Catherine of Aragon

Catherine of Aragon and Castile, or Catherine of Trastámara and Trastámara (Alcalá de Henares, December 16, 1485 - Kimbolton, January 7, 1536) was queen consort of England from 1509 to 1533 as the first wife of King Henry VIII and mother of Mary I of England; She was formerly Princess of Wales by her marriage to the heir to the throne Arthur Tudor, eldest son of Henry VII and older brother of her second husband.

Daughter of the Catholic Monarchs, Catherine was three years old when she was betrothed to Prince Arthur, heir to the English throne. The marriage took place in 1501; however, Arturo passed away five months later. In 1507, she acted as ambassador to the Spanish Court in England, becoming the first female ambassador in European history.In 1509 she married Henry VIII, Arthur's younger brother, who had recently succeeded to the throne. For six months in 1513, she served as regent of England while Henry VIII was in France, and it was during this regency that the English were victorious at the Battle of Flodden Field against the Scots, an event in which she played an important role.

In about 1525, in love with his mistress Anne Boleyn and dissatisfied with his marriage to Catherine, which had produced no surviving male, Henry VIII left his daughter, the future Mary I of England, as heir presumptive during a time when the which there was no established precedent for a woman to succeed to the throne. Henry sought a way to annul his marriage and set in motion a chain of events that led to England's break with the Catholic Church. When Clement VII refused to declare the marriage null and void, Henry challenged him by assuming supremacy over religious affairs. In 1533 the marriage was declared invalid and Henry married Anne Boleyn on trial by the clergy in England and without reference to the pope.

Catherine refused to officially recognize Henry as Paramount Head of the Church of England and continued to consider herself both the king's lawful wife and the true queen, attracting much popular sympathy. Despite this, Henry only recognized her as princess widow. After being banished from Court, she spent the rest of her life at Kimbolton Castle, where she died on 7 January 1536. She was held in high esteem by Catherine's English subjects and her death triggered a long period of intense mourning among the English people.

The controversial book De institutione feminae christianae by Juan Luis Vives, which asserted that women have the right to an education, was commissioned and dedicated to her. Such was the impression Catherine made on people that even her enemy Thomas Cromwell said of her: "If it were not for her sex, she might have defied all the heroes of history." she won a triumph with the successful appeal for the lives of the rebels involved in Evil May Day, whom she defended for the sake of their families. Catherine also earned widespread admiration for initiating a vast program for the relief of the poor The queen was a patron of Renaissance humanism and a friend of the great scholars Erasmus of Rotterdam and Thomas More.

Infanta of Aragon and Castile

Portrait by Juan de Flandes de Catalina at eleven years. It shows a great resemblance to her sister, Queen Juana of Castile.

Born in the Archbishop's Palace of Alcalá de Henares, on December 15, 1485, she was the youngest of all the children of King Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile. She descended through the maternal line of the English royal house; her great-grandmother, Catherine of Lancaster, for whom she was named, and her great-grandmother, Philippa of Lancaster, were daughters of John of Gaunt and granddaughters of Edward III of England. For this reason, she was a cousin in the fourth degree of Henry VII and his wife Elizabeth of York, parents of Henry VIII.

Catherine received the education that was then given to a future queen: she was educated by Alessandro Geraldini, a member of the Holy Orders. She studied canon and civil law, arithmetic, classical literature, genealogy and heraldry, history, philosophy, religion, and theology. She had a very religious upbringing and developed a faith that would play a large role in her later life.She learned to speak, read, and write Spanish and Latin, as well as speak French and Greek. She was also instructed in domestic skills such as cooking, dancing, drawing, embroidery, manners, lace making, music, sewing, spinning, and weaving. Later, the great scholar Erasmus said that Catherine she "loved good literature and had studied it with profit since childhood." Therefore, Catherine became exceptionally well-read for the time, even as queen. According to the English chronicles of the time, she possessed intellectual qualities few queens could rival.

At the age of six he contemplated the capture of Granada (1492). There he stayed to live with his parents, later settling in nearby Santa Fe. His parents were weaving a web of marriage alliances against France: Juan and Juana with the Habsburgs; Isabel and Maria of Aragon with Portugal.

From an early age, Catherine was considered a suitable wife for Arthur, Prince of Wales, first in line to the English throne, thanks to the English ancestry she had inherited from her mother. On her part, Catherine enjoyed a stronger legitimate claim to the English throne than that of Henry VII through the first two wives of John of Gaunt, 1st Duke of Lancaster: Blanca of Lancaster and Constance of Castile. By contrast, Henry VII was the descendant of the union between John of Gaunt and Catherine of Roet-Swynford, whose children were born out of wedlock, and were legitimized only after Constance's death and John's successive marriage to Catherine. Despite being legitimized, the children of John and Catherine were prohibited from inheriting the English throne, a restriction that was ignored in subsequent generations. Because of Henry VII's ancestry by those illegitimate children prevented from succeeding to the English throne, the Tudor monarchy was not officially recognized by all European kingdoms. During that time, the House of Trastámara was the most prestigious in Europe thanks to the reign of the Catholic Monarchs and therefore the alliance of Catherine and Arthur validated the House of Tudor in the eyes of European royalty and reinforced the right of the Tudors to the English throne thanks to the prestigious lineage of Catherine of Aragon. She would also have helped her have a male heir, which she however did not have. The marriage between Catalina and Arturo was celebrated by proxy on May 19, 1499. The spouses wrote in Latin until Arturo was fifteen, when it was decided that they were old enough to consummate the marriage. to London, he took with him a group of people of African origin; one of them, Catalina de Cardones, born in Motril (Granada) and, possibly, the trumpeter John Blanke, one of the first African musicians to documented arrival in London during that time. They made a great impression in favor of the princess and in terms of the power of her family.

Princess of Wales

Arthur around the time of his marriage, about 1501

Portrait of a princess, possibly Catherine of Aragon, about 1502, by Michael Sittow, at the beginning of the sixteenth century,Kunsthistorisches Museum (Vienna).

The policy of the Catholic Monarchs was to isolate France. In keeping with that policy, Catherine was promised in marriage on March 26, 1489, to Prince Arthur of Wales, eldest son of Henry VII of England, in the Treaty of Medina del Campo. Catalina suffered a lot from her when she left the Alhambra, since she had spent her childhood and adolescence in the red castle . When the Infanta was fifteen years old, on August 17, 1501, her ship sailed from La Coruña to England, but in the Bay of Biscay it dismasted, so she had to anchor in the port of Laredo to start the trip again on August 27. September of the same year.

After a month at sea, Catherine reached the port of Plymouth, where she was received by the Bishop of Bath, representing Prince Arthur. The two met on November 4 at Dogmersfield in Hampshire. Little is known about their first impressions of each other, but Arthur wrote a letter to his in-laws stating that he would be "a loving and true husband" and told his parents that he was immensely glad to "behold the pretty face of his wife." bride". However, their engagement was revealed when they were just 8 and 7 years old. Supposedly, they had contact through letters in Latin. Both discovered that they could not understand each other, since they had learned different Latin pronunciations. Ten days later, on November 14, 1501, Catherine and, to her, the unknown young Prince of Wales, were married in the cathedral of Saint Paul of London. She made a great impression on her father-in-law, the king. She had arranged for herself a dowry of 200,000 crowns, half of which was paid shortly after the wedding.

Once married, Arthur was sent, as Prince of Wales, to Ludlow Castle in Shropshire to chair the Council of Wales and the Welsh Marches and was accompanied by the now Princess of Wales. The couple settled at Castle Lodge, Ludlow. A few months later, they both fell ill, possibly from the English sweat that was sweeping the area. On April 2, 1502, the young prince died, leaving Catherine a widow. According to Catherine and the people around her, the marriage to the young prince had never been consummated and therefore she was still a virgin. This point would be the center of a great controversy years later.

At this point, Henry VII of England was faced with the challenge of avoiding the obligation to return the dowry to Catherine's father, even though he had only received half of it. Initially, he proposed himself as the husband of her daughter-in-law, and it was eventually agreed that the princess would marry Henry, Duke of York, second son of Henry VII and five years her junior. However, the death of Catalina's mother, Isabella I of Castile, caused the political value of her marriage to diminish. Castile was a much larger kingdom than Aragon, and was inherited by Catherine's older sister, Juana of Castile. Ostensibly, the marriage was delayed until Henry came of age, but Henry VII put off paying the remainder of the dowry so long as it seemed unlikely that the marriage would take place. Meanwhile, the princess lived as a virtual prisoner at Durham House in London.Some of the letters in which Catherine complained to her father about her treatment by Henry VII have survived. In one of these letters she tells him "I choose what I believe in, and I don't say anything." Well, I'm not as simple as I seem. She was short of money and had a hard time getting by as she had to support both her ladies-in-waiting and herself. In 1507 she served as the Spanish ambassador to England, making her the first female ambassador in European history.Although Henry VII and her advisers expected Catherine to be easy to manipulate, she proved them wrong.

The marriage to Arthur's brother was contingent on the granting of a papal dispensation because canon law forbade a man from marrying his brother's widow. Catherine testified that her marriage to Arthur had not been consummated due to the prince's youth and sickly character, a fact certified by Pope Julius II. On the other hand, canon law only considered a consummated marriage valid.

Queen of England (1509-1533)

Recorded in wood of the sixteenth century of the coronation of Henry VIII and Catherine of Aragon, both showing heraldic emblems, the Rosa Tudor and the Granada

Anonymous portrait of Catherine of Aragon, about 1520.

Wedding

In 1509 Henry VII died and his son Henry VIII assumed the reign, showing his desire to possess the princess as soon as possible. For that reason, their wedding took place two months later, on June 11, 1509, seven years after Arthur's death. The couple married in a private ceremony at Greenwich Church, when Catherine was 23 while the King was only days shy of turning 18.

Coronation

On Saturday, June 23, the traditional procession to Westminster, which used to take place the day before the coronation of English kings, was greeted by a large, enthusiastic crowd. According to custom, the newlyweds spent the night before their coronation at the Tower of London. On Sunday June 24, 1509, also being Midsummer's Day, Henry VIII and Catherine were anointed and crowned together by the Archbishop of Canterbury in a lavish ceremony, held in Westminster Abbey. A banquet was then served in Westminster Hall. Many new Knights of the Order of the Bath were also created in honor of her coronation.Over the next month, the Queen appeared before the English public on many social occasions. She made an excellent impression and was very well received by the English people.

Pregnancies and children

On January 31, 1510, Catherine gave birth to a stillborn daughter prematurely. A son, Henry, Duke of Cornwall, was born in the new year 1511 and died suddenly 53 days later on February 22, 1511. The cause of death was not documented. In 1513, Catherine became pregnant again, but this child, too, was stillborn or died shortly after birth when Henry had returned from France. In December 1514, she had another son, Prince Henry, who died shortly. On February 18, 1516, Catherine gave birth to a healthy daughter, they named her Maria, and she was baptized three days later in a grand ceremony in the church of the Observant Franciscan Friars. In 1518, Catherine became pregnant for the last time. On November 10, a daughter was born to her, but the baby was weak and died within hours. In total, Catalina had six documented pregnancies.

Catherine watching Henry justify in honor of the birth of a child. Enrique's horse is riddled with Catherine's initial in English, "K."

Influence

Portrait of Henry VIII by Hans Holbein the Youth towards 1540

On June 11, 1513, Henry made Catherine regent or governor of England while he traveled to France for the Battle of Guinegate. When Louis I of Orleans, duc de Longueville, was captured at Thérouanne, Henry sent him to live at Catherine's court. She wrote a letter to Wolsey, telling him that she and her council would prefer the Duke stay at the Tower of London, as the Scots were "as busy as they are now." She also added her prayers that "God bring us as much luck against the Scots as the king has there". The war with Scotland kept her subjects busy and she was "horribly busy with making banners, banners and insignia" at the palace. of Richmond. The Scots invaded and on 3 September Catherine ordered Thomas Lovell to raise an army from the counties of central England. Catherine, despite being pregnant, rode north in full armor to address the troops (she gave gave birth to a stillborn son around October) Enrique later found himself in a delicate matter again for the alleged act of his wife in the fight he gave, an act for which his son died. His impressive speech was related by the historian Pedro Mártir de Anglería in Valladolid a fortnight later. Although an Italian news bulletin claimed that Catalina was a hundred miles north of London when news of the victory at the Battle of Flodden Field reached it, she was actually close to Buckingham From Woburn Abbey he sent a letter to Henry along with a piece of the bloody pea coat of James IV of Scotland, killed in battle, for the king to use as a banner at the siege of Tournai.

As Catalina aged, her religious dedication increased as well as her interest in academic affairs. She continued to expand her knowledge as well as see to the training and instruction of her daughter. Women's education became fashionable due, in part, to Catherine's influence. She also donated considerable sums of money to various universities. However, Henry still regarded a male heir as a must. The Tudor Dynasty was new and its legitimacy could still be challenged. The last time a woman (the Empress Matilda) had inherited the throne, a long civil war (1135-54) had broken out, the disasters of which were still fresh in the collective memory because of the War of the Roses.

In 1520 Emperor Charles V, Catherine's nephew, paid a state visit to England, and Catherine urged Henry to ally with Charles instead of France. Immediately after the Emperor's departure, Catherine accompanied Henry to France to visit Francis I and enjoy the famous Field of the Cloth of Gold. Two years later, war was declared against France and Charles V was received once more in England., where plans began to betrothal to young Maria.

The king's "big business"

Catherine pleading in the trial against her by Enrique. Picture by Henry Nelson O'Neil.

In 1525, Henry VIII fell in love with Anne Boleyn, a lady-in-waiting to Queen Catherine who was nine years his junior and began courting her; by this time Catherine was no longer able to conceive children (she was 40 years old).. Enrique began to believe that his marriage was cursed and sought confirmation from the Bible, which he interpreted as saying that if a man marries his brother's widow, the marriage will be barren. Even if the marriage had not been consummated with Arthur, (and Catherine would insist until her death that she was a virgin when she arrived at Henry's bedchamber), Henry's interpretation of the biblical text meant that the marriage had been indecent in the eyes of God. The question of whether the pope he presided over the marriage of Henry and Catherine had had the right to decide against the Biblical impediment indicated by Henry would become the hot topic of a campaign in which the king would try to wring a declaration of nullity from the incumbent pope. It is possible that the idea of a declaration of nullity was suggested to Enrique long before and it was highly probable that it was motivated by his desire to have a child. Before Henry's father succeeded to the throne, England was in the grip of armed conflict over rival claims to the English Crown, and Henry may have wanted to avoid similar uncertainty over the succession.

My tribulations are so great, my life so disturbed by the plans invented daily to promote the twisted intent of the king, the surprises that the king gives me, with certain people of his counsel, and my treatment is what God knows, which is enough to shorten ten lives, much more mine.

Soon, the only absorbing object of Henry's desire became securing a declaration of annulment. Catherine was defiant when it was suggested that she quietly retire to a convent, saying "God never called me to a convent. I am the King's true and lawful wife.” Henry hoped with an appeal to the Holy See, acting independently of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, as well as telling him nothing of his plans. William Knight, the king's secretary, was sent to Pope Clement VII to demand a declaration of nullity on the grounds that Pope Julius II's bull had been obtained under false declarations.

However, at the time the pope was the prisoner of Catherine's nephew (Charles V) after the sack of Rome in May 1527, and therefore it was difficult for Knight to gain access to see him. In the end, Henry's envoy had to return to England without having accomplished much. Now Henry had no choice but to turn this great matter over to Thomas Wolsey, who was doing all he could to secure a decision in Henry's favour.

Lady Mary daughter of Catherine and Henry with 28 years

Wolsey even went so far as to convene an ecclesiastical court in England attended by Catherine and Henry, and presided over by a representative of the pope. Here, on June 21, 1529, is where Catherine made her famous speech; of her rose from her, and slowly, with their eyes fixed on her, she walked around the tightly packed line of bishops, climbed to the other side of the rostrum, and knelt at her husband's feet:

Lord, I beseech you for all the love that has been among us, that ye make me justice and law, that ye have of me some mercy and compassion, for I am a poor woman, a foreigner, born out of your dominions. I don't have any safe friends here, much less an impartial advice. I come to you as the head of Justice in this Kingdom.

I place to God and everyone for witnesses that I have been a true, humble and obedient woman to you, always in accordance with your will and your taste... always satisfied and contented with all the things that pleased you or had fun, whether they were many or few... I have loved all you who have only loved for you, had or not motive and were or not my friends or my enemies. These twenty years or more I have been your true wife and you have had several children of me, although God has wanted to call you from this world. And when you had me for the first time, I put God as a witness that I was a true maiden not touched by man. I invoke your conscience whether this is true or not [...] It amazes me to hear what new inventions are made against me, that I have never sought more than honorability, and it forces me to oppose the order and judgment of this new court, in which so much damage you do to me.

And I humbly beseech you that in the name of charity and for the love of God, who is the supreme judge, you avoid me appearing before this court as long as my friends in Spain have not advised me of the way I have to follow. But if you do not want to grant me such a low favor, please fill your will, that I commend my cause to God.

And with a low bow to the king and without so much as a glance at the two legates or the assembled bishops, he walked slowly towards the door of the Great Hall. A spectator heard Catherine's gentleman, Griffith, timidly say, "My lady, you are called again," and indeed the third formal summons of the court was being pronounced from the dais. "It doesn't matter," he replied, "to me, this court is not impartial. I will not remain here.” Clement VII, however, had no intention of allowing a decision to be reached in England, and his papal envoy was withdrawn. (It is difficult to know to what extent Charles V influenced the pope, but Henry was clear that the pope was unlikely to declare his marriage to the Emperor's aunt null and void.) The pope forbade Henry from remarrying before they had made a decision. decision in Rome. Wolsey had failed and was dismissed from his public office in 1529. Wolsey then began to hatch a secret plot to force Anne Boleyn into exile, and began to communicate with the pope to achieve that end. When the conspiracy was discovered, Henry ordered Wolsey's arrest, and had he not been terminally ill and did indeed die in 1530, he might have been executed for treason. A year later, Catherine was banished from Court, and grants were granted. his former apartments to Anne Boleyn. When Archbishop of Canterbury William Warham died, Thomas Cranmer, the Boleyn family chaplain, was appointed as successor to the vacant post.

Finally, Henry married Anne Boleyn on January 25, 1533, already pregnant with the future Queen Elizabeth I. The Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, declared the king's marriage to Catherine null and void (May 23, 1533). Henry VIII broke allegiance to the Roman Catholic Church in 1534 and was recognized as supreme head of the new Church of England.

Cathedral where the tomb of Catherine is located.

When Henry decided to have his marriage to Catherine annulled, John Fisher became the queen's most loyal adviser and one of her main supporters. John attended the court of the papal envoy on her behalf, shocking those present with the directness of her language and the declaration that, like John the Baptist, he was willing to die to defend the indissolubility of marriage.. This infuriated Henry so much that he composed a long speech in Latin addressed to the legates in response to Fisher's speech. Fisher's copy still exists, with the margin filled with his handwritten notations, showing how little he feared Henry's wrath. Fisher's work ended when the cause of Rome was eliminated, but Henry never forgave him. Other supporters of Catherine's cause included Thomas More, Mary Tudor, Queen of France, the King's own sister, (although as a member of the Tudor family and of royal blood, she was exempt from any punishment and execution), Maria de Salinas, Emperor Charles V, Paul III, and the Protestant reformers Martin Luther and William Tyndale.

Banishment and death

Statue of Catherine of Aragon in her hometown, Alcala de Henares

Returning from Dover from a meeting with Francis I of France in Calais, Henry married Anne Boleyn in a secret ceremony. Some sources speculate that Anne was already pregnant and Henry did not want to risk the child being born illegitimate, but others testify that Anne, noting that her sister Mary Boleyn had been the King's mistress and was later cast aside by him, refused to sleep with Henry until they were married. Enrique defended the legality of the union, pointing out that Catalina had previously been married. If the marriage between her and Arthur had been consummated, canon law indicated that Henry was within his rights to remarry. On 23 May 1533, Thomas Cranmer acted as judge in a special court convened at Dunstable Priory to rule the validity of Henry's marriage to Catherine. Cranmer declared the marriage illegal, despite Catherine's testimony that she and Arthur had never had sexual relations. Cranmer then ruled Henry's marriage to Anne Boleyn valid five days later, on 28 May 1533.

Until her death, Catherine would continue to refer to herself as Henry's lawful wife and the only true Queen of England, and her retainers continued to use that title when addressing her. Henry deprived her of any title save that of "dowager princess of Wales" in recognition of her status as her brother's widow.

Catherine settled in More Castle in the winter of 1531/32. In 1535 she was transferred to Kimbolton Castle, where she confined herself to a single room (from which she only left to attend mass), wearing nothing more than the cilice of the Order of San Francisco and fasted continuously. She was allowed occasional visits, but she was forbidden to see her daughter Maria della. They were also forbidden to communicate in writing, but her supporters discreetly carried the letters from one to the other. Henry offered them better accommodation and permission to meet if they recognized Anne Boleyn as the new queen. Both refused.

In late October 1535, sensing the end was near, Catherine made her will and wrote to her nephew, Charles V, asking him to protect her daughter. In December of her, María de Salinas, a friend of Catalina's who had traveled with her to England when she got married, found out that Catalina was very ill and arranged to see her. Maria arrived at Kimbolton and practically stormed into the castle, making up the excuse that the letter granting entry for her was on its way and begging the guards not to turn a woman out on a cold winter's night. Salinas found Catalina very ill. She had just turned fifty. She could barely settle on the bed, much less stand up. He had been unable to eat or keep food down for several days, and a stomach ache had prevented him from sleeping more than two hours in total during the previous six nights. María de Salinas's visits and affection raised his morale and made that will improve your health. Catalina began to eat and retain food. Her health continued to improve over the next few days. On 6 January she made herself comfortable in bed, arranged her hair and dressed her head. However, Catherine was worried that she would not last until daylight and waited until dawn for her confessor, George of Athequa, to I gave him communion. Thereafter, Catherine devoted herself to praying, murmuring prayers until she finally passed away shortly before two in the afternoon, on January 7, 1536. The next day, the news of her death reached the king. Rumors were circulating at the time that she had been poisoned, possibly by Gregory di Casale.According to chronicler Edward Hall, Anne Boleyn wore yellow in mourning. This was interpreted in various ways; Polidoro Virgilio interpreted this to mean that Ana was not in mourning. Chapuys documented that it was in fact Enrique who dressed in yellow, celebrating the news and proudly showing his daughter with Ana, Isabel, to the courtiers. they saw many as unpleasant and vulgar. It was later said that both Enrique and Ana mourned her death in private.

Tomb of Catherine of Aragon inside the cathedral, with legend "Catalina Queen of England".

On the day of Catherine's funeral, Anne Boleyn miscarried a male child. Rumors then began to appear that Catalina had been poisoned by Enrique or Ana, or even by both, since Ana had threatened to kill Catalina and María on several occasions. The rumors arose after the alleged discovery of a black neoplasm in the heart during the embalming of the body, possibly caused by the poisoning. The embalmer in charge of preparing Catalina's corpse "found all the internal organs healthy and normal, with the exception of the heart, being very black and hideous to look at." The embalmer, actually a grocer whose specialty was wax, tore the heart in half, and although he washed it several times, it remained stubbornly black. Medical experts agree that the discoloration of the heart was not due to poisoning, but rather probably to cancer, a disease that was unknown at the time.

Catherine was entombed in Peterborough Cathedral with the ceremony due to a Dowager Princess of Wales, not that of a Queen. Enrique did not attend her funeral and also forbade Maria from her.Every January 29, the anniversary of her funeral, commemorative events take place in the cathedral.

Semblance

Michael Sittow, Mary Magdaleneprobably using Catherine as a model

Catalina was, according to Castilian chroniclers, the one who most physically resembled her mother: in her youth she possibly had a beautifully proportioned head with a robust and agile body, light and upright step, small feet and hands, gray eyes, She was of short stature with reddish-blonde hair, as well as having a round face and pale complexion. Henry VII says the following upon meeting her: "We have greatly admired her beauty, as well as her pleasant and dignified manners". On her entry into London in 1501 it was said of her that there was "nothing in her that the fairest maiden would want". During her first year as queen, she was described by her confessor Fray Diego Fernández as «the most beautiful creature in the world», and by others as: «delicate and graceful, with beautiful eyes». Later, Thomas More and Lord Herbert would reflect on her appearance: "There were few women who could compete with the Queen [Catherine] when she was in the prime of life". The Hall Chronicle, as in the pamphlet "The Receyte of the Lady Kateryne", describes her hair as "of great length, light ruddy, beautiful and pleasing." to contemplate". On the other hand, as the years passed, observers stopped being so enthusiastic about its beauty, sometimes even the other way around. Gerard de Pleine, a Flemish diplomat who meets her in 1514 writes: « she is of a cheerful and graceful disposition; the complete opposite of the queen her sister in color and shape ». In 1515, when she was 29 years old, Nicolo Sagudino, secretary of the Venetian ambassador Giustiniani, said of her that she is "rather ugly than the opposite". Sebastiano Giustiniani himself, who met her in 1519, reads as follows:« The queen is the sister of the mother of the King of Spain, now called the King of the Romans. She is thirty-five years old (actually, she had not yet turned thirty-four) and she is not pretty, although she has a very beautiful complexion. She is religious and as virtuous as words can express. I have seen it, but rarely". In the framework of his visit to France on the occasion of the celebration of the Field of the Cloth of Gold, in the spring of 1520, King Francis I informed the embassy Venetian that Queen Catherine is "old and deformed". About 1530, an Italian naval commander named Mario Savorgnano describes Catherine in the following terms: « she is not a tall woman, rather short, rather robust; If she's not pretty, she's certainly not ugly. But when she always has a smile on her face". who says of her: «She is of short stature, somewhat stout with a demure countenance; she is virtuous, fair, full of kindness and religiousness; She is more loved by the islanders than any other queen that has ever reigned ».

Spelling your name

She was christened "Catherine", but "Catherine" became the accepted version in England after her first marriage to Prince Arthur. She herself signed her name as "Katherine", "Katherina", "Katharine" and sometimes "Katharina". Arthur wrote him a letter from her, in which he addressed her as "Princess Katerine." Her daughter Maria named her as "Queen Kateryn" in her will. In the 16th century it was rare for names, especially first names, to be spelled exactly, and it is evident from Catherine's letters that she endorsed different variations. The love knots that Henry VIII engraved in various palaces his show the initials “H & K", as were other possessions of Henry and Catherine, such as gold goblets, a gilt saltcellar, gold bowls, and candlesticks. Her tomb in Peterborough Cathedral bears the legend "Katharine, Queen of England."

Ancestors

In fiction

Cinema and television

Predecessor: Isabel de York	Queen Consort of England 11 June 1509 - 23 May 1533	Successor: Ana Bolena
Predecessor: Ana Neville	Princess Consort of Wales 14 November 1501 - 2 April 1502	Successor: Carolina of Brandenburg-Ansbach