MARIA DE SALINAS In SIX WIVES WITH LUCY WORSLEY (2016)

MARIA DE SALINAS in SIX WIVES WITH LUCY WORSLEY (2016)

Mary of Modena, Queen of England, Scotland and Ireland, by Simon Verelst. 1680

Anne Boleyn’s Pregnancies | Dec 1533 - July 1534 Premature Birth/Stillborn (2/3)

“Anne had rapidly become pregnant in December 1532, and she was pregnant again just over a year later, three or four months after Elizabeth was born. Henry associated virility and sexual potency with having children; the birth of Elizabeth reassured him, as did the second pregnancy, and he was quite happy that he would have a son this time. By April, the queen’s condition was obvious, and a portrait medal was struck to commemorate the anticipated birth of a son. Henry’s confidence was seen in the highly elaborate cradle which was ordered from his own goldsmith, with Tudor roses, precious stones, gold-embroidered bedding, and cloth of gold baby clothes. 

By the summer of 1534, Anne was well advanced into her pregnancy, and in June, she was reported to be in good health. The baby was due around the end of July, but before the Queen could take to her chamber, something went terribly wrong and it was born prematurely; it was either stillborn, or died very soon after birth. Anne gave birth to her child when she was about eight months pregnant, and the baby would have been near full-term; the physical and emotional pain that Anne must have felt at this loss is heartbreaking. The physical effects that this may have had on Anne include insomnia, loss of weight, and withdrawal from the world; she may also have experienced ‘empty arms syndrome’, the feeling that she should be holding her child.  

The king left Hampton Court in all haste and abandoned his grieving wife. The silence of the royal nursery and the empty silver cradle, perhaps, too much for the a hardened king - and one well versed in loss - to bear. Anne had promised Henry sons and heirs, but had only delivered a daughter and a dead child, which may well have been a boy. In the king’s eyes, she had failed him; with Henry’s insecurities awakened, there would be no room for further disappointments.”

My love. My Queen.

But you can speak with him! He once was very high of Tyndale. He cannot so easily alter his opinion! Oona Kirsch as Anne Boleyn in God’s Outlaw (1986)

     Queen Jane Seymour c. 1508 - 24th October 1537