The Forgotten Years of Anne Boleyn: The Habsburg & Valois Courts

by Sylvia Barbara Soberton

Anne Boleyn was raised in Belgium and France, spending seven years at the most glittering and progressive courts of Europe. Her mentors were the most brilliant and fascinating women of the sixteenth Margaret of Austria, Louise of Savoy, Claude of Valois and Margaret of Navarre.

It is from them that Anne received a spiritual and humanistic education and learned how women could wield power and use it for greater good. When she returned to England, Anne was equipped with knowledge and Continental gloss that most of her female contemporaries lacked.

In The Forgotten Years of Anne: The Habsburg & Valois Courts, Sylvia Barbara Soberton takes you on a journey through sixteenth-century Belgium and France, showing you where Anne Boleyn spent her formative years and introducing the royal women she served.

What places did she visit?
Who were the women who mentored her and impacted her outlook of the world?
Whom did she emulate when she became queen in 1533?

All of these questions are answered in this book.
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Reviews

Sylvia Barbara Soberton’s The Forgotten Years of Anne: The Habsburg & Valois Courts provides fans of the queen with essential background material about the courts where she passed her adolescence.

Emphasizing the religious orientation of Queen Claude, within whose household Anne spent her years at the French court, Soberton’s study takes its place among the recent scholarship that questions the queen’s status as seductress.

Although the study relies on primary source material, it also dialogues with recent work on the queen. Like Soberton’s earlier studies, this rich and interesting addition to the scholarship helps readers piece together the life of this unfortunate queen.

      -- Tracy Adams,
        co-author of The Creation of the French Royal From Agnès Sorel to Madame Du Barry
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In this fascinating book, Soberton unveils a treasure trove of historical insights, shedding new light on the enigmatic figure of Anne Boleyn during her formative years.

With a scholar's precision and a storyteller's flair, she unveils the hidden gems of Anne's early life, offering readers a front-row seat to the dazzling courts of sixteenth-century Europe.

What sets this book apart is its ability to make history come alive. It's not just a dry recitation of facts; it's a captivating journey that immerses you in the sights, sounds, and emotions of Anne's world.

The Forgotten Years of Anne: The Habsburg & Valois Courts is a triumph of scholarship and storytelling, a testament to the author's dedication to preserving the past for modern readers.

Whether you're a history enthusiast or simply curious about the life and times of Anne Boleyn, this book will leave you enlightened, inspired and hungry for more.

      Barbara Parker Bell, author of Inside the Wardrobe of Anne Boleyn.

Genres: Tudor Period, History

193 pages, Kindle Edition

First published October 24, 2023

Reviews

[Kara · Rating 5 out of 5]

An excellent biography of Anne Boleyn focusing on how much her time in France had an impact on her education and later personality - from fashion to language to literature and music taste to politics to religion to her choice in mottos.

The 'let them grumble' motto is well known as being inspired by the Burgundians, but I LOVED Soberton's theory that her later motto of "the most happy" was inspired by no less than Leonardo di Vinci and the Mona Lisa (!!!)

[Moniek Bloks · Rating 4 out of 5]

Anne Boleyn stood out at the English court because she had spent several years in Belgium and France at the most glittering courts in Europe. 

Anne would learn from the leading women at the time, Margaret of Austria, Claude of France, Louise of Savoy and Marguerite of Angoulême, and she returned to England with something the English women didn't have. 

The Forgotten Years of Anne Boleyn: The Habsburg & Valois Courts by Sylvia Barbara Soberton takes the reader through Anne's formative years. The author really manages to bring the courts of Margaret of Austria and the French to life, but information on Anne's whereabouts is quite scarce. This means that the book sometimes feels like it's not about Anne but about the courts alone. 

Nevertheless, the information is well-researched, and I would still highly recommend this book as it fills in quite a blank spot in history.

[Rozsa Gaston · Rating 5 out of 5]

Well researched and well written

This book offers well-researched details that fill in gaps in Anne Boleyn's story. I found the chapter on Anne’s time spent at Margaret of Austria's court most interesting, as almost nothing has been written about it. The final chapters point toward Henry VIII falling out of love with Anne for the same reasons he fell in love with her- foremost amongst them, the French connection. Can't wait to read Soberton's next book on Catherine of Medici. This author does her homework.

[Astrid · Rating 5 out of 5]

I enjoyed this - it is a familiar tale for anyone who has read anything about Anne Boleyn before, however there is the added layer of detail in her French connections and her time at the French court. This book follows Anne's entire life - from birth to her death at the sword of a French executioner - but focuses on any French connections. Even when she becomes Queen there are still French angles in ambassadors and her meetings with the French king.

Sylvia Soberton is a great writer. Her work is easy to read but doesn't lack detail. It contains all the necessary details without being boring - it is accessible.

If you're a fan of the Tudor period or Anne Boleyn, this is worth a read. Like I stated earlier it's a familiar road to go down, but there are fresh avenues in the French details. I enjoyed it - I've enjoyed all of Sylvia's work I've read so far. It's nice to have the familiarity of the Tudor court, but with the angles of the people and points you're less likely to read about in more mainstream biographies.

[Beverly Diehl · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was interesting. More for a Tudorphile like myself, it doesn't actually dig - much - into Anne's experiences, but more about the courts and women she lived with, in France. What they thought, the environment, what Anne might have experienced and how it might have shaped her.

[Gemma · Rating 4 out of 5]

Short but really interesting. Focuses on what little information is known about Anne pre Henry and the continuing relationship Anne had with the French court after marriage. I really enjoyed the different perspective on Anne life and downfall. Would love to read this authors work again.

[Diane Williamson · Rating 5 out of 5]

Interesting

Short I'm afraid but this book did make some points in Anne,'s life that I hadn't read before. I found that interesting.

[D · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the great perils of studying Anne Boleyn’s rise to power is the frustrating paucity of sources regarding her childhood and early life. Although an unusual upbringing for a 16th century English woman, having been spent at the cosmopolitan courts of Belgium and France, it was, in the words of the late great Eric Ives, a ‘period for which we have no direct evidence’.

This makes it difficult to truly determine what childhood events shaped Anne from the ‘slender, dark-haired girl’ from Hever into the woman she would become, although it is impossible to deny that her experiences abroad aided in crystallizing the educated, cultured queen to later emerge. It is therefore little wonder that these years are dubbed the ‘forgotten’ ones in Anne’s history, a chrysalis caged in mystery that for centuries historians have sought to unravel, given both their international and domestic significance to Tudor history.

Sylvia Barbara Soberton’s latest work, ‘The Forgotten Years of Anne Boleyn’, is such that the dark voids in Anne Boleyn’s early life are illuminated by careful consideration of original documents from across the European continent. Soberton not only dispels puzzling myths, but challenges stereotypes in the historiography and provides new and fresh insights into Anne’s upbringing. By focusing on the broader context of the continental courts rather than a narrow English-centric perspective, Soberton sheds light on the practices, customs, and beliefs that so indelibly influenced Anne's formative years. It is, after all, impossible to follow the steps of Anne Boleyn if we begin and end in England.

Soberton posits that Anne’s seven year stint at the French court significantly influenced her eventual queenship, drawing parallels between Queen Claude’s 1517 coronation and Anne’s triumphant entry into London in 1533. Moreover, Soberton suggests that Claude’s support for Church reform may have left a lasting impression on Anne’s own beliefs. Claude’s emphasis on charity also greatly influenced a young Anne Boleyn, evident in her adoption of some of Claude’s symbols during her short reign as Queen of England. Marguerite de Navarre would also have a marked influence on Anne's views on religion and patronage.

These intricate, easily-overlooked details form the crux of ‘The Forgotten Years of Anne Boleyn’ and make a strong case for a woman who was not merely influenced by her royal mentors, but smelted. The woman who emerges is so thoroughly steeped in the 'continental gloss' that after her execution, carried out by a French swordsman, her husband refuses a French bride.

This is a stunning tour-de-force and one of Soberton’s best books yet. Accessible, informative and well-paced, I highly recommend ‘The Forgotten Years’ for fans of Anne Boleyn, the period, women’s history, and/or the Tudor dynasty! Readers will not be left disappointed with Soberton’s careful examination of the shadowy, little-known childhood of British history’s most notorious queen.

Review originally posted to TudorExtra.com: https://tudorextra.com/2023/12/16/rev...

[Jodi · Rating 2 out of 5]

"The Forgotten Years of Anne Boleyn: The Hapsburg and Valois Courts" by Sylvia Barbara Soberton over promises and under delivers. This segment of Anne Boleyn’s life is difficult to document and to state a premise that this would be thoroughly presented was erroneous.

Soberton tried to play both sides of the documentation issue. When there was not proof of Anne being in attendance at Court events (the author herself told us that Anne was never on the list of ladies for Queen Claude), the author would say that Anne “certainly accompanied the Queen” or “She travelled with Queen Claude and her royal household to various palaces.” Yet, when Soberton would want to disprove a previous historians’ conclusions, she would say there were no documents available. For example, in the Court women listing available, M Wotton would have been Mary, not ‘M’ for Mademoiselle and therefore, M Boleyne would have been for Anne’s sister.

While disturbing enough as it was, the disjointed writing ended up causing this reviewer to think of the work, despite plenty of footnotes and an extensive Bibliography, as less scholarly. On the same page the first paragraph discussed Mary Tudor’s marriage by proxy to Charles, Prince of Castile. The next shared how Katherine of Aragon learned French, followed by the New World artifacts in Margaret of Austria’s collection and her skills at playing musical instruments.

Another example was a paragraph explaining Anne Boleyn’s motto, King Francis’ interest in Italian fashion, Queen Claude acquiring some hand cream and then how the birth of a male heir creates a marital bargaining tool.

While reading, this reviewer tried not to become impatient with the assumptions and startling interpretations which reversed many previous works. Unfortunately, Soberton’s lack of consistency threatened the validity of her conclusions. Seriously, how do we know that Amboise was Anne’s first taste of luxury? She did spend time at the palaces of Margaret of Austria—would they have been opulent? If this cannot be verified, then Sorberton’s dismissal of other scholars comes into question.

As an introduction to the early years of Anne Boleyn, this is an easy read and does give background on the diplomatic landscape of Tudor England as Henry VIII tries to maneuver between the Hapsburgs of Spain and the Holy Roman Empire and the Valois of France.

[Rosie Lee · Rating 5 out of 5]

I haven’t as yet read a bad book by this author it was a brilliant read

[Debra · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very informative, reads like the history it is and doesn’t over list their personal feelings.