The making of a Queen
The birth of Anne Boleyn’s daughter Elizabeth at Greenwich Palace on Sunday 7 September 1533 was a bitter disappointment to Henry VIII. The king had broken with the Roman Catholic Church and annulled his marriage to his middle-aged first wife Catherine of Aragon in order to wed the more nubile Anne in pursuit of a male heir. Documents optimistically prepared in advance to announce the birth of this longed-for prince were hastily amended and a celebratory tournament was cancelled. Nevertheless the princess was accorded a sumptuous christening and at three months old was sent, with her own household, to be raised at the palace of Hatfield in Hertfordshire.
Anyone wanting to get to grips with the courageous, mercurial character of Queen Elizabeth I (as the little princess would become), and to appreciate
