autrenecherche:

autrenecherche:

Henry the VIII and Elizabeth I receive a lot of the same unfair/more or less baseless criticisms, and I can’t help but notice that those of Elizabeth are examined more closely while those of Henry tend to totally be excepted at face value.

For instance…I’ve read both criticized on the grounds that they surrounded themselves with the younger courtiers and friends in their respective twilight years in a “sad, pathetic attempt to recapture their youth”, motivated by “vanity”.

There’s not really much basis for this claim for either of them; not to mention it’s very snarky and uses pretty emotionally loaded language…and makes a lot of assumptions.

It’s true they were friendly with younger courtiers, but this was part of being a monarch, it was part of politics, so reading that much into it just comes off as needlessly spiteful. And both actually did have many people that were close to them that were their age, close to their age, or older when they were in their twilight years (for Henry, Charles Brandon and Anthony Denny come to mind)…so this is the kind of broad generalization that pretty much falls apart upon further examination.