On the ninth day of Christmas On the Tudor Trail gave to me the chance to win a copy of Margaret Tudor, Queen of Scots: The Life of King Henry VIII’s Sister, The Tudor Brandons and Lady Katherine Knollys by Sarah-Beth Watkins!

To be in the running to win this book pack, leave a comment after this post.

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This giveaway is open internationally.

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Margaret Tudor At Christmas

By Sarah-Beth Watkins

Margaret Tudor’s first Christmas with her new husband King James IV in 1503 was one of both pleasure and pain. After their wedding in November she had been looking forward to the season of festivities in Scotland known as Yule from the Old Norse jól, their word for the winter solstice. James was good at spoiling her and making sure she had everything she could wish for but his generosity masked his guilty conscience. Margaret had just found out about his mistresses and illegitimate children. Finding his children housed at Stirling Castle, she was furious and even more so when she realised that the king was still seeing his mistress Janet Kennedy housed at Darnaway Castle.

In my new book about Margaret I explain how she still managed to enjoy her first New Year Scotland.

And she was showered with even more gifts for New Year when James gave her a ‘“heavy ducat,” weighing an ounce of gold, … two rings, set with costly sapphires, and on the following day two pearl-studded crosses’. Her ladies were not left out and also received gifts of gold chains and jewellery. Her first New Year in Scotland may have made her homesick but James kept her thoroughly entertained with daily performances of plays and disguisings, music and feasting. Master John, the master of revels and also James’ physician and alchemist was charged with organising the performances including a morris dance ‘in which six male dancers, attired in dresses of red and white taffety, and one female dancer in a blue robe, all wearing head dresses of blue, red, and variant or various colours, performed sundry evolutions’. For Margaret, the festivities at the Scottish court were as good as at the English and she realised now that Scotland had truly become her home.

But by 1515 Margaret was fleeing Scotland after a disastrous term as regent. When the Duke of Albany assumed the regency he took her two sons into custody. He allowed her to see them regularly and she acquiesced to his governance in order to keep the peace. Her brother Henry VIII however was furious. Scotland had been a perpetual thorn in his side and he felt that Margaret had not done enough to retain control. Her eldest son James was heir to the throne and Henry wanted him in England where he could be raised loyal to the crown but Margaret knew her son would have no chance of gaining his inheritance if he crossed the border.  Instead Margaret escaped by herself, with plans to ask her brother for men, munitions and money to regain her regency.

Heavily pregnant by her second husband, the troublesome Earl of Angus, and severely ill she was travelling to Morpeth when her labour pains started and she was rerouted to Harbottle Castle where she gave birth to her daughter Margaret Douglas. Christmas 1515 was a terrible time for Henry VII’s daughter once so young and vibrant now torn between two countries and still suffering from excruciating sciatica. She managed to reach Morpeth however and there excitedly received 22 dresses from her brother. She told her husband and Lord Home ‘here you may see that the king, my brother, hath not forgotten me, and that he would not I should die for lack of clothes’.

In May Margaret was well enough to reach London and was warmily embraced by her brother and his wife, Katherine of Aragon. Although she was sorely missing her son James, Henry made sure that Christmas 1516 was one of the best she had ever experienced at Greenwich palace with no expense spared on elaborate entertainment and feasting.

‘On the day of the Epiphany at night, the King with eleven others, were disguised after the manner of Italy, called a mask: a thing not seen before in England. They were apparelled in garments long and broad, wrought all with gold, with visors and caps of gold. And after the banquet was done, these maskers came in, with six gentlemen disguised in silk bearing staff torches, and desired the ladies to dance’.

It was hard for Margaret to join in given her situation. She had to borrow £200 from Cardinal Wolsey for New Year Gifts but these were given with love and gratitude to her brother and his wife. Soon it would be time for her to return to Scotland and another tumultuous chapter in her life would begin.