Elizabethan food
Elizabethan foodBORN: 7 SEPTEMBER 1533
BECAME QUEEN: 17 NOVEMBER 1558
DIED: 24 MARCH 1603
Elizabeth's life was troubled from the moment she was born. Henry VIII had changed the course of his country's history in order to marry Anne Boleyn, hoping that she would bear him the strong and healthy son that Catherine of Aragon never did. But, on September 7, 1533 in Greenwich Palace, she bore Elizabeth instead.
Anne did eventually conceive a son, but he was stillborn. By that point, Henry had begun to grow tired of Anne and began to plot her downfall. Most, if not all, historians agree that Henry's charges of incest against Anne were false, but they were all he needed to sign her execution warrant. She was beheaded on the Tower Green in May, 1536, before Elizabeth was even three years old.
Elizabeth was sent away from Court, as she was a reminder to Henry of Anne. Henry has remarried and was eagerly awaiting the son he hoped Jane Seymour was carrying. As it turned out, she was indeed to bear Henry a son, Edward (future Edward VI). Jane died shortly after Edward was born.
Elizabeth's last stepmother was Katherine Parr, the sixth queen to Henry VIII. She had hoped to marry Thomas Seymour (brother to the late Queen Jane), but she caught Henry's eye. She brought both Elizabeth and her half-sister Mary back to court. When Henry died, she became the Dowager Queen and took her household from Court. Because of the young age of Edward VI, Edward Seymour (another brother of Jane's and therefore the young King's uncle) became Lord Protector of England.
Elizabeth went to live with Queen Dowager Katherine, but left her household after an incident with the Lord Admiral, Thomas Seymour, who was now Katherine's husband. Just what occurred between these two will never be known for sure, but rumors at the time suggested that Katherine had caught them kissing or perhaps even in bed together. Katherine was pregnant at the time of the incident. She later gave birth to a daughter. Katherine died not too long afterwards. This left Thomas Seymour as an eligible bachelor once again. Later, he was arrested for an attempted kidnapping of King Edward and for plotting to marry himself to Elizabeth, who was an heir to the throne.
Young Edward had never been a strong child and eventfully contracted what was then called consumption. It is most likely that he had tuberculosis, from contemporary accounts. When it looked inevitable the the teenager would die without an heir of his own body, the struggle for the crown began. And so began an even more dangerous time in the life of the Princess Elizabeth...
The Dangerous Years
Because the Princess Elizabeth was a daughter of the later King Henry, she was in line to the throne (despite several attempts to remove her from the chain, she was in Henry's will as an heir) and was therefore a most sought after bride....
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