BOL, FERDINAND. 



BOLEYN, ANNE. 



introduced a fresh plot in the action of his poem. The design of hia 

 poem is grand, the characters are well delineated, the various threads of 

 his argument cross each other without confusion, but they are all left 

 interrupted by the abrupt breaking off of the poem at the end of the 

 ninth canto of the third book, when the author was perhaps hardly ^ 

 arrived at the middle of his narrative. Bojardo himself accounts for , 

 this interruption by alluding to the " Gallic storm " which was then I 

 bursting upon Italy, and scared away his romantic muse. 



This was towards the close of 1494, when Charles VIII., with a 

 formidable army, had just invaded Italy, and was marching to tlie 

 conquest of Naples. He entered Florence in November, spreading 

 consternation everywhere before him. On the 20th of the following 

 December Bojardo died at Reggio. The subject of his poem was 

 afterwards resumed by Ariosto. 



The first two books, containing sixty cantos of the ' Innamorato,' 

 were printed at Venice in 1486. They were printed again, together 

 with the nine canton of the third book, which were all Bojardo wrote, 

 at Scandiano in 1495, under the direction of Count Camillo, his son. 

 Several reprints were afterwards made at Venice and at Milan, all 

 more or less incorrect. Nicol6 degli Agostini wrote a continuation of 

 the 'Innamorato' in three books, which however is very inferior to the 

 original. In 1545 Lodovico Domenichi published an edition of 

 Bojardo's ' Innamorato ' with many verbal and orthographical cor- 

 rections. But before this, Berni had written his 'Rifacimento ' of the 

 ' Innamorato,' which was published in 1541-42, and obliterated the 

 editions of the original poem of Bojardo, the copies of which became 

 very scarce, and the very name of Bojardo was almost forgotten. 

 [BERNI.] After three centuries of unmerited neglect, a new and 

 correct edition of Bojardo's text of the ' Innamorato ' was edited by 

 Panizzi, with notes and a life of Bojardo, London, 1831. 



Bojardo wrote also a sort of chronicle of the dark ages, of Charle- 

 magne and his successors, of the Crusades, the wars of the Normans 

 and Saracens in South Italy, &c. ' Istoria Imperiale di Riccobaldo 

 Ferrarese tradotta del Latino.' He called it a translation from Riccc- 

 baldi, a chronicler of the 13th century; but it is in fact a compilation, 

 partly from Riccobaldi's work, ' Pomarium, sive Historia Universalis,' 

 and p.irtly from other sources. It contains many strange historical 

 blunders and anachronisms, which serve to show how imperfect histo- 

 rical knowledge was in Bojardo's time, while they throw much light 

 on those popular and confused traditions which gave rise to the stories 

 contained in the romantic poems of Italy, and especially in the 

 ' Innamorato.' 



BOL, FERDINAND, a portrait painter and etcher, born at Dort in 

 the early part of the 17th century. He was the pupil of Rembrandt, 

 and executed some excellent portraits in his style. He painted also 

 dome historical pieces of great merit, which are at Amsterdam, but 

 they are inferior to his portraits. He etched also sixteen spirited 

 pltto.'. Bol died in affluent circumstances, and at a good old age, in 

 I'l- 1, fit Amsterdam, where he had principally lived. 



BOLEYN, ANNE, or, more properly, BULLEN, or BULLETNE, 

 was the daughter of Sir Thomas Bullen, afterwards created Viscount 

 Roehford and Earl of Wiltshire. He was the representative of an 

 ancient line in Norfolk, which had in three descents been allied to the 

 noblest families in England; and he had himself filled important 

 offices in the state. Anne's mother was Lady Elizabeth Howard, 

 daughter of the Duke of Norfolk. 



Anne Boleyn was born in the year 1507, and in her childhood 

 accompanied Mary, the sister of Henry VIII., to France, where she 

 remained in the court of that queen and of her successor, the wife of 

 H I., for many years. She was afterwards attached to the 

 household of the Duchecs of Alen9on. The time of her return from 

 France is doubtful, but Burnet places it in 1527, when her father was 

 sent in an embassy to France. At that time she became a maid of 

 honour to Queen Katherine, the wife of Henry VIII., and was receiving 

 the addresses of Lord Percy, the eldest son of the Duke of Northumber- 

 land. She appears to have quickly attracted the notice of the king, 

 who iu a letter to her in 152S alludes to his having been one whole 

 year struck with the dart of love ; and her engagement with Lord 

 Percy was at this time broken off by the intervention of Wolsey, iu 

 whose household that nobleman had been brought up. Anne retired 

 into the country during the early part of Henry's process for a divorce 

 from Queen Katherine, hut she kept up a correspondence by letters 

 with him. In 1529 she returned to court, and was known to be 

 intended by Henry for hh future queen. 



In the meantime the king's divorce from Katherine was retarded by 

 various delays ; and at the beginning of the year 1533 Henry married 

 Anne Boleyn secretly, in the presence of her uncle, the Duke of Nor- 

 folk, and of her father and mother. Dr. Rowland Lee, afterwards 

 bishop of Litchfield, performed the ceremony " much about St. Paul's 

 day," which is probably the 25th of January, the feast of the con- 

 version of St. PauL This date is established by a letter from Cranmer 

 in the British Museum, quoted by Burnet, and printed in Ellin's 

 'Letters' (first series, p. 34); and Cranmer's assertion is corroborated 

 by that of Stow ; although Hall, and after him Holinshed and Speed, 

 mention St. Erkenwald's day, the preceding 14th of November. It 

 was not until the 23rd of May following that the nullity of the king's 

 us marriage was declared by Cranmer, who five days afterwards 

 confirmed that of Anne Boleyn ; and on the let of June Queen Anne 



BIOO. DI7. VOL. I. 



was crowned with great pomp. On the 13th of the following Septem- 

 ber the Princess Elizabeth was born. 



Of the events of the queen's life during the two subsequent years 

 little is known, except that she favoured the Reformation, and pro- 

 moted the translation of the Bible. In January 1536 she brought 

 forth a dead child, and it was at that time and during her previous 

 pregnancy that the affections of her husband were alienated from her, 

 and fixed upon Jane Seymour, daughter of Sir John Seymour, and 

 one of the maids of honour to the queen. Queen Anne was accused 

 of criminal intercourse with her brother Viscount Roehford. The 

 evidence to support the charge proved that he had leant on her bed. 

 She was accused also of grossly criminal intercourse with Henry Norris, 

 groom of the stole ; Sir Francis Weston and William Brereton, gentle- 

 meu of the chamber ; and Mark Smeton, a groom of the chamber. To 

 support these charges something said by Lady Wingfield before her 

 death was adduced, which amounted only to this : that the queen had 

 told each of these persons that she loved him better than auy person 

 whatever. This was stretched into high treason, under the act of the 

 26th of Henry VIII., which made those wlio slandered the issue 

 begotten between the king and Queen Anne guilty of that crime. The 

 other evidence against her was Mark Smeton, who however was never 

 confronted with her. Two days after she was condemned to death, 

 Cranmer pronounced the nullity of her marriage, iu consequeuce of 

 certain lawful impediments confessed by her. 



Of her conduct in the Tower an exact account may be derived from 

 the letters of Sir William Kingston, the lieutenant, of which five, 

 together with one from Edward Baynton, have been printed by Sir 

 H. Ellis from the originals in the British Museum. To her aunt, the 

 Lady Boleyn, she confessed that she had allowed somewhat too familiar 

 approaches by her courtiers, but she never varied iu her denial of any 

 criminal act. On the 15th of May she was arraigned, together with 

 her brother, before a special commission, of which her uncle, the Duke 

 of Norfolk, was president. The sitting of this commission was secret, 

 but the tradition of all contemporary writers agrees that the queen, 

 unassisted by legal advisers, defended herself firmly and skilfully, 

 notwithstanding the indecent impatience of the president. She was 

 of course convicted. After her conviction her feelings seem to have 

 been absorbed in indignation at the baseness of her persecutors, and 

 anxiety for her own posthumous fame. In the British Museum there 

 is the copy of a letter, unquestionably authentic, addressed by Anne 

 to the king, which is written in such a strain of conscious innocence 

 and of unbending and indignant reproof, that it sets her immeasure- 

 ably above her oppressor. She tells him " Neither did I at any time 

 so far forget myself in my exaltation, or received queenship, but that 

 I always looked for such an alteration as I now find ; for the ground 

 of my preferment being on no surer foundation than your Grace's 

 fancy, the least alteration was fit and sufficient I know to draw that 

 fancy to some other subject. . . . Try me, good king, but let me 

 have a lawful trial ; and let not my sworn enemies sit as my accusers 

 and judges ; yea let me receive an open trial, for my truth shall fear no 

 open shames." This appeal to her brutal husband was of course in vain. 



Sir William Kingston, with the aid of his wife, and of the Lady 

 Boleyn (the queen's aunt and known enemy), acted as a constant spy 

 on her ; reporting to Secretary Cromwell, for the king's information, 

 all that escaped the prisoner's lips. On the 16th of May Kingston 

 writes impatiently to " know the king's pleasure as shortly as ruay be, 

 that we here may prepare for the same which is necessary for to do 

 execution." On the 18th he writes : " And in the writing of this she 

 sent for me, and at my coming she eaid, ' Mr. Kingston, I hear say I 

 shall not die afore noon, and I am very sorry therefor, for I thought 

 to be dead by this time and past my pain." I told her it would be no 

 pain, it vas so subtle. And then she said, ' I heard say the executioner 

 was very good, and I have a little neck ;' and put her hands about it, 

 laughing heartily." On the 19th of May she was executed on the 

 green before the Tower, denying her guilt, but speaking charitably of 

 the king, no doubt with a view to protect her daughter from his 

 vengeance. " Her body was thrown into a common chest of elm-tree, 

 used to put arrows in." Lord Roehford, Norris, Weston, Brereton, 

 and Smeton, were also put to death. What would else seem the 

 apparently inexplicable hatred of Henry towards Queen Anno is 

 sufficiently explained by the fact that the day after her execution 

 Henry married Jane Seymour ; and he afterwards procured an Act of 

 Parliament (28 Hen. VIII., c. 7) declaring his marriage with Anne 

 void, and the issue of it and of his former marriage illegitimate. 



If Anne Bol> yn were only remarkable as the victim of the lusts, the 

 caprice, and the, heartless selfishness of Henry VIII., her history would 

 be interesting as an illustration of the state of our jurisprudence in her 

 time, and of the temper of a king whose personal character exercised 

 more influence over the affairs of England than that of any of our 

 kings since the Conqueror. But the name of Anne Boleyn is still more 

 remarkable by her connection with the Reformation in England, of 

 which incidentally perhaps she was the immediate cause. Henry VIII. 

 could only obtain her hand by annulling his previous marriage, and 

 the refusal of the pope to do this led to the severance of England from, 

 the Romish communion. Thus it is that the character of Anne Boleyn 

 (a- matter utterly beside tiie questions agitated between the Roman 

 Catholic and Protestant churches) has become a subject of fierce 

 controversy which three centuries have not extinguished. 



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