The Life Of Elizabeth I

1. The Life Of Elizabeth I By: Antonia Butts

2. The Beginning Elizabeth was born on Sunday 7 September 1533 in Greenwich Palace the Chamber of Virgins between three and four o'clock in the afternoon, to her father King Henry VIII., and her mother Henry’s second wife, Anne Boleyn and she was named after both her grandmothers, Elizabeth Howard and Elizabeth of York. Her mother was executed two years and a half years after her birth, and the Roman Catholics of England considered her an illegitimate child.

3. Education Elizabeth was taught a range of many different lessons, which was part of a standard curriculum for the royal children. Her studies included languages, grammar, theology, history, rhetoric, logic, philosophy, arithmetic, logic, literature, geometry, and music. She was also taught religious lessons. Kat Ashley was her governess and first tutor, she was also tutored by Lady Jane Grey and the young sons of John Dudley, Jean Belmain, John Cheke, William Grindal, Roger Ascham. Elizabeth was many times considered a serious child due to her amazing capacity for intelligence, and her love of learning. Her education also included other subjects that fit a lady of her rank and status. Like included sewing, embroidery, dancing, music, archery, riding and hunting

4. Elizabeth's England17 November 1558 – 24 March 1603 Elizabeth's name is usually associated with a time period of remarkable achievement in humanism and literature. Elizabeth loved music and dancing, pageantry and masques. She had no time to waste on the Puritan theologians thoughts on what was appropriate. She also loved watching plays. Some say she made the atmosphere responsible for the flourishment of literary masterpieces. Some great playwrights of her reign were Shakespeare, Christopher Marlowe, and poets John Donne and Ben Jonson, and Edmund Spenser.

5. Elizabeth’s Love Life The most serious contender for her hand in marriage was Robert Dudley. Dudley and Elizabeth had known each other for years and had also been jailed in the Tower of London together. However, letting him take her hand would have been a political disaster. He was unpopular, and he was the son of the traitor Northumberland, and was hated even more after his wife was found dead in mysteriously. It was said by many he had murdered her so he would be free to marry Elizabeth. The other contender for the Queen's hand was Francis, Duke of Alencon/Anjou. Who was heir to the French throne. But again, political considerations made it impossible.

6. Death On 24 March 1603, Queen Elizabeth's reign came to an end after forty four years. After months of depression and plummeting health, she gave up and lost all will to stay alive, she refused to eat and lost the ability to speak. She slipped into a coma and died at age 69. The Queen's funeral was held five weeks after her death, on April 28th. Over one thousand people came with her body from Westminster, and tens of thousands gathered in the streets.

7. Accomplishments Queen Elizabeth I survived to become Queen of England. She came up with a compromise to please the Roman Catholic and the Protestant churches. She funded voyages of discovery to the Americas, which prepared England for an age of colonization and expansion. Under her reign, the arts began to flourish. Also the English Navy defeated the Spanish Armada under Queen Elizabeth’s rule. One of the biggest accomplishments was she lead England as a woman, in what was very much a man's World, and she did this with courage, intelligence and loyalty to her friends.

8. Rumors It’s said that the real Elizabeth died in childhood and was secretly replaced with a servant boy, but it is not likely to be true. It is just another story to explain why she never married when she had her choice of men, and to explain how she, a woman, could be a political genius It has often been said that Queen Elizabeth became bald at the age of thirty, but there is proof of her having her own hair all the way into her sixties. Elizabeth's high forehead in her paintings may have been natural, or it may have been exaggerated by the portrait painters. Also it may have been due to that fact that the Queen wore wigs and may have shaved the front of her hair to make them stay easier, or the Queen may have had some hair loss due to the lead in the "mask of youth" make-up that she wore on her face. Thomas Seymour the brother of Edward Seymour, Duke of Somerset, Lord Protector of the young King Edward VI - Elizabeth's brother, was reported to have paid morning visits to Elizabeth, in her bedroom. There was romping, laughing and giggling. No one knows how far these visits went. Elizabeth denied any scandal or bad behavior, but things went too far and early in 1548 Elizabeth leaves Katherine Parr's household under questionable circumstances. There was an even rumor that Elizabeth was pregnant by Thomas Seymour. Elizabeth was questioned but swore she was still a virgin and nothing was proved. Thomas Seymour was found guilty of High Treason and executed on March 10 1549. The scandal terrified the young Elizabeth and taught her a valuable lesson.