Carol Curt Enos on Shakespeare and Queen Catherine Parr
Shakespeare
and Queen Catherine Parr
Who
would suspect that the country bumpkin from Stratford on Avon would have any
connection with a queen of England? An
intriguing web of relationships involving the Neville, Arden, Webb, and Green
families reveals several connections between William Shakespeare’s family and
Catherine Parr, last queen of Henry VIII.
Catherine
Parr, born in 1512 or 1514 either at Kendal Castle, Kendal, Cumberland, or at
Blackfriars in London, represents the religious controversy initiated by Henry
VIII’s break with the Pope in 1534. She
was probably raised as Catholic by her mother, her father having died when
Catherine was five years old. She
ultimately became devotedly Protestant and wrote two books on religion, Prayers
or Meditations and The Lamentation of a Sinner, published while she was queen. She
was closely related to the Throckmortons of Coughton Court, a militant Catholic
family that engaged in nearly every plot against Queen Elizabeth and James
I. Catherine’s determined Protestantism
after 1543 was at odds with the Throckmorton side of her family as well as with
the staunchly Catholic Ardens of Park Hall.
Catherine’s second husband, Sir John
Neville, 3rd Lord Latimer, was also a supporter of the Catholic
Church. He had opposed the annulment of
Henry VIII’s marriage to Catherine of Aragon, and in 1536 joined, perhaps
reluctantly, in ‘The Pilgrimage of Grace,’ a Yorkshire uprising against Henry’s
break with the Pope as well as social issues.
Lord Neville and Catherine then spent the next seven years, until his
death, in disgrace and in some danger.
At one point, Catherine and Sir John’s children of a prior marriage were
held hostage and their house was ransacked.
Physical and emotional strain over the penalties Catholics endured may have turned her from the Catholic faith
in which she was raised in favor of the safety of the new state religion.
After her marriage to Henry VIII in
1543, Catherine became embroiled in the controversy concerning the right of
everyone to read and study the Bible.
She favored this right, a Protestant position, but conservatives in the
Church of England, still essentially Catholic in Sacraments and ritual, warned
that citizens would grow to think for themselves, lessening Henry VIII’s control. She was accused of heresy, and Henry went so
far as to sign the warrant for her arrest, but she managed to convince him that
she was only trying to divert him from his physical pain with her theological
arguments.
To some of her very Catholic relatives,
she surely was a heretic according to their
concept of the ‘true’ Catholic church as opposed to Henry’s new reformed
church. These family members (young
William Shakespeare among them?) must have viewed her with a mixture of pride
that their family could boast of their Queen of England, and shame at her
turning away from the Catholic faith.
PARR’S CONNECTION to MARY ARDEN
through the NEVILLES
Catherine
Parr ruled as Queen of England and Ireland from 1543 to 1547. Her first husband, Sir Edward Burgh, died in
1533. In 1534, she married, as his third
wife, Sir John Neville 3rd Baron Latimer (1493–1543), her father’s
second cousin. He was a descendant of
Ralph, 1st Earl of Westmorland, by his second wife Joan Beaufort, the daughter
of John of Gaunt. The Neville connection
then leads to Shakespeare’s family, the Ardens of Park Hall. Sir John had a
brother, William Neville (1497-?), who married Elizabeth Greville
(1501-1600). This William and Elizabeth
Neville were the parents of Richard Neville (1523-1590) who married Barbara
Arden (1535-?), daughter of William Arden (1509-1545) and Elizabeth
Conway. Barbara Arden was the sister of
Edward Arden (1542-1583) of Park Hall who was executed as a participant in the
Somerville Plot instigated by his son-in-law, John Somerville. Barbara Arden and Richard Neville were the
parents of Edmund Neville (1555-1629) who claimed the hereditary title of Earl
of Westmorland. Sir John Neville and
Catherine Parr, as aunt and uncle of Richard Neville, probably knew Richard and
his future wife, Barbara Arden. Mary
Arden (1537-1608) was second cousin to Barbara Arden and Edward Arden, so it is
probable that Shakespeare’s mother was acquainted with all of these relatives: Barbara and Edward Arden, John Neville and Catherine
Parr, and their nephew, Edmund Neville, purported Earl of Westmorland. These relationships are outlined in the
following table:
ARDEN NEVILLE
Walter
Arden (1437-1502)
John Arden (1467-1526)
Thomas Arden (? 1563) William
Neville (1497-1545)
= Elizabeth | | Greville. William, brother
William Arden (d 1545) = Elizabeth Conway | of John Neville 1493-1543, | | John Neville = Catherine | | Parr in
1533.
Barbara Arden (b 1535) = Richard
Neville (1523-1590)
Edmund Neville (1555-1629)
Edward Arden (1533-1583)
John Arden (1496-1526)
Thomas 1469-1546)
Robert Arden
(abt 1497-1556)
Mary Arden
Shakespeare (1537-1608)
William
Shakespeare (1564-1616)
William Arden (about 1479)
Robert Arden about (1475-?)
(Numerous
sources. Most can be found in Tudor.com)
If
John Neville and his wife, Catherine Parr visited John’s nephew, Richard
Neville, Richard would have been between 10 years of age when they married and
around 20 when John Neville’s died in 1543.
Barbara Arden, Mary Arden’s cousin, was around 8 years old at this time,
and Mary Arden, Shakespeare’s mother, would have been around 6 years old. Even if they had not encountered each other
personally, the families would have been aware of the relationships, and Mary
Arden Shakespeare’s family were probably proud of their royal relative although
they differed on religion.
THE PARR CONNECTION through GREENE
and THROCKMORTON FAMILIES
As
noted, Shakespeare’s mother was distantly related to the very Catholic
Throckmortons of Coughton Court via Edward Arden of Park Hall’s marriage to
Mary Throckmorton (1543-1643). Catherine
Parr was a descendant of the Throckmortons through her mother, Maud (also known
as Matilda) Green Parr (1492-1531), granddaughter of Sir Thomas Green and
Matilda Throckmorton (1425- 1496).
Matilda was the sister of Thomas Throckmorton (1412-1472) of Coughton
Court, who was both the great, great grandfather of Mary Throckmorton, Edward
Arden’s wife, and the great uncle of Catherine Parr. Catherine Parr’s great grandmother, Maude
Throckmorton, was the daughter of Sir John Throckmorton and Eleanor de la
Spine, Heiress of Coughton. The
relationship among these families is very difficult to untangle and probably
more difficult to decipher from the evidence presented here. However, the families would probably have
understood and recognized the relationships.
The diagram below may add clarity.
These families clung to their Catholic faith and had to confront the
political/religious conflict that began in Queen Catherine Parr’s day.
Green/Throckmorton/Parr
[The first listing
below: Thomas Green 1369 to Matilda
Throckmorton is questionable. It cannot
be verified in other sources. This came
from https://www.geni.com/people/Sir-Thomas-Green-Kt/6000000002916812069.]
Thomas Green (1369-1417) = 1) Ela Malorie 2) Matilda Throckmorton (est 1339-1399) 3) Mary Talbot
(1383-1433)
Sir Thomas
Green (1400-1462) = 1) Lucy Zouche, 2) Philippa Ferrers, 3) Marina Bellers
(c 1414-1489)
(Sir Thomas was bro of
Margaret Arderne (d 1412) = Richard Arderne (1382-1412)
Sir
Thomas Green (1421-1462) = Maud (also known as Matilda) Throckmorton (1425-1496)
(Sister of Tho
Throckmorton 1412-1472)
Sir
Thomas Green, Jr (1461-1506) = Tira Heaton and Lady Joan Fogge
Maude
Green (1495-1531)
= Sir Thomas Parr (1484-1517)
(Lady in waiting on Queen Katherine
of Aragon)
Catherine
Parr (1512-1548)
Throckmorton
Sir Thomas
Throckmorton (1412-1472) = Margaret Olney
(Bro of Maud Greene, (see
above) wife of Sir Tho Green and great uncle of Catherine Parr.)
Robert
Throckmorton (1451-
1518) = Elizabeth Baynan and Catherine Marrow
George
Throckmorton (1489- 1552) = Katherine Vaux
Robert
Throckmorton (1513-1581)= Muriel Berkley
Mary
Throckmorton (1531-1559) = Edward Arden
QUEEN CATHERINE’S CONNECTION to the
WEBBS, ARDENS, AND SHAKESPEARES
Catherine Parr had a “trusty and well beloved servant, Sir Henry Alexander
Webbe (1510-1544), gentleman, usher of her privy chamber" whose lands had been
confiscated by Henry VIII during the suppression of the monasteries . A letter Catherine Parr sent her council asking
them to grant her friend, Sir Henry Webb, the lands and estates still exists. He was also knighted by Queen Catherine and
granted a Coat of Arms (Parr. Complete Works and Correspondence, p 57).
Sir Henry was born 11 May 1510, the son of Sir John
Alexander Webb, Jr. (1484-1516) and Margaret Arden Webb. His sister Abigail married Richard
Shakespeare, and they were the parents of John Shakespeare, father of William
Shakespeare. Sir Henry married cousins,
Margaret Arden and Grace Arden. He and
Margaret were the parents of Sir Alexander Webb, Jr., Kt (1559-1629), who
immigrated to America. He then married
the cousin of his wife Margaret, Grace Webb, and they were the parents of Agnes
O’Dell Hill Webb who married Robert Arden of Wilmcote (1506-1556), William
Shakespeare’s grandfather. Agnes became
stepmother (although they were cousins) to Shakespeare’s mother after Robert
Arden’s first wife, Mary Webb (1512-1550) died.
Little information is available about the Webb family, but because of
their intricate intermarriage with the Catholic Ardens and Shakespeares, it is
probably that they, too, were Catholic.
The Arden, Webbe, and Shakespeare families were very inbred as can be
seen in the diagram of WEBBE/ARDEN/SHAKESPEARE families below.
Henry Alexander Webbe even has
a tenuous link with Shakespeare’s life in London: through theater associate James Burbage and
with Shakespeare’s patron and relative, Henry Wriothesley.
In
1922, Charlotte Stopes identified a link between Henry Wriothesley, Burbage and
the Theatre, Burbage’s first theatre, built in 1576, and Susan Webbe, daughter
of Sir Henry Alexander Webbe: “A close friend of Henry Wriothesley’s, the Earl of Rutland, [Roger Manners, 5th
Earl of Rutland (1576-1612)] had a town house on part of the old Holywell Priory
Estates, of which the other part, granted to Henry Webbe, was eventually sold
to Gyles Alleyn and let to James Burbage, who was then in trouble with his
landlord (Stopes, The Third Earl of
Southampton, 93). Stopes identified
Susan’s father, Sir Henry Alexander Webbe (1510-154), as “a servant of Queen
Katharine” (Stopes, The Third Earl . . . 486). After Sir Henry died in 1544, his daughter,
Susan, and her husband George Peckham, inherited his property in the old
Holywell Priory. George Peckham was a
nephew of Thomas Wriothesley (1505- 1550) who opposed Queen Catherine Parr’s
protestant theology. Thomas was the
grandfather of Henry Wriothesley, 3rd Earl of Southampton
(1573-1624), friend and patron of Shakespeare.
The year after Sir Henry died, his daughter Susan and her husband George
Peckham mortgaged the property to Christopher Alleyn and Alleyn’s son
Giles. Susan died in childbirth in
December 1555, and after her death, George became a leader in an enterprise to allow Catholics to immigrate to the New
World to avoid penalties imposed by the Elizabethan government. In 1574 he joined with Sir Humphrey Gilbert in exploring and
planning the settlement of Newfoundland.
Eventually, he was imprisoned in England as a recusant and died in
1608. His attempts to relieve the
repression of Catholics in England suggest that he, too, was a Catholic. The perilous voyages of these explorers were
precursors of the 1609 voyage that ran aground in the Bermudas and is thought
to figure in Shakespeare’s Tempest.
It
seems more than coincidental that a member of Shakespeare’s Arden/Webbe family participated
in the transfer of property for the building of the Theater.
Recall
that Sir Henry’s wife was Grace Arden. To take
this a step further, because of Sir Henry Webbe’s close work association with
Catherine Parr, it is probable that his wife, Grace Arden, and some of Grace’s
family would have been acquainted with the future queen. These Ardens, Sir Henry Alexander Webbe, and
James Burbage were all citizens of Stratford on Avon who were well acquainted
with each other.
Shakespeare’s
seeming knowledge of the lifestyle of the upper class is often questioned and
regarded as incongruous with his somewhat lowly background in Stratford. The families named here as connections to
Shakespeare’s family were anything but lowly.
A very
brief summary of the Neville family’s
lengthy history comes from Wikipedia:
“The House of Neville (also the House
of Nevill) is a noble house of early medieval origin, which was a leading
force in English politics in the later Middle Ages. The family became one of
the two major powers in northern England along with the House of Percy and
played a central role in the Wars of the Roses.”
Meg MeGath delineated
the Green family’s many ties to past
nobility:
“Too
name a few of the ancestors of Lord Green:”
- Edward I and Eleanor of Castile, John I
of England
- Henry II of England
- Henry I
- Blanche de Brienne, granddaughter of
Berenguela of Leon, Empress of Constantinople, herself the daughter of
Alfonso IX, King of Leon and Berengaria of Castile [daughter of Eleanor of
England, Queen consort of Castile].
- Alfred ‘the great’, King of Wessex.[3]
- David I of Scotland via Dervorguilla,
Lady of Galloway, granddaughter of David of Scotland
- Llewelyn, Prince of Wales.
- Louis VI
(Adapted
from Tudorqueen6. The Life and Family of Queen Katherine Parr
Additionally,
the Green family history from the
1200’s can be found in The Green Family
Genealogy by Lois Case. It names,
among many other notables, Sir Henry de Greene (c 1310-1369), Lord Chief
Justice of England and Lord Chancellor of England and largest landholder in
England. Case refers to Queen Catherine
Parr as a member of the Green family: “It might be interesting to add here that Henry VII's son,
Henry VIII, married as his sixth and last wife Lady Catherine of Parr, a
daughter of the House of Greene, and she was the only one of Henry's wives to
survive the ordeal!”
The Throckmorton family traced its history
to the 12th century and had two baronetcies in two branches of the
family. The family lineage can be traced
in tudorplace.com. An example of many
members of note is Robert Throckmorton of Coughton, born 1451, who was Privy Councilor
to Henry VII. Another was Sir Nicholas
Throckmorton, born 1515, sewer in the household of Queen Catherine Parr, his
cousin. After 1544, following the death
of Catherine, Sir Nicholas spent some years in the service of Henry VIII’s
illegitimate son, the Duke of Richmond, and eventually served as Queen
Elizabeth’s ambassador to France from 1559-1562.
The Webbe family. Sir Henry Alexander Webbe, servant to Queen
Catherine Parr appears to be the most illustrious of the line of Webbes that
can be traced back to Henry Webb (1350-1397?).
However, all of those listed from Henry Webb to Abigail Webb share the
honor of being ancestors of William Shakespeare, for Abigail Webb, Sir Henry
Alexander Webb’s sister, married Richard Shakespeare, and they were the parents
of John Shakespeare, father of William (see table below). They were also related to William’s mother,
as detailed above.
Henry
Webb (1350-1397)
Geoffrey
Webb (1372-?)
John
Webb (1402?-1455?)
William
Webb (1425-1495?)
John Webb
(1450-?)
John Alexander Webb
(1484-?)
Sir Henry Alexander Webb, I
(1510-1544)
{Abigail Webb (1515-1595) Sister of Sir Henry
John Shakespeare (1535-1601) = Mary Arden
(1537-1608) William
Shakespeare (1564-1616)
The following is an
additional attempt to explain these complicated relationships:
Sir John Alexander Webb, Knt
(1484-1516) = 1) Margaret Arden (1488-1548) 2) Alice Brueton
(1450-1490)
Mary Webb
(1512-1550) = Robert Arden (1506-1556) Also = Agnes O’Dell/Hill
Abigail
Webb (1515-1595) = Richard Shakespeare (1512-1561)
John
Shakespeare (1537-1601) = Mary Arden (1537-1601) D of Mary and Robert Arden
(1506-1556) Sister of Margaret Webb =
Sir Henry Alex Webb, I (1510-1544)
William
Shakespeare
Sir Henry
Alexander Webb, I (1510-1544) = 1) Margaret Arden (c 1538-1608) D of Robert
(1506) and Mary Arden (1412). Their
son: Alexander Webb, Jr (1559-1629)
immigrated
to America.
Grace
Arden (1512- 1539) D
of Thos Arden, sister of Robert Arden (1506- 1556). 1st cousin of her husband.
Agnes
O’Dell/Hill Webb = Robert Arden (1506) His 2nd wife
The Arden family is one
of only three families in England that can trace its lineage to before the time
of William the Conqueror (James Lees-Milne.
Burke’s Peerage/Burke’s Landed
Gentry, volume 1, as cited in
Wikipedia, Arden family). The extensive biographical sketches of earls
and noteworthy members of the family can be found in A Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Commoners of Great Britain by
John Burke, pp 637-640.
To
judge from the ties the country bumpkin’s parents had with old, powerful
families of the upper classes and with Queen Catherine Parr, it should come as
no surprise that William Shakespeare understood their demeanor and language
well enough to incorporate it convincingly in his plays. Shakespeare’s family surely was proud to be
acquainted with and related to royalty, although for her Catholic relatives,
Queen Catherine Parr must have epitomized the religious conflict that was to
plague the country until the Roman Catholic Relief
Act, passed by Parliament in 1829.
Works
Consulted or Cited
Burke, John. A
Genealogical and Heraldic History of the Commoners of Great Britain by John
(See Wikipedia)
Case, Lois. The Green Family Genealogy January
20, 2015. Carl J. Case, Ph.D.,
ed, 16 Sunburst Lane, Allegany, NY
14706. ccase@sbu.edu
Enos, Carol Curt. “WEBBE/ARDEN/SHAKESPEARE Families.” Shakespeare’s Cheshire and Lancashire Connections and His Tangled Family Web. Parker, Colorado: Outskirts
Press, 2016.
Fab Pedigree. http://fabpedigree.com/s041/f376196.htm
Lees-Milne James Burke’s Peerage/Burke’s Landed Gentry, volume 1. (See Wikipedia)
Parr, Catherine. Complete
Works and Correspondence. Janel
Mueller, ed. Chicago: UP,
2011.
Stopes,
Charlotte Carmichael. The Third Earl of Southampton. Cambridge UP, 1922.
Tudor.com The Life and Family of Queen Katherine Parr
Wikipedia, Arden family. Reference to article by James Lees-Milne
in the 18th edition of Burke’s Peerage/Burke’s Landed Gentry, volume
1.
