¹ Dowling, Maria, ‘Anne Boleyn and reform’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, XXXV (1984), 30–46CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ives, Eric. W., Anne Boleyn (Oxford, 1986)Google Scholar; Warnicke, Retha. M., The rise and fall of Anne Boleyn (Cambridge, 1989)Google Scholar; Bernard, G. W., ‘The fall of Anne Boleyn’, English Historical Review, CVI (1991), 584–610CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Ives, Eric. W., ‘The fall of Anne Boleyn reconsidered’Google Scholar, ibid, CVII (1992), 651–64; Bernard, G. W., ‘The fall of Anne Boleyn: a rejoinder’Google Scholar, ibid. 665–74 and Warnicke, Retha. M., ‘The fall of Anne Boleyn revisited’Google Scholar, ibid, CVIII (1993), 653–68.

² Bernard, G. W., ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, Historical Journal, XXXVI (1993), 1–20CrossRefGoogle Scholar. For Latymer's treatise see Maria, Dowling, ‘William Latymer's Cronickille of Anne Bulleyne’, Camden Miscellany, XXX, Camden Society, Fourth series, XXXIX (1991), 23–65Google Scholar. Following Dowling's usage, Latymer's name is spelt here with a ‘y’ instead of an ‘i’ in order to avoid confusion with the much better known Hugh Latimer, who will also be mentioned in this article. The four editions of the Acts and monuments printed during Foxe's lifetime are designated in my article by the year in which they were published – i.e. 1563, 1570, 1576 and 1583. All of these editions were published by John Day in London.

³ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, pp. 2–3.Google Scholar

⁴ ‘Erat eo quidem tempore in aula regis adolescentula genere non ignobili, sed forma multo nobiliori, tum vero pietate et ingenio omnium nobilissimo Anna Bolenia: quam rex magnopere meritoque adamatam sibi in uxorem ac Reginam delegit. Quam propterea mihi in hac historia non praeterundam duxi, ob felicis nominis Bolenei auspicatissimam memoriam. Cui universa resp. Brytannica, tanquam pietatis ecclesiae restauratori, tot tantisque debet nominibus. Primum quando ex huius nominis occasione profligata: deinde recepta iterum per Elisabetham Henrici regis eadem hac Anna Bolenia filiam, eiecta sit infelix haec Romanae praefecturae labes. Atque utinam, quemadmodum per Annam primum ecclesiis Anglorum parta est libertas: ita et ipsa libertate hac diutius cum longiori vita frui potuisset…. Atque vero mortis causam hie non disquiro, quae suum aliquando iudicem habitura est: verba solum morientis notare volui, singulari fide, et modestia erga regem suum plena.’ (John, Foxe, Rerum in ecclesia gestarum [Basle, 1559], p. 145)Google Scholar. All translations in this article are my own, unless otherwise indicated.

⁵ ‘Erant in ea Regina praeter formae decus, multae maximaeque bene instituti dotes, comitas, modestia, pietatis erga omnes, potissimum erga eos qui ope egebant singularis: turn insuper sincerae religionis summum in eius pectore vigebat studium. Quae quam diu vita hac perfruebatur, in felici floruit cursu religio.’ (Rerum, p. 145).

⁶ Foxe's speech, allowing for translation, matches the version in Hall's chronicle and the specific details he provides about Anne's fall – i.e. the date and the fact that her brother was also arrested – are also found in Hall's chronicle. (Edward, Hall, The union of the two noble and illustre famelies of Lancastre and Torke, ed. Henry, Ellis [London, 1809], p. 819)Google Scholar. Admittedly there are other, very similar, versions of this speech and it is only an assumption that Foxe drew the speech from Hall's chronicle. I have made this assumption because Foxe took some of the material in the Rerum from Hall's chronicle, e.g. the account of Richard Hunne (compare Rerum, pp. 119–21 and Hall's chronicle, pp. 573–80) and the account of Wolsey's reception of Cardinal Campeggio in 1517, which is drawn word-for-word from Hall (compare Rerum, pp. 136–7 with Hall's chronicle, p. 592), and because Foxe, in the Acts and monuments, would print the account of Anne's execution, including the speech, that was in the chronicle word-for-word, rather than simply translating what he himself had written in the Rerum (see below, n. 18).

⁷ Amyot, T., ‘Transcript of an original manuscript containing a memorial from George Constantine to Thomas Cromwell’, Archaeologia, XXIII (1831), 50–78, especially p. 66CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Hastings, Robinson, ed., Original letters relative to the English Reformation I, Parker Society (Cambridge, 1846), pp. 203–4Google Scholar and John, Aylmer, An harborowe for faithfull and trewe subiectes (Strasburg, 1559), sig. B4V.Google Scholar

⁸ Aylmer wrote to Foxe on 10 Dec. 1557, in answer to Foxe's inquiry about extant writings of Lady Jane Grey, Aylmer's former pupil (B.L. Harley MS 417, fo. 122r). It is doubtful, however, that Foxe's description of Anne was directly influenced by Aylmer's description. According to a statement on the title page of the Harborowe, Aylmer's book was printed on 26 Apr. 1559, while Foxe's dedication to the Rerum, describing the book as just having been printed, was dated 1 Sept. 1559. Given the time it would have taken to publish a folio of 750 pages, it is safe to assume that the Rerum was in the press before Foxe would have had a chance to see Aylmer's book.

⁹ For Rose Hickman's memories of Anne Boleyn see Joy, Shakespeare and Maria, Dowling, ‘Religion and politics in mid-Tudor England through the eyes of an English protestant woman: the recollections of Rose Hickman’, Bulletin of the Institute of Historical Research, LV (1982), 97Google Scholar. In these recollections, Rose mentioned that Foxe had been her and her husband William's guest in Edward VI's reign (ibid. p. 98). Foxe wrote to William Hickman upon the latter's return from exile, declining, on the grounds of ill health, an invitation the Hickmans had sent (B.L. Harley MS 416, fo. 134r). The friendship between Foxe and the Hickmans apparently continued, however, since a mutual friend, John Gordon, later wrote to Foxe inquiring about books of his which Foxe had borrowed from Hickman (B.L. Harley MS 416, fo. 101r).

¹⁰ 1563, p. 508. The original spelling has been retained in all quotations from the Acts and monuments – and all other sixteenth-century works – but standard abbreviations have been extended and punctuation, including capitalization, modernized.

¹¹ 1563, p. 508.

¹² 1563, p. 509.

¹³ 1563, p. 509.

¹⁴ 1563, pp. 448–9.

¹⁵ Cf. Hall's chronicle, p. 819 and 1563, p. 526 [recte 525]. Bernard, (‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, p. 19)Google Scholar implies that Foxe's version of this speech differs from Hall but, in fact, they are identical.

¹⁶ 1563, p. 526 [recte 525].

¹⁷ 1563, p. 509; 1570, p. 1198.

¹⁸ John, Bale, Scriptorum illustrium maioris Brytanniae catalogus (Basle, 1557), p. 763Google Scholar. Also see 1570, p. 830.

¹⁹ 1563, p. 509; 1570, p. 1198.

²⁰ Brewer, J. S., Gairdner, J. and Brodie, R. H., eds., Letters and papers, foreign and domestic, of the reign of Henry VIII (1862–1932), X, 827.Google Scholar

²¹ Ridley repeatedly mentioned, in his letters from prison, the kindness of Warcup and Wilkinson to him (see 1563, pp. 1294–5 and Certain most godly fruitful and comfortable letters of such true saintes and holy martyrs [London, 1564], pp. 60–2 and 75Google Scholar. Hereafter this will be cited as Letters). Latimer wrote Wilkinson a note, thanking her for her ‘manifold and bountifull gifts’ to him and for visiting him in prison (1563, p. 1356). John Bradford's closing comments in a letter to Wilkinson imply that she aided him during his imprisonment as well. (See Letters, pp. 342–3 and 1570, p. 1825 for an emended version of this letter. Emmanual College Library MS 262, fo. 276r is a complete contemporary copy.)

²² See Letters, pp. 23–4 and 1570, p. 2071 (ECL MS 262, fo. 214r–v is a contemporary copy of this); Letters, pp. 280–6 and 1570, p. 1817–18 (ECL MS 260, fos. 175r–180r and ECL MS 262, fos. 45r–46r); Letters, pp. 342–3 and 1570, p. 1825 (ECL MS 262, fo. 276v); Letters, pp. 131–2 and 1570, p. 1691; Letters, pp. 343–4 (ECL MS 262, fos. 247v–248r) and Letters, pp. 423–5.

²³ Garrett, C. H., The Marian exiles: a study in the origins of Elizabethan puritanism (Cambridge, 1938), pp. 321 and 334Google Scholar; Susan, Brigden, London and the Reformation (Oxford, 1989), p. 562.Google Scholar

²⁴ 1563, p. 1356.

²⁵ The fact that the information about Wilkinson together with Latimer's note to her were published in the 1563 edition of the Acts and monuments, while the other epistles to her were first published in Letters, might seem to weigh against all of this material having been provided by a single person. But this does not take into account the close relationship between the two works and their authors. (For this see Susan, Wabuda, ‘Henry Bull, Miles Coverdale and the making of Foxe's Book of Martyrs’ in Studies in Church History, XXX, ed. Diana, Wood [Oxford, 1993], 245–58Google Scholar. I am grateful to Dr Wabuda for supplying me with a copy of this article before its publication.) It is possible that Henry Bull, the editor of the Letters, uncovered the epistles to Wilkinson and brought her to Foxe's attention. It is also possible that Foxe found the letters and passed them on to Bull – other letters which were unquestionably uncovered by Foxe first appeared in Letters.

²⁶ ‘Ex certa relatione, vivoque testimonio propriae ipsius coniugis’ (1570, p. 1153).

²⁷ 1563, pp. 492–3. It might be argued that the inaccuracies in this account of Bainham preclude its having come from as knowledgeable a source as his widow. More vehemently denied allegations that he had suspected heretics whipped in his garden and historians have taken him at his word (Trapp, J. B., ed., The complete works of St Thomas More, IX [1979], 117–20)Google Scholar. Nevertheless, More's self-justification indicates that these charges were circulating within a year of Bainham's execution. Although More did not name Bainham as one of those he had been accused of scourging, gossip and rumour could have easily confused Bainham, a very conspicuous victim of persecution, with other evangelists supposedly whipped at More's command. Certainly Bainham's widow, in prison when the beating was supposed to have taken place, would have readily believed the worst of More, given her rough treatment at his hands. J. B. Trapp has also maintained that Foxe excised the story of Bainham's prayer at the stake for More's forgiveness from subsequent editions of the Acts and monuments and Trapp implied that Foxe did so because he knew the story was false (ibid. p. 348). The story, however, was not excised, it was simply moved to another location in the text and was faithfully reprinted in each edition (1570, p. 1199; 1576, p. 1027 and 1583, p. 1055). The Venetian ambassador's report of the execution confirms that Bainham was praying while he burned, although it does not say anything about the content of the prayer (Calendar of state papers Venetian, 1527–33, p. 765).Google Scholar

²⁸ Ives, , Anne Boleyn, p. 63Google Scholar and 1570, p. 1233.

²⁹ Dowling, , ‘Latymer's Cronickille’, pp. 60–1Google Scholar and 1570, p. 700 (reprinted in 1576, p. 567 and 1583, p. 588); 1570, p. 1254 (reprinted in 1576, p. 1074 and 1583, p. 1100); 1570, p. 1301 (reprinted 1576, p. 1113 and 1583, p. 1139) and 1570, p. 1359 (reprinted in 1576, p. 1160 and 1583, p. 1188).

³⁰ Dowling, , ‘Latymer's Cronickille’, p. 51.Google Scholar

³¹ Alesius, , Calendar of state papers foreign, 1558–59, p. 1303.Google Scholar

³² Dowling, , ‘Anne Boleyn and reform’, pp. 34–5Google Scholar. The first of Barker's references, which describes Anne's general munificence to Cambridge students, was written in 1559 and thus antedates the Acts and monuments. Barker's second reference, written in 1571, was to Anne's support of him while he was a student at Cambridge. Both references then are independent of Foxe and confirm his statement of Anne's generosity to university students.

³³ Bruce, J. T. and Perowne, T. T., eds., Correspondence of Matthew Parker 1535–75, Parker Society (Cambridge, 1853), pp. 2–3Google Scholar; Dowling, , ‘Latymer's Cronickille’, p. 57.Google Scholar

³⁴ Dowling, , ‘Latymer's Cronickille’, p. 54.Google Scholar

³⁵ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, pp. 3–4.Google Scholar

³⁶ William, Harrison, The description of England, ed. Georges, Edelen (Ithaca, NY, 1968), pp. 227–31.Google Scholar

³⁷ Ives, , Anne Boleyn, p. 163 n. 39Google Scholar. The story of the footman and the merchants bringing Fish's tract to Henry first appeared in the second edition of the Acts and monuments (1570, p. 1153). The story of Anne and Tyndale's Obedience appears in a letter to Foxe from his friend John Louthe, the archdeacon of Nottingham. (The relevant section of the letter is printed in Nichols, J. G., ed., Narratives of the days of the Reformation, Camden Society, First series LXXVII [1859], 52–7Google Scholar; the original section of the letter is B.L. Harley MS 425, fo. 144r–v.) Louthe is generally a rather unreliable source but in this case his story was independently related, with slight variations, by George Wyatt in his life of Anne Boleyn; Wyatt's informant was Anne Gainsford, who had been one of Anne Boleyn's waiting-women. (See Singer, S. W., ed., The life of Cardinal Wolsey by George Cavendish, second edition [London, 1827], pp. 438–41Google Scholar and Ives, , Anne Boleyn, pp. 161–3.)Google Scholar

³⁸ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, p. 5Google Scholar and 1570, p. 1153.

³⁹ 1570, pp. 1233–4. Foxe also first made the oft-quoted comment identifying Anne as one of the evangelical influences on Henry (‘so long as Quene Anne, T. Cromwell, B. Cranmer, M. Denny, D. Butts with such like were about him and could preveal with him, what organe of Christes glorye did more good in the Churche then he?’) in this edition (1570, p. 1441).

⁴⁰ For Parker giving Foxe testimony on Bilney's death see 1570, p. 1150. For Parker's regard for Anne see Parker correspondence, pp. 70, 391 and 400.

⁴¹ Warnicke, , Rise and fall of Anne Boleyn, p. 165.Google Scholar

⁴² Ives, , Anne Boleyn, p. 327 n. 94.Google Scholar

⁴³ Dowling, , ‘Latymer's Cronickille’, p. 50.Google Scholar

⁴⁴ ibid. p. 59 and Alesius, Calendar. Latymer also claimed that Anne secured the see of Canterbury for Cranmer, Hereford for John Skip and Ely for Thomas Goodrich. Foxe's failure to mention these acts of patronage is another indication that he never read Latymer's treatise.

⁴⁵ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, pp. 11–12.Google Scholar

⁴⁶ 1563, pp. 1309 and 1348.

⁴⁷ 1570, pp. 1233 and 1905–7.

⁴⁸ Ives, , Anne Boleyn, pp. 311–12Google Scholar and Dowling, , ‘Anne Boleyn and reform’, pp. 38–9.Google Scholar

⁴⁹ L&P IX, 203, 252 and 272, also see Dowling, , ‘Anne Boleyn and reform’, p. 38.Google Scholar

⁵⁰ 1576, pp. 1026 and 1055; 1583, pp. 1034 and 1082.

⁵¹ 1570, p. 1188 and 1576, p. 1017. Foxe also related that Thomas Patmore, a draper, had, in the following year, been accused by informants of defending the validity of clerical marriage and attacking the veneration of images and had been forced to abjure these statements (1570, p. 1188; 1576, p. 1016–17 and 1583, p. 1044). Foxe identified this Thomas Patmore as the brother of the parson of Much Hadham, but Susan Brigden has persuasively suggested that the two were one and the same, with the priest living for a period in the Drapers, the company to which his father had belonged (London and the Reformation, p. 206).

⁵² 1583, pp. 1044–5.

⁵³ L&P VII, 923 (XXVI).

⁵⁴ See, for example, G. R. Elton's strictures on Foxe's chronology of Thomas, Cromwell's early career (The Tudor revolution in government [Cambridge, 1959], pp. 74–5).Google Scholar

⁵⁵ L&P VIII, 1063.

⁵⁶ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, p. 8 n. 41.Google Scholar

⁵⁷ B.L. Harley MS 425, fo. 15r (printed, with serious inaccuracies, in John, Strype, Ecclesiastical memorials [Oxford, 1822], I, I, 116)Google Scholar and L&P Addenda I, 752.

⁵⁸ L&P v, 982 and B.L. Harley MS 422, fo. 88r (printed in Strype, Ecc. mem., I, 2, 175).

⁵⁹ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, p. 2.Google Scholar

⁶⁰ Ives, , Anne Boleyn, p. 302Google Scholar; also see 1570, p. 1233.

⁶¹ An excellent example of such hortatory material is John Hale's oration to Elizabeth, first reprinted by Foxe in 1576, pp. 2005–7.

⁶² See 1563, p. 1051.

⁶³ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, p. 2.Google Scholar

⁶⁴ The following passage, also introduced in the 1570 edition, about Lucius, the (mythical) first Christian king in England, offers a revealing glimpse of both Foxe's anxieties about the current political situation and his tendency to use history to comment on it: ‘although the foresaid Lucius, the Britayne kyng, through the mercifull providence of God, was then Christened and the gospell receaved generallye almoste in all the lande: yet the state therof as wel of the religion, as of the commonwealth, coulde not be quiet, for that the Emperours and nobles of Rome were yet infidels, and enemies to the same: but especially the case so happening, that Lucius the Christen kyng dyed wythout issue: for thereby such trouble and variance fell among the Britaynes (as it happened in all other realms, namely in this our realm of England whenever succession lacketh) that not onely they brought upon them the idolatrous Romanies, and at lengthe the Saxones, but also inwrapped themselves in such miserye and desolation, which yet is this day amongest them remayneth. Such a thyng it is (where a prince or a kyng is in a kyngdom) there to lacke succession…’ (1570, p. 147).

⁶⁵ E.g. 1563, p. 875 (reprinted in 1570, p. 1542; 1576, p. 1314 and 1583, p. 1364).

⁶⁶ See 1570, pp. 850–2.

⁶⁷ For Foxe's charity to university students see B.L. Harley MS 416, fos. 110r, 189r–190r, 206r and 207r.

⁶⁸ This is my assumption based on the fact that Foxe described Bainham and his execution in the Rerum (p. 1267) but did not, presumably from ignorance, so much as mention Fish in that work.

⁶⁹ For a balanced assessment of Anne and her career see David, Starkey, The reign of Henry VIII: personalities and politics (London, 1985), pp. 91–101 and 108–15.Google Scholar

⁷⁰ Bernard, , ‘Anne Boleyn's religion’, p. 18.Google Scholar

⁷¹ 1570, p. 1149 and 1563, p. 529.

⁷² Amyot, , ‘Transcript’, p. 77.Google Scholar

⁷³ John, Frith, A booke made by Johann Frith…answering unto M. Mores letter (Antwerp, 1533), sigs. L6v–L7r.Google Scholar

⁷⁴ See Susan, Wabuda, ‘Equivocation and recantation during the English Reformation: the “subtle shadows” of Dr Edward Crome’, Journal of Ecclesiastical History, XLIV (1993), 224–42Google Scholar. The passage I have quoted is on p. 232.

⁷⁵ 1570, p. 1233.