Vulgar History Podcast
Elizabeth Barton and the Downfall of Anne Boleyn
September 23, 2026
Hello, and welcome to Vulgar History, a feminist women’s history comedy podcast. My name is Ann Foster. I’m a historian and an author, and I’ve been into the Tudor era since I was a small child. This season on the podcast, we’re talking about the notorious Tudor era: what the royal family was up to, and also what other people were doing at that time, including people in other countries. Today, our story is about Elizabeth Barton, who started off being sort of a normal person without anything to do with the royal family, and then her life became intricately connected with Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn.
And the new book, Notorious: Anne Boleyn and the Great Tudor Hoax, is kind of a dual biography of Elizabeth Barton and Anne Boleyn and kind of how their lives were entwined with each other. And I have the author of Notorious on the podcast with me today, Hayley Nolan is a historian, TEDx speaker, associate of King’s College London, and is currently at the University of Oxford, undertaking her second master’s degree. And she joined me for a conversation about, kind of, half of her book, because her book, again, it’s about Anne Boleyn, it’s about Elizabeth Barton. We’re focusing on Elizabeth Barton, because this is a really interesting way to look at a story that many of us already know very well, and kind of how Elizabeth Barton’s mysticism, how her activity sort of affected all of history. So, please enjoy this chat between myself and author Hayley Nolan.
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Ann: So, I’m joined today by Hayley Nolan, author of the new book, Notorious: Anne Boleyn and the Great Tudor Hoax. Welcome, Hayley.
Hayley: Hello! Thank you for having me. And Hepburn, who was already— It’s Hepburn, wasn’t it?
Ann: Yeah, Hepburn is here, my cat. She’s really into this story. I don’t think there’s any cats in it, but you know…
Hayley: No.
Ann: I’m sure they were always around. They just didn’t write about them in Tudor times, because they’re just there catching mice. You just don’t think about it.
Hayley: They’re there, just getting on with the job, you know, curling up in laps, calming them through all the trauma that they had to go through.
Ann: Can we talk about… We’re going to get into a lot of trauma, actually. Actually, to begin with, we’re going to talk about Elizabeth Barton. But first, the way that you start your book is starting to describe just, kind of, the misery of life in Tudor times and how people sort of clung to any semblance of hope or religion. Can you just explain sort of the context in which this hoax emerged?
Hayley: Yeah, I do think it’s really important that people understand how did it come to be that not just, you know, the villagers believed that this girl was a prophet, but the King of England, and the Pope, and Cardinal Wolsey. You have to think that it was such an incredibly religious time, and life on Earth was fleeting; lifespans were cut short by illnesses and disastrous carriage rides, all sorts! You name it! It was quite short.
So, they focused on everlasting salvation in the afterlife. And what did they have to sort of guide them through this brief journey here on Earth, were the wondrous teachings of the Bible. So, they were looking out for any sign from God, whether that was interpreting a dream or inclement weather, you know, a rainbow or a bolt of lightning or, you know, a prophet’s sign from God, or a vision from the angels. They really clung to the preachers who appear to have a closer connection to God than them. And if you think about it, there’s all the pilgrimage and holy relics were of great importance because they wanted to be able to erase any sins here on Earth so that they would have a shorter stint in purgatory before they went on to heaven, hopefully, fingers crossed.
So yeah, it is hard for us to sort of grasp how difficult life was, and why they clung to people like Elizabeth Barton, who we’re about to be talking about.
Ann: Well, she also reminds me, and I think you mentioned a few times in your book, it was probably about 100 years before Joan of Arc came on the scene. So, people were already primed and ready to believe that, like, a young woman could have visions.
Hayley: Oh, yes. And you know, this is sort of really the only way in which women who had no status were actually able to be elevated, I suppose, and have any kind of status in their own way. The fact that she was this… She was a housemaid! She did become a nun, but she started out as a humble housemaid, and I think it was that sort of humility that gave her… [sighs] I don’t know, it’s really hard to explain, to be honest, as to how the working mind of a Tudor— We have to get into the mind of a Tudor, and I suppose the fact that she wasn’t – well, she did eventually become quite grasping, or did she? We will debate it – but because I suppose she wanted for nothing, she was just one of those, or rather, one of them, one of the people who could be trusted. I think that kind of lent to the whole situation.
Ann: So, let’s begin at the beginning. Elizabeth Barton, she’s about 19 years old, probably, when this all sort of kicks off, and she’s a housemaid in the house of somebody who’s involved with the Archbishop. It’s sort of a high-up house, right?
Hayley: Yeah. So, you think, well, if she was this lowly housemaid, how did she get in front of the King of England? And it’s because of this connection. So, she was a housemaid to Thomas Cobb, and he was a land agent to the Archbishop of Canterbury. So, he not only dealt with his own farm, but other houses in Aldington, the Manor of Aldington. And so, yes, it was that connection.
So, when she started to have this— It wasn’t just visions at first; she had this debilitating illness. They didn’t know what it was. She was struck down with sort of convulsions and what was described as a trance-like immobility. It was during this immobility, this trance, that suddenly, apparently, a voice was heard speaking from deep within her belly, and if it spoke anything of the joys of heaven, it spoke so sweetly, but when it spoke of hell, apparently it spoke terribly and put everyone in a great fear.
So, it was at that point they brought in the local parson of Aldington to assess her, and it was him who was the first to sort of essentially put words in her mouth because he said, “Well, while you are having one of these trances, you actually spoke many high and notable matters of the seven deadly sins and the ten commandments.” She clearly was a little bit skeptical at this because, well, the indication that there was some pushback to just accepting this was that he said, “You would be greatly blamed if you did not share the wondrous works that have been shown in you through God.” So, that, to me, indicates that she sort of wasn’t too sure. She didn’t sort of jump on board straight away and say, “Hey, yeah, I’m a visionary.”
Ann: Can I just say one thing? Because the first, as I recall from your book, this all gets really… The momentum starts going really quickly, but the first sort of “prophecy” that she does is she’s sick, and she’s put in a room with a baby from the household who’s also sick, and she says something like, “Oh, I think that baby is going to die.” And then the baby dies. And that’s where people are like, “She’s a prophet,” where it’s like, “Mmm, I think she’s just kind of observing symptoms.”
Hayley: There you go. So, she says, “I think the baby is about to die.” And it’s within… They don’t really say when, how soon after she says, “This baby is going to pass away,” that it sadly does, but it’s sort of indicated sort of within the next breath, it does pass away. If you think about it again, back to the very superstitious times of Tudor England, this could have gone one of two ways. They could have thought, “Oh my God, she has just prophesied the death of an infant! She has had a vision,” or “She’s possessed by the Devil. Did she curse his child to die?” And yes, that is why they brought in the parson of Aldington. As I say, there’s many twists and turns here with this story.
Ann: Well, it really starts off… You know, it’s just a snowball. It’s the smallest thing, and then! But because of this, they’re like, “Ohhh, she “prophesized” this clearly ill infant was going to die.” And then that’s where he starts coming in, being like, “And she said this!” When you were talking about, you know, she spoke with a voice deep within her belly, it’s like, well, she was sick. So, was this not just maybe a scratchy throat and her voice sounded kind of weird?
Hayley: Exactly. Yeah, there’s so many different ways you can interpret it very logically. But as we say, they’re going to jump—
Ann: They were not.
Hayley: They were not. They didn’t go for logic, have to be honest. [laughs] They went straight to prophecy. And I think because of the time, this was a time when the church was starting to come under scrutiny from Martin Luther, with his Ninety-five Theses. So, I don’t think it would have bode well, especially it being a house of, you know, the land agent of the Archbishop of Canterbury, for this to have been a demonic situation. So, I think the parson of Aldington sort of jumped on the idea of her being a prophet straight away.
Ann: And she gets this team of men who are sort of her entourage, sort of her PR team. Can you explain sort of who’s assigned this task?
Hayley: Yeah, it wasn’t just her who was skeptical at first. The parson of Aldington went to the Archbishop of Canterbury, and he said, “Okay, hold your horses. I’m going to send my men to assess this woman, and who he sends essentially becomes— I’ve positioned them as her celebrity manager and her publicist (the publicist comes in slightly later) just for you to understand the roles they played. So, this was Edward Bocking. He was a monk at Christchurch in Canterbury, and he also said that while she was having her visions that Elizabeth Barton at the time just a maid, I was going to refer to her as the Nun, but not just yet, he said, “You’ve actually just had a vision saying that I should become your spiritual father.” Again, like a sort of manager, someone to offer guidance.
But while he’s there, she says, “Okay, I’ve had a vision, I need to go to the local church. Our Lady is going to cure me, and everyone should come and watch.” So, 2,000 people essentially, apparently, pack into this church to watch her have this vision where she falls to the floor – it’s very theatrical, as they tell it – but what’s interesting is Our Lady does not cure her. She says, “I’m going to delay your cure for a season. However, don’t worry. I think you should profess yourself a nun,” which really sold it for the crowd; if she was demonic, she wouldn’t have been advised to go to a nunnery. And so, everyone hailed this for a miracle. And yet, she hadn’t really done much at that point. But yeah, she went to a nunnery.
Ann: And this is how she becomes a nun. But I think it’s really interesting that she, initially, you know, the prophecies and the visions that she’s having are just like, “I think I should have a better life, and I think I should get these opportunities. The Holy Mother says this,” and everyone’s like, “Okay.” So, she goes from being a housemaid to being a nun, which is, I would think, a much more comfortable existence, certainly.
Hayley: There was still actually a surprising amount of housework, so to speak, that needed doing. It was a very humble life, and, you know, you have to take the vow of chastity and the vow of poverty. But yes, I think it was kind of less demanding and more godly, more superior existence. And actually, while she was there, that was when her miracles started to really ramp up. So, she apparently lit candles without fire, helped women who came to the nunnery, produced breast milk where they’d run dry. And the most fantastical one of all, she brought a man back from the dead. Let’s not brush over that one. How dead was he? Is my question [laughs] if she was able to revive him.
Ann: Yeah. Was he just… Exactly. Who’s to say? But these are things that, if you’re a superstitious person and if people already believe in her, then the things that she does just confirms what they already think, sort of situation.
Hayley: You know, there weren’t medical experts in the Tudor era. He could have had a very weak pulse. It could have been something like that that could be easily interpreted as dead and then being brought back to life by her prayer. Yeah, so all these miracles then got turned into best-selling pamphlets and books, and the celebrity began to grow.
Ann: Okay, I just want to pause for a second. I’m doing this whole Tudor series, and I’m always… When things become pamphlets, it’s always kind of like, “Okay, this is like going viral.” This is like, when you’ve made a pamphlet, when there’s a pamphlet about the situation, you know it’s like, that’s the hot gossip everybody is excited about. So, she’s making it into the pamphlets.
Hayley: Exactly. She’s just like front page of the newspapers. We have, like, tabloid press over here. Do you have this sort of tabloid culture in the US as much?
Ann: Not… It’s not quite as strong here. But I’m thinking it’s more, like, she’s a trending topic on social media, you know, everyone’s talking about her on TikTok. Yeah, everybody is just, like, “There’s this nun, and she’s doing these miracles.” And at this point, still too… We’re about to get to how she gets in front of the king, but at this point, she’s not involved politically in what’s going on. But then some people see, because you mentioned that there’s the Reformation. It’s happening in some other European countries where, like, people are breaking off, the new Protestant religions are taking off. And in England, that’s a threat that people are worried about. But she’s coming from a Catholic point of view, so people who want to keep Catholicism strong are like, “Oh, she’ll be on our side. We can use her as a sort of figurehead for the Catholic cause.”
Hayley: That’s exactly what happened. Yeah, absolutely. Because as much as people did want reform, because, you know, there are a few bad eggs in the apple cart— No, I’ve mixed up my analogies. That’s the rotten apple in the apple cart.
Ann: [laughs] Well, if there’s bad eggs in the apple cart, that’s pretty bad, too.
Hayley: It’s a new phrase, guys, it’s going to catch on. But yeah, they wanted to flush out the bad apples or rotten eggs. But also there was a lot of fear with this change. So yes, people were saying, “Well, I don’t want to abandon all rituals of Catholicism.” So, when you have someone like this nun suddenly say, “Don’t worry, it’s actually sinful to be going over to the other side,” then they clung to her. I think that also helped her celebrity build, and also it absolutely helped her get the sort of major power players as fans, as I say, in the Pope and Cardinal Wolsey, and at this point, also the Archbishop of Canterbury was on board.
Ann: So, at what point is she brought before the King for the first time?
Hayley: So, it’s after she’s gone to the nunnery. Funnily enough, her new spiritual father, her manager, says, “I don’t suppose you’ve had any visions or God said anything about the King’s desire to divorce Catherine of Aragon and marry this Anne Boleyn?” And she said, “Oh, one second, let me go and have a vision. I’ll come back to you on that.”
Ann: I love this part of her story, actually. Just the fact that they’re like, “Oh, next time you have a vision, could you bring this up?” And she’s like, “Got it. Yeah, I think I have one scheduled for later this afternoon.” Like, it’s very… It’s not random.
Hayley: I did not know that’s how it worked. It was a revelation in itself to me. I know, that kind of made me chuckle when I read that. But yeah, so that’s pretty much what happened. And when she came back, obviously, she started prophesizing from that point against the King’s marriage. And actually, later on, when she does have her naysayers, this is one of the points they pick up on, that she didn’t start prophesizing against the King until she started being guided to by her manager.
So, at first they tried to get through to Henry VIII via Thomas Moore, who was one of his advisors. He very quickly just dismissed it, mocked it a little, said, you know, “I found nothing notable apart from the fact that she’s now and again would speak in rhyme,” which, you know, is quite a skill, but still, he wasn’t impressed. Then, with a letter from the Archbishop of Canterbury, they went to the Tudor court, and we don’t particularly know who she went with… Got a fly attacking me, sorry. [chuckles] Yes, so she went to the Tudor court, and somehow she got in front of Cardinal Wolsey with this letter from the Archbishop, managed to put the fear of God into him because the next thing you know, she has a private audience with the King of England.
Ann: So, I just want to… I’m going to be doing a whole thing about Anne Boleyn in a bit. But Henry VIII is trying to find a Bible-based reason to call his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, to say that it was invalid for Bible-based reasons, so that he can marry Anne Boleyn, and Anne Boleyn as a believer in the Reformed religion. So, there’s lots of reasons here why the existing institution are very against this because they don’t want him to marry a reformist because that would challenge the Catholic Church. But also, Catherine of Aragon is this very connected princess, who’s connected to the Holy Roman Emperor and all these people. So, all of the Catholic institutions are just like, “Please, don’t do this, Henry VIII.” So, they’re trying to convince him not to do it for Bible, spiritual reasons. He’s trying to find sort of biblical precedent to do this.
So, the fact that she is coming as – this is my interpretation, correct me if I’m wrong – she’s coming from a sort of, you know, she’s direct from God, effectively, she’s like, “God says, don’t do this.” So, they’re like, “Okay, maybe this will persuade Henry to stop.” Right? They’re trying to persuade him… This is how desperate they are to stop him from doing this, that they’re like, “Well, let’s just bring this nun who has visions, and maybe that’ll scare him into stopping.”
Hayley: That was my interpretation. I one hundred percent agree. I think they thought, “Well, if he’s got to be quoting Leviticus, then we’re going to quote the angels in heaven via this girl.” She was a very convenient tool to be able to use, and if they needed, discard later on. But yes, absolutely, the fact that she was on their side, prophesizing what they needed her to say, and she seemed to be very willing to go along with the words they were putting in her mouth… As far as they were concerned, she was the most perfect sort of figurehead for their task to stop him, to dissuade him.
Ann: The whole story. I was just like, why have I never heard about this? But the fact that she actually got an audience with Henry VIII, it’s not just some, like, fringe thing that’s happening up in Kent. It’s like, this is as serious as it could be; she’s actually seeing him in person.
Hayley: It’s actually incredible that she did, and it just speaks to the sort of level of desperation that Wolsey had. And people say, you know, was Wolsey actually against the marriage? I think this absolutely proves that he was. He was using her, and she was pretty damning. By the end of it, her threats did get more and more outlandish. She said that if he divorced Catherine of Aragon and married Anne Boleyn, he would lose the crown within a month. She said that she had seen his seat in Hell. She was bold. Wolsey would never dare to reproach the King and say things like that. So, clearly he had tried, no one could dissuade him, and here was this bold girl, so emboldened. Where did she get the guts to do it? I suppose this is where having God on your side, or really believing that you did have God on your side, goes a long way.
Ann: Well, and this is also, just in terms of, you know, the Tudor history that I’ve been looking at recently, just a few generations before, Henry VI, there was a whole thing where Eleanor Cobham was put to death because she said she thought the king might die. Like, it’s treason to just say, “I think the King might die one day.” Like, people in past generations have been put to death. So, the fact that she’s telling the king himself, “You are going to go to Hell.”
Hayley: It’s incredible that they sort of… I think they must have thought, “If we just ignore her, she’ll go away.” Because how was it allowed to trundle on as long as it did? I think he did just try to dismiss her, because it did go on for the full seven years. The seven-year delay was down to her, and when it came down to it at the end, they solely blamed her. Henry VIII said to, I think it was a French ambassador, that it was because of the lies and the sedition this nun was whipping up that Catherine, his ex-wife at that point, and his daughter, Princess Mary, were seduced. They were sort of induced to rebellion because of her. They said that the Pope was seduced by the diabolic lies of this nun and Cardinal Wolsey, too, and that she did marvellously stop the King’s marriage to Anne Boleyn for the space of seven years, with her idle words. They all blame her solely. This hoax. When I say blame her, we’re going to talk about who else was pulling the strings around it. But yes, they actually believed it was her at that point.
Ann: And because she’s so powerless, right? She’s a housemaid turned nun, there’s these obviously-much-more-powerful-than-her men are sort of being like, “Oh, could you have a vision about this? And it’d be great if this is the point of view that the vision gives you.” Like, it’s this whole sort of team. So, she comes to meet Henry VIII, and she says, “If you divorce Catherine Ergon and marry Anne Boleyn, you will go to hell,” basically. And then, she’s just able to go back home. Her reputation is, I would imagine, the pamphlets are going to heat up; she’s been in front of the king. Like, she’s becoming more and more famous.
Hayley: Yeah, this now just elevates her status, that the king wanted to see her. So, she started receiving money for prayers, which I sort of think, okay, was it the money she was interested in?
Ann: I was just going to say, because the whole thing about a hoax always comes down to money. And I was literally just going to say, “Where does money come into this?” But she’s getting money for prayers.
Hayley: Well, she was getting money for prayers and for curing people. But then, there’s letters saying, “But she didn’t keep the money I sent last time, she donated most of it to charity.” So, I thought, okay, maybe it’s not the money. Then maybe it’s the adulation because people were making money. They were, as I say, selling the books, the pamphlets, there were holy relics made of… At one point she burned her veil – which, I am jumping ahead, but I think she wanted to sort of quit the con, I think it got a lot more dangerous, she started to realize it – but because they carried on after that, her manager turned the burned veil into a holy relic, which, of course, people paid to have access to see. They made a shrine to her in her local church where, well, the Virgin Maryd didn’t— Or Our Lady, rather, didn’t actually cure her.
Ann: But told her to become a nun, so that was the scene. So, people are certainly making money off of the situation, whether she is or not. I just wanted to say, something that keeps bumping up in my mind is this reminds me of, like, I don’t know how familiar you are, but with the Salem witch trials, where you’ve got young girls who are suddenly being listened to for the first time, and then just all, men around them make it all get kind of a bit more out of control, and then the visions start getting a bit more extreme. Like, it just seems… And that’s a hundred years later, but it’s a similar sort of thing to me where it’s just like, a girl is being listened to in a world that doesn’t listen to girls, and she’s going to do whatever she needs to keep getting listened to.
Hayley: And also, at this point, by 1529, Cardinal Wolsey had died, as she’d threatened, and the Archbishop of Canterbury also ended up dying. So, I think that at that point she started to think, “Hang on a second, they’re all saying I’m having these visions and speaking from my belly and saying notable words. Maybe it’s all true.” I do think that they started to come true, these threats of ours, these visions. So, I think that, again, goes a long way to sort of instilling this sense of self-belief in who you are. But also, the manipulation of her managers…
So, Edward Bocking, the spiritual father, he would also tell her about other prophets who would be saying certain things and the visions they’d been having recently. People say this was to inspire her. But also, the prophecies went dry for a short spell, and he then says, “Well, how are you living now? Virtuously? I think God might have taken back his good grace seeing as you’ve not had any revelations lately.” And that, to me, just smacks of coercion, because when we have got everyone’s sort of testimony at the end, when everyone starts getting interrogated, there are about three separate accounts that use the same wording that she did all of this to please him, to satisfy the minds of those around her. And I just think that’s very telling.
Also, the fact that when he says, “How are you living now? Virtuously?” That indicates to him sort of manipulating her in a really insidious way, because we have a draft of a book that he started to pen; he cut out the middleman who wanted to rake in the coin himself.
Ann: He’s going to write the biography himself, yeah.
Hayley: He’s going to write it. However, there are many inconsistencies which tell me it wasn’t written with her knowledge or consent or input, and not surprising because he spoke about that she’d admitted she was struggling with what they called sexual incontinency, which means sort of sexual immorality. She was having some very saucy visions, some sexual fantasies, essentially, there’s no other way to put it. And she confided this in her spiritual father. We can debate, did she have a sort of schoolgirl-ish crush? Was she trying to flirt with him? Was she being perfectly honest and just trying— She’d taken the vow of chastity, was she trying to get his help? Was he then manipulating that, aware that maybe there was a crush, or aware that she was worried about this, and that’s why he started to taunt her? “How are you living? Virtuously?” Knowing that she’d confided this, like, deeply personal thing she was struggling with. It’s just so [sighs] coercive.
Ann: And there’s the moment where she claims that she was visited by a vision of the Devil, and then she’s covered in… What she call the Devil’s spit? Or…?
Hayley: Yeah. So, the Devil asked her to marry him, she says no, and it spits in her face. But she doesn’t just stop there. She goes to Edward Bocking, and she apparently has smeared, wiped off the spit from her, which was black and apparently stank of human feces. Now, if you’re going to stick that under the nose of the man you fancy, I just don’t think that’s a seduction technique. That, to me, is her trying to revolt him, trying to scare him off.
Ann: To get him to leave her alone, yeah.
Hayley: Exactly. So, it’s all these little actions that just, the story starts to form, and you think, “Okay, I understand what’s happening here.” Because also, when he did say, you know, “How are you living? God must have taken back his love.” The next part of the story, the very next sign is about, she says, “I’ve not just had a vision from Mary Magdalene. She has appeared to me, written me a letter, and here it is.” She has a handwritten letter from Mary Magdalene in heaven, which, of course, was then rewritten and turned into a holy relic, which you had to pay to have access. So, augh! The con continues.
Ann: It’s just… It has so much in common with, I mean, things you see today, people who claim to know exactly, you know, “This is the day the world is going to end,” or whatever, “So if you give me money…” It’s just a classic sort of hoax situation. And what we don’t know, and what we can’t know, is how much did she believe in what was happening?
But as this is going, Henry VIII is getting more and more determined to marry Anne Boleyn. But she said, if he marries her, he will die shortly afterwards. So, there’s kind of a ticking clock on this now.
Hayley: Yes. So, the clock does start to tick down, especially when, unbeknownst to the Nun, Henry is just like “To Hell with it,” literally, and he goes ahead and marries Anne Boleyn. So, when she finds out that they’ve been married, her manager thinks, “Okay, maybe we can salvage this. You know, perhaps we’ve just misinterpreted your vision. Maybe he just won’t be king in the eyes of God.” And so, then, the next thing you know, the Pope is threatening excommunication, and suddenly you think, well, hang on a second. Yeah, if he gets excommunicated, he will not be king in the eyes of God. So again, the visions do seem to be sort of coming true. But what’s the most interesting part about that is that when the Pope does send the threat of excommunication, he sends it to Elizabeth Barton first.
Ann: That’s crazy when I got to that part! I was just like, “What?” Like, she’s such an integral part of this whole situation that, yeah, she’s getting communications from the Pope.
Hayley: Yeah. I mean, hoax or not, the fact that she was seen as so important to be able to be included in international diplomatic relations is incredible. Yeah, that actually blew my mind too. But it was Cranmer who was Archbishop Cranmer at this point, so Anne Boleyn had appointed her. Her first reformist archbishop, there was no such luck for him, and he was just cut off and excommunicated at that point, so they couldn’t help him.
Ann: But this is where she starts, she and the team, are kind of twisting and turning. There’s various sort of groups who are like, “This is the day that the world is going to end,” and when that day comes and goes, they’re like, “Oh, I guess everyone just prayed so well, it’s going to be this day instead.” So, they keep kind of just “Oh, okay. Well, if he marries Anne Boleyn, he won’t be the king in the eyes of God.” And so, they just keep kind of twisting and turning it to make it seem like what they have said is actually true, but Henry is getting… He met with her and let her go, but he’s getting more determined to quiet her.
Hayley: Well, you see, shortly before it all sort of goes to pot, so to speak, I think it’s— And this is what actually intrigued me and made me realize, hang on, there’s a story here is that I found a piece of evidence that said Anne Boleyn called her in, so she had a second meeting with the King, and then she went and had a private meeting with Anne Boleyn, who offered her a place in her household and also a place as prioress at her own nunnery. But that, to me, speaks volumes as to who Anne Boleyn believed was the ring read— ring… [laughs]
Ann: Ringleader.
Hayley: The ringleader! [laughs] She’s so excited, can’t get her words out. The ringleader in this whole escapade, and clearly, she saw that the girl was being manipulated. I’m not going to say she was an absolute saint, she did want to shut her up, but I think she could see where this was going. She’d pushed too far, she knew the girl was the one who was going to take the fall, probably not the men around her; certainly not the Pope for, well, obviously, Cardinal Wolsey had gone by that point. But I think she wanted to try and rescue the girl and also save them both at that point.
Ann: And just quiet, like, end the whole thing. So, there’s an alternate, you know, situation where Elizabeth Barton said yes and went off and became a prioress of her own abbey and lived a quiet life, but that is not what happened. She did not accept this offer.
Hayley: No. The way they tell these stories are, sort of like, they don’t give you exact dates, because it’s all very retrospective when everyone was hauled in before the authorities, their testimonies just read like a story. So, jumping ahead here, that was actually before they married because or, at least before the Nun knew they’d got married, because she said no. And I believe she turned her down because she thought, no, she’s not going to succeed.
Ann: Oh, because she’s not going to be a queen. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Hayley: Yeah, she’s not going to be the queen! So, I think she thought she was in a position of power at that point. So, yeah, she said no, and then it trundled on. And yes, she was eventually, first interrogated, I think they did try to scare her. That didn’t work. That’s when she said, “Okay, for a second time, I’m going to go away and have another prophecy and find out what God really thinks about your marriage.” But in the meantime, that’s when they were circulating the prophecy that she’d seen Henry VIII’s seat in Hell, which I think really secured it for her. It’s like she’s not going to stop, at which point she was arrested, properly, and then she confessed. She actually confessed.
Ann: Do we know… In the sense that, so she was arrested and we don’t necessarily know exactly what happened. But in your opinion, did she confess straight away, or was there torture and stuff implemented that got her to confess?
Hayley: I mean, gosh, you never know. You honestly just don’t know, and I really wouldn’t put it past them, a bit of heavy-handedness. But I think because, at this point, she had attempted to sort of burn the veil and she knew they were closing in on her, I think she was ready to give up the con. I think she was ready to be martyred. She still believed, but yeah, I think she was ready to be put to death. And surely, this would have put her to death.
However, they couldn’t martyr her for that reason, that she had so many fans. So, what they did, which is very similar to what happens today, is they de-platformed her first. They sent her on what I call the “tour of shame,” and it was her and all her adherents, so it was all the men as well, the manager, the publicist who was spreading all her lies around the country. They went through several cities in the, in England— I was going to say the UK. Too modern, go back a few centuries.
Ann: England, England. So, these are cities that she had kind of been in, where a lot of her fan base was because people had seen her. So, they went back to these cities to just kind of be like, “I was lying.” Just to publicly be shamed.
Hayley: To shame her and to have the have the fans actually see her stood there and have her story just exposed essentially. Yes, she went back to Aldington; the crowd, I can imagine, was very hostile there. And it was effective. It was! She was hated. I think it was at that point she was thrown back into the Tower of London, and she probably panicked because they were still not planning on executing her, and she thought, “Well, I don’t have my fans. I have nothing to live for.” Probably wouldn’t go back to the nunnery. They wouldn’t have her back after she’d admitted. What household would want girl who would try to con the King of England?
So, it was at that point she said, “Hang on a second, everyone, I’ve just had a vision from the angels and they said, actually, I was meant to tell you it was all a hoax because you’re just not ready to hear the truth. You’re just not.” Which doesn’t make sense because if she’d had that vision, surely she would have had it before she admitted it was a hoax at the beginning? I think it speaks to her, sort of…
Ann: Sort of a last gap, trying to save herself.
And I found this really interesting, can we talk just for a second about just the concept of a Catholic martyr? Because so many, if you look at who becomes saints, especially from this sort of medieval and then Renaissance period, like, it’s young women, young virgins who are put to death for various reasons. And they’re sort of then, afterwards, “Oh, well, she was a saint.” So, I could see her maybe wanting to allow herself to be executed because then that then she would be remembered in this way, she’d be commemorated. She would be like Saint Cecilia or Saint Brigitte or whoever. But it’s just so funny that she would have wanted that, but they knew that she would have wanted that and they didn’t want her to have it, because then people would still doubt Henry if she became a martyr. So, it’s…
Hayley: It was too dangerous to do that. They didn’t want to give her the glory, and yes, I think she wants to sacrifice herself. She was ready, but she must have prepared for it. As we know, the lives are short, and when you think about all the monks that lost their lives and went to their deaths when they refused to sign the Act of Succession afterwards. So, yeah, there was great glory in martyrdom, but they just refused to give it her.
However, at that point, when she did dig her heels in and say, “No, no, the angel’s here!” Then she had a meeting with the brother of her publicist, and she said, “Spread the word. Tell my fans, essentially, that actually, it was true.” At that point, they say, “Oh, she’s not going to quit. We’re just we are going to have to kill her, silence her.” That’s how you cancelled someone in the Tudor era. Literal cancellation. And so, yeah, she was hung, drawn, and headed.
Ann: And so, who else was executed along with her? Because we’ve been doing a lot of jumping back and forth.
Hayley: I know!
Ann: But when she was arrested, so too were the men around her, and they immediately threw her under the bus, and they were like, “It was her idea. It was all her. It was not us.” So, they tried to save themselves by saying it was all her, and they were all misled too. But it wasn’t just her who took the fall. Like, several of the men also were executed, right?
Hayley: Yeah, thankfully. You know, justice does prevail. Well, kind of. Yeah, so it was her manager, Edward Bocking, her publicist, Henry Gold. Also, the Parson of Aldington, Richard Risby, who started the whole thing by saying, “Oh, you’ve just spoken notable words.” So, yes, thankfully, the men in the story who manipulated her from the start and used her also fell with her and had a rather gory end. I got slightly lightheaded having to write that in detail. But I do feel like it was important for us to— We’ve become so desensitized with the whole beheaded, you know? Divorced, beheaded, died. I wanted people to understand what this really entailed, but it was vile what they have to go through. I won’t go through it now, here.
Ann: No, read the book! [both laugh]
So, they really made it so that when she was executed, when she was put to death, her fans, there weren’t very many of them left, so she wouldn’t have been remembered fondly. What did you find about people afterwards? Were people writing about her just being like, “Oh, she was a liar”? Like, what were people saying towards the end?
Hayley: Well, what’s actually interesting is that many years later, so she was disgraced and essentially forgotten, you know, dismissed as the crackpot that many of us actually dismiss her as at the moment. But yeah, when Princess Mary became Queen Mary many years later, it was Nicholas Sanders, I believe, who then sort of revived the Holy Nun of Kent and said, “See! She was telling the truth all along. She predicted that Princess Mary would take the throne, and here she has. She was a prophet!” Obviously, because she was prophesizing against Anne Boleyn, that worked very well. So, it’s very interesting to see how her image got rehabilitated many years later.
Ann: And in terms of your book that you published about her, which is the first book I’ve ever encountered about her, how did you first find out that she even existed? Because it’s just not a narrative that I’ve come across in other books about Anne Boleyn or this era.
Hayley: She is mentioned. It’s always in, like, the footnotes of usually the Boleyn biographies. And yeah, sort of, in passing. And I have dismissed her just because, as we say, there were so many sort of prophets of the time, and people prophesizing this. But when I saw that Anne Boleyn had tried to save this woman who tried to bring her down, I thought, “Okay, there’s more to this story.” So, started delving into the archives. And her story is pretty much fully formed in various documents. She got the act of attainder, which is a court statute or government statute that allows the Tudor court to condemn anyone to death without a trial. I think the next time it was used was for Thomas Cromwell, so the King’s new advisor… Let’s not talk about him. I’m not a huge fan.
Ann: No, we don’t need to get into him. Yes, actually, that reminds me that because after she was executed, she was one of the only women whose head was put on London Bridge, right? Like, the most notorious criminals have their heads put there as kind of a warning to people like, “Don’t do this,” and women often weren’t. So, the fact that her downfall was so extreme.
Hayley: Exactly. The fact that she was immortalised, not the right word. But yeah, given this dishonour is very telling as to… They were just trying, at this point, it was damaged limitation. So, one of these other documents that I was looking at, they had all the nobles in the country, and even people who are ambassadors from other countries, and they said, “You have to share this story in your own countries and tell the truth.” So, news of her false prophecies had spread into Europe at this point, obviously, with the Pope. It’s incredible. So, they really just needed, yeah, damage limitation, absolutely. A hundred percent. So, stick her head on Tower Bridge, or Tower of London. Sorry, I’m perspiring here. My brain has stopped working, not the Tower Bridge.
Ann: Everyone I’ve spoken to at the summer who is in England, I’m just like, imagine if you had to wear all those clothes! Imagine if it was the Tudor era and it was this hot. What would you what would people even do? I don’t know.
Hayley: I know! Well, I know they had the worst, most brutal winter. So, I think it was the other way for them. They used to have the Thames freeze over. But yeah, it could be worse. I could be sat in a Tudor gown; I should not complain about the heat. [laughs]
Ann: [laughs] But Elizabeth Barton, in general. So, your book, at the time of people listening to this, it’s available in the UK, and it’s coming out in North America soon. So, Notorious: Anne Boleyn and the Great Tudor Hoax. I’m curious, I mean, because you’ve been doing appearances and imagine even talking to people who have read it, what have the responses of people been like? Is it similar to me, where it’s just like, “I’ve never heard of her. Why have I never heard of her? This is incredible.”?
Hayley: People say that they’ve heard of her in Wolf Hall, I think that’s the main sort of, you know, reference to her. And then, it’s the same reaction of “Gah, women being manipulated… same old. History repeating.” Yeah, sort of an eye roll.
But also, it’s incredible the impact that she had on the Reformation, and I do think that— I don’t blame history for overlooking this because I myself overlooked it. It’s only when you sort of delve into these sort of micro-histories, you realize the impact each person had. Because if you think about it, the fact that she incited Catherine of Aragon’s rebellion was the reason why they couldn’t then, when it was time to dispatch of Anne Boleyn, they couldn’t just send her off to a nunnery. They didn’t want to repeat of the obstinacy of Catherine. So, that’s why he decided to kill her, I believe. So, that links back to the Nun.
And why he wanted to get rid of her in the first place. The thing is, six days before Anne Boleyn’s arrest, Henry VIII was still using their marriage as a political bargaining tool with Europe. And then, suddenly, it all changes. I think it’s because another one of the Nun’s prophecies started to come true, and that she said Henry VIII would lose his crown. It was right at the point when France and Spain were starting to go to war, a war was brewing, essentially. They both needed allies, and France was threatening to publish a Papal decree that apparently denied Henry VIII his place on the throne, and this was to win brownie points with the Pope. And so, suddenly, Henry VIII saw that, “Yeah, the Nun warned, if I marry Anne Boleyn, I will lose my crown, and now it looks like it might happen,” and that’s when he suddenly just got rid of her.
So, it’s all these extra little nuggets of information. You think, “Hang on a second, that slots into the story I already know.” And you know the Tudors, there’s so many gaps in the story.
Ann: No, that’s the thing. Exactly, exactly. Like, it fills in just these little gaps I didn’t even realize were there in various different sorts of things. Even the fact that her involvement, like, not her personally, her and her team was part of why Henry VIII was not able to marry Anne Boleyn for seven years. Had that team not coalesced around her, maybe it would have been two years. You know, maybe it would have been a much shorter situation, and then things could have happened, fallen out differently.
Hayley: Yeah, and it would have put less pressure on the marriage, then when they had the daughter, not the son and heir that signals God’s good grace, maybe they’d have just brushed over it and carried on. But because it had been seven years, they had to prove the Nun wrong straight away. Yeah, there are so many factors that come into play. It was so fascinating. I loved writing this book, honestly.
Ann: Well, and honestly, that’s what’s fun. Do you know the play, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern Are Dead? It’s like Hamlet, but from the point of view of these two minor characters. Anyway. I sometimes thought of your book kind of like that, where it’s like, it’s the story that you know about Anne Boleyn and Henry VIII, but you just tilt the camera lens, and it’s like, but look at this person over here. So, suddenly, the same events happen, but it’s just from the point of view of somebody else.
Hayley: Yeah, and sort of their impact and their influence, and none of us knew
Ann: And how they’ve invisibly been affecting the story all along and all the other books, but we just didn’t know. [chuckles]
Hayley: I know! Honestly, it’s been hugely eye-opening for me as a historian, too, and just reaffirms that there’s always a story lurking. You think you know everything about the Tudors and Anne Boleyn, but no. Nay, sir! There’s always more. [laughs]
Ann: Well, and I feel like it must be so exciting, too, as a historian, to find a new angle to tell the same story, to be the one who gets to share the story.
Hayley: Yeah, I loved it. Because I know we do love the Tudors, and people are always saying, “Have you got anything else about the Tudors?” And I’m like, “Well, actually… I do.”
Ann: Do I!
So, for all the episodes on my podcast, where we’re giving a biography of a person, we give them a score in four different categories. I’m very intrigued to see. And after we give her a score, I can tell you, like, who that puts her near on the overall…
Hayley: Oh, that’s interesting. A leaderboard, okay. [laughs]
Ann: We do have a leaderboard. So, the first category is Scandalousness. And this is in terms of how scandalous was this person seen in her time and age?
Hayley: Oh, how was she seen by others, you’re saying?
Ann: Yeah. Like, how scandalous was she in her time? And I think at first she was sort of scandalous, not even scandalous, but just sort of revered, like, you know, the early pamphlets. But by the end, it would just be like, “Oh, she’s a criminal. She’s a liar.”
Hayley: Yeah. I mean, if we’re going to look at her story as a whole, I would say, I mean, scandalous, a 9? A 10? Have I gone too high?
Ann: I think the fact that she was executed, that she was paraded around the country, that her head was on the Tow— I think a 10 is fair.
Hayley: I think a 10. She had the fans all around the country; they had to do the tour of shame. She was very well known. Widely scandalous, I would say.
Ann: And the fact that she was widely known, that they were telling a story across other parts of Europe, like, I don’t… When you’re put to death for your actions, I think that’s a pretty high Scandalousness.
Hayley: [laughs] We’ll commit to 10 for that one.
Ann: Definitely. The next one, this is another interesting discussion because it’s the Schemieness. And I mean it on this podcast in a positive way. You know, I love a woman with a plan, with a scheme. But in this, it’s like, how much of this? Because a lot of it was she was clearly being at least led, if not manipulated. Like, “Oh, could you have a vision? Could the vision say this? Thanks.”
Hayley: That’s the thing! Yeah.
Ann: She did try to get out of that at one point. But so… I don’t know how… I wouldn’t give her a 10 for this.
Hayley: Initially, I’d be inclined to think, “Oh, very schemey.” But then you think, “Well no, she was so incredibly manipulated.” I think at the beginning, schemieness, she’d be about a 4. But then I think as she sort of found her feet, started to believe herself, and then needed to take charge of the situation, I think it kind of creeps up to maybe a 7.
Ann: No, I think that’s fair. It’s tricky to tell because of how much was she like, and she wouldn’t know either, but you know, how much of this is her being like, “Yes, I’m going to do this and get fame and glory,” and how much of it is her being like legitimately believing she is a prophet, you know? Which is not really schemey, that’s just kind of being herself.
Hayley: In a slightly disillusional… Maybe, I was also thinking, you know, when she’s deep in prayer for hours on end and, you know, without drinking, maybe get lightheaded, maybe you start to interpret your own thoughts as messages from God. It’s easy to see how you could believe…
Ann: Yeah, like if you’re thinking about, in terms of a con artist in this era, you know, there’s other people running around who are actively… You know, they would just crumple up a piece of paper and be like, “This piece of paper was Jesus’s paper.” Like, there’s people who are actively being criminals, you know? And she’s not there, but I think a 7 is fair.
Hayley: Like the fact that she thought to turn down Anne Boleyn because she thought she was in a better position, I think she had to be using her brain a bit of the scheming going on that. Yeah, okay, we’ll stick with 7.
Ann: I think it’s good too. And also, I’m just thinking, you know, at first, when people… She could have shut this down— Well, once it’s a machine that’s moving with other people would have been harder, but like she could have just been like, “Sorry, I don’t have any more visions. That’s it. Visions are closed. The end.” Like she did continue, and that kind of shows perhaps some schemieness.
Hayley: There is some… I think she got on board with the schemieness. What we haven’t really touched on, but just so very briefly that she would meet up with the Marchioness of Exeter, which was Catherine of Aragon’s close friend, and towards the end, she started sort of inciting a royal coup. Now, I know that is quite a statement to then brush over and say, “But anyway, moving on.” [laughs] There’s a lot of detail. Again, read the book.
Ann: No, exactly. But yeah, like she was up in these schemes, these like high-level, coup-adjacent…
Hayley: Coup-adjacent, there you go. [laughs] So, okay, I think 7 is…
Ann: I think that’s fair.
The next category is Significance. And this is more significance to history in general. I think a book like yours really shows, you know, 25 years ago, maybe nobody would have known her significance. But now, people like you have been finding, and it’s like, “Oh! Actually, it directly correlates to this and this and this.” So, where would you rank her life and what she did to the significance of Tudor history?
Hayley: Well, I am going to have to go bold, like the Nun, and say 10, because I truly think she had a catastrophic impact on Anne Boleyn’s marriage, her death, on the Reformation. But, you know, at the beginning of the book and also, as you say, 25 years ago or so, I would have said, well, 2. But now I’m going 10.
Ann: Yeah, no. Be like Elizabeth Barton, go bold. If there’s one thing we learned from her. [Hayley laughs]
And then, the final category is what I call this Sexism Bonus, which is kind of like, how much did the patriarchy and sexism get in the way of what she would have done? In her case, I would say something like, if this was a man, if this had been a male house servant who had these visions, would the story have progressed the same way and would it have ended the same way? I think there’s something about her being a young woman, made her more believable somehow? I don’t know.
Hayley: Yeah, no, no, I agree. I’d not actually considered, yeah, if she’d been a man, would this have gone anywhere? There were, obviously, male prophets, obviously. She might have been safer had it actually gone ahead and happened. But would it have happened in the first place? That’s a really good question. Yeah, there’s definitely something about the sort of innocent, virgin woman or girl, yeah.
Ann: So, there’s something… It’s a tricky one, because like, obviously, she was living in Tudor era, a very misogynistic, patriarchal time. She was a housemaid, like, she wouldn’t have had very many good options for her life. But she was like, “I had a vision, and I am a nun, and I should become…” Like, she… Somebody would get a 10 in the Sexism Bonus if they were 14 and they’re married to some odious 60-year-old man who keeps them trapped away, and they just have child after child until they die in childbirth. Like, that would be a 10 out of 10 because they just had no chance, and that’s a person I want to just give some points because they didn’t get points in other categories, probably.
Hayley: Okay, okay, right. We’re really thinking this through. [laughs]
Ann: So, for her, I think certainly like the fact that she was manipulated like she was, and then because she was a woman, it was easier to throw her under the bus and be like…
Hayley: Yeah. And also, did she feel because she was a woman and because they were men saying, “You’re having these visions, you’re speaking these words in your trance,” is that why she went along and believed them? If it had been a woman, if it had been the other housemaid saying, “Oh, guess what you’ve just said,” would you have gone along with it, or gone “Get away with ya”?
Ann: There’s a sort of people-pleasing thing where it’s just like, “Well, these men are telling me I should do this, and so I need to do this because they’re men and I’m a woman.” So, I don’t know.
Hayley: And all the men taking advantage, like the King, the Pope, Wolsey. So, wait. Are we saying she was a victim of the patriarchy and we should calculate that? Or…?
Ann: Yes. How much did the patriarchy lead to what happened in her life, which is a complicated thing to think about, and make it a number. That’s an insane question, I know. But I would say 7. What do you think?
Hayley: Oooh! Why 7? Why so low? I would actually go higher.
Ann: I would say low because she did have some more independent option that other women in this era might not have had.
Hayley: Oh okay, right. And she did have a position of power. She did wield this power over the men, so she sort of turned it to her advantage. Okay, yeah. I was going to go higher, I was going to say about 9. But yes, so even though she was a victim of the patriarchy, she then did start using it to her advantage.
Ann: Exactly, yeah.
Hayley: Particularly like when she starts having the men carry out penance that would really…
Ann: Oh, my gosh. We didn’t even talk about that! Where she… [laughs] Explain that part.
Hayley: “Wrap chains around your neck if you really want to preach my words, and yes, you need to be pure. You need to starve yourself.” And yeah, she was pretty vindictive in the end, and again, I think that shows that she knew at that point she was being taken advantage of and she wanted to inflict some pain on the men who’d been pushing her front and centre in these terrifying situations. “Go speak to the King of England.” “What?!”
Ann: No, this was… Yeah, towards the end of her story where it’s, like, the ways that she’s pushing back because she had the moment where she had the, like, smells like feces, devil spit on her face, and she went to see him. But then also later, yeah, like you’re describing the men who are around her, she was like, “Well, you guys have to live a completely penitent life if you want more prophecies from me, and that means you have to wear these hair shirts and you have to fast.” Wait, hair shirts, that’s not bad enough. “You have to wear this kind of, like, metal… thing.”
Hayley: Chains. Yeah, tight around your chest, constricting your breathing, so it hung so it would, like, create welts on the skin and then get infected. When you really start to think about what the reality of the penance was, it was actually quite brutal. So yeah.
Ann: She has some power in that instance.
Hayley: She did have some power, and she really did try and wield it. And it sounds like she was quite a formidable presence when she did have these meetings with Cardinal Wolsey to stand up and meet them. So okay, I mean, maybe now we’ve considered this. I’m thinking maybe a 6. Oh, it’s so difficult, she was a victim! But she used it to her advantage. I don’t know. We’ll stick with 7. We’ll stick with 7.
Ann: Okay. This is where it’s an interesting conversation. Her story is so interesting. So, this lands her with a final score of 34. So, I’ll just give you… Let’s see who else is…
Hayley: Who is she up against then?
Ann: Who is she up against? Let’s see. I’m trying to find people who you may have heard of because I’ve done a lot of seasons of this show. From this era…
Hayley: Any Tudors in there?
Ann: We’re just getting into the Tudors now. So, I don’t know if you’ve heard of Marie Maitland, who is the Scottish poet. There’s just a book coming out about her. She was a lesbian Scottish poet of this era. She has a 36.
Hayley: So, she’s got 36, and what did Barton have?
Ann: We’ve got a 34 for Barton. Mary, Queen of Scots is at a 36, so she’s, like, just below. I’m seeing who else is around a 34.
Hayley: She’s alongside the queens. It just goes to show…
Ann: Cleopatra has 34.5.
Hayley: Really? Wait, who’s low down? So generally, is it the impact then that they’ve had? The overall score?
Ann: You need to have a bit of a score in every category, and there’s always, like, the highest-up people have a bit of points in everything. The lower-down people, like, maybe they were really scandalous, but their significance is low, like some sort of Vaudeville singer or something like that. Somebody who had a good time, but their impact on history was minimal. That would be somebody who’s quite low down.
Hayley: You’ve got to have an impact on history. If you’re going to go big and even if you go home, you’ve got to have an impact along the way. [laughs]
Ann: Exactly. Exactly. So, I like to… It’s just kind of a way to have everybody on a list. And I like, you know, there’s so many lists that are like “The greatest people of history” or like “The greatest leaders,” and I like to have my scale that gives points to things and to people who don’t ordinarily show up high up on a list.
Hayley: I like this. I like that you’ve thought of this. It’s a great list. There’s a book in this. How many have you got from the list?
Ann: Oh… dozens. It’s quite a long list, and it’s interesting too, I love talking with authors like you. Sometimes I do the episodes myself; sometimes I have an author on. Authors are also passionate about the people they’ve done a biography of, so those scores are always higher than maybe I would have done.
Hayley: Oh, really. Oh, okay.
Ann: No, I respect. Like, no one’s thought about this about Elizabeth Barton more than you at this point, so I respect your opinion entirely. You’ve been living with her.
Hayley: Yeah, I feel I’m her lawyer now. She’s had a publicist and a manager. She’s got me as her lawyer.
Ann: Yeah, no. She needs the full team. Exactly! Oh, if only she had a lawyer!
But I wanted to ask you, so your book is available, at the time people are listening to this, it’s available in the UK, and then it’s coming out in North America in December, right?
Hayley: Yes, I actually don’t know what the date is, but yeah, it will be coming out. I’ve seen the covers as well. I actually think I prefer the North America cover. Isn’t that controversial! But they’re very, very similar. Yes, please! Have a read! And the way I’ve sort of written it, I’ve tried to just present the evidence, and because there’s so many different ways in which it can go down. I feel like the reader will come away with a different view to the next. And it really is down to you. You kind of play Tudor detective.
Ann: Yeah! What do you think really happened? Exactly. Exactly.
Hayley: So many different ways it could go, as you’ve seen from our conversation today. So, yeah, I’d be very interested to hear, once it’s out there, what readers are saying and what they make of her.
Ann: And do you have… How can people keep up with you? Do you have social media or a website? How can people know what you’re up to?
Hayley: I have it all. Well, websites, which I don’t really update as much as I should, it’s just HayleyNolan.com. But I’m on social media, TikTok and Instagram, and that is @HayleyNolanHistorian. So, come say hi, or we’ll have a Tudor debate there.
Ann: Perfect. Exactly. Exactly. And I would imagine you’ll have readings and events and things, and you’d just be posting about those there. So, if people want to keep up with you.
Hayley: Yeah, yeah, in publication week in bookshops. I’ve got to be doing something for the American release, so maybe I’ll do some…
Ann: Online or something.
Hayley: Fly me out to LA!
Ann: Yeah! [laughs]
Hayley: New York, Chicago.
Ann: Do it up.
Hayley: We’ll see how it goes. [laughs] It’s been so lovely chatting with you. Thank you so much for having me.
Ann: Yeah, thank you so much. This is a wonderful, wonderful conversation about a person I’d never heard of, and now I’m obsessed with. So, thank you.
Hayley: That’s what I like to hear. That’s how all conversation should end. Obsessed. [laughs]
Ann: Obsessed. [laughs] Thank you so much.
Hayley: Thank you!
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So, Hayley’s book, Notorious: Anne Boleyn and the Great Tudor Hoax, it’s available right now in the UK. If you are in North America, if you’re in the US or in Canada, you can pre-order it; it’ll be available for you on December 1st. If you’ve never pre-ordered a book before, it’s pretty straightforward. You can go to your favourite independent bookstore, your favourite book website, and just order it. Like, look up the book, Notorious by Hayley Nolan, place your order, and then on December 1st, it will just show up. It’ll be mailed to you, or you can pick it up at your bookstore. It’s such a great book, and I think it really helps expand upon this very well-known story of Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII, and what was going on at that time. If you want to know more about Anne Boleyn, stay tuned to this podcast next week.
I also have other information to tell you, which is you can keep up with me on my Patreon where you can get ad-free episodes for one dollar a month and/or, for six dollars a month, you also get bonus episodes featuring me and some of my friends. So, for instance, today, the same day since this episode, a new bonus episode just dropped there on Patreon where I’m discussing the Frances Hodgson Burnett book, A Little Princess with my friends Allison Epstein and Lana Wood Johnson, both of whom, it turns out, this book was really important to them. I have never read it, so they explained the story to me, and you can listen to that if you show my Patreon at the six dollars or more a month level.
Also, people at that level get access to our Discord chat to hang it with other history fans as well as access to my monthly Zoom Live events. So, these happen… I’m trying to do it every month or so. And in fact, the next one is happening tomorrow, Thursday, September 24th. I’m going to be talking with author Vikki VanSickle about tarot cards, which I’m going to be honest, I don’t know anything about and she’s going to explain it all to me. So, if you want to do all those things, if you want to have all the fun, go to Patreon.com/AnnFosterWriter. You can get a free trial to my Patreon so you can just like sneak into these events before it expires, it’s like a seven-day free trial, or you can join as paid member and get all these perks and help support this show.
Also, heads up, you can get Vulgar History merchandise at VulgarHistory.com/Store. I also wrote a book. It’s called Rebel of the Regency, and you can buy that wherever you get your books. I’m really excited about it, and I think you’ll really love it, and I’m excited to be an author. And if you like this podcast, you’ll probably like that book as well.
Actually, you know what? Since I’m on a roll, I’m going to tell you as well, we, this show, we have a brand partner which is Common Era Jewelry, which is a small, woman-owned business based out of the United States where our friend of the podcast, Torie, she designs jewelry inspired by almost always the ancient world. So, like, people who you might have seen in the movie The Odyssey, like there’s Cersei, we’ve got Clytemnestra, we’ve got Athena, lots of classical baddies like that. And she made one exception to that; she included one person from a bit more recent history, and that person is Anne Boleyn. So, Anne Boleyn is part of their collection there. You can get a beautiful Anne Boleyn pendant. You can get that in gold, you can get it in more affordable gold vermeil. Vulgar History listeners can always get 15% off all items from Common Era by going to CommonEra.com/Vulgar15, or just use code ‘VULGAR15’ at checkout to get your discount there.
Speaking of Anne Boleyn… next week, that’s what we’re talking about. And so, until then, everybody keep your pants on and your tits out.
Vulgar History is researched, scripted, and hosted by Ann Foster. Editor is Cristina Lumague. Theme music is by the Severn Duo. Vulgar History artwork by Karyn Moynihan. Social media videos by Magdalena Denson. Transcripts of this podcast are available at VulgarHistory.com by Aveline Malek. You can get early, ad-free episodes of Vulgar History by becoming a paid member of our Patreon at Patreon.com/AnnFosterWriter. Vulgar History merchandise is available at VulgarHistory.com/Store for Americans and for everyone else at VulgarHistory.Redbubble.com. Follow us on social media @VulgarHistoryPod. Get in touch with me via email at VulgarHistoryPod@gmail.com.
References:
Buy a copy of Hayley’s book Notorious: Anne Boleyn and the Great Tudor Hoax (affiliate link)
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Get Discord access, ad-free episodes, and bonus episodes by joining our Patreon patreon.com/annfosterwriter
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Buy a copy of Ann’s book Rebel of the Regency
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Get 15% off all the gorgeous jewellery and accessories at commonera.com/vulgar15 or go to commonera.com and use code VULGAR15 at checkout
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Get Vulgar History merch at vulgarhistory.com/store (best for US shipping) and vulgarhistory.redbubble.com (better for international shipping)
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Vulgar History is an affiliate of Bookshop.org, which means that a small percentage of any books you click through and purchase will come back to Vulgar History as a commission. Use this link to shop there and support Vulgar History.
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