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Didn't pay attention in history class? HowStuffWorks has you covered.
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Announcer
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class, from HowStuffWorks.com.
Katie Lambert
Hello and welcome to the podcast. I’m Katie Lambert.
Sarah Dowdy
And I’m Sarah Dowdy.
Katie Lambert
And we’ve talked about Queen Elizabeth I in a couple of podcasts, so you know that her reputation was that of the virgin Queen, and it’s a reputation she worked very hard to maintain all throughout her life. And it’s one that served her well.
Sarah Dowdy
Yeah, she was a game player. She encouraged suits from all sorts of Princes and fellow Englishmen, and deflected them adeptly.
Katie Lambert
She never married but she did have one great love, and his name was Robert Dudley. And to give a little background on Robert, they’d been friends since they were children. He said later in life, I have known her better than any man alive since she was eight years old.
Sarah Dowdy
And to sort of build up the myth that they shared, they both spent time in the tower together. It’s unlikely that they ever saw each other there. Elizabeth was kept under very tight security and Robert was actually married at the time. But it plays into the romantic myth.
Katie Lambert
Of course, they’re both doomed, they’re both imprisoned, and yet they find love quite close to home. But again it never happened. But you can understand why someone might be attracted to Robert. He was 6 feet tall, very attractive, dark skinned. Some called him the gypsy.
Sarah Dowdy
Which I really love because Elizabeth, of course, is the rose.
Katie Lambert
Exactly. Gypsy rose. Sarah thought this was really [inaudible]. he has red-brown hair and a mustache. He’s very active. He danced and sang, was a wonderful conversationalist, he was very well educated.
Sarah Dowdy
But he’s also from a rather traitorous family. He’s of Northumberland, who is involved in treason. So he doesn’t have the best pedigree when it comes to being loyal to the Monarch.
Katie Lambert
And he is of course of too common birth to be considered an appropriate suitor for a Queen. So that’s something we’ll keep in mind. But he was married to someone else, a woman named Amy, and it was a love match and a very happy marriage, at least at first.
Sarah Dowdy
So that’s Robert and Elizabeth’s personal history. But he makes his public entrance into her life when she appoints him master of the horse the day after she ascends to the throne. And if you don’t know what that job is, it’s pretty important. It’s to purchase, breed, train and maintain the Queen and the Court’s horses. And for somebody like Elizabeth who goes on a grand progress every year, that’s a big deal.