Elizabeth`s Accession

Life Before 1558:

• Traumtic early life - father hugely dissapointed that she was not the son he wanted
• less than 3 years old her mther (Anne Boleyn) is executed for treason - Henry remarries and Elizabeth is declared illigitimate by Parliament
• her father died when she was 13, she was not overly close to him - he was old and had little to do with her
• became really close to Catherine Parr, who took her under her wing and gave her a Protestant, humanist education
• her religious beliefs were secured with Catherine Parr - moderate Protestant within her father`s church of England
• legitimised and made third in line to the throne in the 1544 Succession Act
• Catherine Parr remarried Thomas Seymour - uncle of her brother. he began t flirt wiht Elizabeth and encouraged rumours that he was to marry her after the death of his wife in childbirth
• thomas arrested and executed for high treason and Elizabeth denies any knowedge of his plan to kidnap her brother when faced with a similar fate
• she was declared innocent due to lack of evidence and there was nothing to be gained from pursuing an heir to the throne
• episode deeply affected her and afterwards she was always deeply cautius around men (emotionally)
• she had nothing to do with alterations to the Succession in 1553, but became a figurehead of the Wyatt rebellion in 1554
• her position…