Pembroke Castle, Wales. Photo May 2003.
It’s Henry VII’s birthday, so you know what that means! Yep, another photo of Pembroke Castle. I think the Henry VII Tower is the one to the far left along the wall.
Year: 2015
Sunday Short Takes
It should be no surprise that there was a lot of news last week coinciding with the premiere of “Wolf Hall”! I’ve just a made a few selections from a bunch of articles that came across my path.
* Adapting Wolf Hall for TV: how I played historical guessing game – Catherine Fletcher writes about being a historical advisor on “Wolf Hall”.
* Seductress or Scholar – The Real Anne Boleyn – Leanda De Lisle writes about Henry VIII’s second Queen for Newsweek
* Where to find the best Tudor sights in England – As the dramatisation of Hilary Mantel’s Wolf Hall begins its run on BBC Two, historian Suzannah Lipscomb reveals her favourite Tudor homes and palaces around the country
* Tudor timeline: 10 momentous dates – It was one of the most transformative periods in English history, but which dates in the Tudor calendar had the greatest impact? Historian Lauren Mackay maps out the top 10
* Rare Tudor hat finds new home at Hampton Court Palace – Hat linked to Henry VIII acquired by charity Historic Royal Palaces in Hampton Court
Happy New Year!
Yeah, I’m a little late getting this posted, but at least it’s still January!
Last year I wrote about the various goals that I had for 2014, both personal and for the site. I did okay on some, terrible on others, but I’m going to set goals for myself again in 2015 and hopefully keep a little better account of them. (You can read more about my personal goals for last year and what I have in store for 2015 over on my personal blog.)
On the Shakespeare Challenge, I only made it through one third of the plays, but I did manage to read all of the sonnets. A little trivia – if you read a sonnet a day starting on January 1 and in a non-leap year, you’ll finish them on June 3. I’m planning to continue this challenge and read another third this year and next, so I’ll have read all by the end of 2016. I originally started the challenge in honor of the Bard’s 450th birthday, but this way I’ll finish them by the 400th anniversary of his death.
On the rest of last year’s goals: I totally failed. I didn’t manage to post one single book review. So, this year I’m going to make another attempt at that. I’m going to aim for six reviews, although they may cover more than one book in each review since I have a few that would work nicely as pairs. I did manage to do a few behind-the-scenes things on my to-do list, but I didn’t get to any of the really big ones I was aiming for. So I’ll keep working on those as well.
One other thing to note for this year – by one way of counting (more on that in a minute) this is the 20th anniversary of this site. The reason I say “by one way of counting” is that the site has gone through several iterations, and this is the 20th anniversary of the first one. I think the first page about my Tudor History interests that I put on my personal website actually dates from late 1994, but I know that it was going strong by mid-1995 since that was when I started thinking about splitting it off into its own thing and when I started my current job full-time (and yes, I’m getting a 20 year plaque for that this year). It didn’t actually end up it’s own site until July 1997 (after the Elizabeth I pages were previously on GeoCities – remember that?? – in 1996, I think). So 2017 would be another 20 years milestone. This year is also the 15th anniversary of the site at TudorHistory.org domain, which I originally bought on July 9, 2000. I’ll probably do a full post on the history of the site later in the year and bore everyone with more details than anyone could possibly want.
Best wishes for 2015 everyone!
Picture of the Week #316
Heraldic panel from 1518, Swabia, Germany. The Cloisters, Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. Photo August 2006.
This is one of a pair of panels (the other will be posted in a couple of weeks) celebrating the marriage of Barbara von Zimmern and Wilhelm von Weitingen, representing the union of two well-established families of the area.
Picture of the Week #315
Royal arms at the Tower of London. Photo May 2003.
These arms are actually post-Tudor, but they are so pretty I had to use this photo eventually.
Sunday Short Takes
Here’s what caught my eye in the past week or so!
* How Thomas Wolsey made Hampton Court fit for a king
* Lucy Worsley: the fuss over Prince George was nothing compared to the uproar over Henry VIII’s son
* The Dublin King with John Ashdown-Hill – Interview with the author at Nerdalicious
* A Collection of Christmas Cokentryce! – @TudorCook did a Storify of the three cokentryce cooked up at the Hampton Court Kitchens over the holidays
* Brave New Worlds: The Shakespearean Moons of Uranus – Podcast from the Folger Shakespeare Library (and includes a mention of McDonald Observatory, part of the department where I work!)
Picture of the Week #314
Carew Castle, Wales. Photo May 2003.
One of the neat things about Carew were the interesting shadow and light patterns from the windows (or more accurately, the stone that once held glass to make windows).
Upcoming Books, Events, and Exhibitions for January 2015
Books
As far as I know there was only one book from December that I missed, the paperback release of David Loades’ Catherine Howard: The Adulterous Wife of Henry VIII.
And I only have one new US release – Pirate Nation: Elizabeth I and Her Royal Sea Rovers by David Childs was released last fall in the UK and will be out January 15 in the US.
Now for the new books for January!
First up is Mary McGrigor’s biography of Margaret Douglas – The Other Tudor Princess: Margaret Douglas, Henry VIII’s Niece which will be out January 5 in the UK and will be released in May in the US.
Next is The Dublin King: The True Story of Lambert Simnel and the Princes in the Tower by John Ashdown-Hill, out January 5 in the UK and in May in the US.
And finally, Lady Katherine Knollys: The Unacknowledged Daughter of King Henry VIII by Sarah-Beth Watkins will be released at the end of the month in both the UK and US.
Lecture
* Dressing Elizabeth: The Phoenix Portrait as Evidence of a Royal Wardrobe – January 29th at 7:00 p.m. at the National Portrait Gallery, Professor Maria Hayward will discuss the wardrobe and jewels of Elizabeth I
Continuing Exhibitions
* Treasures from the Royal Archives opened at Windsor Castle on May 17, 2014 and runs through January 25, 2015 and features some items from the Archives that have never been on display before.
* The Real Tudors: Kings and Queens Rediscovered display at the National Portrait Gallery opened September 12, 2014 and will run through March 1, 2015.
Television
* Wolf Hall, the 6-part drama based on the books of Hilary Mantel’s award-winning books, will premiere in the UK on BBC Two in January and will air in April on PBS in the US. You can learn more about the series at the BBC Media Centre. There will also be several documentaries on BBC Two and BBC Four to accompany the series.
See the first trailer for Wolf Hall, embedded below:
