Anthropomorphic cat guarding geese, Egypt, c. 1120 BCE

Aesop, by Velázquez

Jean de La Fontaine

Bernard de Mandeville

John Gay

Gotthold Ephraim Lessing

Ignacy Krasicki

Dositej Obradović

Félix María de Samaniego

Tomás de Iriarte y Oropesa

Jean-Pierre Claris de Florian

Ivan Krylov

Władysław Reymont

Felix Salten

James Thurber

George Orwell

Fable is a literary genre. A fable is a succinct fictional story, in prose or verse, that features animals, mythical creatures, plants, inanimate objects or forces of nature which are anthropomorphized (given human qualities such as verbal communication), and that illustrates or leads to an interpretation of a moral lesson (a "moral"), which may at the end be added explicitly in a pithy maxim.

A fable differs from a parable in that the latter excludes animals, plants, inanimate objects, and forces of nature as actors that assume speech and other powers of humankind.

Usage has not always been so clearly distinguished. In the King James Version of the New Testament, "μύθος" ("mythos") was rendered by the translators as "fable"^[1] in First and Second Timothy, in Titus and in First Peter.^[2]

History[link]

The fable is one of the most enduring forms of folk literature, spread abroad, modern researchers agree,^[3] less by literary anthologies than by oral transmission. Fables can be found in the literature of almost every country.

Ante-Aesopic fable[link]

Several parallel animal fables in Sumerian and Akkadian are among those that Erich Ebeling introduced to modern Western readers;^[4] there are comparable fables from Egypt's Middle Kingdom,^[5] and Hebrew fables such as the "king of trees" in Book of Judges 9:8-15 and "the thistle and the cedar tree" in II Kings 14:9.^[6] The most recent study on the ante-Aesopic fables or the fables in ancient Near Eastern languages by Akimoto discovers the rich fable traditions in ancient Mesopotamia and Anatolia; for example, the Ninurta-uballitsu Assyrian fable collection which is the oldest known fable collection with the compiler's autograph and the completion date 883 BCE, the Hurrian-Hittite bilingual fable collections are embedded in a long myth and the storyteller tells after each fable his/her own moral.^[7]

Aesopic or Aesop's fable[link]

The varying corpus denoted Aesopica or Aesop's Fables includes most of the best-known western fables, which are attributed to the legendary Aesop, supposed to have been a slave in ancient Greece around 550 BCE. When Babrius set down fables from the Aesopica in verse for a Hellenistic Prince "Alexander," he expressly stated at the head of Book II that this type of "myth" that Aesop had introduced to the "sons of the Hellenes" had been an invention of "Syrians" from the time of "Ninos" (personifying Nineveh to Greeks) and Belos ("ruler").^[8] Epicharmus of Kos and Phormis are reported as having been among the first to invent comic fables.^[9] Many familiar fables of Aesop include "The Crow and the Pitcher", "The Tortoise and the Hare" and "The Lion and the Mouse". In ancient Greek and Roman education, the fable was the first of the progymnasmata--training exercises in prose composition and public speaking—wherein students would be asked to learn fables, expand upon them, invent their own, and finally use them as persuasive examples in longer forensic or deliberative speeches. The need of instructors to teach, and students to learn, a wide range of fables as material for their declamations resulted in their being gathered together in collections, like those of Aesop.

Africa[link]

African oral culture^[10] has a rich story-telling tradition. As they have for thousands of years, people of all ages in Africa continue to interact with nature, including plants, breathtaking animals and earthly structures such as rivers, plains and mountains. Grandparents enjoy enormous respect in African societies and fill the new role of story-telling during retirement years. Children and, to some extent, adults are mesmerized by good story-tellers when they become animated in their quest to tell a good fable.

India[link]

Hundreds of fables were composed in ancient India during the first millennium BC, often as stories within frame stories. These included Vishnu Sarma's Panchatantra, the Hitopadesha, Vikram and The Vampire, and Syntipas' Seven Wise Masters, which were collections of fables that were later influential throughout the Old World. Ben E. Perry (compiler of the "Perry Index" of Aesop's fables)has argued controversially that some of the Buddhist Jataka tales and some of the fables in the Panchatantra may have been influenced by similar Greek and Near Eastern ones.^[11] Earlier Indian epics such as Vyasa's Mahabharata and Valmiki's Ramayana also contained fables within the main story, often as side stories or back-story. The most famous fables from the Middle East were the One Thousand and One Nights, also known as the Arabian Nights.

Europe[link]

Fables had a further long tradition through the Middle Ages, and became part of European high literature. During the 17th century, the French fabulist Jean de La Fontaine (1621–1695) saw the soul of the fable in the moral — a rule of behavior. Starting with the Aesopian pattern, La Fontaine set out to satirize the court, the church, the rising bourgeoisie, indeed the entire human scene of his time.^[12] La Fontaine's model was subsequently emulated by England's John Gay (1685–1732);^[13] Poland's Ignacy Krasicki (1735–1801);^[14] Italy's Lorenzo Pignotti (1739–1812)^{[15][verification needed]} and Giovanni Gherardo de Rossi (1754–1827);^{[16][verification needed]} Serbia's Dositej Obradović (1742–1811); Spain's Félix María de Samaniego (1745–1801)^[17] and Tomás de Iriarte y Oropesa (1750–1791);^{[18][verification needed]} France's Jean-Pierre Claris de Florian (1755–94);^[19] and Russia's Ivan Krylov (1769–1844).^[20]

Modern era[link]

In modern times, while the fable has been trivialized in children's books, it has also been fully adapted to modern adult literature. Felix Salten's Bambi (1923) is a Bildungsroman — a story of a protagonist's coming-of-age — cast in the form of a fable. James Thurber used the ancient fable style in his books Fables for Our Time (1940) and Further Fables for Our Time (1956), and in his stories "The Princess and the Tin Box" in The Beast in Me and Other Animals (1948) and "The Last Clock: A Fable for the Time, Such As It Is, of Man" in Lanterns and Lances (1961). Władysław Reymont's The Revolt (1922), a metaphor for the Bolshevik Revolution of 1917, described a revolt by animals that take over their farm in order to introduce "equality." George Orwell's Animal Farm (1945) similarly satirized Stalinist Communism in particular, and totalitarianism in general, in the guise of animal fable.

Classic fabulists[link]

• Aesop (mid-6th century BCE), author of Aesop's Fables.
• Vishnu Sarma (ca. 200 BCE), author of the anthropomorphic political treatise and fable collection, the Panchatantra.
• Bidpai (ca. 200 BCE), author of Sanskrit (Hindu) and Pali (Buddhist) animal fables in verse and prose, somethimes derived from Jataka tales.
• Syntipas (ca. 100 BCE), Indian philosopher, reputed author of a collection of tales known in Europe as The Story of the Seven Wise Masters.
• Gaius Julius Hyginus (Hyginus, Latin author, native of Spain or Alexandria, ca. 64 BCE - 17 CE), author of Fabulae.
• Phaedrus (15 BCE – 50 CE), Roman fabulist, by birth a Macedonian.
• Walter of England c.1175
• Marie de France (12th century).
• Vardan Aygektsi (died 1250), Armenian priest and Fabulist
• Berechiah ha-Nakdan (Berechiah the Punctuator, or Grammarian, 13th century), author of Jewish fables adapted from Aesop's Fables.
• Robert Henryson (Scottish, 15th century), author of The Morall Fabillis of Esope the Phrygian.
• Leonardo da Vinci (Italian, 1452–1519).
• Biernat of Lublin (Polish, 1465? – after 1529).
• Jean de La Fontaine (French, 1621 – 95).
• Sulkhan-Saba Orbeliani (Georgian, 1658–1725).
• Bernard de Mandeville (English, 1670–1733), author of The Fable of the Bees.
• John Gay (English, 1685–1732).
• Gotthold Ephraim Lessing (German, 1729–81).
• Ignacy Krasicki (Polish, 1735 – 1801), author of Fables and Parables (1779) and New Fables (published 1802).
• Dositej Obradović (Serbian, 1742–1811).
• Félix María de Samaniego (Spanish, 1745–1801), best known for "The Ant and the Cicade."
• Tomás de Iriarte (Spanish, 1750 – 91).
• Jean-Pierre Claris de Florian, (French, 1755 – 94), author of Fables (published 1802).
• Ivan Krylov (Russian, 1769–1844).
• Hans Christian Andersen (Danish, 1805–75).

Modern fabulists[link]

• Leo Tolstoy (1828–1910).
• Rafael Pombo (1833–1912) Colombian fabulist, poet and writer.
• Nico Maniquis (1834–1912).
• Ambrose Bierce (1842 – ?1914).
• Sholem Aleichem (1859–1916).
• George Ade (1866–1944), Fables in Slang, etc.
• Władysław Reymont (1868–1925).
• Felix Salten (1869–1945).
• Don Marquis (1878–1937), author of the fables of archy and mehitabel.
• Franz Kafka (1883–1924).
• Damon Runyon (1884–1946).
• James Thurber (1894–1961), Fables for Our Time and Further Fables for Our Time.
• George Orwell (1903 – 50).
• Dr. Seuss (1904 – 91).
• Isaac Bashevis Singer (1904 – 91).
• José Saramago (1922–2010).
• Randall Kenan (born 1963).
• Italo Calvino (1923 – 85), Cosmicomics etc.
• Arnold Lobel (1933 – 87), author of Fables, winner 1981 Caldecott Medal.
• Ramsay Wood (born 1943), author of Kalila and Dimna: Fables of Friendship and Betrayal.
• Bill Willingham (born 1956), author of Fables graphic novels.
• David Sedaris (born 1956), author of Squirrel Seeks Chipmunk
• Stephen Stapley (born 1953), author of Fables of Fabulous Animals
• Aaron Weiss (born 1979), lead singer of mewithoutYou

Notable fables[link]

• The Jataka Tales
  • Henny Penny
• Aesop's Fables by Aesop
  • The Boy Who Cried Wolf
  • The Cock and the Jewel
  • The Goose That Laid the Golden Eggs
• Panchatantra by Vishnu Sarma
• Baital Pachisi (also known as Vikram and The Vampire)
• Hitopadesha
• Seven Wise Masters by Syntipas
• One Thousand and One Nights (also known as Arabian Nights, ca. 800–900)
• The Fable of the Bees (1714) by Bernard de Mandeville
• Fables and Parables (1779) by Ignacy Krasicki
• The Emperor's New Clothes (1837) by Hans Christian Andersen
• Bunt (Revolt, 1922) by Władysław Reymont
• Fables for Our Time (1940) and Further Fables for Our Time (1956) by James Thurber
• Animal Farm (1945) by George Orwell
• 99 Fables (1960) by William March
• Jonathan Livingston Seagull (1970)
• The Thief of Always (1992) by Clive Barker
• The Princess and the Tin Box by James Thurber
• The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari (1998) by Robin Sharma

See also[link]

• Allegory
• Anthropomorphism
• Apologia
• Apologue
• Fabel
• Fables (comics)
• Fairy tale
• Fantastique
• Ghost story
• Parable
• Proverb
• Wisdom

Notes[link]

References[link]

Novels portal

• Buckham, Philip Wentworth (1827). Theatre of the Greeks. http://books.google.com/books?id=IjAZAAAAYAAJ&printsec=frontcover&dq=The+Theatre+of+the+Greeks. 
• King James Bible; New Testament (authorised).
• DLR [David Lee Rubin]. "Fable in Verse", The New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics.

External links[link]

• Fairy tales and fables traditions and reality through imagination
• Fables from around the world
• The Dragon-Tyrant
• A collection of Fables and Teaching-Stories from All Cultures and Traditions
• Fables - Collection and guide to fables for children
• Imaginexus A collection of interconnected stories that anyone can edit
• Parable of the Week Modern fables, parables and maxims
• Fables of Fabulous Animals, E-book

Robert Miles (born Roberto Concina, November 3, 1969) is a Swiss-born Italian record producer, composer, musician and DJ in electronica and alternative music.^[1]

Biography[link]

Robert Miles was born to Italian immigrants Antonietta Lauro and Albino Concina in Fleurier, Switzerland.

Miles became proficient at playing the piano during his youth in Friuli, Italy, in the small town of Fagagna, where his family moved when he was still a young boy, and has been in the music scene since 1984. He worked as a DJ in some Italian clubs and private radio networks and in 1990, he used his savings to establish his own recording studio and a pirate radio station.

In 1994, Miles wrote a house/chill-out piece based on acoustic guitar chords and soft synthesizer effects, "Children", which was later developed into a dream trance track featuring a piano theme on top. The single picked up sales slowly, but within two weeks of its official release in 1995, it had sold more than 350,000 copies all over Europe and topped the charts in many countries. After occupying the Euro Top 100 chart number 1 spot for thirteen consecutive weeks,^[2] by 1997, "Children" had sold more than 5 million copies worldwide. It earned Miles platinum records^[3][4] in many countries, a Brit Award (Robert Miles is, to date, the only Italian artist who has received the award) as Best International Male Newcomer 1997,^[5] a World Music Award as World's Best Selling Male Newcomer and various other awards.

Miles' next single was "Fable". Part of this song was used in the theatrical trailer for the U.S. movie Ever After^[6] starring Drew Barrymore and Dougray Scott. His debut album Dreamland was released on June 7, 1996 in Europe, and released in the United States about a month later, with a new track, "One and One". This new track became very popular (it reached number 1 in the Euro Top 100 Singles Chart during the Christmas period and remained in the top spot for six consecutive weeks)^[7] and was later released as a single in Europe and the U.S.

In November 1997, Miles released another track, "Freedom", which was one of the key tracks on his second album 23am featuring vocals provided by Kathy Sledge of Sister Sledge. Containing a different feel from the previously more club-oriented Dreamland, 23am incorporated more lyrics-driven songs than its predecessor while maintaining Miles' trademark piano sound from the first album.

After splitting from BMG/Deconstruction and his former management in London, he set up his own independent record label S:alt Records (with S:alt being short for suitably:alternative) in 2001 and released his third album, Organik,^[8] featuring the new single "Paths" with vocals provided by Nina Miranda of Smoke City. Guests on the album included Trilok Gurtu, Bill Laswell and Nitin Sawhney. Music from Organik was used on various movie soundtracks such as The Bourne Identity, Derrida, and City of Ghosts. In 2002, an album containing mainly remixes of songs found on Organik was released. The album, appropriately entitled Organik Remixes,^[9] contained remixes by the winners of the remixing contest held on Robert Miles' website, as well as remixes from well known artists such as The Future Sound of London, Riton, and Alexkid amongst others. The album also had one new track, "Bhairav", which featured the vocals of Amelia Cuni.

In 2004, Miles released Miles_Gurtu,^[10] his fourth album which was a collaboration with percussionist Trilok Gurtu and included jazz and electronica elements. Also guesting on the album were Nitin Sawhney, Jon Thorne, Mike Patto and Paul Falloon.

His fifth album entitled Th1rt3en^[11] was released worldwide on S:alt Records in February 2011, and featured guests such as Robert Fripp, Dave Okumu, Jon Thorne, Mike Patto and Davide Giovannini. For this album, Miles produced a blend of alternative and progressive rock with ambient and electronic soundscapes.

Miles is currently working on a soundtrack for the forthcoming movie documentary The Turn of This Century, directed by Peter Beyak and featuring the photography of Life Magazine.

Selected discography[link]

Studio albums[link]

• 1996: Dreamland
• 1997: 23am
• 2001: Organik
• 2004: Miles_Gurtu
• 2011: Th1rt3en

Singles[link]

Remix albums[link]

• 1997: In the Mix
• 1997: Renaissance Worldwide — London (with Dave Seaman)
• 2002: Organik Remixes
• 2011: Th1rt3en Remixes

See also[link]

• List of number-one dance hits (United States)
• List of artists who reached number one on the US Dance chart

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official Robert Miles website
• Robert Miles discography at Discogs
• Robert Miles at Allmusic
• Robert Miles on Myspace

Tigran Hamasyan
Background information
Born	(1987-07-17)July 17, 1987 Gyumri, Armenia
Genres	Jazz
Instruments	Piano
Years active	2001
Website	tigranhamasyan.com

Tigran Hamasyan (born July 17, 1987) is an Armenian jazz pianist. He plays mostly original compositions, which are strongly influenced by the Armenian folk tradition, often using its scales and modalities. In addition to Tigran's folk influence, he is much influenced by American jazz tradition and to some extent, as on his album Red Hail, by progressive rock. His most recent album, entitled A Fable, which is a solo album, is most strongly influenced by Armenian folk music. Even on his most overt jazz compositions and renditions of well-known jazz pieces, his improvisations often contain embellishments based on scales from Middle Eastern/South Western Asian traditions.

Awards[link]

• 2002: 3rd Prize Concours International de Piano-Jazz Martial Solal (Paris).
• 2003: 1st Prize Jazz à Juan Révélations in the jazz instrumental category.
• 2003: 1st Prize Prix de la Critique et du Public, Concours de Piano du Montreux Jazz Festival.
• 2005: 3rd Prize Concours de Piano-Jazz de Moscou.
• 2005: 1st Prize 8ème Concours de Solistes de Jazz de Monaco.
• 2006: 1st Prize Thelonious Monk Institute of Jazz.^[1]
• 2006: 2nd Prize Concours International de Piano-Jazz Martial Solal.

Discography[link]

As leader

• World Passion (2006) Nocturne
• New Era (2007) Plus Loin Music
• Arrata Rebirth: Red Hail (2009) Plus Loin Music
• A Fable (2011) Verve
• EP No. 1 (2011) Released exclusively on vinyl and digital download

As sideman

• Abu Nawas Rhapsody (2010) Jazzland Records, with Dhafer Youssef,

References[link]

External links[link]

• Official website

Anne Boleyn
Later copy of an original portrait, which was painted c.1534.
Queen consort of England
Tenure	28 May 1533 – 17 May 1536
Coronation	1 June 1533
Spouse	Henry VIII of England
among others... Issue
Elizabeth I of England
House	House of Tudor (by marriage)
Father	Thomas Boleyn, 1st Earl of Wiltshire
Mother	Lady Elizabeth Howard
Born	c.1501[1] Blickling Hall/ Hever Castle, England
Died	19 May 1536(1536-05-19) (aged 34-35) Tower of London
Signature
Religion	Anglican, formerly Roman Catholic [2]

Anne Boleyn ( /ˈbʊlɪn/, /bəˈlɪn/ or /bʊˈlɪn/);^[3][4] c.1501^[5] – 19 May 1536) was Queen of England from 1533 to 1536 as the second wife of Henry VIII of England and Marquess of Pembroke in her own right.^[6] Henry's marriage to Anne, and her subsequent execution, made her a key figure in the political and religious upheaval that was the start of the English Reformation. Anne was the daughter of Thomas Boleyn, 1st Earl of Wiltshire, and his wife, Lady Elizabeth Howard, and was educated in the Netherlands and France, largely as a maid of honour to Claude of France. She returned to England in early 1522, in order to marry her Irish cousin James Butler, 9th Earl of Ormond; however, the marriage plans ended in failure and she secured a post at court as maid of honour to Henry VIII's queen consort, Catherine of Aragon.

Early in 1523 there was a secret betrothal between Anne and Henry Percy, son of the 5th Earl of Northumberland. However, in January of 1524 Cardinal Thomas Wolsey broke the betrothal, Anne was sent back home to Hever Castle, and Percy was married to Lady Mary Talbot, to whom he had been betrothed since adolescence. In February/March 1526 Henry VIII began his pursuit of Anne. She resisted his attempts to seduce her, refusing to become his mistress as her sister Mary had. It soon became the one absorbing object of Henry's desires to annul his marriage to Queen Catherine so he would be free to marry Anne. When it became clear that Pope Clement VII would not annul the marriage, the breaking of the power of the Catholic Church in England began. In 1532, Henry granted her the Marquesate of Pembroke.

Henry and Anne married on 25 January 1533, when Anne was 32 or 33. On 23 May 1533 Thomas Cranmer declared Henry and Catherine's marriage null and void; five days later, he declared Henry and Anne's marriage to be good and valid. Shortly afterwards, the Pope decreed sentences of excommunication against Henry and Cranmer. As a result of this marriage and these excommunications, the first break between the Church of England and Rome took place and the Church of England was brought under the King's control. Anne was crowned Queen of England on 1 June 1533. On 7 September she gave birth to the future Elizabeth I of England. To Henry's displeasure, however, she failed to produce a male heir. Henry was not totally discouraged, for he said that he loved Elizabeth and that a son would surely follow. Three miscarriages followed, however, and by March 1536, Henry was courting Jane Seymour.

Henry had Anne investigated for high treason in April 1536. On 2 May she was arrested and sent to the Tower of London, where she was tried before a jury of peers - which included Henry Percy, her former betrothed and her own uncle, Thomas Howard - and found guilty on 15 May. She was beheaded four days later. Modern historians view the charges against her, which included adultery and incest, as unconvincing. Following the coronation of her daughter, Elizabeth, as queen, Anne was venerated as a martyr and heroine of the English Reformation, particularly through the works of John Foxe.^[7] Over the centuries, she has inspired or been mentioned in numerous artistic and cultural works. As a result, she has retained her hold on the popular imagination. Anne has been called "the most influential and important queen consort England has ever had",^[8] since she provided the occasion for Henry VIII to divorce Catherine of Aragon, and declare his independence from Rome.

Early years[link]

Anne was the daughter of Thomas Boleyn, later Earl of Wiltshire and Earl of Ormond, and his wife, Lady Elizabeth Howard, daughter of Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk. Thomas Boleyn was a respected diplomat with a gift for languages; he was also a favourite of Henry VII of England, who sent him on many diplomatic missions abroad. Anne and her siblings grew up at Hever Castle in Kent. A lack of parish records from the period has made it impossible to establish Anne's date of birth. Contemporary evidence is contradictory, with several dates having been put forward by various historians. An Italian, writing in 1600, suggested that she had been born in 1499, while Sir Thomas More's son-in-law, William Roper, indicated a much later date of 1512. However her birth was most likely sometime between 1501 and 1507. As with Anne herself, it is uncertain when her two siblings were born, but it seems clear that her sister Mary was older than Anne. Mary's children clearly believed their mother had been the elder sister.^[9] Most historians now agree that Mary was born in 1499. Mary's grandson claimed the Ormonde title in 1596 on the basis she was the elder daughter, which Elizabeth I accepted.^[10][11] Also, Mary was married first, and by custom, the eldest daughter would be married before the younger.^{[citation needed]} Their brother George was born some time around 1504.^[12][13]

Anne's sister Mary Boleyn

The academic debate about Anne's birth date focuses on two key dates: 1501 and 1507. Eric Ives, a British historian and legal expert, advocates the 1501 date, while Retha Warnicke, an American scholar who has also written a biography of Anne, prefers 1507. The key piece of surviving written evidence is a letter Anne wrote sometime in 1514.^[14] She wrote it in French to her father, who was still living in England while Anne was completing her education at Mechelen, in the contemporary Netherlands, now Belgium. Ives argues that the style of the letter and its mature handwriting prove that Anne must have been about thirteen at the time of its composition, while Warnicke argues that the numerous misspellings and grammar errors show that the letter was written by a child. In Ives's view this would also be around the minimum age that a girl could be a Maid of Honour, as Anne was to the regent^{[citation needed]}, Margaret of Austria, Duchess of Savoy. This is supported by claims by a chronicler from the late 16th century, who wrote that Anne was twenty when she returned from France.^[15] These findings are contested by Warnicke in several books and articles, but the evidence does not conclusively support either date.^[16]

There are two independent contemporary sources for the 1507 date. Author Gareth Russell wrote a summary of the evidence and relates that Jane Dormer, Duchess of Feria, wrote her memoirs shortly before her death in 1612; in it the former lady in waiting and confident to Queen Mary I of England wrote of Anne Boleyn "She was convicted and condemned and was not yet twenty-nine years of age." William Camden wrote a history of the reign of Queen Elizabeth I of England and was granted access to the private papers of Lord Burghley and to the state archives. In that history, in the chapter dealing with Elizabeth's early life, he records in the margin that Anne was born in MCVII.^[17]

Anne's great-grandparents included a Lord Mayor of London, a duke, an earl, two aristocratic ladies, and a knight. One of them, Geoffrey Boleyn, had been a mercer and wool merchant before becoming Lord Mayor.^[18][19] The Boleyn family originally came from Blickling in Norfolk, fifteen miles north of Norwich.^[18] At the time of Anne's birth, the Boleyn family was considered one of the most respected in the English aristocracy. Among her relatives, she numbered the Howards, one of the pre-eminent families in the land; and one of her ancestors included King Edward I of England. According to Eric Ives, she was certainly of more noble birth than Jane Seymour, Catherine Howard, and Catherine Parr, Henry VIII's three other English wives.^[20] The spelling of the Boleyn name was variable. Sometimes it was written as Bullen, hence the bull heads which formed part of her family arms.^[21] At the court of Margaret of Austria in the Netherlands, Anne is listed as Boullan. ^[11] From there she signed the letter to her father as Anna de Boullan.^[22] She is also referred to as "Anna Bolina" (which is Latin); that name is in most portraits of her.^[22]

Anne's early education was typical for women of her class. Her academic education was limited to arithmetic, her family genealogy, grammar, history, reading, spelling, and writing. She developed domestic skills such as dancing, embroidery, good manners, household management, music, needlework, and singing. Anne learned to play games, such as cards, chess, and dice. She was also taught archery, falconry, horseback riding, and hunting.

Netherlands and France[link]

Claude of France, queen consort of Francis I. Anne served as her maid of honour for nearly seven years

Anne's father continued his diplomatic career under Henry VIII. In Europe Thomas Boleyn's charm won many admirers, including Archduchess Margaret of Austria, daughter of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor. During this period, she ruled the Netherlands on her father's behalf and was so impressed with Boleyn that she offered his daughter Anne a place in her household. Ordinarily, a girl had to be twelve years old to have such an honour, but Anne may have been younger, as the Archduchess affectionately referred to her as "la petite Boulin [sic]".^[23] Anne made a good impression in the Netherlands with her manners and studiousness, Margaret reported that she was well spoken and pleasant for her young age ("son josne eaige").^[24] and told Sir Thomas Boleyn that his daughter was "so presentable and so pleasant, considering her youthful age, that I am more beholden to you for sending her to me, than you to me" (E.W. Ives, op.cit.). Anne stayed with Margaret from spring 1513 until her father arranged for her to attend Henry VIII's sister, Mary Tudor, Queen of France, for Mary's marriage to Louis XII of France in October 1514.

In France Anne was a maid of honour to Queen Mary, and then to 15-year-old Queen Claude of France, with whom she stayed nearly seven years.^[25][26] In the Queen's household she completed her study of French and developed interests in fashion and religious philosophy. She also acquired knowledge of French culture and etiquette.^[27] Though all knowledge about Anne's experiences in the French court are conjecture, even Eric Ives, in his latest edition of the biography, conjectures that she was likely to have made the acquaintance of King Francis I's sister, Marguerite de Navarre, a patron of humanists and reformers. Marguerite de Navarre was also an author in her own right, and her works include elements of Christian mysticism and reform that, but for her protection as the French king's beloved sister, verged on heresy. She or her circle may have encouraged Anne's interest in reform, as well as in poetry and literature.^[26] Anne's education in France proved itself in later years, inspiring many new trends among the ladies and courtiers of England, and it may have been instrumental in pressing their King toward the culture-shattering contretemps with the Papacy itself. Eric Ives's latest version of his biography hypothesizes that Anne may have had evangelist conviction and a strong spiritual inner life. William Forrest, author of a contemporary poem about Catherine of Aragon, complimented Anne's "passing excellent" skill as a dancer. "Here", he wrote, "was [a] fresh young damsel, that could trip and go."^[28]

Anne exerted a powerful charm on those who met her, though opinions differed on her attractiveness. The Venetian diarist Marino Sanuto, who saw Anne when Henry VIII met Francis I at Calais in October 1532, described her as "not one of the handsomest women in the world; she is of middling stature, swarthy complexion, long neck, wide mouth, bosom not much raised... eyes, which are black and beautiful".^[29] Simon Grynée wrote to Martin Bucer in September 1531 that Anne was "young, good-looking, of a rather dark complexion". Lancelot de Carles called her "beautiful with an elegant figure", and a Venetian in Paris in 1528 also reported that she was said to be beautiful.^[30] The most influential description of Anne,^[31] but also the least reliable, was written by the Catholic propagandist and polemicist Nicholas Sanders in 1586, half a century after Anne's death: "Anne Boleyn was rather tall of stature, with black hair, and an oval face of a sallow complexion, as if troubled with jaundice. It is said she had a projecting tooth under the upper lip, and on her right hand six fingers. There was a large wen under her chin, and therefore to hide its ugliness she wore a high dress covering her throat... She was handsome to look at, with a pretty mouth".^[32] Sanders held Anne responsible for Henry VIII's rejection of the Catholic church, and writing fifty years after her death, was keen to demonize her. Sanders's description contributed to what biographer Eric Ives calls the "monster legend" of Anne Boleyn.^[33] Though his details were fictitious, they have formed the basis for references to Anne's appearance even in some modern textbooks.^[34]

Anne's experience in France made her a devout Christian in the new tradition of Renaissance humanism. Anne knew little Latin but, trained at a French court, she was influenced by an “evangelical variety of French humanism” which led her to champion the vernacular Bible.^[35] While she would later hold the reformist position that the papacy was a corrupting influence on Christianity, her conservative tendencies could be seen in her devotion to the Virgin Mary.^[36] Anne's European education ended in 1521, when her father summoned her back to England. She sailed from Calais in January 1522.^[37]

An early 20th-century painting of Anne Boleyn, depicting her deer hunting with the King

At the court of Henry VIII: 1522–1533[link]

Anne was recalled to marry her Irish cousin, James Butler, a young man who was several years older than she was and who was living at the English court,^[38] in an attempt to settle a dispute over the title and estates of the Earldom of Ormond. The 7th Earl of Ormond died in 1515, leaving his daughters, Margaret Boleyn and Anne St Leger, as co-heiresses. In Ireland the great-great-grandson of the 3rd earl, Sir Piers Butler, contested the will and claimed the Earldom himself. He was already in possession of Kilkenny Castle - the ancestral seat of the earls. Sir Thomas Boleyn, being the son of the eldest daughter, felt the title belonged to him and protested to his brother-in-law, the Duke of Norfolk, who spoke to King Henry about the matter. Henry, fearful the dispute could be the spark to ignite civil war in Ireland, sought to resolve the matter by arranging an alliance between Piers's son, James, and Anne Boleyn. She would bring her Ormond inheritance as dowry and thus end the dispute. The plan ended in failure, perhaps because Sir Thomas hoped for a grander marriage for his daughter or because he himself coveted the titles. Whatever the reason, the marriage negotiations came to a complete halt.^[39] James Butler later married Lady Joan Fitzgerald, daughter and heiress of James FitzGerald, 10th Earl of Desmond and Amy O'Brien.

Mary Boleyn, Anne Boleyn's older sister, had earlier been recalled from France in late 1519, ostensibly for her affairs with the French king and his courtiers. She married William Carey, a minor noble, in February 1520, at Greenwich, with Henry VIII in attendance: soon after, Mary Boleyn became the English King's mistress. Historians dispute King Henry VIII's paternity of one or both of Mary Boleyn's children born during this marriage. Henry VIII: The King and His Court, by Alison Weir, questions the paternity of Henry Carey;^[40] Dr. G.W. Bernard (The King's Reformation) and Joanna Denny (Anne Boleyn: A New Life of England's Tragic Queen) argue that Henry VIII was their father. Henry did not acknowledge either child, as he did his son Henry Fitzroy, his illegitimate son by Elizabeth Blount, Lady Talboys.

Anne made her début at the Chateau Vert (Green Castle) pageant in honour of the imperial ambassadors on 4 March 1522, playing "Perseverance." There she took part in an elaborate dance accompanying Henry's younger sister Mary, several other ladies of the court, and her sister. All wore gowns of white satin embroidered with gold thread.^[41] She quickly established herself as one of the most stylish and accomplished women at the court, and soon a number of young men were competing for her.^[42]

The Six Wives of Henry VIII
Catherine of Aragon
Anne Boleyn
Jane Seymour
Anne of Cleves
Catherine Howard
Catherine Parr

The American historian Retha M. Warnicke writes that Anne was "the perfect woman courtier... her carriage was graceful and her French clothes were pleasing and stylish; she danced with ease, had a pleasant singing voice, played the lute and several other musical instruments well, and spoke French fluently... A remarkable, intelligent, quick-witted young noblewoman... that first drew people into conversation with her and then amused and entertained them. In short, her energy and vitality made her the center of attention in any social gathering." Henry VIII's biographer J. J. Scarisbrick adds that Anne "revelled in" the attention she received from her admirers.^[43]

During this time, Anne was courted by Henry Percy, son of the Earl of Northumberland, and entered into a secret betrothal with the young man. Thomas Wolsey's gentleman usher, George Cavendish, maintained the two had not been lovers. If Cavendish is to be believed, it may be that their relationship wasn't sexual.^[44] The romance was broken off when Percy's father refused to support their engagement. According to Cavendish, Anne was sent from court to her family's countryside estates, but it is not known for how long. Upon her return to court, she again entered the service of Catherine of Aragon.

The distinguished courtier-poet Sir Thomas Wyatt grew up at Allington, an estate nearly adjoining the Boleyn family's estate at Hever Castle in Kent. Wyatt was estranged from his own wife, and unverifiable romantic legends about Anne and him abound, particularly in the writings of Wyatt's grandson. There is conjecture that some of the most yearning poetry attributed to Wyatt was inspired by their relationship and that it is Anne whom he describes in the sonnet Whoso List to Hunt,^[45] as unobtainable, headstrong, and belonging to the King: "noli me tangere for Caesar's I am/And wild for to hold though I seem tame".^[46] In 1526 King Henry became enamoured with her and began his pursuit.^[47]

Some say that Anne resisted the King's attempts to seduce her, refusing to become his mistress, often leaving court for the seclusion of Hever Castle. But within a year, he proposed marriage to her, and she accepted. Both assumed an annulment could be obtained within a matter of months. There is no evidence to suggest that they engaged in a sexual relationship until very shortly before their marriage; Henry's love letters to Anne seem to suggest that their love affair remained unconsummated for much of their seven year courtship. However, Anne was pregnant by the time of her marriage.

Henry's annulment[link]

Late Elizabethan portrait of Anne Boleyn, possibly derived from a lost original of 1533–36.^[48]

It is probable that the idea of annulment (not divorce as commonly assumed) had suggested itself to Henry much earlier than this and was motivated by his desire for an heir to secure the legitimacy of the Tudor claim to the crown. Before Henry's father Henry VII ascended the throne, England was beset by civil warfare over rival claims to the crown and Henry wanted to avoid a similar uncertainty over the succession. He and Catherine had no living sons: all Catherine's children except Mary died in infancy.^[49] Catherine of Aragon had first come to England to be bride to Henry's brother Arthur who died soon after their marriage. Spain and England had, at that time, still wanted a union of their kingdoms, and, in 1509, Henry and Catherine were wed. But this marriage could not take place until the Pope had ruled about a passage in the Leviticus 20:21, which seems to forbid the marriage of a man to his brother's widow lest he and the widow be cursed. The Pope ruled that the passage was inapplicable as Arthur had not had relations with Catherine and so the Pope issued a dispensation to that effect. However some years and a new Pope later, Henry was re-thinking things. Prodded by Catherine's inability to provide an heir, and possibly by Anne herself, Henry decided that no Pope had a right to overrule the Bible. This meant that he had been living in sin with Catherine of Aragon all these years, though Catherine hotly contested this and refused to concede that her marriage to Arthur had been consummated. It also meant that his daughter Mary was a bastard, and that the new Pope (Clement VII) must admit the previous Pope's mistake and annul his marriage. Henry's quest for an annulment became euphemistically known as the "King's Great Matter."^[50]

Anne saw an opportunity in Henry's infatuation and the convenient moral quandary. She determined that she would yield to his embraces only as his acknowledged queen. She began to take her place at his side in policy and in state, but not, at least not just yet, in his bed.^[51] Confusing the issue of whether or not Anne and Henry had a sexual relationship, is the fact that there is no doubt that Anne was pregnant with Elizabeth (born on 7 September 1533) when she and Henry hastily and secretly wed in order to be married when Anne was crowned queen in May, 1533, since any child born before she was queen would not be able to succeed to the throne.

Various are the opinions of scholars and historians as to how deep was Anne's commitment to the Reformation, how much was she perhaps only personally ambitious, and how much she had to do with Henry's defiance of Papal power. There is anecdotal evidence, related to biographer George Wyatt by her former lady-in-waiting Anne Gainsford,^[52] that Anne brought to Henry's attention a heretical pamphlet, perhaps Tyndale's "The Obedience of the Christian Man" or one by Simon Fish called "Supplication for Beggars," which cried out to monarchs to rein in the evil excesses of the Catholic Church. She was sympathetic to those seeking further reformation of the Church, and actively protected scholars working on English translations of the scriptures. According to Marie Dowling "Anne tried to educate her waiting-women in scriptural piety” and is believed to have reproved her cousin, Mary Shelton, for “having ‘idle poesies’ written in her prayer book.”^[53] If Cavendish is to be believed, Anne's outrage at Wolsey may have personalized whatever philosophical defiance she brought with her from France. Further, the most recent edition of Ives's biography admits that Anne may very well have had a personal spiritual awakening in her youth which spurred her on, not just as catalyst but expediter for Henry's Reformation, though the process took a number of years.

In 1528 sweating sickness broke out with great severity. In London the mortality rate was great and the court was dispersed. Henry left London, frequently changing his residence; Anne Boleyn retreated to the Boleyn residence at Hever Castle, but contracted the illness; her brother-in-law, William Carey, died. Henry sent his own physician to Hever Castle to care for her,^[54] and shortly afterwards, she recovered. It soon became the one absorbing object of Henry's desires to secure an annulment from Catherine.^[55] Henry had set his hopes upon a direct appeal to the Holy See, acting independently of Cardinal Wolsey, to whom he at first communicated nothing of his plans related to Anne. In 1527 William Knight, the King's secretary, had been sent to Pope Clement VII to sue for the annulment of his marriage to Catherine, on the grounds that the dispensing bull of Pope Julius II permitting him to marry his brother's widow, Catherine, had been obtained under false pretences. Henry also petitioned, in the event of his becoming free, a dispensation to contract a new marriage with any woman even in the first degree of affinity, whether the affinity was contracted by lawful or unlawful connection. This clearly referred to Anne.^[56]

Catherine of Aragon, Henry's first wife and queen

As the Pope was, at that time, prisoner of Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor, as a result of the Sack of Rome in May 1527, Knight had some difficulty obtaining access. In the end he had to return with a conditional dispensation, which Wolsey insisted was technically insufficient.^[57] Henry had now no choice but to put his great matter into the hands of Wolsey, who did all he could to secure a decision in Henry's favor.^[58] Wolsey went so far as to convene an ecclesiastical court in England, with a special emissary, Lorenzo Campeggio, from the Pope himself to decide the matter. But the Pope never had empowered his deputy to make any decision. The Pope was still a veritable hostage of Charles V, and Charles V was the loyal nephew of Henry's queen, Catherine.^[59] The Pope forbade Henry to contract a new marriage until a decision was reached in Rome, not in England. Convinced that Wolsey's loyalties lay with the Pope, not England, Anne, as well as Wolsey's many enemies, ensured his dismissal from public office in 1529. George Cavendish, Wolsey's chamberlain, records that the servants who waited on the king and Anne at dinner in 1529 in Grafton heard her say that the dishonour that Wolsey had brought upon the realm would have cost any other Englishman his head. Henry replied, "Why then I perceive...you are not the Cardinal's friend." Henry finally agreed to Wolsey's arrest on grounds of praemunire.^[60] Had it not been for his death from illness in 1530, he might have been executed for treason.^[61] A year later in 1531 (fully two years before Henry's marriage to Anne), Queen Catherine was banished from court and her rooms were given to Anne.

Public support, however, remained with Queen Catherine. One evening in the autumn of 1531, Anne was dining at a manor house on the river Thames and was almost seized by a crowd of angry women. Anne just managed to escape by boat.^[62]

When Archbishop of Canterbury William Warham died in 1532, the Boleyn family chaplain, Thomas Cranmer, was appointed, with papal approval.^[63]