“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 plus the Holy Roman Empire and the Valois of France.