HF Bloggers Round Table: Guest Post on Queen Elizabeth I by Amy from Passages to the Past!

Guest post by Amy from Passages to the Past:

Elizabeth & Robin

Queen Elizabeth I is known as “The Virgin Queen” and although it is still debatable as to whether she truly kept her virtue intact or not, what is not debatable is that she was a very passionate person, a romantic and an outrageous flirt. I mean, come on her parents were King Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn for pete’s sake! Elizabeth always seemed to have a bevy of young, handsome, virile young men about her, even into her 60’s! Flattering her, writing songs about her and vying each other for her affection. But one man stands out when we talk about Elizabeth…Lord Robert Dudley. The man I believe to have been her true love.

They became friends when they met as children and through the years their friendship blossomed, becoming even more solid when they were both imprisoned in the Tower. When Elizabeth ascended to the throne, Robert was made Master of the Queen’s Horse. A doubly beneficial situation – not only would he be in a position to remain close to the Queen daily, but he was genuinely a great horseman.

Elizabeth & Leicester at Kenilworth

The Queen and her Robin were always together, flaming the rumor fires that they were lovers. Robert had certainly benefited with titles, lands and money from Elizabeth. Rumors that Elizabeth was pregnant with their love child and that they conspired to kill Robert’s wife, Amy Dudley were whispered in dark corners. But even now that Robert was free to marry, Elizabeth knew that marriage with him was out of the question. Not only did she think it would confirm her involvement in the death of Amy Dudley, she also believed it would damage her popularity with the people of England. And there was no one more beloved than her England.

Elizabeth says about marriage with Robert Dudley…

“How could I refuse him? Yet how could I accept? For I was married already – married to England from that moment in Westminster Abbey when I bared my breasts to the cold, rancid oil and felt the chill kiss of England’s ring upon my finger. And any other marriage would be adultery, fornication, blasphemy…”
(I, Elizabeth by Rosalind Miles)

The devastated Dudley went on to marry one of Elizabeth’s cousins, Lettice Devereux, whom he was still married to at the time of his death. Robert died shortly after England defeated the Spanish Armada and Elizabeth was said to have been beyond consolation – locking herself in her room for days. A letter labeled “His Last Letter” was found to be in her treasure box when she passed 15 years later.

Robert Dudley’s last letter to Queen Elizabeth I

I most humbly beseech your Majesty to pardon your poor old servant to be thus bold in sending to know how my gracious lady doth, and what ease of her late pain she finds, being the chiefest thing in the world I do pray for, for her to have good health and long life. For my own poor case, I continue still your medicine and find that [it] amends much better than any other thing that hath been given me. Thus hoping to find perfect cure at the bath, with the continuance of my wonted prayer for your Majesty’s most happy preservation, I humbly kiss your foot. From your old lodging at Rycote, this Thursday morning, ready to take on my Journey, by Your Majesty’s most faithful and obedient servant,

R. Leicester

Even as I had writ thus much, I received Your Majesty’s token by Young Tracey.
(via www.elizabethi.org)

Thanks so much Amy for this terrific post on one of the greatest scandals of the 16th Century! The romance of Robert Dudley and Queen Elizabeth was always so sad to me because they loved each other so much but could never actually end up together, and they knew that. I thought Cate Blanchett played an excellent Elizabeth I in the Elizabeth movies (not the most factually based, but great movies none the less), and the first one covers the love story of Elizabeth and Robin.