Katherine the Queen: The Remarkable Life of Katherine Parr by Linda Porter

Author:Linda Porter [Porter, Linda]
Language: eng
Format: epub, azw3, mobi
Publisher: Macmillan Publishers UK
Published: 2011-01-31T00:00:00+00:00

At first glance, this seems a curiously stilted effort. It is, nevertheless, very revealing, once the allowances for etiquette, formality of address and Elizabeth’s still imperfect grasp of the Italian language have been appreciated. And the choice of that language is surely significant. Elizabeth was, of course, eager to demonstrate her skills in a tongue that was neither Latin nor English, but her own proficiency at the age of eleven in both was clearly taken as given. She shared language tutors with Edward and was an outstanding pupil. She must also have known that her stepmother would understand what she wrote. Perhaps she had discussed her progress in modern languages with Katherine at earlier meetings, and she might also have seen the copy of Petrarch that we know the queen possessed.

The letter also demonstrates Elizabeth’s tendency to hyperbole, an aspect of her character that developed even more with time and infuriated her sister when Mary became queen. She had, for example, definitely seen Katherine during the previous twelve months, at Ashridge during the royal honeymoon progress, and kept in touch with her through Margaret Neville’s visits. The queen’s generosity towards her younger stepdaughter was also obvious in the gifts of clothes shown in the accounts, including a beautiful gown of purple cloth of gold.14 And her ‘exile’, which has often been misinterpreted as some sort of banishment for having offended her father, referred merely to the fact that Edward and Mary had already gone to join Katherine at Hampton Court in the summer of 1544 while Elizabeth remained behind, temporarily, in London.15 She had, in fact, dined with her father, brother and sister on 26 June, not long before Henry VIII set sail for France. It is unclear why Katherine was left out of this family occasion but one possible explanation is that she was spending time with Margaret Douglas, Henry’s niece, who was about to be married to the Scottish nobleman Matthew Lennox. Finally, the reason that Elizabeth had not dared write to her father was a straightforward one of propriety; one did not normally address the king directly, but it was permissible to do so through his wife, the queen. Elizabeth does not say how she knew that Katherine was mentioning her in letters to the king, but it was certainly true. Possibly the queen had already told her stepdaughter this in another letter that has not survived, or through other contacts between their households.

Elizabeth, like Edward and Mary, shared with Katherine a love of study. She was keenly aware of her stepmother’s growing interest in religious ideas and at the end of 1544, when she was back at Ashridge, she sent a New Year’s gift which she believed would allow her to highlight her continuing educational progress while also pleasing the queen. It was a translation of a literary work by another royal lady, Marguerite of Navarre, called Le Miroir de l’ me Pécheresse. The young princess called it The Mirror or Glass of the Sinful Soul.

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