I’ve often pondered the question – if I could meet an historical figure, who would it be and why? It’s like the question – if you could invite anyone living or dead to a dinner party, who would you invite? The list is far too long for a dinner party, more a banquet. Because I am an historian and I would like to meet so many different people from the past. But really, only as long as I could ask the same question – why did you do what you did? With one exception. Queen Elizabeth I.
So, my answer to meeting any historical figure would be to meet Queen Elizabeth I. A more enigmatic woman I don’t think you could wish for. I have always loved the stories of Eleanor of Aquitaine, but I don’t think any of us could say she was entirely enigmatic…she was certainly clear how she felt about both her husbands through her actions! And for a woman to be as influential and wealthy as she was independently at that point in history, she is nothing short of remarkable. But she is not enigmatic, not really. Elizabeth I is quite possibly our most famous queen, certainly she is one of the top 5 of our most famous monarchs. There is almost a romance about her that is difficult to deny. All she achieved as a woman and a Protestant despite the almost insurmountable odds railed against her throughout her reign. Throughout her life. That she survived at all to take the throne at the age of 25 is nothing short of remarkable. The fact that she fought off all the requirements for her to marry is very significant for the history of this country, and I think she had the foresight to know that. She knew that whoever she married would have a significant impact on the country at that time, but I think she also knew that the impact of her marriage would be felt throughout history. But I think she also had an inbuilt – and quite natural – aversion to marriage and babies. Look what her father had done to all of his wives (even Catherine Parr hadn’t been exempted, he was looking to have her got rid of but died before he could). And those women who were close to her and had died during or shortly after childbirth, including Catherine Parr to whom Elizabeth had been devoted. And think of how she had been treated by men who had their eye on the prize – Thomas Seymour whose actions raised suspicions of an extra-marital affair with him whilst he had been married to…Catherine Parr. And even Robert Dudley around whom always clung the suspicion of murder for the rather convenient death of his wife.
So, why would she be the one historical figure I would like to meet above all others? Simply because I am fascinated by the question of how she viewed the father who had her mother beheaded and had her declared illegitimate immediately after. How did she think of the older sister who had initially almost raised her and then turned on her for their religious differences (and, I suspect, the interest that Philip of Spain showed in Elizabeth)? All of these people who had surrounded her in her young life, who had shaped her into the ruler and monarch she became, people that there is little to no record of her views on – what did she think of them? Did she think of them? She took her revenge on her father by following in her sister’s footsteps and not building a great tomb for him, rather leaving him in ignominy buried at Windsor Castle in a plot he eventually had to share with the condemned Charles I. So, we can possibly guess that her feelings towards him were not favourable, but it does beg the question of…why? She was just over 2 when her mother was beheaded, she would have had no memory of her whereas her sister had been grown when her mother had been treated so appallingly by her father and devoted to a mother she had not been allowed to contact for long periods. Was it because she had felt she had to walk on eggshells around the famously mercurial man, afraid for her own life? What kind of relationship – if any – did they have? I am fascinated by that father/daughter dynamic. And what of her mother? What did she think of the charges brought against her which led to her downfall and beheading? Did she think them just or did she have them investigated for her own purposes? Certainly she never spoke of her, and never sought to have her reputation rehabilitated but she did welcome members of her maternal family to her court.
She certainly inherited her parents’ fierce intellect and her mother’s clear preference for the Protestant church. Nothing, not even the prospect of death, could deter her from her faith. Which is another thing I am fascinated by…what brought about that dedication? That certainty that Protestantism was the way forward versus Catholicism? To the point where she courted death her entire life, even leading to a Pope to decree that to murder the heretical queen would not be a sin. Yet whilst she wasn’t entirely tolerant of the continuation of the Catholic faith in her country, she did not set out to eradicate it as violently as Mary had attempted to remove Protestantism. She did not wish to ‘make windows into the souls of men’ on the subject, an incredibly enlightened stance to take at that time. With, as I have said, significant repercussions. It enabled the Armada to set sail on the pretext of religion (I’m never convinced anything is truly on the grounds of religion, then it was a terribly convenient excuse) which arguably should have led to her downfall. That it didn’t is down to a not inconsiderable amount of luck with the weather.
I would love to meet her to discover what she really thought of being a female ruler. Did it come naturally to her? She was more a female ruler than her sister or Mary, Queen of Scots in the way she had eschewed marriage. She ruled alone, but had to be surrounded by men who would have much preferred to deal with another man. Even if that other man had been a foreign ruler. How did she truly feel about it? Did she wish, deep down, that she could share the burden of ruling with another? Or was her faith in the institution of marriage so damaged by her father’s behaviour that it was never a thought for her? The way she neatly side-stepped all the attempts, stating that realistically there was no one for her to marry and keep the country happy, I suspect the latter more.
And, finally, I am also curious as to how she would deal with me. A woman asking her questions about very intimate subjects. Would she fob me off? Or would she be open and honest? She was, as I say, fiercely intelligent so I suspect she would have fobbed me off of the very deep stuff with just enough information to let me think I had a scoop. And then gone on her merry way wondering why she’d had to waste her time with someone who wanted to know about things she had no intention whatsoever to reveal to anyone.
A complete enigma.
Louisa Simpson 