Henry wished to be seen as a ruler equal to those much admired in other realms. The fine food and clothes she enjoyed were as much for show as her pleasure. Elizabeth was expected to give birth to her children and then immediately hand them over to others for care and education. The story being told offers a window into the day to day life of a Queen during a turbulent period in English history. He regarded these as a means to secure peace as well as economic benefits. When not defending his kingdom from usurpers, Henry put much time and effort into negotiating advantageous marriages for his offspring. As she reflected, had she been a boy she would likely have been killed by rivals.Įlizabeth bore seven children, although several of these died in childhood. A female monarch was unlikely to find the support necessary to rule effectively in late medieval England. The country remained unstable, with numerous uprisings to contend with, but the Queen supported her husband, mostly accepting that her own claims to the throne could not be pursued further. The disappearance of these two young princes cast a shadow over her remaining years.Īlthough a political marriage, following Richard’s defeat at the Battle of Bosworth, Elizabeth and Henry are portrayed as having as happy a marriage as could be hoped for at the time. When Richard III took the throne and Elizabeth’s brothers were taken to the tower the family had to make difficult decisions to ensure survival. She and her siblings enjoyed the opulent surroundings of the many palaces her father kept, although suffered periods of imprisonment, albeit in comfortable surroundings, when Edward’s position was challenged or defeated.
The first half of the book covers the time before young Elizabeth’s marriage, aged nineteen, to King Henry VII. It did not help that Edward’s wife, Elizabeth Wydeville, exerted her considerable influence to promote members of her family to positions of power, leading to resentment among those from more established aristocratic families who regarded them as upstarts.
The simmering rivalry between his kinsfolk, and those of the royal House of Lancaster, festered throughout his reign. Elizabeth was the eldest child of King Edward IV of the royal House of York. It is a novel rather than a biography, thereby enabling the author to fill in gaps between known facts about the woman who became the first Tudor Queen. Elizabeth of York, The Last White Rose, is the first book in a new trilogy by historian Alison Weir.
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