure as queen, she remained deeply unpopular, in large part due to her harsh treatment of Catherine and Mary, who enjoyed widespread public support.Ĭritics of Jane often name her and Katherine Broughton, wife of Anne’s half-uncle William, as members of the group imprisoned for their public display in Mary’s favor. The English people viewed Anne as a scandalous usurper of the rightful queen’s place. Formerly known as Princess Mary, she was now simply Lady Mary.Ĭatherine of Aragon (left) and her daughter, the future Mary I (right)

A devout Catholic who disapproved of Henry’s break from Rome-a move prompted largely by the pope’s refusal to grant him a divorce from Catherine-Mary found herself disinherited from the line of succession upon the birth of Henry and Anne’s daughter, the future Elizabeth I, in 1533.

Soberton’s argument centers on a document from October 1535, when a French ambassador wrote of “a great troop of citizens’ wives and others, unknown to their husbands, presented themselves” to Mary, Henry’s only surviving child from his first marriage to Catherine of Aragon, “weeping and crying that she was princess, notwithstanding all that had been done.” The ambassador continued, “Some of them, the chiefest, were placed in the Tower, constantly persisting in their opinion.”Īt the time, Henry and his daughter were locked in a battle of wills, with Mary refusing to acknowledge either the dissolution of her parents’ marriage or the king’s new status as head of the Church of England. “ a lot of what we think we know about Jane Boleyn turns out to be a myth based on misinterpretation of the original source material.” “It’s difficult to overturn the centuries-long opinion of Jane as an accuser of her own husband because it’s so deeply entrenched in popular imagination,” says Soberton, author of Ladies-in-Waiting: Women Who Served Anne Boleyn, which came out in June, and several other books on Tudor women. Now, a new book by historian Sylvia Barbara Soberton adds to the evidence in Jane’s favor, drawing on archival records to argue that Anne and her sister-in-law were closer than previously thought.

Buyīut more recent scholarship-most notably a 2007 biography by historian Julia Fox-has adopted a sympathetic attitude toward Jane, portraying her as a convenient scapegoat who enjoyed a congenial relationship with the Boleyn siblings and didn’t actually accuse them of any crimes. Ladies-in-Waiting: Women Who Served Anne Boleynīy concentrating on a previously neglected area of Anne Boleyn’s female household, this book seeks to identify the women who served Anne and investigate what roles ladies-in-waiting played in this queen’s household.

Six tudor queens anne boleyn