Queen Elizabeth’s Role as a Female English Monarch

Queen Elizabeth I was one of England’s greatest monarchs, staying in power for 45 years, one of the longest reigns of any English monarch. But her rise to power was not easy, and she wasn’t even the first in line. Carole Levin’s Heart and Stomach of a King tells us the ways Elizabeth navigated the complexities of her rule: by combining her feminine natural side with her masculine monarchical role. This essay argues that Elizabeth capitalized on the advantages of her female gender through propagating herself as the nurturing virgin mother of England and courting men, while dealing with the disadvantages through projecting a strong body politic. Elizabeth equated the Virgin Mary as an object of devotion among her people. She dabbled in courtship, exploited the media of the time to project her image of power and punished slanderers and dissenters.

Elizabeth propagated herself as a Virgin Queen, equal to the Virgin Mary. Elizabeth’s rule ran counter to the natural conventions of the early modern world: John Knox described female rule as against nature (10). As a response, Elizabeth portrayed herself as the Virgin Queen, aiding her popularity and the transition to Protestantism “since many English Protestants came to love and revere Elizabeth as they had previously loved and revered the virgin” (28). Elizabeth’s role as the Virgin Queen was part of her media res approach to religion: keeping a church that looked Catholic but thought in a Protestant way. Elizabeth saw herself as “wed to England”, portraying herself as the mother of her subjects and sponsoring many godchildren (87). She maintained the use of royal rituals, which “echoed the cult of not just the Virgin Mary, but also perhaps those of such saints as Frideswide and Uncumber” (18). As a woman, Elizabeth could capitalize on the popularity of these saints to strengthen her portrayal as a holy virgin and her position as queen. These ritual ceremonies were important spectacles for displaying Tudor power and were doubly important for queens like Elizabeth. Elizabeth kept the most public ceremonies while discontinuing the less public ones (31). She kept the public ceremonies because she wanted to make herself accessible to her people and show herself as their servant. Elizabeth often used the ritual touch to cure scrofula (16). Elizabeth changed the Maundy ceremony from 12 recipients to a number reflecting her age. This would place “more emphasis on the specific monarch as Christ figure rather than simply as an anonymous representative of the Church” (34). Elizabeth, like Mary before her, also performed the ceremony for women, emphasizing the monarch’s sex (34). Elizabeth’s courtiers saw her presence in their homes as blessed, and Lord Burghley saw Elizabeth’s visit to Theobalds as “consecrating” it (28). Elizabeth played on the natural role of women as mothers in the Renaissance and used it to her advantage. A man could not have played the same nurturing role or replaced the Virgin Mary. Richard Day’s A Book of Christian Prayers includes an image of Elizabeth kneeling and praying at her bedroom (37). This type of propaganda would be important to prop up Elizabeth as devout and chaste to temper rumors about what Elizabeth did in her private time. Elizabeth played on the advantages of her female gender through portraying herself as the Virgin Queen Mother of England.

Elizabeth engaged in courtship while keeping the appearance of a virgin. She courted the Archduke Charles in the mid-1560s, along with the Duke of Anjou and future Henry III of France in 1571-72 and Francis, Duke of Alencon in the late 1570s and early 1580s. Her favorite was Robert Dudley, the Earl of Leicester. Elizabeth’s subjects not only expected her to marry, but she even considered it at times. In 1558 she claimed to be married to England, but also considered marriage (39-42). Elizabeth enjoyed the rituals and theatricality of courtship (45). She could exercise her power in courting men, keeping them waiting and pleading to marry her. Elizabeth would feel prestigious with men flattering her. She did not want to lose this power by actually marrying. Elizabeth felt genuine affection for Dudley. But she made sure he did not overstep his role: for example, when Dudley attempted to discipline her servant, Bowyer, Elizabeth reprimanded him, saying that she will “have here but one Mistress, and no Master” (47). Elizabeth’s second marriage negotiation with the Duke of Anjou was part of “larger negotiations with France” for an alliance (54). Indeed, despite the marriage negotiations going nowhere due to Elizabeth’s age and Anjou’s lack of enthusiasm, Elizabeth obtained short-term agreements with France (56). Elizabeth used people’s expectation for her to marry in these negotiations as a cover to obtain political benefits for England, another advantage of her female sex. Elizabeth’s final negotiation with the Duke of Alencon also had political reasons: “to support anti-Spanish forces in the Netherlands” (60). But Elizabeth actually tried to woo Alencon. In 1581 Elizabeth told the French ambassador that she would marry Alencon, kissed him and gave him a ring. It is possible that part of her feelings towards Alencon were to cope with Robert Dudley’s marriage to Lettice Knollys, which deeply upset her because she could no longer dalliance with him (63-4). She turned to court Alencon instead, as with him she could regain the dominant position in the relationship. Elizabeth played up her role as Virgin and Mother to compensate for not marrying. Elizabeth saw the risks with marriage: she could lose power to her husband, be infertile or die in childbirth (64-5). Elizabeth’s unmarried status made her people uneasy at times, and they coped through comments and rumors about her unchastity and sexual impropriety (90). Elizabeth’s love life was a compromise like many aspects of her life. Courtship was her way of building relationships with men and getting benefits from them without actually having to commit to marriage.

Elizabeth projected a strong body politic. When her reign began, the Archbishop of York Nicholas Heath hailed her as “our sovaraigne lord and ladie, our king and queen, our emperor and empress” (121). This was the concept of the two bodies: the body natural and the body politic (122). The former was her biological female body, and the latter her monarchical position, believed to be infallible and immortal. The Queen understood that Renaissance monarchs were viewed as actors on stage, so she polished and managed her body politic. She was a very skilled speaker, and she distributed her printed speeches and had them read aloud (129). She exploited the printing press’ wide reach and revolutionary potential. It helped that European states centralized in this period: monarchies brought nobles directly under their control and projected their power to the countryside. Elizabeth’s image as a strong ruler was noticed early in her reign, even by her enemies: in 1570 the Scot George Lord Seaton asked the Duke of Alva for aid, warning him that Elizabeth’s “manly Courage and Sex ambitions of command” will find ways to entangle Spain in a long war (140). At Tilbury, dressed in breast plate armor, she told her troops: “I know I have the body of a weak and feeble woman, but I have the heart and stomach of a king” (144). Elizabeth’ presence and speech rallied and inspired her men against Spain, with her leadership helping to defeat the Spanish Armada a few weeks earlier. Elizabeth combined male motifs and language with her female biological sex to present herself as a strong and majestic female monarch. She was powerful as a woman but insisted she could do manly things better than any man (140). Elizabeth backed up her image through force. When she was negotiating to marry Alencon, John Stubbs objected that “a husband could easily dominate a wife”, that she could die in childbirth and Alencon was actually hoping for it so that he could take over (61). A furious Elizabeth had the right hands of Stubbs and his publisher Singleton chopped off (62). They had insulted Elizabeth through implying that she was weak and would be no match for Alencon, and Elizabeth acted forcefully to protect her honor. The queen’s willingness to punish slanders showed that she was not weak simply because she was a woman. While she used the carrot often, being known for her leniency, she would not hesitate to use the stick even if it seemed harsh. This impressed the English people and added to her popularity. Elizabeth executed impostors of her late brother Edward, like Robert Blosse, nicknamed Mantell (103). She also executed William Hackett (115). Hackett was particularly dangerous, claiming to be Jesus Christ and king or emperor of Europe (112-3). Hackett and Mantell “threatened the position of the legitimacy of the queen” (116). Anne Burnell made a less severe claim of being King Philip’s daughter and having the arms of England on her back, but she was still whipped (110-1). As a woman, she could not make an equally dangerous claim as that of a man (116). Elizabeth recognized these types of gender biases, and they informed her response to sedition. Elizabeth displayed a strong body politic to deal with the disadvantages of her gender.

Queen Elizabeth took advantage of her female gender by portraying herself as the Virgin Queen mother of England and courting men, while she dealt with the disadvantages through projecting an image of a strong body politic. Elizabeth largely succeeded in satisfying the English people throughout her reign, and she returned legitimacy to the monarchy. She also firmly established the Church of England as the official church of the realm. When she died, she was given full funerary honors and even a monument by King James I (168). She and her father Henry have been the most written about English monarchs, and she has been the subject of many media, like movies and comic books. She is an inspiration for female leadership.