Tudors Versus Stewarts; The Fatal Inheritance of Mary, Queen of Scots

Porter, Linda

ISBN 10: 0312590741 / ISBN 13: 9780312590741

Published by St. Martin's Press, New York, 2013

About this Item

xi, [7], 523, [1] pages. Illustrations. Dramatic Personae. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Black dot on top edge. Linda Porter was born in Exeter, Devon in 1947. On completing her postgraduate work she moved to New York, where she lived for almost a decade, lecturing at Fordham University and the City University of New York. Three of her books have been published and she is currently doing research and writing on a fourth. Porter has had a varied career. She has worked as a journalist and been a senior adviser on international public relations to a major telecommunications company. She has always stayed close to her roots as an historian. In 2004 she was the winner of the Biographers Club/Daily Mail prize which launched her on a new career as an author. Her first book, Mary Tudor: The First Queen was published in 2007. Derived from a Kirkus review: Porter again draws from her exhaustive knowledge of 16th-century British history to explain the strong ties that eventually united Scotland and England. Beginning with the ascent of Henry VII in 1485 and the start of the Tudor dynasty, the author explains the many threats against his reign, including imposters, uprisings and constant border skirmishes. Henry sent his daughter, Margaret, to marry the future James IV, the first step toward union. Porter clearly shows the ways in which Scotland was used by the English and French against each other, always at the expense of the Scots. Henry VIII reigned and was bent on recovering England's territories in France. Regents ruled for James V until he wed Mary of Guise in 1538. That union produced Mary Queen of Scots, widowed Dauphine of France who, at age 24, was a deposed queen facing 19 years of imprisonment. Her son united Scotland and England in 1603. A wonderfully thorough history of the Scot. First U. S. Edition [Stated], First Printing [Stated].

Seller Inventory # 75930

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Tudors Versus Stewarts; The Fatal Inheritance of Mary, Queen of Scots
• Publisher: St. Martin's Press, New York
• Publication Date: 2013
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 0312590741
• ISBN 13: 9780312590741
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Very good
• Dust Jacket Condition: Very good

About this title

Synopsis

The war between the fertile Stewarts and the barren Tudors was crucial to the history of the British Isles in the sixteenth century. The legendary struggle, most famously embodied by the relationship between Elizabeth I and her cousin, Mary Queen of Scots, was fuelled by three generations of powerful Tudor and Stewart monarchs. It was the marriage of Margaret Tudor, elder sister of Henry VIII, to James IV of Scotland in 1503 that gave the Tudors a claim to the English throne―a claim which became the acknowledged ambition of Mary Queen of Scots and a major factor in her downfall.

Here is the story of divided families, of flamboyant kings and queens, cultured courts and tribal hatreds, blood feuds, rape and sexual license, of battles and violent deaths. It brings alive a neglected aspect of British history―the blood-spattered steps of two small countries on the northern fringes of Europe towards the union of their crowns. Beginning with the dramatic victories of two usurpers, Henry VII in England and James IV in Scotland, in the late fifteenth century, Linda Porter's Tudors Versus Stewarts sheds new light on Henry VIII, his daughter Elizabeth I and on his great-niece, Mary Queen of Scots, still seductive more than 400 years after her death.

About the Author

Linda Porter has a Ph.D. in history from the University of York, England. She was the winner of the 2004 Biographers Club/Daily Mail prize in England and is the author of The Myth of "Bloody Mary", also available from St. Martin's Press. She is married with one daughter and lives near London.