do you think they would have stayed together? If he didn't cut her head off either, lol.
Sorry if this has been discussed before, I just started binge watching and am towards the end of season 2. She has just miscarried for the second time.
If she had given him a healthy son, they probably would've stayed together but he eventually would've had other lovers.
It was just part of his personality and his incredible desire for beautiful women, would've given him many lovers.
They would've probably stayed married until one of them died.
Thanks, I think so too. He was spoiled and entitled and totally incapable of being faithful, imo. I can't believe I didn't watch this when it was first on. I'm so hooked on it now.
Sad how women were blamed for the sex of their babies and miscarriages.
Women in that position were mainly viewed as being king makers and so was Anne, no matter how much Henry loved her. It was HIS duty to provide the country a king. Remember this too, there were many Plantagenets still around to threaten him and that if he had only daughters, they could overtake the crown by rallying support from the nobility.
Henry VIII executed many Plantagenets to rid his children of rivals. He used any excuse to remove them.
Had to google Plantagenets, lol.
Do you believe he really thought Anne was guilty of adultery? He seemed content to use any excuse to rid himself of her also. Appears to be an extremely insecure man. The way it is portrayed in this series, at least, leads me to believe he didn't care if it was true. He only cared that he could make others believe it and justify his actions.
Easy answers.
He made himself believe she was guilty by believing what he was told because it was convenient. Remember he was already in love with Jane Seymour, or at least was enamoured with her.
He was extrememly insecure. Again, his paranoia of the Plantagenets was life-long, his father gained the crown as an usurper and he was the top of a power system that gave him unlimited might, something his possible rivals cherished.
So, no, he didn't care if it was true, his passion for Anne was gone, his attention was centered on Jane Seymour and he used an excuse of being seduced/deceived ("sortilege") by Anne Boleyn to get rid of her.
All the other excuses that were used to condemn Anne was just more justification as you put it.
Salmonit, I thank you for expanding my vocabulary!
As StupidityBuster, I too had to Google "Plantagenets." And then "sortilege." I squeaked past "putative' a little shakily, but did get past it - sans Wikipedia, etc.
Great $20 words, as one of my favorite English teachers used to call them.
Here's a different but related question: If Anne hadn't been such a bitch and annoyed Henry do you think he would have kept her around longer to keep trying to have a son?
Clark Kent + Lois Lane 4ever
DC Can Suck It
Anne would have most likely been safe, especially if she had another son... but seeing how bitchy she was, i think the King would limit his time with her. And so yes, to mydnightRose, i think that she would have done herself many favors by cutting back on the tude and demands. She was in no position. She was so smart, why didn't she see how delicate her situation was and nothing was solid for her. Everything and everyone against her? But i guess the stress really took its toll on her and amplified her argumentative nature. I know when i get more stressed, i get more demanding and bitchy, so it makes sense. She was under so much pressure. Also, she went from mistress to wife and Henry saw those two positions so differently. Anne was too much for him to handle. And while they had immense passion, immense hatred counterbalanced that. So if she could have scaled it back, she may gotten another chance. Maybe. Her behavior should have been modified.
"I can't be let off the hook because I might just get the notion that it's ok to keep running"
He wasn't as voracious in his sexual appetites as the series makes him out to be. Historically, he had comparatively few mistresses relative to other kings or men of his day. In his entire reign, he was known or rumored to have only nine mistresses, including Bessie Blount, Anne Boleyn, and her sister Mary Boleyn.
"Sacred cows make the best hamburger."
If Anne had given birth to a son, there would have been no one to touch her. She would have been an anointed queen and the mother of a son - no one would have accused her of anything untoward.
I believe that Henry actually thought that Anne had committed the crimes she was accused of. There is an interesting paper by Greg Walker called "Rethinking the Fall of Anne Boleyn" that illustrates just how quickly it all happened. Also, at this point of his life, Henry was suffering from impotence. Of course, his inability to have sex with his wife had to be her fault, and the accusations of witchcraft and incest and adultery made it obvious that she was unclean and he so he couldn't perform with her (he used somewhat similar reasoning to explain his inability to consummate his marriage to Anne of Cleves - that she was another man's wife so Henry couldn't perform properly - also that he believed that she wasn't a virgin because of her body).
Henry and Cromwell had still been hard at work trying to get the Imperial government to acknowledge Anne as Queen of England in April of 1536. The idea is that Anne's fall had more to do with accusations by Lady Worcester - defending her own behavior against her brother's accusations of sexual immorality by pointing at Queen Anne and saying she was worse - and by Anne's own comment to Norris that "you look for dead men's shoes, for if ought came to the king but good, you would look to have me." Imagining the King's death was, in itself, treason.
Henry apparently initially laughed at the claims that Anne was unfaithful, but allowed an investigation with the warning that, if the allegations were false, the accusers would be punished. After that, there was a lot of ass-covering and terror going on during the investigations. Even after the investigation was starting to turn up evidence that Anne might be guilty, Henry only postponed their planned trip to Calais rather than canceling it suggests that he hadn't been completely convinced she was guilty at that point.
And contrary to popular belief, Henry was quite faithful to his wives. Compared to Francis I of France, Henry VIII was a monk. Henry didn't have a string of mistresses, and it doesn't even look like he slept with anyone other than a wife after Anne died. He was probably completely faithful to Jane Seymour, Katherine Howard, and Kathryn Parr (Anne of Cleves he never considered as his wife, but who knows if Henry slept with Katherine Howard before he married her - I doubt it since he thought she was so virginal). He seemed to have been faithful to Catherine of Aragon for a very long time, especially considering he was so young when they married. He certainly didn't bed every lady in the court like this show (and most other shows) makes it seem.
I'll mourn him to my very marrow. The pity is he will never know how much I will grieve.
And contrary to popular belief, Henry was quite faithful to his wives.
I think lots of sex is a requirement when you cast JRM in a part.
With Anne of Cleves, that certainly didn't happen (as far as anything can be certain from a distance of 500 years). She was even pissed off when Henry didn't take her back as queen after Katherine Howard was executed, saying that she herself was much prettier than Kathryn Parr.
Off the top of my head, Henry's putative liaisons were possibly some woman at Marguerite of Navarre's court (a one off if that), Bessie Blount, Mary Boleyn, Madge Shelton, maybe one other unnamed lady during his marriage to Anne Boleyn (he really only strayed when his wife was pregnant, and that was expected). He left Catherine of Aragon for Anne Boleyn, and Anne Boleyn for Jane Seymour, and Anne of Cleves for Katherine Howard, but I don't think he slept with any of them before his previous "marriage" was over, if not after he married the new wife herself. Of course, maybe there were tons of other women lost to history, but there was no privacy where a king was involved. I'm sure there would have been a lot more rumors and shifting of alliances had there been more women.
Henry had more wives than mistresses.
I'll mourn him to my very marrow. The pity is he will never know how much I will grieve.
To be honest, if Catherine of Aragon had a son, I doubt he would have divorced her in favour of Anne in the first place. I think his main priority was a legitimate son and heir.
But if Anne had a son, unless he had been seriously brain washed into thinking she had commited adultery (especially if there was doubt over the son's paternity), she would have been safe.
Would he have been faithful? I don't think so, just because how volatile things had become between them. He had obviously come to a point where he had nothing but pure hatred towards Anne (to not only accuse of her adultery but incest is going to the extremes!) and I think it was down to a clash of personalities. Henry was selfish, as was his Kingly right to be, and was used to things being his own way. Anne was ambitious and thought that as his wife she was equal to the King. Both were fiery tempered, stubborn and argumentative. Unfortuantely for Anne you can never really win against a King.
Ultimately, if Henry didn't want to do something nothing could change his mind.
If Anne had given him a so she almost certainly wouldn't have been executed and the likely hood of affairs as you suggest isn't as certain as the show would have you think...either due to his sexual needs or due to the supposed tension in the relationship. This show is not a documentary and takes many dramatic liberties.
shareThank you for the bit about Henry being remarkable faithful for a king in his day. Henry was not the oversexed horn dog the show depicts him as...he had very few mistresses in reality.
shareIf Princess Mary had been Prince Martin, Anne Boleyn would never enter the picture in the first place.
sharedo you think they would have stayed together? If he didn't cut her head off either, lol.
Sorry if this has been discussed before, I just started binge watching and am towards the end of season 2. She has just miscarried for the second time.
Probably only the one child. That depends if we are ever allowed to prove H8's blood dyscrasia theory.
"What is TRUTH?"
I WANT AN ErJen1 SIGNATURE, ALSO.
Absolutely
I'm pretty sure he would've stayed married to her (same for KofA), but I think he prob would have had an occasional mistress. I don't think he was the serial cheater the show made him out to be but I do think he would've strayed eventually. With Anne's personality I could definitely see Henry getting sick of her so he'd probably limit the amount of time he spent with her (which is funny because he loved her personality in the beginning). I definitely picture a tumultuous marriage between them until one of them died had Anne had a son & they stayed married. If it was K of A I definitely think it would have been business as usual for Henry since Katharine was more submissive to Henry and wouldn't make waves like Anne would. He'd stay married to Katharine & have an occasional mistress.
shareNo.
Once he had a son he didn't need her any more. Plus it would have given her more power and influence which would have made her more of a political threat to those who conspired to discredit her.
Without a son Henry simply had an excuse.
With a son, her enemies would have manufactured the same adultery story to get rid of her.
Either way, she would have lost her head.
The only difference would have been if the son was born before Elizabeth, the world would have lost one of the most powerful world leaders of the time and without Elizabeth there is no telling what losses in the arts and sciences would have happened.
I'm new to this series. I don't have Showtime so I never had an opportunity to watch it but it's free on Amazon Prime right now so I thought I'd give it a whirl and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The locations and sets were gorgeous and the costumes were amazing - in particular, the men's costumes. I'm still drooling over Henry's boots.
That said, I think that Anne was destined to, at the very least, lose her crown if not her head. Henry changed a great deal during the time that they were together - not for the better - and Anne failed to take heed of those changes. Henry was no longer interested in her intelligence or quick whit and he no longer found her sharp tongue delightful. The more she pushed, the more distasteful he found her. Once Henry had tired of a woman, she was gone. Having a son would have made no difference. Whether it was charging her with adultery or some other crime and cutting off her head, Henry would have found some way of getting rid of her.
The thing that I find interesting is the selections that Henry made in choosing his wives. I'm excluding Anne of Cleaves here because (a) at that time I don't Henry would ever have been satisfied with a wife that was chosen for him and (b) Henry simply wasn't ready to take a new wife so I don't think that anyone would have pleased him. Catherine of Aragon was prim, proper, subservient and born to be a queen. Anne was the exact opposite - she was lust, passion, sex, intelligence, whit and charm. After Anne, Jane Seymour was prim, proper and subservient. Kathryn Howard was youth, lust and sex - it could be said that she was Henry's mid-life crisis. And after Kathryn, Catherine Parr was proper, intelligent and stoic. It seemed that whatever Henry had in a woman, he wanted the exact opposite.
Henry wouldn't have gotten rid of her if she had a son. There could be no risk compromising his sons legitimacy. Would he have just ignored her and had mistresses? Likely but a son would have made her place solid and made him fall for her again. At the very least he wouldn't dethrone her even if he tired of her.
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Consider the daffodil. And while you're doing that I'll be over here looking through your stuff.
I think the only reason Anne was considered his true love is because she gave him a son and died before he got bored of her.
"Well, you're dead now, so shut up."
He would certainly never have got rid of her if she had given him a living son, because that would have cast doubts on his son's legitimacy, the last thing he would have wanted. But he would have had mistresses, and she would just have had to put up with it "as your betters did" as he told her when she complained to him about it. His passion for her had cooled, and probabaly would still have done so even if she gave him a son. But she would have been safe.
share