← Dan Snow's History Hit
Dan Snow's History Hit
Elizabeth I: Evil or Genius?
00:31:22
We explore whether Elizabeth’s legacy is one of power and stability or one marked by bloodshed and negligence.
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- [00:00]
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- [02:15]
Dan Snow
Hi everybody. Welcome to the podcast Elizabeth the First. She regularly tops those polls as the greatest English monarch. But should she be there? She projected power and beauty through grand speeches and art, and she was charismatic and she obviously had a bit of a cool head. But underneath all that, she was unafraid to silence and suppress and oppress and spill a lot of blood to protect her crown and expand her realm was that just what was required for a dangerous age? Or was she a cold and calculating monarch who deepened the divisions of that time and created a whole host of new ones? What should we think about Elizabeth I? It's such a difficult one. And here to help us get into the murky details is Anna Whitelock, historian, author and professor of the history of monarchy at City University of London. Let's get into it. Anna Wylock. Good to see you.
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Anna Whitelock
Good to see you.
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Dan Snow
Let's just cut to the chase here. Queen Elizabeth. Elizabeth Tudor. Overrated.
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Anna Whitelock
Absolutely.
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Dan Snow
Really?
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Anna Whitelock
I think so. I know. I can hear. I know. Helen Castor's on tech speed dial straight away. I think so. I just want to suggest for a second that the whole idea of Elizabeth I, one of the greatest Britons, is more style over substance. I give her that. She was the queen of spin.
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Dan Snow
Well, those portraits.
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Anna Whitelock
The portraits.
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Dan Snow
Ah, the Armada portrait. I'd follow that woman into battle.
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Anna Whitelock
Oh, my goodness. The Armada portrait is the most incredible thing.
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Dan Snow
Yeah.
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Anna Whitelock
So tell me why you like the Armada portrait?
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Dan Snow
She's got a hand on the globe. There's an enemy fleet foundering in the background. She looks fabulous. I mean, she just looks like someone in charge.
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Anna Whitelock
Yeah, but have you noticed, I mean, I'm not surprised that you talk about the naval formations, but have you not noticed the bow, the strategically placed bow at her groin? Ooh, this is the per. Oh, my goodness. It's probably good that you've said you didn't notice and you were more fixated on the boats behind. I mean, this is the most amazing piece of spin. So one of the things when we think about Elizabeth I, we think of, oh, the Virgin Queen. And that Armada portrait is the most incredible thing because it's after the Armada. So the Armada is, of course, 1588. It's the end of her reign. Elizabeth is in 50s. She is basically a single, unmarried, post menopausal queen. It's not a good look. It's not a good look in the sense of what is the future. It's a dead end. There is no Tudor succession. So everybody's beginning to think, oh, dear, this isn't a great thing. The prospect of her marrying is now not really a positive one because she's too old to have children anyway. And so what happens is that in that image, Elizabeth's body, which has been massively at issue for the whole of her reign, because Catholics have basically said, of course, she was the daughter of Anne Boleyn. She's the kind of little whore of Europe. There's all this slander about Elizabeth, you know, famously, of course, with Robert Dudley, but with a whole load of other people, people saying that she wasn't a virgin. Absolutely not the Virgin Queen. That was the kind of scurrilous rumours that ambassadors would circulate around Europe. So what does Elizabeth do? She makes a virtue of being basically this post menopausal virgin Queen by saying, just like England's coastline was impenetrable, so is the body of the queen. And so the strategically paced beau is to kind of symbolically represent her virginity, that she is chaste, that she's married to the realm. And this is a great sense of her kind of impenetrability and stability. And so she brings those two ideas together and it becomes this great currency, the fact that she's suddenly the Virgin Queen, which of course is a nonsense because she may well have been still a virgin, but the idea that she was somehow.
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Dan Snow
That's a good thing.
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Anna Whitelock
Exactly. That it was a good thing was crazy.
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Dan Snow
But no foreign fleet's gonna sail up the Thames.
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Anna Whitelock
Well, exactly. But. So, I mean, one of the things that I compare very often, Henry VIII's, the big Holbein picture, prominent cod piece, because, of course, virility, sexual potency, political power, all are good. It all goes together. For women, chastity was necessary. But also, at the time, people believed that women were more sexually voracious than men. So you kind of needed to get married pretty quick. So chastity was not the greatest thing in the world. So here was Elizabeth making a virtue in the most direct way in that portrait. And so in a way that represents this being a mistress of spin, but covering up, of course, her failure to marry, her failure to produce an heir and ensure a smooth succession.
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Dan Snow
Okay, we're gonna come to those failures in a sec. But let's start with the good things, because this is what most people think when they think about Elizabeth. She regularly tops the poll for best English or British monarch. Why do people think that? You tell me. So, yes, there's the spin. There is these baby steps towards something we might now call the British Empire buccaneers going out. Francis Drake circumnavigates the world. First bits of territory are being claimed. Like, weirdly, in northern Canada, off the southern coast of South America, Tierra del Fuego, California, weirdly, briefly claimed. Anyway, so that's all beginning in this period. And then a bit of William Shakespeare as well. Why do people think Elizabeth so great?
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Anna Whitelock
Partly, she lives a long time. And that helps.
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Dan Snow
That really helps.
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Anna Whitelock
That really helps. And if we think about some of the most significant English monarchs. There's quite a few women up there. Victoria, because they live longer. Queen Elizabeth ii. Queen Elizabeth ii. They look after themselves, you see.
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Dan Snow
Come on lads, go to the.
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Anna Whitelock
Exactly, exactly. So they live for longer. So that really does help. I mean if you look at some of the early periods of Elizabeth's reign, the sort of disaster in her first French expedition, for example, foreign policy disaster, that's quite bad. But when you look at her foreign policy across the whole reign, and particularly of course with the Spanish Armada, the small get overshadowed. So I think she's seen as significant because she was a woman and she is seen as in a way exceeded expectation of being a woman in a man's world. Of course, she wasn't the first crowned Queen of England Plug, as you would expect. Big sister for Mary. Mary the first Queen of England. But Elizabeth succeeds as a woman. She's a kind of successful woman in a man's world.
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Dan Snow
And she does a long time, long time, very choppy. Her brother, Edward vi, short, scary little civil war, mini civil war at the end again Mary, very short religious repression. But it's weird, isn't it, how we do grade quite highly for just being around a long time. Even if they're quite passive, at least you don't get succession disputes. There's no major crises as long as they're just there sitting.
- [09:20]
Anna Whitelock
Exactly. And it's also that question about to what extent is a monarch responsible for the period or which defines them. So you know, how much of Elizabeth is responsible for the flourishing of Elizabethan age. So we talk about Elizabeth being a patron of the arts or the sort of flourishing of individuals like Christopher Marlowe and Shakespeare. And then you think about Francis Drake and Walter Raleigh and some of the overseas exploration and sure, there was a kind of nod and some support. How much of all of these endeavors. Exactly.
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Dan Snow
There was a lot of change. I don't wanna sound like a Marxist, but there's a lot going on under the old.
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Commercial Narrator
Totally.
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Anna Whitelock
And a lot of stuff happens over the period of her, what, 45 year reign. A lot of stuff's gonna happen. And so similarly to the reign of Elizabeth ii, I mean huge transformation. And so she is associated with some of that.
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Dan Snow
So she provides a bit of stability.
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Anna Whitelock
Yeah, and that's no small deal, of course, because as you said, there's been what used to be called back in the day, back in the 1970s, the Mid Tudor crisis. Very infamous question on a level papers, was there a mid Tudor crisis? No, there wasn't a mid Tudor crisis, because ultimately the T endured. There was lots of change. First it was rocky with a boy king and then a woman. But Elizabeth, yes, she established his stability.
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Dan Snow
What about Parliament? Does she deserve any credit there? You know, Cromwell and her dad had sort of pushed statutes through. Parliament is the position of Parliament in our weird English constitution. Does she encourage that? Does she work quite collegiately with.
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Anna Whitelock
I think she does. I mean, this is where Elizabeth as a political operator becomes quite interesting, because I think Helen Castor, whom I'm a great fan of, I know she's spoken to you about Elizabeth and her brilliant biography, and she would talk about Elizabeth as deliberately prevaricating at times, but she being a real operator and a strategist and not giving away too much, and I think there was definitely a sense of that. She did rely heavily on William Cecil, for example. She did step back at certain times. She wasn't as interventionist in Parliament and pushing things through perhaps as her father had been. And similarly, of course, she's associated with a relative period of religious peace, relatively. She tried to create a middle way whereby as many Catholics and Protestants could feel at home within the English church. So she tried to be as liberal as possible. She tried to really stretch the envelope of sort of a definition of loyalty and in that sense, created for a time. And as you say, there was also beginnings of exploration, but there was also war with Spain.
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Dan Snow
We're gonna come to the bad stuff in a second.
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Anna Whitelock
I wanna talk about the bad stuff.
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Dan Snow
I know, I know. We're gonna come to that. So, any other good stuff?
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Anna Whitelock
So, yeah, Patron of the arts, cultural flourishing. Lots of that came from her wanting to have a court that had a lively cultural scene, for want of a better term. She had these thrusting men around her who were ambitious. Elizabeth couldn't be as a female monarch. She couldn't lead an army into battle. But she did let some of these men do their thing, often not following her orders, but by letting them do their thing, we do see circumnavigation of the globe and the establishment or the attempt to establish territories in different places, I suppose the Spanish Armada. And although we can, as historians now go, yeah, but how much did she do? How much did she do? There is no contemporary source that describes the speech, is there not? No, I know. So, of course, the famous speech, I.
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Dan Snow
Have the harp at Tilbury. Yeah. Which we know, even if it did happen, happened after the Spanish Armada had already been defeated. And we're sailing up the sea.
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Anna Whitelock
Exactly. So Elizabeth rocking up potentially in her armour. Again, it was style over substance, because actually the Armada wasn't anywhere coming near. But this speech was certainly attributed to her, even though the first source of the speech isn't until 1623.
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Dan Snow
Okay.
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Anna Whitelock
So we don't know if she said it, but certainly she's been celebrated for it.
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Dan Snow
Yeah, but the trouble, though, Anna, is the problem with leadership is a lot of it is about style, isn't it? That's the weird thing about it, is legacy. Does a lot come down to just vibe, the vibe you create, doesn't it?
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Anna Whitelock
Well, I mean. Yeah, and I think this is the question. I mean, was it a kind of intentional style of being quite elusive at times? I mean, letting factions be created and sort of play themselves out and staying above them, outliving them, outliving them. Was she very much a skillful political operator? Was she lucky by virtue of the fact that actually she lived a long time and therefore some of the failures were kind of diluted? I mean, I would think that ultimately, you know, her reign is defined as this moment of. Well, nowadays where English nationalism is seen to kind of flourish and be cemented in the popular imagination. And so I think that's why we have this kind of amazing image of her, Gloriana. And, of course, films about the Spanish Armada were screened during the Second World War. I mean, it's seen as this moment where you can rally England when you think of the Spanish Armada. Come on, everybody. And so she will always have that. And I think that symbol that she becomes of English nationalism covers a multitude of sins.
- [14:42]
Dan Snow
And you say she's surrounded by men. But there's something quite interesting about English government at this point, although it's far from being modern in any sense, and it was often catastrophic. Is there something about the building of the Queen's ships, the dockyard? She's carrying on her dad Henry's work. She's obviously promoting decent people into these kind of beginnings, these bureaucratic positions who are doing decent work and helping to prepare a navy, for example, that will be able to fend off the Spanish Armada?
- [15:07]
Anna Whitelock
Yeah, I mean, I think that is true. And of course, she also has the challenge of having to deal with a lot of male egos and a lot of male egos of people who, for them is just about going and defeating the Spanish and piracy, getting treasure, making money from the New World, and she's having to manage these men.
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Dan Snow
Yeah, the west country lads are like, we can go and steal gold for we want. This is great. Meanwhile, all the sheep farmers in Lincolnshire and Norfolk, like You've destroyed our entire industry because now we can't sell our wool into Europe. So she's balancing that constantly.
- [15:39]
Anna Whitelock
Yeah. And I think not wanting to be converted to Elizabeth as one of the greatest Britons. That is certainly true. I mean, people think about Margaret Thatcher having to deal with a sort of largely male cabinet. How did she manage. Think about Elizabeth, think about a Privy Council, a parliament full of men who undoubtedly felt they could do a better job than her, who would have been jockeying for position, who thought, come on, come on, lads, we need to go and take it to the Spanish. We want war. And of course, she prevaricated. When we think of the Low Countries, you know, she prevaricated until 1584 when she finally decided that she would send an army in support of the Protestant rebels there. And people have been champing a bit for years. So the fact that she, I suppose, wasn't deposed, wasn't toppled, and actually managed to balance these egos and keep Parliament. I mean, of course we see what happens to Parliament during the reign of James and then Charles, keeping Parliament relatively in check. That's not to say that they don't endlessly petition her to marry, but ultimately, I mean, her actions aren't fundamentally circumscribed by Parliament.
- [16:57]
Dan Snow
This is Dan Snow's history here. More after this.
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Commercial Narrator
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- [18:13]
Dan Snow
To keep up when the world moves fast?
- [18:16]
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- [19:19]
Dan Snow
Let's get into it. Let's give the other side of this. Say why she does not deserve to be thought of as one of the greatest monarchs in this island's history. Should we start with religion? Because that's the bit everyone forgets. Well, let's start with religion, then go on to Ireland. The two are obviously linked. So she is maiming and torturing and killing as many people as her big sister, right? Mary.
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Anna Whitelock
Yeah, exactly. So Mary Bloody Mary killed 287 men, women and children. We all know the stories, we all know from the John Fox's Book of Martyrs, Elizabeth. We just don't really think about it, but absolutely. Hung, drawn and quartered many, many Catholics. Brutal murders of Catholic priests and so on, and yet often really overlooked. I mean, I remember doing the Tudors for a level. And even at that age thinking, oh, Elizabeth, you know, this just feels entirely bizarre that that's written out of the narrative.
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Dan Snow
Sanctions, ease of torture.
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Anna Whitelock
Yeah, but the point, of course, for Elizabeth is that after 1570, with the excommunication from the Pope and then with the bond of association in 1584, the change is that Catholics become traitors.
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Dan Snow
Okay, so the Pope excommunicates her and said, this person is. You can kill her and not suffer anything.
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Anna Whitelock
Exactly. She's an infidel, she's a heretic, etc. And the bond, the bond of association, is where people were called upon to sign it and basically say that they would not support. Well, particularly Mary Queen of Scots was in mind, but anybody to act against the life of the queen. And so at that point, Catholics became traitors. So it wasn't simply them being religious opposition and religious fanatics, but they were seen as traitors and hence were hung, drawn and quartered as traitors. So for Mary, it was about purging souls and burning the souls of Protestants. For Elizabeth, it was about killing traitors. But I mean, in both senses, it was brutal. I mean, to be honest, I don't think you can. I mean, controversial position, but I'm not sure you can hold those killings against either Mary or Elizabeth. The ferocity of the burnings under Mary, fair enough, it was only over a number, you know, three years or so. But actually this was the accepted form of punishment for heresy. Burning was. And being hung, drawn and quartered was the accepted punishment for treason. So that was the currency of the day. So I think we have to be careful when we're evaluating the reigns by what our terms of reference are.
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Dan Snow
Sure. But we're just saying that it's not all rosy.
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Anna Whitelock
Oh, it's definitely not rosy.
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Dan Snow
She did not bring religious harmony to the kingdom.
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Anna Whitelock
Absolutely.
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Dan Snow
That everyone could be part of. Then let's go to Ireland. Which, when I talk to Irish colleagues, I mean, they're like, what, you Brits are obsessed. Elizabeth. And we remember her as one of the worst in a pretty strong field. One of the worst English leaders out there.
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Anna Whitelock
Yeah. I mean, brutal actions in Ireland, she attempts a colonisation. The brutality that was inflicted upon the native Irish. I know you've talked to a number of Irish historians, I mean, they definitely see the seeds of future conflict as being established and sown during Elizabeth's reign. And not only is there this brutal actions against the Irish stirred up by the English, I mean, there was a sense of let's stir them up so that we can then act against them. But also, of course, there was the Nine Years War between England and Ireland, which was a huge drain in resources. A very large English army. I mean, that's where an English army was sent abroad. It was sent to Ireland. And again, real repression, brutality. And why? The answer to that was in part that Ireland was seen as a springboard, potentially for the Spanish. And the Spanish were meddling in Ireland and so Elizabeth couldn't afford not to act in Ireland. But, yeah, I mean, the Irish would say both Elizabeth and then of course, James, who also attempted a colonisation, a plantation of Ulster. Really, the brutality and the. The degree to which they attempted to cleanse, I mean, it was an ethnic cleansing of a sort. Has sowed the seeds. Yeah. For what followed in the centuries to come. Often overlooked in Elizabeth's reign.
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Dan Snow
And the plantation of Ulster, we should say Ulster, the northern part of. And now much of it in Northern Ireland, still part of the uk. And the plantation is just literally taking people, taking settlers from England, Scotland, and replacing native Irish people with those settlers and taking land, throwing people off. Enormous hardship and starvation, huge scale violence as well, with little quarter Given often.
- [24:01]
Anna Whitelock
Exactly. And part of the reason, I think, that Elizabeth has kind of not been condemned for that is that it's taken a long time when we think of studying Tudor history to actually bring in both Scotland and Ireland. I mean, even back in the day when I was doing my A levels, it was really about England and then Ireland was a bit of a headache. And Scotland too, it was very much peripheral to it and people were like, is it English? Is it British? And it was just always a little bit of a mess. And so in many ways, it's only relatively recently that we've understood that Tudor history and the reigns of the Tudor monarchs needs to be understood by looking at relations with Ireland and Scotland too. And I think by looking at them in the round, we do get a rather different view of them.
- [24:47]
Dan Snow
Right, so we've got that. We probably should mention the traffic in enslaved people as well, because there is a little bit of that under Henry viii. But England starts to get involved more heavily in trading enslaved Africans in this period as well.
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Anna Whitelock
And cheaper than that.
- [25:01]
Dan Snow
Exactly.
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Anna Whitelock
John Hawking's slave trader in the 1560s. I mean, Elizabeth sponsors and supports him. Essentially, he's trading African slaves. So, yeah, I mean, the beginning of the slave trade can in part be attributed to Elizabeth, who has actually an African in her household.
- [25:19]
Dan Snow
Also, speaking of Hawkins, her relationship with those maritime which people say, oh, she was a secret investor and it was great. I mean, she was deeply duplicitous, wasn't she? She sent Francis Drake, she got one of her subordinates to give him permission to go around the world, would not give him an official letter. So if he had been captured by the Spanish, he would have been hanged as a pirate. Or worse. He could not say, I'm not here on the Queen's orders, so deeply double dealing. And then also she would sort of send them orders and then countermand them constantly. And there was this game of cat and mouse about trying to sail out of Plymouth before the Queen could send orders, refusing to let them. I mean, it is quite chaot.
- [25:53]
Anna Whitelock
That is so interesting. And is this Elizabeth being this amazing politician that is literally trying to make both decisions at the same time. And of course, we see this famously when she's under pressure to sign the death warrant of Mary Queen of Scots. And having prevaricated for years, she eventually signs it. And then literally, as the guy is leaving the messenger carrying it, she basically calls him back and it's exactly the same thing. So when we say, oh, Elizabethan exploration, and we think of some of These great military men, did Elizabeth support them? Can Elizabeth be credited with that exploration as you describe? It was lucky that more harm didn't come to them. It could have been a very bloody end.
- [26:31]
Dan Snow
It could have been for many of them. So the Spanish Armada people will obviously know all about. She interfered constantly with Drake's. And Drake used to get furious and Howard furious with the sort of preparations that were made. They carried out an attack on Spain the year before. Elizabeth tried to countermand that after it sailed. So, you know, perhaps trying to have it both ways. But chillingly, her treatment of the Spanish Armada, sailors, the veterans, after that campaign, she let them just die on the quayside in the wars. I mean, it was terrible. They starved to death. Disease. I mean, it was absolutely appalling treatment.
- [27:03]
Anna Whitelock
I love how impassioned you are.
- [27:04]
Dan Snow
Yeah, I'm still upset about that.
- [27:06]
Anna Whitelock
I can see you're still upset about it. I can see you channeling your inner dream.
- [27:09]
Dan Snow
But also, I find it difficult to talk about Elizabeth. Cause I just think she is a person of such extraordinary contrast. Maybe because of the way I was brought up to think about her. And then what you.
- [27:16]
Anna Whitelock
But do you think she's the greatest Britain? I mean, you have a real sense of.
- [27:19]
Dan Snow
Well, I think I've got so old now and so messed up that I've got a problem with greatness anyway. What is. I don't even know.
- [27:24]
Anna Whitelock
What is greatness?
- [27:25]
Dan Snow
What is greatness? I don't know.
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Anna Whitelock
But also, I mean, for you, your whole. I was gonna say affiliation with Drake, would you say association with him? You feel that really, quite passionately. And also the treatment, as you say, of the Armada veterans, which is such a disconnect from how we think of Elizabeth in terms of being the great triumph of the Spanish Armada. And of course, all the attempt afterwards to take it to the Spanish.
- [27:49]
Dan Snow
Oh, my goodness. Disaster, absolute disaster. Doesn't send a siege train with Drake and Norris. But now we're getting to the weeds there. But then you find yourself. Because there's something about the longevity of the reign and the sort of reasonable domestic stability that does keep you coming back. From the English, narrowly English point of view, it's a successful reign.
- [28:07]
Anna Whitelock
Well, this is where I'm gonna sort of throw my. What I think is my kind of ace card, the succession.
- [28:13]
Dan Snow
Yes. Yeah, right. She messes it up.
- [28:15]
Anna Whitelock
I mean, she doesn't even try. She doesn't even try.
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Dan Snow
And we should come to. It's one of the first duties of a monarch in a hereditary system to ensure succession.
- [28:26]
Anna Whitelock
Everybody knows that. That is the thing you have to do. Elizabeth II knew that. Think about all of those images and bits of footage in the last years of her reign. Whether it was like stirring the Christmas pudding with Prince Charles and Prince George, the balcony shot at the end of the Jubilee where all her heirs were there, or the portrait where, brilliantly, she's got her handbag almost as an exclamation mark, where she's got the generations of Charles and William and George. She knew that it was all about the succession. And of course, that was Elizabeth ii. When it doesn't really matter. Rewind to Elizabeth I, it matters. The monarch is the focus of all political power. The idea as a monarch that you wouldn't preserve the succession and pass on not only your dynasty, but also the sense of security of the realm is, like, massively negligent.
- [29:17]
Dan Snow
And so many wars in this period caused by succession crises.
- [29:20]
Anna Whitelock
I mean, totally wars of the Roses, I mean, succession crisis all over Europe. I mean, it doesn't get much bigger than this, failing to ensure the country's security. I mean, it's the number one thing. And so, you know, this isn't just, oh, Elizabeth doesn't get round to writing a will at the end of a race. This is dynastic insecurity that is absolutely shot through her reign. She refuses to marry and dilly dallys around that. Now you can say, yes, but there wasn't any one candidate that all the council got behind. True. Wouldn't it have caused faction at home? Wouldn't it have caused potentially instability abroad? Potentially, yes. But Mary, I had had to deal with this. She'd married Philip of Spain and so on. She tried to have an heir. Desperate failure, as it turned out. But Elizabeth didn't even try. And of course, she then didn't even name an heir at the end. So there was this sense of what is going on. And although people would go, yeah, but she knew about the correspondence that was going on between James.
- [30:22]
Dan Snow
Right. So she's got a cousin, James VI of Scotland.
- [30:25]
Anna Whitelock
Exactly.
- [30:25]
Dan Snow
Distant, ish cousin. Senior politicians at the English court are sort of writing to him going, yeah, don't worry, you're the guy and we'll make it all happen. So people have said, well, she turned a blind eye to that.
- [30:34]
Anna Whitelock
Well, people are saying. But then at the same time, you know, people are writing and going, it is not for want of heads. In other words, there is so many potential successors here that could be claiming the throne. And there was a sense that the Spanish might try and claim the English throne. They might take advantage of the succession. I mean, it really was the talk of Europe, what was going to happen to England. And there was a real sense of impending civil war and massive crisis. I mean, Elizabeth had acknowledged. I mean, her response to the succession crisis had been one, to put more white makeup on and two, to create this mask of youth, quite literally, where no longer was it permissible to show the queen aging in portraits. But actually, we think that her ladies sat for portraits wearing her gowns. But then this approved face mask, which the court sergeant painter approved, would basically then just be inserted. So it didn't show the queen aging. And that wasn't just because she was vain, which she was, but it was also to try and maintain this fiction that the queen would kind of live forever because so much instability was being stored up. It was felt for when she eventually died.
- [31:47]
Dan Snow
And it's weird because as you're saying that I'm thinking, given that Henry VIII spent most of his time worrying about a successor extraordinary, that his daughter didn't spend any time at all.
- [31:54]
Anna Whitelock
No, no, exactly. If you think about all the desire for Henry to have a male heir, all of that going on, I mean, the point is that Elizabeth didn't even try. I mean, commentators, at the end of her reign, first of all, there's lots of accounts where she didn't want to go to bed. You know, she had to be sort of carried to bed because it was almost like she knew the game was up and she knew that by going to bed, it would be her deathbed. So she sort of lies on cushions in her privy chamber right at the end of her reign. And then accounts when she finally dies or she loses the ability to speak. And of course, those who want James to succeed record afterwards that when James name was mentioned, she does a sort of crown gesture above her head. That's convenient.
- [32:35]
Dan Snow
That's great.
- [32:36]
Anna Whitelock
So she doesn't have a great deal of ability to speak, but apparently still had the kind of will to make this crown gesture. I'm not sure. And of course, the great Tudor dynasty that people would go amazing, significant Tudor dynasty that dies out with Elizabeth. And by her failure to name and provide an heir, or name an heir, a Scottish king inherits the throne. And although that turned out to be okay, did it, people didn't know that at the time Scotland was the great enemy of England. So she'd set up a potential kind of tinderbox of crisis and uncertainty and had made no effort to resolve it. So abdication of responsibility. Fundamental abdication of responsibility. And that is why I think she cannot receive the accolade of one of the greatest Britons.
- [33:29]
Dan Snow
Okay, well, you've made that very clear. But luckily, as in other areas of her life, she was blessed with good subordinates who quietly arranged the whole succession thing. And there was no civil war.
- [33:38]
Anna Whitelock
Well, indeed. And some people would say she kind of knew that, and she just was being a bit savvy and letting them get on with it. And she did say at various points, all eyes will turn to the rising and not the setting sun. So she knew the minute she said, I'm going to be replaced by James, everybody would look to him and she would become entirely politically impotent. So that's in defense of her high risk, though. Incredibly high risk. I mean, she was playing a very dangerous game with England's security. And this being the woman who, you know, is credited by being the great symbol of English national identity with the Spanish Armada, that in itself was largely a myth. And the fact that she failed to ensure a smooth succession, certainly by her efforts, is not held against her at all.
- [34:28]
Dan Snow
End up with a Scottish guy as king.
- [34:30]
Anna Whitelock
Exactly.
- [34:31]
Dan Snow
Thank you very much, Anna Whitelock, for coming on the podcast.
- [34:34]
Anna Whitelock
Pleasure. Thank you, Dan.
- [34:36]
Dan Snow
Thank you so much for listening. Listening as always. And thanks for sticking with this podcast for so many years. If you're a long time fan now, if you are, you'll remember the days when we used to smash out seven episodes a week. You'll probably notice that we're slowly honing the craft. We're bringing you longer and frankly, better episodes. There's a lot more research that goes into them, and we're trying to focus on more of what you want as well. And that's exactly what we're going to keep doing. So from November, there's going to be a change in our release schedule. You're going to get new episodes every Monday and Thursday if you're a subscriber, which I urge you to become, of course. And then if you are, you'll get extra bonus episodes on Fridays, too. The reason I'm doing that is I want to make sure I can put more time into the episodes I'm making for you. Try and do more of those explainers, for example. And I just monologue along. People seem to like those. Thank you very much for all the reviews. As you can imagine, those take a lot of time. So with this new release schedule, I'll be able to give you more of those. Worry not, though. Dan Snow's history is not changing. It's just getting better.
- [35:40]
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