Did Anne Boleyn Have Six Fingers?

hello and welcome back to the channel if you're new here hi you're very welcome this is reading the past and i'm dr cat and today i'm responding to a question that i have received countless times and that's not surprising because this is a question that has been doing the rounds for centuries did ann berlin have six fingers [Music] nope well i hope you enjoyed this video and found it useful if you did please let me know by hitting the thumbs up i'm just kidding of course i'm not going to cut the video there stop talking about the topic i don't believe that amberlynn had six fingers but that doesn't mean that it's not worthy of discussion and debate i want to know why this fiction myth slander is so attached to her name why it's such a prevalent part of the way history remembers her and exploring that is the plan for today's video although our ancestors were absolutely not the superstitious fools that they are frequently presented as having been overt physical differences presumably would have been a cause for concern for some they might have been viewed as physical evidence of a moral failing perhaps even a sign of demonic influence for this reason i think that a sixth finger may have been caused for some if not all parents to choose to hide their child away this was not what happened to ann berlin she would spend many of her formative teenage years on public display on the continent she briefly acted as a maid of one of the archduchess of margaret of austria before being transferred to the service of queen claude of france where she would spend many years by all accounts her time on the continent particularly the service of queen claude was a successful one however anglo-french tensions had begun to escalate and anne was recalled to england in 1521 no doubt an advantageous marriage would be her next step anne's father thomas berlin believed himself to have a strong claim to the earldom of ormonde however there was a rival claimant he had a son who was unmarried called james butler it was suggested that perhaps the whole mess over who had the rightful claim could be swept under the rug if only anne could marry james of course as we know this was not to be amberlynn would not marry james butler however that didn't mean that she was short of admirers and perhaps the most high-profile one to come out of the woodwork at first was henry percy he was the heir to the earldom of northumberland a position which made him eminently eligible in fact in the 20th century m.e james would go so far as to assert that quote the north knew no prince but a percy henry percy had become besotted with anne and determined that he would marry her unfortunately for the couple their match produced consternation and pressure would have to be applied apparently henry percy's father and cardinal woolsey waded in to make him renounce anne and any promises that he had made to her he would eventually crumble and do as they asked henry percy was then hastily and apparently miserably married off to one mary tulbert sir thomas wyatt although married had also sought amblin out as a subject or muse for his love poetry at the very least in the following poem he appears to record his disappointment at discovering that amberlynn has drawn powerful attention from elsewhere who so list to hunt i know where is unhind but as for me halas i may know more the vain travail hath wearied me so sore i am of them that farthest cometh behind yet may i by no means my weary mind draw from the deer but as she fleeth the four fainting i follow i leave off therefore see then in a net i seek to hold the wind who list her hunt i put him out of doubt as well as i may spend his time in vain and graven with diamonds in letters plain there is written her fair neck roundabout no lay me tangare for caesar's i am and wild for to hold though i seem tame no lay me tangray touch me not for caesar's i am caesar in this case refers to king henry viii and berlin had caught his attention to my mind henry viii is a man who would show himself apt to find signs messages and warnings in the events that affected his life especially if he could use them to support an argument that god wanted him to act in a way that pleased his fancy whether he was actually superstitious or not he would certainly i think use superstition as an excuse to go his own way so my question is is it likely that this man would have overlooked a sick finger in a woman he wished to bed let alone marry i believe that as anne moved her way through the french court and then ascended to the dizzying heights she reached at the english court a sick finger would have been something that would have been noticed remarked upon and recorded during her lifetime if not by her friends then certainly by her growing number of enemies so much is made after all of her dark complexion amberlynn was on display as a member of the court she was educated to be so we may assume that she was expected to play a part in court masks to dance play musical instruments like the loot for the entertainment of herself and others to gamble decoratively at the card tables and undertake elaborate embroidery projects in public her hands would have been made visible by many if not all of these activities a sixth finger would have been evident even if she was wearing gloves equally any attempt being made to conceal a hand such as one that bore an extra digit would also no doubt have been remarked upon but what records do we have of how anne was viewed by those who knew her in life anne's first employer the archduchess margaret wrote a thoroughly glowing report of anne to her father telling him that she was quote of such good address and so pleasing in her youthful age that i am more beholden to you for having sent her to me than you are to me we might also look at the sonuto diaries which records among other things the reports of the venetian diplomatic delegation to england the entry for october 31st 1532 asserts that quote madam anne is not one of the handsomest women in the world she is of middling stature swarthy complexion long neck wide mouth bosom not much raised and in fact has nothing but the english king's great appetite and her eyes which are black and beautiful and take great effect on those who served the queen when she was on the throne lancelot de carl a french cleric and poet was in london at the time of ambulance trial and execution in the retinue of the french ambassador to england it is debated as to whether he was an eyewitness to events or if he based his contemporary account of anne's life and fall on the reports of those who were there in person nevertheless he describes anne as beautiful and with an elegant figure and of fearful beauty he explains that from her time in france she became so graceful that you would never have taken her for an english woman but for a french woman born and further to this and in common with the reports of the venetian diplomats lancelot de carl also praises the beauty of her eyes which she well knew how to use in truth such was their power that many a man paid his allegiance one of anne's proteges a cleric that she particularly favored john barlow was asked to compare anne to bessie blount the mother of henry viii's illegitimate son henry fitzroy although he is said to have proclaimed bessie to be the more beautiful he did say that anne quote was very eloquent and gracious and reasonably good looking in all of these reports of ambulance which chart her time from teenage maid of honour on the continent to queen of england absolutely no mention is being made of a sick finger or in fact any physical abnormality of any kind and i wonder why these contemporary sources would seek to hide or ignore such a factor when they do talk about her swarthy complexion the wideness of her mouth the raising of her bosom even the beauty and power of her eyes for me the most compelling piece of evidence to stand against the idea that amberlynn had a sick finger or indeed any pronounced physical abnormality that was visible to the naked eye is the fact that the spanish ambassador to the english court eustis shapwee makes no mention of any such thing eustis chapley was famously an ardently loyal friend and supporter of catherine of aragon who went to great lengths to avoid acknowledging ambulance place as henry's wife and queen indeed he would never refer to anne as queen or henry's wife instead she was known as the lady the concubine or the harlot in his official dispatches the fact that this man who evidently disliked anne would choose to ignore or hide the fact that she had a sick finger when corresponding to his spanish masters is as far as i'm concerned improbable in 1876 the chapel of petra vincular underwent a period of restoration the chapel had fallen into disrepair and work on the foundations was deemed to be necessary in turn this would necessitate the disinterment of the human remains that were buried beneath the chapel and berlin being one of their number unsurprisingly a few sets of female remains were found during this excavation process now the identification of these remains is debated in particular by alison weir however none of the remains female or otherwise that were found during this process were reported to have a sick finger or indeed any bony male formation on either hand so we are still left with the question where does the idea of ambulance having a sick finger actually come from nicholas sander was an english catholic priest trained in rome in the second half of the 16th century while mary the first had been his ideal queen her successor and half sister elizabeth was certainly not indeed he chose to live as a catholic exile during her reign nicholas sander was still a small child when ann berlin was executed nevertheless he offers the following report of amberlynn in his text the rise and growth of the ancient schism which he wrote in around 1573. according to sander quote amberlynn was rather tall of stature with black hair and an oval face a sallow complexion as if troubled with jaundice she had a projecting tooth under the upper lip and on her right hand six fingers there was a large when under her chin and therefore to hide its ugliness she wore a high dress covering her throat in this she was followed by the ladies of the court who also wore high dresses having before been in the habit of leaving their necks and the upper portion of their person uncovered we'd only look at the portraits and sketches of members of the english court from around this time the time of ambulance rise and queenship up to her fall to see that this was absolutely not the fashion worn by the ladies of that time nicholas sander is also believed to be the origin of the narrative that anne's miscarriage of early 1536 had resulted in the delivery of quote a shapeless mass of flesh perhaps this is a further attempt to insinuate divine punishment for adultery or even demonic activity in doing so sander attacks anne's reputation and through her the reputation and place of her daughter elizabeth who at this point was queen of england nicolas sana's account of ambulance rebutted in the 1590s by george wyatt who himself was the grandson of anne's great admirer sir thomas wyatt however george had been born in 1550 so after ambulance execution so he certainly couldn't have seen her in life thus he was reliant on the reports of others he says quote there was found indeed upon the side of her nail upon one of her fingers some little show of a nail which yet was so small by the report of those that have seen her as the work master seemed to leave it an occasion of greater grace to her hand which with the tip of one of her other fingers might be and was usually by her hidden without any blemish to it likewise there was said to be upon some parts of her body certain small moles incident to the clearest of complexions so we have no eyewitness testimony here but this is a gentleman saying that people have told him that there was a secondary nail but that it was so small that it actually ornamented her hand and was a mark of beauty to it also in the late 16th century pierre de borde senor de brantom wrote his own report of anne boleyn he moved in french court circles so it's very possible that he was in contact with people who had known anne boleyn from her time in france he asserted that she was quote the fairest and most bewitching of all the lovely dames of the french court pierre de bourdais tells us that anne was bewitching and this is fitting as she is also remembered by some for having been tried convicted and executed for witchcraft at the time of her fall eustis shapwee reports that henry had complained to his courtiers that he had been quote seduced and forced into his second marriage by means of saltages and charms namely witchcraft when this is coupled with the later tales of misshapen births and sick fingers it is perhaps easy to understand how witchcraft becomes one of the crimes that anne is believed to have been charged with but she wasn't and was charged with a litany of crimes she was charged with treason plotting the king's death adultery with henry norris sir francis weston william baraton and mark smeaton and also of incest with her brother george berlin although amberlynn was found guilty of adultery and incest those charges in her case were not equivalent to treason the only thing that would be treasonous was if she had been found guilty of plotting the king's death for the men accused and convicted alongside her however their crime was treason according to the treason acts of 1351 which states if a man do violate the king's companion or the king's eldest daughter unmarried or the wife of the king's eldest son and heir it was deemed to be treason and thus punishable in the usual ways as we see there is no mention in this act of 1351 of the queen herself being guilty of treason if she was found to be unchaste indeed the lack of chastity in the queen would not be made treason until six years after anne's death on the 11th of february 1542 with the signing into law of the bill of attains against catherine howard and herco accused part of this bill reads as follows to avoid doubts in the future it is declared that the royal assent given by commission shall be valid in all cases hereafter that any likeness of the queen for the time being may be revealed to the king or his council and that an unchaste woman marrying the king shall be guilty of high treason while we're here let's answer the other big question was amberlynn guilty i certainly don't believe that anne was guilty of everything she was accused of for one thing in some instances the dates and locations that were offered for the various liaisons she was supposed to have taken part in run counter to the known movements of anne and her co-accused it's also odd to me that none of her ladies fell with her it is inconceivable to me that they wouldn't have known if this number of men were taking part in quote violating the king's companion they would have been keeping it secret then and this would have been punishable as a misprison of treason the notion of ambulance as a woman controlled and compelled by lust also doesn't ring true to me either after all had she not proved herself to be more than capable of sexual restraint in her dealings with henry viii while he was courting her of course it is possible that anne's desperation to produce a live male heir could have driven her to take an enormous risk to have a baby by any means but surely involving this number of other men and perhaps using her brother for the purpose is as far as i'm concerned extraordinary to the point of implausibility henry viii may have believed that anne was guilty or he at least wanted to claim that he did however as i mentioned in my video on the life and fall of catherine howard which i will be leaving links in the card when he responded to the fall of ambulance to the tales of her adultery we don't hear the accounts of the shame rage and grief that he was said to have shown later when catherine howard fell were these different behaviors and responses the result of aging or did henry viii's ego not feel wounded in the first instance in the case of amberlynn for some other reason the last thing i wish to discuss i fear may be unpopular because i believe that it is possible even plausible that anne was technically guilty of one of the charges leveled against her i think she had been caught imagining the king's death which was an offense characterized as high treason from 1351 and i'm saying this because i think it's likely that the following conversation or argument did in fact take place in the last months of amberlynn's life it was reported that she had an altercation with her friend and courtier sir henry norris anne had it seems taken issue with the length of time it was taking henry norris to marry her cousin mad shelton and now she was seeking to embarrass him for it norris tried to sidestep the issue by claiming he wished to tarry a time and went further too far and she is alleged to have said quote you look for dead men shoes for if ought came to the king but good you would look to have me in essence you aren't marrying my cousin because you are waiting for the king to die so you can marry me instead norris was said to be shocked and horrified and immediately asserted that if any such thought had crossed his mind he would that his head were off his shoulders tragically as we all know he would soon get his wish why would anne be so reckless to have this conversation to say these things in an argument where she could be overheard well i think that anne knew that powerful forces were moving against her that she was losing her grip on henry's affection and her own power and place so i think she engaged in the flirtatious play that was expected to take place at the english court and i think she stepped over the line had she still been in henry's favor had she given him a son and heir we would probably have no record and no knowledge of this conversation ever having taken place if it had but that was not the case and this loose talk was the spark that ignited the kindling of court rumor and speculation if this conversation between henry norris and amberlynn did take place and i think it is likely that it did then technically according to the very letter of the law amberlynn was guilty of high treason but what do you think as always i'm looking forward to reading your discussion in the comments section underneath this video or you can come and find me over on my social media i'll leave links to my instagram and twitter in the description box you can follow me there and we can continue this conversation i do hope you enjoyed this video and found it useful if you did then please let me know by hitting the thumbs up please also subscribe to this channel and while you're there hit the notification bell beside the subscribe button so that youtube tells you when i've next uploaded i hope you're gonna have a great day whatever you're doing and i look forward to speaking to all in my next video take care of yourselves bye bye for now [Music] you

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Views: 48,935

Rating: 4.9788947 out of 5

Keywords: Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII, Tudor, Six Fingers, Historical Myth, Fact or Fiction?, Education, Literature, Culture, History, Early Modern, Renaissance

Id: 8U3juD16ZS4

Length: 22min 41sec (1361 seconds)

Published: Fri Oct 02 2020