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Elizabeth I was born in 1533 to Henry VIII and
Anne Boleyn. Although she entertained many marriage proposals and flirted
incessantly, she never married or had children. Elizabeth, the last of the Tudors,
died at seventy years of age after a very successful forty-four year reign.
Elizabeth inherited a tattered realm: dissension between Catholics and
Protestants tore at the very foundation of society; the royal treasury had
been bled dry by Mary and her advisors, Mary's loss of Calais left England
with no continental possessions for the first time since the arrival of the
Normans in 1066 and many (mainly Catholics) doubted Elizabeth's claim to the
throne. Continental affairs added to the problems - France had a strong footland
in Scotland, and Spain,
the strongest western nation at the time, posed a threat to the security of
the realm. Elizabeth
proved most calm and calculating (even though she had a horrendous temper) in
her political acumen, employing capable and distinguished men to carrying out
royal prerogative.
Her first order of business was to eliminate religious unrest. Elizabeth lacked the
fanaticism of her siblings, Edward VI favored Protestant radicalism, Mary I,
conservative Catholicism, which enabled her to devise a compromise that, basically,
reinstated Henrician reforms. She was, however,
compelled to take a stronger Protestant stance for two reasons: the
machinations of Mary Queen of Scots and persecution of continental
Protestants by the two strongholds of Orthodox Catholicism, Spain and France. The situation with Mary
Queen of Scots was most vexing to Elizabeth.
Mary, in Elizabeth's
custody beginning in 1568 (for her own protection from radical Protestants
and disgruntled Scots), gained the loyalty of Catholic factions and
instituted several-failed assassination/overthrow plots against her cousin,
Elizabeth. After irrefutable evidence of Mary's involvement in such plots
came to light, Elizabeth
sadly succumbed to the pressure from her advisors and had the Scottish princess
executed in 1587.
The persecution of continental Protestants forced Elizabeth into war, a situation which she
desperately tried to avoid. She sent an army to aid French Huguenots
(Calvinists who had settled in France) after a 1572 massacre
wherein over three thousand Huguenots lost their lives. She sent further
assistance to Protestant factions on the continent and in Scotland following the emergence of radical
Catholic groups and assisted Belgium
in their bid to gain independence from Spain. The situation came to head
after Elizabeth rejected a marriage proposal
from Philip II of Spain;
the indignant Spanish King, incensed by English piracy and forays in New
World exploration, sent his much-feared Armada to raid England. However, the English won
the naval battle handily, due as much to bad weather
as to English naval prowess. England
emerged as the world's strongest naval power, setting the stage for later
English imperial designs.
Elizabeth was a
master of political science. She inherited her father's supremacist view of
the monarchy, but showed great wisdom by refusing to directly antagonize
Parliament. She acquired undying devotion from her advisement council, who
were constantly perplexed by her habit of waiting to the last minute to make
decisions. She used the varying factions (instead of being used by them, as
were her siblings), playing one off another until the exhausted combatants
came to her for resolution of their grievances. Few English monarchs enjoyed
such political power, while still maintaining the devotion of the whole of
English society.
Elizabeth's
reign was during one of the more constructive periods in English history.
Literature bloomed through the works of Spenser, Marlowe and Shakespeare.
Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh were instrumental in expanding English
influence in the New World. Elizabeth's religious
compromise laid many fears to rest. Fashion and education came to the fore
because of Elizabeth's
penchant for knowledge, courtly behavior and extravagant dress. Good Queen
Bess, as she came to called, maintained a regal air until the day she died; a
quote, from a letter by Paul Hentzen, reveals the
aging queen's regal nature: 'Next came the Queen in the sixty-fifth year
of her age, as we were told, very majestic; her face oblong, fair, but
wrinkled; her eyes small yet black and pleasant; her nose a little hooked;
her lips narrow she had in her ear two pearls, with very rich drops her
air was stately; her manner of speaking mild and obliging.' This regal
figure surely had her faults, but the last Tudor excelled at rising to
challenges and emerging victorious.
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