Queen Family and Kills Them History Wedding True Burns

Anne Boleyn was the only Tudor effigy beheaded with a sword instead of an ax. Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Tudor history is littered with tales of executions gone wrong. In 1541, an inexperienced axman butchered Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, taking upward of 10 blows to dispatch the elderly noblewoman. Four decades afterwards, Mary, Queen of Scots—executed on the orders of her cousin Elizabeth I—required three strikes of the ax earlier she lost her head.

Comparatively, Anne Boleyn's execution was a relatively straightforward, albeit unprecedented, affair. On the morn of May 19, 1536, Henry VIII's fallen queen ascended the scaffold, delivered a conventional oral communication praising the king as a "gentle and sovereign lord," and knelt to receive the expiry accident. The executioner struck Anne's head off with a unmarried swing of his sword.

Recent reporting by the Observer's Dalya Alberge suggests that a previously disregarded passage in a 16th-century warrant book housed at the Uk's National Archives offers fascinating insights on the events surrounding the execution.

Researchers have long debated the circumstances surrounding Anne'south downfall, from the question of her guilt (most contemporary scholars hold that the charges of adultery, incest and conspiring to kill her husband were contrived) to the effect of whether Henry bears the brunt of the responsibility for the queen's fate. Opinions differ, wrote historian Suzannah Lipscomb for History Actress in 2018, with some experts positing that the king instigated the proceedings after tiring of Anne and others arguing that Henry'south meridian adviser, Thomas Cromwell, conspired to convince the "pliable king" to abandon his wife in favor of the more demure Jane Seymour.

A 17th- or 18th-century depiction of Anne Boleyn'due south beheading Public domain via Wikimedia Commons

Anne's bodily "crimes" were merely failing to produce a male heir and refusing to rein in her headstrong personality. Found guilty of treason, the queen was sentenced to "be burnt here within the Tower of London on the Green, [or] else to take thy head smitten off [per] the Rex'south pleasure."

According to the document reported on by Alberge, Henry, who claimed to be "moved by pity," opted against the harsher sentence of called-for at the stake. But he commanded that "the head of the aforementioned Anne shall be … cut off" and proceeded to map out every aspect of the execution, urging Sir William Kingston, constable of the Belfry, to "omit nothing" from his orders.

Archivist Sean Cunningham brought the book to historian Tracy Borman'due south attention when she visited the National Athenaeum to examine Anne'southward trial papers. Borman, who is prepare to include the entries in an upcoming documentary serial, tells the Observer that the warrant book exemplifies "Henry's premeditated, calculating mode."

She adds, "He knows exactly how and where he wants it to happen."

As several Tudor historians observed on social media, the details included in the warrant volume aren't entirely new discoveries. Yet, Cunningham notes on Twitter, "[I]n a wider context of organizing public executions, the series of entries reveal much near the government's concerns."

Writing for the Spectator in 2013, historian Leanda de Lisle pointed out that Anne was the merely Tudor effigy beheaded with a sword instead of an ax. (Henry failed to extend the same courtesy to his 5th married woman, Catherine Howard, who was executed for infidelity in 1542.) Leading theories regarding the king's option of weapon include affording Anne "a more than dignified end" or using an execution method popularized in France, where the queen spent many happy years; de Lisle, however, argued that Henry's decision was an entirely selfish one rooted in warped conceptions of chivalry.

Edouard Cibot, Anne Boleyn in the Belfry, 1835 Public domain via Wikimedia Eatables

Both Henry and his begetter, Henry VII, painted the Tudor dynasty as a continuation of the Camelot of Arthurian legend. Henry'south older brother, who died at historic period 15 in 1502, was even named Arthur in a nod to the apocryphal rex. Faced with the dissolution of his second marriage, Henry bandage himself as Arthur and Anne every bit Arthur's adulterous wife, Guinevere, who was similarly sentenced to be burned at the stake but saved by her husband's deed of mercy.

"The choice of a sword—the symbol of Camelot, of a rightful male monarch, and of masculinity—was Henry's solitary," wrote de Lisle in her sweeping 2013 biography of the Tudor family.

Anne's alleged adultery bandage aspersions on Henry'due south masculinity, suggesting that the king was unable to fulfill his marital duties. In public, Henry countered this perception by surrounding himself with beautiful women and partaking in displays of "extravagant joy," in the words of one gimmicky observer. Privately, the king comforted himself past taking charge of every attribute of Anne's execution. Every bit de Lisle explains, "Taking command of the minutiae of how his married woman was disposed of helped Henry to convince himself that he was empowered rather than macerated by her fall."

Another potential factor in Henry's method of execution was a want to avoid the drawn-out, tortuous ordeal of burning at the pale—the typical judgement for female traitors in Tudor England. Executing a queen was unprecedented in and of itself; consigning one to the flames could have had an even greater touch on on the prototype-conscious king's reputation.

"Because we know the story so well, nosotros forget how deeply shocking information technology was to execute a queen," Borman tells the Observer. "They could well accept got the collywobbles and thought we're not going to do this. Then this is Henry making really certain of it. For years, his trusty adviser Thomas Cromwell has got the blame. But this shows, actually, it's Henry pulling the strings."

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Source: https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/why-henry-viii-orchestrated-every-detail-anne-boleyns-execution-180976135/

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