#bcus what support would she have had in the wake of the obliteration of the boleyn factions and all the alliances they'd brokered--

[fideidefenswhore]

I've read some historians defend the Seymour faction recently, and was wondering if Gross included the defense. It is that while they did plot to neutralize Anne, they were probably only aiming for annulment and banishment like had been done to Katherine.

No, Gross didn't include that. That's been a more recent defense, I've read it too, from both Weir & Mackay.

Yeah, the defense is interesting because...it seems more like a strawman argument/ moving the goalposts than anything else. I have never read anyone claim that, it doesn't make sense that back in February of 1536 or whatever, they would be plotting Anne's judicial murder. It was unprecedented, how would they have even conceived of it?

The squeamishness people feel in regards to the Seymour faction is that when it did reach that fever pitch, they did not flinch. They readily accepted it. They didn't speak in their defense, in all likelihood, because Anne and George Boleyn being permanently removed along with their supporters (and poor Mark as collateral) meant their rise was more firmly secured.

A lot is made of Anne as Henry's 'mistress' then wife was sort of their blueprint. But I think, when they were moving strategically, Anne's queenship, was, maybe more so than her as mistress. The prospect of Anne alive, banished, insisting she was still queen as Catherine had, and attracting public sympathy (and anyone that doubts Anne ever had that, I mean...she had it more than she ever had in the Tower, a 'ballad of derision' aimed at Henry&Jane was not nothing), was a daunting one. It was very convenient for them that that was never going to happen. There was never the potential of a lightning rod to attract public sympathy and detract from their own reputations and status when it was permanently extinguished (think on Edward Seymour's animosity towards his nephew's half-sister, Elizabeth, when she was a teenager and all the pieces sort of start falling together...).

The defense that they could not have said anything in defense of, or to encourage mercy towards, those about to be judicially murdered as they waited in the wings for the spoils, because oh no, the potential wrath of Henry frightened them so much, is also a weak one. Maybe it was the potential risk/loss of their future rise that frightened them so much. But the idea that anyone that ever spoke on behalf of those accused of treason were going to doubtless be arrested by Henry is a fiction created for the purpose of defense to the morally indefensible, this genre of pretended fair-mindedness, pretended symmetry (the Boleyns benefited from the former Queen and Princess’ demotions and exiles, not their murders), both-sidesism. Cranmer was the only one that spoke in Anne's defense, and he was protected by Henry for the rest of his reign. It's like the fiction that no noblewoman could ever refuse Henry's bed because he would inevitably 'ruin' them and their family financially for their refusal. This is such a readily accepted narrative at this point that it doesn't even seem to matter that there's not a single example of Henry ever doing that, that in fact, in the few recorded instances of refusals to be his mistress (respectively, AB and JS), that he didn't do that to their families in retaliation, and arguably even elevated them (timelines are iffy for the AB courtship, but we do know that the ‘for a thousand deaths I would not wound’ was reported April 1, and that Edward Seymour was promoted to Gentleman of the Privy Chamber some weeks before that...it’s possible they coincided, or that the first did not negate the second).

But I digress. It didn't seem to 'terrify' Jane when she interceded on Mary's behalf when she was about to be arrested. So, no, I don't think the prospect of encouraging mercy towards these men and woman 'terrified' the Seymours, I think they just had no compulsion to do so because it wouldn't benefit them (and, fwiw, Mary’s reinstatement as heir would/could have benefited Jane by netting herself Imperial support, and it wasn’t like it would’ve reversed principles of primogeniture...if Jane had a son, which clearly recent events had shown she needed to, he would still inherit above Mary, we can consider it a gesture of the moment/circumstances...or you can decide it was because she was ‘selfless’...an adjective that probably doesn’t really fit either AB or JS, both of whom were benficiaries of, at the very least, their predecessor’s disgrace and repudiation). That's why they're popularly thought of as a group with no scruples. It really just does not seem like they had any, even if they never ipso facto encouraged the arrests, they accepted the windfall over six corpses. There's no way to spin that into something palatable, unless you truly believe the Boleyns, and their supporters, and a court musician, were all evil people with no redeeming qualities that 'got theirs'.

#anon #they directly benefited and there's just no getting around that #vacated viscountship --> granted to edward seymour #place in the privy chamber (mark smeaton's) --> granted to henry seymour #where are the qualms? you can hope they were there but ultimately there's no evidence extant of any whatsoever #they ceased to speak of them as if they had never existed #they joked about that status quo a decade later (thomas seymour did; at any rate) #which doesn't suggest there were any conflicted feelings about it from the direct beneficiaries #it's not exactly a topic of levity and yet. #the mary one is always a hoot bcus the actual 'selfless' thing to do in that situation-- ie what would not have benefited jane at all #bcus what support would she have had in the wake of the obliteration of the boleyn factions and all the alliances they'd brokered-- #would have been to promote elizabeth's interests as heiress #or even to potentially advocate that both be reinstated legitimate in good faith #the wording is actually vague; what does 'the princess to be placed in her former position' mean? #every historian always assumes it means reinstated as princess but could it have just meant attendance in court? #with her own household without elizabeth ? (in which case...did not happen in jane's lifetime) #restoration simply means to be given something that was taken away. and for mary that could have been a lot of things #or just to be treated better? and that this was what was going to ensure the emperor 'being content'? #all the 'alicent is AB takes she should be more like jane seymour' seem to conveniently forget jane had another stepdaughter lmao...