Courtly love in the time of the Tudors was not a simple case of locking eyes across a banqueting hall and waiting for Cupid to take aim. Marriages were often transactional and even affairs could be political, with all the key players in an intricate game that, like chess, involved bishops, knights, queens, and kings.
There were clear winners (usually the monarch) and even clearer losers – some of whom ended up losing their heads. It was, then, all down to how well you played this game of thrones. Here are five legendary love stories of the period, some ill-fated, some star-crossed and just a few enduring.
Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn
Discarded gnawed chicken legs aside, King Henry VIII’s matrimonial record is the first thing that any budding historian thinks of when they consider the gargantuan Tudor monarch.
