Anne of Cleves Read online

  The tale was one of Germanic Arthurian literature first written by Wolfram van Eschenbach in Parzival, an epic poem c.1210. As with tales of myth and folklore there are many different versions but a later story linked the legend more directly with Cleves when Beatrice the only daughter of Dietrich, the Duke of Cleves, saw a boat being pulled along by a white swan with a gold chain carrying the knight Helias towards her. He married her and became Duke of Cleves but as with the earlier legend she broke their bond by asking who is was. He left his children his sword, his horn, and his ring before he sailed away. These children would carry on the line of the swan-knight as dukes of Cleves.

  Swans were an ever present theme in Anne’s life. She had two white swans as her heraldic device and the Schwanenburg, or Swan Castle, was one of her childhood residences used by the family in the spring and summer. Here the impressive 180 foot Swan Tower topped by a golden swan weather vane gave a vantage point from which to look out across the town of Cleve and the countryside beyond. Knights in Cleves joined the Order of the Swan founded by Frederick II of Brandenburg in 1440 and wore a badge depicting a silver swan with a gold chain, symbolism which would later be added to the Cleves coat of arms.

  By the end of 1536, the man who was to be Anne’s knight had already had two wives; Katherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn and was married to his third Jane Seymour. Katherine had died in January alone and heartsick from being divorced from the king. Anne had been beheaded in May on trumped-up charges of adultery. One day later Henry VIII became betrothed to Jane Seymour and married her on 30 May. Recent events had changed the king of England from the athletic, glorious specimen of his youth to the fuller, harsher man of middle age he had become. She did not know it yet but Anne would soon be thrown into his world and he would prove to be no swan-knight.

  Anne of Cleves

  Chapter Two

  The Search for a Bride

  1537–1539

  Early in 1537 John Husee, an agent of Lord Lisle’s, the governor of Calais, wrote that the king of England hardly went out as his ulcerated leg was so sore. In Tudor times to reach the age of forty was an accomplishment and Henry was now forty-five. Physically he had managed to survive without suffering much illness. He had had bouts of malaria and smallpox and occasionally suffered from constipation. Two jousting accidents had rendered him blows to the head and caused him recurring headaches. He was fastidious about the risk of ill health, moving his court away from areas affected by prevalent disease like the sweating sickness and bubonic plague. He had suffered from ulcers on his leg from 1527 and liked coming up with his own remedies including The King’s Own Grey Plaster, a remedy to ease his pain and reduce inflammation. Its ingredients included roots and buds from plants, vinegar, rosewater, ivory flakes, powdered pearls and less savoury ingredients like earthworms, lead, chicken and calf fat.

  Mentally the king had been going through one of the toughest times in his life from his divorce to his marriage with his second wife Anne Boleyn and her subsequent trial and execution in 1536. The pope had threatened to excommunicate him and although Henry had promised in 1534 he would not ‘decline or vary from the congregation of Christ’s church in any things concerning the very articles of the Catholic faith of Christendom’,1 his relationship with Rome would worsen and his people would rise up against him. The Pilgrimage of Grace in 1536 was a rebellion that arose in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire due to Henry’s policy of dissolving the monasteries, his break with Rome and many other grievances including those against chief minister Thomas Cromwell’s policies. Cromwell had worked in Thomas Wolsey’s household and risen to become the cardinal’s secretary. By the end of 1530 he had joined the Privy Council and Henry made him chief minister and the king’s principal secretary officially at the end of 1534. He was instrumental in both the king’s divorce from Katherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn’s downfall. Cromwell was Henrys go-to man of ‘singular excellence of wit, joined with an industrious diligence of mind’2 but he was unpopular with the people for his sweeping reformations.

  The Pilgrimage of Grace was a well organised uprising that swelled to over 30,000 men and ‘After the king’s highness was informed of this newly arisen insurrection he, making no delay in so weighty a matter, caused with all speed the Dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk, the marquis of Exeter, the earl of Shrewsbury and others, accompanied by his mighty and royal army which was of great power and strength, immediately to set upon the rebels. But when these noble captains and counsellors approached the rebels and saw their number and how they were determined on battle, they worked with great prudence to pacify all without shedding blood’.3 In fact Henry’s army was no match for the rebels and Norfolk persuaded their leaders to accept peace terms with promises of change and redress. It was not to be forthcoming and in July 1537 many of the rebels were executed.

  Henry VIII was now married to Jane Seymour, the humble and pious wife, who bore him his longed for heir on 12 October 1537 but triumph soon turned to sorrow when she died twelve days later of puerperal fever ‘and none in the realme was it more heavelier taken then of the kynges Maiestie him self, whose death caused the kyng immediately to remove into Westminster wher he mourned and kept him selfe close and secret a great while…’4 Whilst he shut himself away with only his fool Will Somers for company, his councillors immediately began the search for a new wife. There was no suitable match in England and Cromwell first set about contacting his contemporaries in France to enquire on the availability of King Francis I’s daughter Margaret or possibly Marie de Guise, a widowed duchess.

  Henry knew at his age that he could not wait too long to remarry. As the Duke of Norfolk said ‘by reason of which more children might be brought forth’.5 Jane had given him one male heir but he was still young enough to father more and make sure the succession was secure. His councillors were in agreement. Not only was there a need to secure the Tudor line but now Henry was Europe’s most eligible bachelor, his marriage with a foreign princess could strengthen England’s alliances. It could also change Europe’s political outlook which was currently a power play between Francis I of France and Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor.

  England had signed a defensive treaty with France in 1532 and in September 1533 the French king was godfather to Henry’s daughter Elizabeth. Francis I had supported Henry’s marriage to Anne Boleyn but their relationship would be a fractious one as was Henry’s relationship with Charles V, his nephew, through his marriage to Katherine of Aragon. The Holy Roman Emperor would never forgive him for his treatment of his aunt and the potential for foreign hostilities hung heavy in the air.

  Both of these kings were Catholic and uncertain of where Henry VIII’s loyalties lay and his relationship to church reform. In 1536 Henry devised the Ten Articles which laid down the official position of the church in England. It discussed three sacraments – baptism, penance and the Eucharist – yet failed to mention the sacraments of confirmation, ordination, marriage and last rites. It was a middle ground between Catholicism and Protestantism by which Henry ‘preserved his freedom to move in either direction’.6

  As far back as 1533 when Henry first heard the pope was threatening to excommunicate him Cromwell had started to look to Germany for an alliance. The king’s minister sent Christopher Mont to find out more about the German princes especially those opposed to Rome and their attitude towards England. It would foreshadow years of negotiations with the possibility of Henry joining the Schmalkaldic League – a move that Cromwell welcomed to further church reformation but also to provide mutual defence. Something of import if Francis I and Charles V were to turn against him. Henry welcomed theological discussions but would not commit himself. Still it raised the possibility of a marriage outside of Francis’ and Charles’ control.

  It was John Hutton, ambassador to Dowager Queen Mary of Hungary, regent of the Netherlands, who first suggested Anne of Cleves in December 1537 but she was one at the end of an unflattering list and his report was not favourable. He wrote from Brussels:
<
br />   There is in the court waiting upon the Queen the daughter of the lord of Breidroot, 14 years old and of goodly stature, virtuous, sad and womanly. Her mother, who is dead, was daughter to the cardinal of Luike’s sister; and the Cardinal would give her a good dote (dowry). There is a widow of the late earl of Egmond, who repairs often to the Court. She is over 40, but does not look it. There is the duchess of Milan, who is reportedly a goodly personage and of excellent beauty. The duke of Cleves has a daughter, but there is no great praise either of her personage or her beauty.7

  It was her sister Sybilla that was known for her beauty not Anne.

  Margaretha Brederode was the first candidate he mentioned. The motherless child of Lord Reinoud III van Bredrode was probably too young to be considered seriously and she was also a dependant of one Cardinal Liege who was a contemporary of Reginald Pole’s, Henry’s old enemy. Frances van Luxembourg, widow of Jan van Egmond by contrast was probably deemed too old at forty. Henry wanted a wife who would bear him children and Frances, although being a mother, would have been seen as past childbearing age.

  Christina of Denmark, Duchess of Milan, and Anne of Cleves were still possibilities although the German reformer Melanchthon thought Christina had almost married Anne’s brother William. He wrote to a friend ‘The Widow of Milan, daughter of Christian, the captive King of Denmark, was brought to Germany to wed the young Duke of Juliers. This is now changed, for Juliers becomes heir to Guelders, against the Emperor’s will, and the girl is offered to the Englishman, whom the Spaniards, aiming at universal empire, would join to themselves against the Frenchmen and us. There is grave matter for your consideration’.8 However Henry had become fixated with the idea of Marie de Guise as his next wife even though she was promised to his nephew James V of Scotland, the son of his elder sister Margaret. It was the French ambassador, Louis de Perreau, Sieur de Castillon, who had to inform him that she was unavailable. Marie came from the powerful Guise family descended from John II of France and had proved she was fertile with two sons from her previous marriage to Louis II d’Orléans, the Duke of Longueville, who had died in 1537. Henry was not to be put off so easily. Castillon reported weeks later that the king was still ‘amorous of Madame de Longueville’ and that ‘if matters were not so far advanced that they could not be broken off, to deliver her to him’. Henry promised ‘he would do twice as much for you (Francis) as the king of Scots would’.9 If Henry could marry Marie it would cement his relationship with France.

  Marie herself had mixed feelings about the match. She is reported to have said when hearing Henry’s comment he was ‘big in person, in need of a big wife’, that ‘although she was very tall, her neck was very small’.10 For any woman the prospect of marrying the king of England was a scary one given his treatment of his first wife and the execution of his second. James V by contrast had lost his first wife to illness and was a young, strong, athletic man whereas Henry was over twenty years older and past his prime. Still the king of England would be a prestigious match and the Guise family would welcome such a powerful ally. Yet the king of Scotland maintained the ‘auld alliance’ with France – a treaty in place since 1295 – and had not been as fickle in his political dealings as Henry. Either way Marie would be leaving France and her surviving son behind and ultimately it was not her decision to make.

  Peter Mewtas, a gentleman of the privy chamber, was sent twice, to Chateaudun Castle and Joinville, to visit Marie of Guise and obtain her portrait. He was also to find out whether regardless of any arrangement with James V the widowed duchess would consider Henry as her next husband. Marie, playing for time, said her father had consented to her marriage to the Scottish king, although she had not, but she could only wed whomever King Francis I decided on. A letter from her mother suggests she was willing to see her daughter married to Henry but a marriage contract with James had already been settled so ‘that things will not be done so much for your advantage as I wished’.11 The situation was out of their control and Francis I had promised Marie to James after his first wife, the king’s daughter Madeleine, had died after their short marriage in July 1537. Marie would marry Henry’s nephew in Scotland in May and the king of England would have to look elsewhere.

  His ambassadors had not been lax in finding out who else was available and in March 1538 Hans Holbein and Philip Hoby were sent to Christina of Denmark, the widowed duchess of Milan, now living in Brussels with her aunt, Mary of Hungary, to paint the sixteen-year-old’s portrait. Christina was the niece of Charles V and would make a significant political match. Hutton described her as ‘competent of beauty, of favour excellent, soft of speech and very gentle in countenance’.12 She sat for three hours for the portrait. But her guardian Mary was unimpressed with any notion of a marriage to the English king. When Henry married Jane Seymour she had commented ‘It is to be hoped – if one can hope anything from such a man – that when he is tired of this wife he will find some better way of getting rid of her. Women, I think, would hardly be pleased if such customs became general, and with good reason; and although I have no wish to expose myself to similar risks, yet, as I belong to the feminine sex, I, too, will pray that God may preserve us from such perils’.13 Yet she had been unable to stop Christina’s marriage at the age of thirteen to Francesco Sforza, Duke of Milan, a man twenty-six years older than her. Mary herself had been married to King Louis II of Hungary and Bohemia in 1515 but lost her husband at the Battle of Mohács in 1526. She had not wanted to become regent of the Netherlands but her brother Charles V had insisted telling her ‘I am only one and I can’t be everywhere; and I must be where I ought to be and where I can, and often enough only where I can be and not where I would like to be; for one can’t do more than one can do’14 and with that statement she could hardly refuse. With it came the guardianship of her nieces Dorothea and Christina. After the death of her husband Christina returned to her aunt’s household. Wolsey had proposed a marriage between Dorothea and Henry’s illegitimate son, the Duke of Richmond but this was rejected and she would instead marry Frederick of the Palatinate in 1535. At least she had escaped Henry’s clutches.

  The king was still very excited about the possibility of a marriage with Christina. She was young and beautiful by all accounts but while he waited for her portrait to arrive his health was suffering. His ulcerated leg was so bad that he had to have it lanced. Although it improved the sore, it would never heal completely and Henry was rapidly gaining weight since he could no longer participate in the sports of his youth. It didn’t stop him from thinking he was a much sought-after husband and now he enthusiastically began to look at other marriage possibilities. Who else might make a suitable bride?

  In May the French ambassador Castillon contacted the French court for suggestions of who else could be put forward as potential matches for Henry. Mary de Guises’ younger sister Louise ‘as beautiful and graceful clever and well fitted to please and obey’15 was suggested as was her other sister Renee. Marie of Vendome, the eldest daughter of Charles de Bourbon and Anne of Lorraine, daughter of Antoine the Good, were also mooted. By June Holbein and Hoby were travelling back to France to paint Louise de Guises’ portrait. Henry was happy with her likeness but wanted to see his bride in person. He may have been making a political alliance with his fourth marriage but he wanted a good-looking wife as well.

  Sir Francis Bryan, Henry’s friend and diplomat, was serving in France and knowing the king wished to see his potential brides suggested the king come to Calais, an English-owned port since 1347, where he could meet them. Henry certainly thought it a good idea writing to his ambassador at the imperial court:

  His Grace prudently considering how that marriage is a bargain of such nature as may endure for the whole life of a man, and a thing whereof the pleasure and quiet, or the displeasure and torment of the man’s mind doth much depend, thinketh it to be much necessary both for himself and the party with whom it shall please God to join him in marriage, that the one might see the other before the time they shoul
d be so affianced, as they might not without dishonour or further inconvenience break off.16

  Bryan thought that Marguerite of Navarre, Francis I’s sister, could chaperone a bevy of beauties from which the king could take his pick. Henry’s desire for a French alliance was cooling due to King Francis signing the Truce of Nice with the Holy Roman Emperor in June, a ten year truce between these two powerful men that made no mention of England. In August Castillon urged his master to allow the meeting to go ahead but Francis refused. Henry told the ambassador ‘By God, I trust no one but myself. The thing touches me too near. I wish to see them and know them some time before deciding’17 but Francis was not happy at having his noble ladies trotted out for the English king’s pleasure and his ambassador was told to put him off. This he did by ridiculing the situation and asking the king did he mean to sleep with them to test them out, which embarrassed Henry so much he gave up on the idea. He could still pursue Christina of Denmark after all even though her guardian had also refused a meeting in Calais. Negotiations had started and Charles V gave the unwilling Mary of Hungary permission to arrange their marriage.

  Throughout the summer other possibilities were still being raised. Marriage negotiations could drag on and Henry continued to keep his options open. Cromwell, a key instigator of church reform, invited a delegation of German ambassadors to England to discuss further Henry’s alliance with the Schmalkaldic League. By the time the embassy arrived in 1538 church reformation in England was in its infancy but Henry would not go the whole way and agree to the Confession of Augsburg, the twenty-eight articles of faith of the Lutheran church, as the League requested. While Cromwell continued to work towards an alliance with the Schmalkaldic League there was another way in which England could ally with Germany.