Guest Post and Give Away: Inside the Tudor Court by Lauren McKay

I’m delighted to be part of Lauren McKay’s virtual book tour for Inside the Tudor Court, a look at the court of Henry VIII and his six wives through the correspondence of Imperial Ambassador Eustace Chapuys. Below you’ll find an excerpt from the book.

Amberley Books is giving away a free copy of the book at each stop on the tour, so if you would like to be entered in the drawing, click over to the contest form and leave your email address here:

“Inside the Tudor Court” book give-away

The contest will be closed at noon US CDT on Sunday April 13th and the winner will be contacted shortly after!

Update 04-13-14: The contest is now closed and the winner has been contacted. Thanks to all who entered!

Excerpt

Royal Rivals

It is true that in an indirect manner they have occasionally hinted at what they call Your Majesty

Upcoming Books and Exhibitions for April 2014

Books

Catching up on book releases the slipped past me in the last few months:

Robert Stedall’s second volume on Mary Queen of Scots, Survival of the Crown was released in February in both the UK and UK. Check out his website MaryQueenofScots.net for more information on both the books and the history!

Next is The Third Plantagenet: George, Duke of Clarence, Richard III’s Brother by John Ashdown-Hill. It is out in hardback in the UK and on Kindle in the US, but won’t but out in print in the US until June (where the link below goes).

And finally, I mentioned in last month’s round-up that Jessie Childs’ God’s Traitors: Terror and Faith in Elizabethan England would be out in April in the US, but now it looks like it won’t be until September. Sorry!

New Display

* Hans Holbein Re-made: Copies and versions of portraits from the Tudor court, went on display at the National Portrait Gallery on March 4th and will be up through August 31.

Continuing exhibitions

* Closing this month: The Museum of London’s exhibition on the Cheapside Hoard, a collection of Elizabethan and Jacobean jewels that were found in a cellar in 1912. The exhibition opened October 11, 2013 and runs through April 27, 2014.

* Strange Beauty, an exhibition on painters of the German Renaissance (including Hans Holbein) opened at the National Gallery in London on February 19, 2014 and runs through May 11, 2014.

* If you missed out on In Fine Style when it was at Buckingham Palace, you can catch it now at the Palace of Holyroodhouse from March 14 to July 20.

Sunday Short Takes

Quick run-down this week as I get back to enjoying my last few hours of spring break:

* Seminal portrait of Queen Elizabeth I on display at the Museum of Reading – Painting commissioned by Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, as part of a pair of portraits depicts the Queen wearing a white satin jewel-encrusted doublet

* Is this the bed which launched the Tudors? – Dumped in a hotel car park this four poster could be where Henry VIII was conceived and is worth

Doing some upgrades today

Just wanted to warn everyone that I’m going to do some necessary upgrades on the WordPress theme today so things might look a little wonky while I’m working on it. I’ll update this post when I’m done, but if after I update you notice any weird behavior, please leave a comment or send me an email.

Update: Well, upgrading to the new theme seemed to break more things that it fixed, so I’ve gone back to the old one for now.

Sunday Short Takes

Quick and dirty round-up this week – I’ve worked the past two Saturdays and I’m completely knackered after yesterday in particular (working this, for those interested) and in general.

* March 2014 issue of BBC History Magazine out now – featuring a cover article on Chapuys and the Six Wives of Henry VIII by Lauren Mackay

* Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn: Suzannah Lipscomb dispels myths about the lovers who changed history

* The Lovers Who Changed History – Related to above, a post from the British Library Manuscripts Blog about Anne Boleyn’s Book of Hours

* TannerRitchie and the Scottish Record Society announce new agreement

* York’s

Picture of the Week #268

Side of Hatfield House. Photo May 2000.

I think I’ve only used photos of the Old Palace and the park prior to this. Technically Hatfield House post-dates the Tudor period but is definitely worth a visit for the art collection alone. There are several well-known portraits of Elizabeth I there, as well as the “Fete at Bermondsey”, and many other interesting artifacts.

Sunday Short Takes

The story that lit up my news alerts the most this past week was the announcement that a team of researchers working on the DNA of Richard III are going to map the king’s complete genome:

* Richard III: Scientists to sequence DNA

Another popular story last week was the auction of another supposed flag from the Battle of Bosworth (see here for a link to another from past September):

* Richard III’s ‘Battle of Bosworth flag’ sold at Suffolk auction

In “Tudors on TV” news – Suzannah Lipscomb’s newest program, a two-part documentary on Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn’s relationship, starts Thursday on Channel 5 in the UK:

* Henry & Anne: The Lovers Who Changed History

And finally…

I just wanted to give a shout-out to the British Library’s Flickr account, which now has over 1 million public domain images from their collections. And of course there are some Tudor-history-related items in there, such as the one above of Henry VIII and Will Somers from the Psalter of Henry VIII and this one of the Trial of Mary Queen of Scots as just a few examples!

Sunday Short Takes

* The Missing Tudors: black people in 16th-century England – They were baptised and buried in parishes across the country, and even attended queens at court. So why, asks Onyeka, do we continue to airbrush black Africans out of Tudor England?

* Work starts on ‘exceptional’ Beauchamp Chapel in Warwick – Work is set to start on the restoration of a 15th Century chapel, described by English Heritage as being “of exceptional interest”.

* Cardinal backs campaign to buy

Picture of the Week #265

Another view of Henry VII’s tower at Pembroke Castle. Photo May 2003.

Regular readers of this blog will not be surprised to see yet another photo of Pembroke Castle with yesterday being the anniversary of Henry VII’s birth. (Pembroke Castle is second only to the Tower of London in number of pictures… and I have visited the Tower three times – I’ve only been to Pembroke once!)