Claire | November 30, 2016
On this day in history, 30th November 1529, St Andrew’s Day, the two women in King Henry VIII’s life got rather cross with him. Queen Catherine of Aragon, who was still Henry’s wife at this time, confronted the king regarding his treatment of her, which she said was causing her “the pains of Purgatory on […]
Claire | November 28, 2016
A big welcome to historical novelist Wendy J. Dunn who is joining us today on the first stop of her book tour for Falling Pomegranate Seeds: The Duty of Daughters, Book 1 in Katherine of Aragon Story. It’s a wonderful book. MadeGlobal Publishing is offering a paperback copy to one lucky Anne Boleyn Files follower. […]
Claire | November 6, 2016
6th November was quite a busy day in Tudor history! We have Mary Tudor’s entry into Paris, following her coronation on this day in 1514; we have the first meeting of Catherine of Aragon and Arthur Tudor, on this day in 1501; and then we have Henry VIII abandoning Catherine Howard at Hampton Court Palace […]
Claire | August 20, 2016
I know many of you will join me in congratulating historical novelist Wendy J. Dunn on the release today of her book Falling Pomegranate Seeds: The Duty of Daughters, which is Book 1 in the Katherine of Aragon story. Wendy is someone I’ve got to know through running the Anne Boleyn Files and she is […]
Claire | June 11, 2016
On this day in history, 11th June 1509, just under two months after his accession to the throne of England, seventeen-year-old King Henry VIII married twenty-three-year-old Catherine of Aragon, daughter of Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon, and the widow of Henry’s brother, Arthur, Prince of Wales. The couple got married in […]
Claire | December 16, 2015
At some time during the night of 15th/16th December 1485, Queen Isabella I of Castile gave birth to a daughter at the Archbishop of Toledo’s Palace (Palacio Arzobispal de Alcalá de Henares) in the city of Alcalá de Henares, just over twenty miles north-east of Madrid. This little girl was to be the youngest surviving […]
Claire | August 14, 2015
On 29th July I received news that my best friend of thirty-three years had died. I was devastated, particularly as I was actually on my way to spend a few days with her and her family. Su was the best friend a girl could have, and an amazing woman, and I miss her like crazy. […]
Claire | July 3, 2015
On 3rd July 1533, William Blount, 4th Baron Mountjoy and Catherine of Aragon’s Chamberlain, was instructed to inform Catherine that she was “to satisfy herself with the name of Dowager” and to stop calling herself ‘Queen’. In his instructions to Mountjoy, Cromwell wrote that if Catherine carried on using the title of queen then “the […]
