#matilda shall we date

[hhoneypop]

@hhoneypop. — “ could get out of my hands when you lie in my bed, been tryna take it slow. . . ”

[memoria-99]

Drew something for Blood in Roses!

Like in WH, I slightly changed something about the canon characters and added my OCs.

Unlike WH though, didn't changed much about canon ones cuz they are already interesting.

So what I changed are...

Witch MC's power. She looked kinda powerless as a witch compared to the hunter MC. So for the balance, I decided to make her more powerful. Now she's a genius in potions, including the one giving life to lifeless beings(like creating Rosapast), and the master of curse and blessings.

Hunter MC's name. I can't agree both MCs could have a same name when their history and appearance are different. I think the devs were just too lazy to give another name for the second one. I call her Ruby, because that was the first name that came to mind when I saw her. I think it quite suits her eye and hair color. So the witch MC is Mina, and the hunter MC is Ruby for me.

I didn't change anything for Bridget and Matilda. I decided they're more than fine just the way they already are.

And there are my two OCs.

The silver haired one is Clara, the daughter born between Tatiana and Harold.

The dark blue haired one is Alice, the incarnation of the blue rose.

I'll write more infos about these two in another post.

[ind1exo]

Like how he's been doing it the whole time like a scardy little bi-

Clearly you haven't seen the mf make tons of getaways, Evan. Lol goodness Matilda. As goofy as it is, it's true. Finn and Evan are the it members of the Hooded Bois Supremacy!

From what I've seen in the other routes of this Killer Kenneth saga, Matilda can really give Evan a run for his money. Let's leave it to her!

[reeselovesfoblog]

Introduction ✨

Hi! My name is Reese and as you can tell I’m a self shipper lol. I love these guys and they love me :3

PRIMARY F/O’S! DO NOT INTERACT IF WE SHARE THEM! (Purple means they’re REALLY special to me ;-;):

Riff Raff (Rocky Horror Show) (Tag: 🔫I’m your new commander, you now are my prisoner)

Magenta (Rocky Horror Show) (Tag: ☠️ When shall we return to Transylvania?!)

(Let me clarify. DO NOT INTERACT IF YOU ARE A RIFFGENTA SHIPPER! I ship my s/i with them both but they are NOT dating each other in my head! THEY’RE BROTHER AND SISTER FFS!)

MAIN F/O! I WOULD PREFER IF YOU DIDN’T INTERACT WITH ME IF WE SHARE THEM UNLESS WE ARE MUTUALS/FRIENDS BUT I WON’T SEND HATE TO YOU IF WE SHARE DW (Purple means they’re REALLY special to me ;-;):

Penny Pocket (Balamory) (Tag: ➕ Count on me, one two three!)

Rudi (Me Too!) (Tag: 🥔 The market is a wonderful place!)

Louie (Me Too!) (Tag: 🎺 I wouldn’t have a cup of coffee on this buffet car for all the tea in china)

SECONDARY F/OS: YOU CAN INTERACT IF YOU ARE WITH THEM, THEY DESERVE BITCHES:

Mickey Altieri (Scream 2) (Tag: 🔪It's a perfect example of life imitating art imitating life)

Honey Lemon (Big Hero 6) (Tag: ⚗️ WOO! Now THAT'S a chemical reaction!)

Cosmo McKinley (Shock Treatment) (Tag: 🧠 With neurosis in perfusion)

Nation McKinley (Shock Treatment) (Tag: 💉 And psychosis in your soul)

Rick (The Young Ones) (Tag: 🛼 What have you done, turned it into a roller disco?)

Rest Home Ricky (Shock Treatment) (Tag: 📷 Young male intern, tall and handsome)

Raymond (Me Too!) (Tag: 🚝 I’ll do a trick and make the journey quick)

Tina (Me Too!) (Tag: 🚕 People wave me down in my pretty pink taxi)

Mickey John (Me Too!) (Tag: 📚 School Day Work Away)

QUEERPLATONIC PARTNER! SHE MEANS SO MUCH TO ME!!!

Bobby (Me Too!) (Tag: 🚎 Ready to dazzle the day away!)

FAMILY, THESE GUYS ARE MY FAMILY, I LOVE THEM PLATONICALLY <3:

Pamela Voorhees (Friday the 13th) (mom)

Miss Honey (Matilda) (mom)

Miss Hoolie (Balamory) (mom)

Edie McCredie (Balamory) (aunt)

Gale Weathers/Riley (Scream) (Aunt)

Jason Voorhees (Friday the 13th) (Brother)

Amanda Young (Saw) (Sister)

Columbia (Rocky Horror Show) (Sister)

Nurse Ansalong (Shock Treatment) (Sister)

Musa (Winx Club) (Sister)

Casey Becker (Scream) (Sister)

Noel Gruber (Ride The Cyclone) (Cousin)

Constance Blackwood (Ride The Cyclone) (Cousin)

Neil (The Young Ones) (Brother)

Matilda (Matilda. All versions) (Sister)

Mo (Horrible Histories 2011) (Daughter)

Stitch (Horrible Histories 2001) (Son)

Whyatt/Super Why (Super Why) (Son)

Pig/Alpha Pig (Super Why) (Son)

Red Riding Hood/Wonder Red (Super Why) (Daughter)

Princess Pea/Princess Presto (Super Why) (Daughter)

Lisa (Me Too!) (Stepdaughter)

Jack (Me Too!) (Stepson)

Rebecca (Me Too!) (Stepdaughter)

Kai (Me Too!) (“Nephew”) (or whatever you call your QPPs kid)

MY DEAR FRIENDS:

Tecna (Winx Club)

Helia (Winx Club)

Flora (Winx Club)

Hiro Hamarda (Big Hero 6)

Gogo (Big Hero 6)

Wasabi (Big Hero 6)

Fred (Big Hero 6)

Baymax (Big Hero 6)

Tatum Riley (Scream)

Sidney Prescott (Scream)

Randy Meeks (Scream)

Derek Feldman (Scream)

Jill Roberts (Scream)

Kirby (Scream)

Michael Myers (Halloween)

Eddie (Rocky Horror Show)

Rocky (Rocky Horror Show)

Brad Majors (Rocky Horror Show/Shock Treatmenr)

Janet Weiss/Majors (Rocky Horror Show/Shock Treatment)

Frank N Furter (Rocky Horror Show)

Neely Pritt (Shock Treatment)

Betty Hapschatt (Shock Treatment)

Judge Oliver Wright (Shock Treatment)

Ocean O’Connell Rosenberg (Ride The Cyclone)

Mischa Bachinski (Ride The Cyclone)

Ricky Potts (Ride The Cyclone)

Jane Doe/Penny Lamb (Ride The Cyclone/Legoland)

Luigi (Mario)

Daisy (Mario)

Vyvenne (The Young Ones)

Mike Thecoolperson (The Young Ones)

Granny Murray (Me Too!)

Dr Juno (Me Too!)

Chuck (Me Too!)

Nurse Hendry (Me Too!)

Suzie Sweet (Balamory)

Archie (Balamory)

Spencer (Balamory)

Josie Jump (Balamory)

(More to be added if I can remember more :3)

BASIC RULES:

1. No proshippers -_-

2. No bigotry

3. No being fucking weird

[charlesandmartine]

Wednesday 1 March 2023

The start of autumn today and two weeks before we have to start our journey home.

Longreach was only to be seen as an overnight stop to break an otherwise too long a journey. However it has been really interesting and sitting at the bar overlooking the main street on our high stools drinking Aussie beer we people watched, albeit a fairly quiet evening, all signs of life on the thoroughfare. Further up Eagle Street the cops were working a pincer movement on unsuspecting traffic, breathalyzing anything that moved. In cities folk predominantly drive town cars, saloons. In rural towns the SUVs take over. Out here in the outback the heavier trucks are almost universally used; bull horns to protect from kangaroo strikes, large 2 way radio antenna on front bumper, true off-road capability and of course 4WD. Still, our little tin SUV is fine on sealed roads pretty much but even these in the intense heat are buckling somewhat.

The motel was very different from most. It was called the Staging Post but the rooms were across the road in a stables layout but no parking allowed. Instead, where cars might have parked, old carts and vintage trucks are positioned in a casual nonchalant sort of way amidst seating areas. Very atmospheric. Longreach was on the Cobb& Co stagecoach route, and one such coach was on display across the road. This boneshaker would have carried 14 fare paying people from Longreach to Winton. Scary thought.

Longreach has some interesting stuff on offer. For us at this time of year it's very quiet, however in April the hordes shall appear. It seems Longreach is more on a tourist route than perhaps we thought. We were alone in the tourist information centre, but the nice lady said that come April she will be talking to 400 people a day! We asked for things to do in an hour and a half. Top is the Qantas Founder Museum. This was their first flight Operation Centre although it was founded in 1920 at Winton. Longreach today has a DC-3, a Super Constellation, Boeing 707 and more lately a 747. There's a runway next to the museum which provided the means of delivery for this huge 747, Spirit of Australia aircraft, however due to the lack of runway length, all seats were removed, only 2 very brave, optimistic or certifiable pilots aboard, sufficient fuel to take them to Townsville as a plan B and only used 2 engines on landing. In this manner they got it down and parked it under the canopy. It will never get out again. We had a look at the extremely quaint little railway station which runs trains twice a week from Longreach to Brisbane along narrow gauge track. We have never actually seen a train on this line but they assure us they do run.

Winton is our next stop for 3 nights and is also our furthest north west destination. It was 40 degrees in the shade on the 180km journey here. We sat on the Matilda Highway all the way, hardly saw another car and didn't pass through any towns, villages or even hamlet. Australian opinion about us visiting Winton varies from where's that, there's nothing there why go there, to great place. We have checked into the North Gregory Hotel which has had a slightly unfortunate history. To date it has burned down 3 times. We are being very careful to extinguish all fires we might light. To us Winton is a comly place. It came about when Englishman Robert Allen, a policeman from Aramac in Queensland resigned his post and decided to set up camp here in 1875. His camp was in a place called Pelican Waterhole (pelicans came to a waterhole there) and for a time he served as an unofficial postmaster and he soon tired of writing pelican waterhole so renamed it Winton, because it used less pencil and also after the town of his birth. He built a hotel and a business and lived happily ever after. Winton however is certainly a town of surprises. No other than Banjo Paterson who famously in 1895 wrote Waltzing Matilda. So in his honour there now stands in this fair town a Waltzing Matilda Museum and a commemorative statue to Banjo and also for all the swagmen who lie in unmarked graves. And so to the big one...

In 1999 David and Judy Elliott were mustering sheep when they came upon part of a femur of a Cretaceous Sauropod, as you do. More fossils were to follow. Then in 2005 again whilst mustering sheep again, this time nearby in Belmont, a whole load more were unearthed. We are going tomorrow on a half day red dirt tour bouncing along unsealed tracks to see these sites most importantly where actual dinosaur footprints have been discovered from 95 million years ago. You'd have thought someone would have swept up at sometime since then!

We have concluded the day with a jolly nice meal at the hillbilly pub across the road. Nice food, nice beer and fantastic flies.

ps The water here smells of a school chemistry lab. Very sulphuric but harmless they say.......

[fantasy-dating-sim-trash]

NOT ME FREAKING OUT ABOUT THE SOUND TRACK FROM THE RECENT EVENT

In CHAPTER TWO BEING LIKE THIS SOUNDS FAMILIAR

And it SOUNDS LIKE THE SOUND TRACK FROM THE BLOODN ROSES GAME

LIKE BRO I PLAYED THAT GAME FOR AGES AND I STILL SO OF COURSE I RECOGNIZE THE MUSIC

I absolutely love that GAME

PLUS I AM A LITTLE BIT OF AN AUDIO NUT

And I think Voice actors and music in games is way too under appreciated

So I pay attention to it

Plus I played that game (still do) when it only had 2 characters out (I fell out of playing it for a while bit now I'm back) and they were Rupert and his brother. MAN

LIKE THE FACT THEY'RE USING THAT AUDIO FROM ONE GAME I LIVE IN ANOTHER MAKES ME SO HAPPY

It DHOWS UP WHEN U GET TO THE AUFIO IN CHATPER 2-2

Right when u see Mammon alone with the mask on and I'm FREAKING OUT

AhhhhhhhHhHHHHHHHHBHB

[mallorygrayson]

Oh it's nothing I'm just hanging out with my wives having a good time and all

[yaassu]

Keep him off the kitchen 🤧

[sailorgeeky]

🌹 New character announcement for SWD’s Blood in Roses+ 🌹 (finally a new female route!!!)

Matilda is scheduled to be released in mid-January.

[otomechuchu]

SWD - Blood in Roses - Matilda released

Matilda was released today, Jan 16 2020, in Blood in Roses.

I completely forgot to post a reminder yesterday... sorry! (since there was a 24 hours announcement for her).

[floresanlamba]

She is right

[gileschristophe]

YES!!!! YESSSSSS!!!!!

[astral--horrorshow]

Fandoms I Write For

☆TV Shows☆

Kuroshitsuji/ Black Butler

K-ON!

Toilet-Bound Hanako-Kun

Bungou Stray Dogs (S1)

Mieruko Chan

Nichijou/My Ordinary Life

Spy x Family

Kakegurui

The Promised Neverland (S1)

The Way of the House-Husband

Star Vs the Forces of Evil (S1)

Ducktales (2017)

Count Duckula (1988)

Danger Mouse (2015)

Invader ZIM

Derry Girls

Freakazoid!

Gregory Horror Show

Popee the Performer

Animaniacs (1992 & 2020)

Spooky Month

Superjail!

The Powerpuff Girls

The Powerpuff Girls Z

Smiling Friends

Carmen Sandiego

Bigtop Burger

Rise of the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles

The Cuphead Show!

Hazbin Hotel

Helluva Boss

The Disastrous Life of Saiki K.

☆Video Games☆

Twisted Wonderland

Cookie Run: Kingdom

Postal 2

Five Nights at Freddy's

Five Nights at Candy's

Bugsnax

Smile for Me

Friday Night Funkin'

Doki Doki Literature Club!

Dark Deception

Obey Me! Shall We Date?

Bendy and the Ink Machine

Cuphead: Don't Deal With The Devil

Little Nightmares

Little Nightmares 2

River City Girls

John Doe

MazM: Jekyll and Hyde

Psychonauts

☆Comics/Manga☆

Johnny the Homicidal Maniac

I Feel Sick

Squee!

The Rise of the TMNT IDW Comics

☆Movies☆

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Mutant Mayhem (2023)

 Howl’s Moving Castle

Heathers (1989)

Jennifer's Body

Ready or Not (2019)

A Goofy Movie

An Extremely Goofy Movie

Bad Ronald (1974)

Barbie (2023)

Beetlejuice (1988)

Home Alone (1990)

Little Shop of Horrors (1986)

NOPE (2022)

The Banana Spilts Movie

Osmosis Jones

Corpse Bride

The Nightmare Before Christmas

Coraline

Bird Box

The Bad Guys (2022)

The Black Phone

Who Framed Rodger Rabbit

Jurrasic Park

Austin Powers

The Batman (2022)

JAWS

Ace Ventura: Pet Detective

Matilda

Legally Blonde

Space Jam

Spider Man: Into the Spiderverse

Spider Man: Across the Spiderverse

A Quiet Place

Spirited Away

Whisper of the Heart

The Cat Returns

K-12

The Lion King (1994)

☆Books☆

Howl's Moving Castle

The Hunger Games

Percy Jackson and the Olympians

The Bad Guys

Miss Peregrines Home For Peculiar Children

Fazbear Frights

Tales From the Pizzaplex

☆Other☆

Welcome Home (ARG)

Ride the Cyclone (Musical)

The Sounds of Nightmares (Podcast)

[ind1exo]

Matildoll.

[blakebbgirl22]

Hospital Birth:

This is my first time writing so please be gentle with critiques.

This is a first time momma who’s baby is estimated to be 11 lbs 9 oz. Her constructions have just started and being her first baby she rushes to the hospital.

Emma is only 3 cm dilated upon arriving at the hospital but because she’s 10 days past her due date the hospital admits her.

Natie: Hi Emma, I’m Natie and I’ll be your nurse until tomorrow morning. Let’s get you up and walking shall we?

Emma walks rounds around the labor and deliver floor before retiring to her room. As the next few hours the contractions become more intense. Coming about every 15 minutes lasting for two minutes each.

Natie: It sounds like someone is making progress in here! Let’s check you and see how far you’ve come in the bast three hours. …your 5 centimeters, half way there.

Emma: Only 5?

Emma is disappointed and feels like she’s already in a good amount of pain.

Natie: This is your first baby, labor can last from 12-36 hours for new moms and you’re only 8 hours in. Let’s get you on the bouncing ball to roll your hips. That should help you progress.

Over the the next 4 hours Emma peaks at 7 cm. She stays here for over an hour and a half. With no progress being made head nurse Matilda makes the decision to break Emma’s water.

Matilda: Okay Emma, we’re going to break your water and see if that helps get things going. Put your feet together and let your knees fall apart. (Breaks water)

Emma: I want an epidural! Please I can’t do this anymore, I’m exhausted.

Matilda: I’ll send for one but know that that means you won’t be able to get out of bed after that.

Emma: I don’t care, I just want to fall asleep, she cries.

Emma receives an epidural and waits for it to take affect. By this time she’s dilated to 8 cm and begins to transition into the most intense part of labor.

Emma: When is this epidural going to kick in?! Ah ah ah! Please help me!

Matilda: Let’s do some breathing. Breathe with me. He he hooo he he hoo. And again, he he hooo, he he hoo. If it hasn’t started to take affect there’s a chance you’re one of the few it doesn’t work for.

Emma: What?! No! I can’t do this without it! Gooooood I need to push! Oooowwwww! What is that feeling?!

Matilda: Don’t push we need to check you first. Are you feeling a low pressure?

Emma: I don’t know I just feel like I need to push!

Matilda: You’re about 9 and a half centimeters, keep breathing and I’ll call Dr.Rod.

Dr.Rod: Hi I’m doctor rod and I’ll be delivering you today. Let’s go ahead and get these legs up and see if you can push through the slight lip that’s left.

Matilda puts spreads Emma’s legs in wide stirrups.

Dr.Rod: Matilda is going to count and your going to push for as long as she counts and take big breaths in between. And push.

Emma bears down for 4 counts before letting out a scream. Dr. Rod inserts two fingers and feels for any remaining cervix.

Dr. Rod: Your cervix is almost completely thinned, jeep in your screams and push.

Emma pushes for 8 seconds

Dr. Rod: Chin to your chest, keep going.

Emma pushes for another 4 seconds.

Dr. Rod: Good girl, breath an take a break.

Emma let’s out a small groan and she lets her air out and rests. Panting until her breathing steadies two minutes later.

Dr. Rod: Here comes another contraction, go ahead and push. Push harder. Harder. (He reached in and check her cervix)

Emma: AAAAAAAH!

Dr. Rod: Keep going! Good girl, you’re fully dilated.

Emma pushes like this for an hour, pushing for nearly 15 seconds every breath.

Emma: can you see the head?

Dr. Rod: Not yet, pull your legs back and push again. (Inserts two fingers and pushes down) Push my fingers out! Harder. Go! Good girl.

The baby descends into the birth canal

Emma: There’s so much pressure!! Aahhh, oooooowwwww!!!

Dr.Rod: Yep that’s your baby, I can feel the top of his head. I’m going to start stretching you so you don’t tear.

Emma: Ow no please stooop!! Aaahhhh!!

Dr. Rod: Push! Harder! Harder! And again right back into it. Don’t stop. Push!

Emma: Ow it burns!! Ow ow ow!!!!It’s burning!!

Dr. Rod: Push again, go!I can see the head.

The head peaks out and slips back in for 30 minutes.

Dr. Rod: He’s right here, pull your legs back and push Now! Harder! (Pulls the bottom of her two lips apart) Push right here! Harder!

The head reaches a full crown

Dr. Rod: Stop pushing and pant. Pant! Now rest here and let him stretch you.

Emma: I can’t do this (she cries)!

Dr. Rod: You have to. You can do it, deep breath in and bear down.

The head begins sliding out.

Dr. Rod: Stop pushing and pant the rest of the head out.

Emma begins to push harder

Dr. Rod: Stop! Now pant it out slowly.

Emma: I have to push!!!! It burns!!!

Dr. Rod: Pant!

The head slides out

Dr. Rod: Push for the shoulders! Go! Push harder! Harder!

Emma screams as the shoulders pop out and the baby slides out to its belly.

Dr. Rod: Last push for the hips.

Emma: Just pull it out!!!

Dr. Rod: No. Now push!!

Emma pushes and delivers a healthy 12 lbs 9 oz baby boy.

Let me know what you all want to read next.

[minervacasterly]

“Henry VIII was at Whitehall Palace when the Tower guns signaled that he was once more a free man. He then appeared dressed in white mourning as a token of respect for his late queen, called for his barge, and had himself rowed at full speed to the Strand, where Jane Seymour had also heard the guns. News of Anne Boleyn’s death had been formally conveyed to her by Sir Francis Bryan; it does not seem to have unduly concerned her, for she spent the greater part of the day preparing her wedding clothes, and perhaps reflecting upon the ease with which she had attained her ambition: Anne Boleyn had had to wait seven years for her crown; Jane had waited barely seven months.

It was common knowledge that Henry would marry Jane as soon as possible; the Privy Council had already petitioned him to venture once more into the perilous seas of holy wedlock, and it was a plea of the utmost urgency due to the uncertainty surrounding the succession. Both the King’s daughters had been declared bastards, and his natural son Richmond was obviously dying. A speedy marriage was therefore not only desirable but necessary, and on the day Anne Boleyn died the King’s imminent betrothal to Jane Seymour was announced to a relieved Privy Council. This was news as gratifying to the imperialist party, who had vigorously promoted the match, as it would soon be to the people of England at large, who would welcome the prospect of the imperial alliance with its inevitable benefits to trade.

Although the future Queen had rarely been seen in public, stories of her virtuous behavior during the King’s courtship had been circulated and applauded. Chapuys, more cynical, perceived that such virtue had had an ulterior motive, and privately thought it unlikely that Jane had reached the age of twenty-five without having lost her virginity, ‘being an Englishwoman and having been so long’ at court where immorality was rife. However, he assumed that Jane’s likely lack of a maidenhead would not trouble the King very much, ‘since he may marry her on condition she is a maid, and when he wants a divorce there will be plenty of witnesses ready to testify that she was not’. This apart, Chapuys and most other people considered Jane to be well endowed with all the qualities then thought becoming in a wife: meekness, docility and quiet dignity. Jane had been well groomed for her role by her family and supporters, and was in any case determined not to follow the example of her predecessor. She intended to use her influence to further the causes she held dear, as Anne Boleyn had, but, being of a less mercurial temperament, she would never use the same tactics. 

Jane’s well-publicized sympathy for the late Queen Katherine and the Lady Mary showed her to be compassionate, and made her a popular figure with the common people and most of the courtiers. Overseas, she would be looked upon with favour because she was known to be an orthodox Catholic with no heretical tendencies whatsoever, one who favoured the old ways and who might use her influence to dissuade the King from continuing with his radical religious reforms.

Jane was of medium height, with a pale, nearly white, complexion. ‘Nobody thinks she has much beauty,’ commented Chapuys, and the French ambassador thought her too plain. Holbein’s portrait of Jane, painted in 1536 and now in the Kunsthistorisches Museum, Vienna, bears out these statements, and shows her to have been fair with a large, resolute face, small slanting eyes and a pinched mouth. She wears a sumptuously bejeweled and embroidered gown and head-dress, the latter in the whelk-shell fashion so favoured by her; Holbein himself designed the pendant on her breast, and the lace at her wrists. This portrait was probably by his first royal commission after being appointed the King’s Master Painter in September 1536; a preliminary sketch for it is in the Royal Collection at Windsor, and a studio copy is in the Mauritshuis in The Hague. Holbein executed one other portrait of Jane during her lifetime. Throughout the winter of 1536-7, he was at work on a huge mural in the Presence Chamber in Whitehall mural no longer exists, having been destroyed when the palace burned down in the late seventeenth century. Fortuitously, Charles II had before then commissioned a Dutch artists, Remigius van Leemput, to make two small copies, now in the Royal Collection and at Petworth House. His style shows little of Holbein’s draughtsmanship, but his pictures at least give us a clear impression of what the original must have looked like. The figure of Jane is interesting in that we can see her long court train with her pet poodle resting on it. Her gown is of cloth of gold damask, lined with ermine, with six ropes of pearls slung across the bodice, and more pearls hanging in a girdle to the floor. Later portraits of Jane, such as those in long-gallery sets and the miniature by Nicholas Hilliard, all derive from this portrait of Holbein’s original likeness now in Vienna, yet they are mostly mechanical in quality and anatomically awkward. 

However, it was not Jane’s face that had attracted the King so much as the fact that she was Anne Boleyn’s opposite in every way. Where Anne had been bold and fond of having her own way, Jane showed herself entirely subservient to Henry’s will; where Anne had, in the King’s view been a wanton, Jane had shown herself to be inviolably chaste. And where Anne had been ruthless, he believed Jane to be naturally compassionate. He would be in years to come remember her as the fairest, the most discreet, and the most meritorious of all his wives.

Her contemporaries thought she had a pleasing sprightliness about her. She was pious, but not ostentatiously so. Reginald Pole, soon to be made a cardinal, described her as ‘full of goodness’, although Martin Luther, hearing of her reactionary religious views, feared her as ‘an enemy of the Gospel’. According to Chapuys, she was not clever or witty, but ‘of good understanding’. As queen, she made a point of distancing herself from her inferiors, and could be remote and arrogant, being a stickler for the observance of etiquette at her court. Chapuys feared that, once Jane had had a taste of queenship, she would forget her good intentions towards the Lady Mary, but his fears proved unfounded. Jane remained loyal to her supporters, and to Mary’s cause, and in the months to come would endeavor to heal the rift between the King and his daughter.

-          Alison Weir, The Six Wives of Henry VIII

“A story of a later date had Queen Anne finding Mistress Seymour actually sitting on her husband’s lap; ‘betwitting’ the King, Queen Anne blamed her miscarriage upon this unpleasant discovery. There was said to have been ‘much scratching and bye-blows between the queen and her maid’. Unlike the King’s invocations of the divine will, however, there is no contemporary evidence for such robust incidents; the character of Jane Seymour that emerges in 1536 is on the contrary chaste, verging on the prudish. As we shall see, there is good reason to believe that the King found in this very chastity a source of attraction; as he had once turned to the enchantress Anne Boleyn from the virtuous Catherine. Yet before turning to Jane Seymour’s personal qualities for better or for worse, it is necessary to consider the family from which she came … The Seymours were a family of respectable and even ancient antecedents in an age when, as has already been stressed, such things were important. Their Norman ancestry – the name was originally St Maur – was somewhat shadowy although a Seigneur Wido de Saint Maur was said to have come over to England with the Conquest. More immediately,  from Monmouthshire and Penbow Castle, the Seymours transferred to the west of England in the mid-fourteenth century with the marriage of Sir Roger Seymour to Cecily eventual sole heiress of Lord Beauchamp of Hache. Other key marriages brought the family prosperity. Wolf Hall in Wiltshire, for example (scene of Henry’s autum idyll with Jane if legend is to be believed) came with the marriage of a Seymour to Matilda Esturmy, daughter of the Speaker of Commons, in 1405. Another profitable union, bringing with it mercantile links similar to those of the Boleyns, was that of Isabel, daughter and heiress of Mark William Mayor of Bristol, to a Seymour in 1424. Sir John Seymour, father of Jane, was born in about 1474 and had been knighted in the field by Henry VII at the battle of Blackheath which ended a rebellion of 1497. From this promising start, he went on to enjoy the royal favour throughout the next reign. Like Sir Thomas Boleyn, he accompanied Henry VIII on his French campaign of 1513, was present at the Field of Cloth of Gold, attended at Canterbury to meet Charles V; by 1532 he had become a Gentleman of the Bedchamber. Locally, again echoing the career of Thomas Boleyn, he had acted as Sheriff of both Wiltshire and Dorset. It was a career that lacked startling distinction – here was no Charles Brandon ending up a duke – but one which brought him close to the monarch throughout his adult life. Sir John’s reputation was that of a ‘gentle, courteous man’. That again was pleasant but not startling. But there was something outstanding about him, or at least about his immediate family. Sir John himself came of a family of eight children; then his own wife gave birth to ten children – six sons and four daughters. All this was auspicious for his daughter, including the number of males conceived at a time when women’s ‘aptness to procreate children’ in Wolsey’s phrase about Anne Boleyn, was often judged by their family record. It was however from her mother, Margery Wentworth – once again echoing the pattern of Anne Boleyn – that Jane Seymour derived that qualifying dash of royal blood so important to a woman viewed as possible breeding stock. Margery Wentworth was descended from Edward III, via her great-great-grandmother Elizabeth Mortimer, Lady Hotspur. Indeed, in one sense – that of English royal blood – Jane Seymour was better born than Anne Boleyn, since she descended from Edward III, whereas Anne Boleyn’s more remote descent was from Edward I. This Mortimer connection meant that Jane and Henry VIII were fifth cousins. But of course neither the Wentworths nor the Seymours were as grand as Anne Boleyn’s maternal family, the ducal Howards. The Seymours may not have been particularly grand, but close connections to the court had made them, by the generation of Jane herself, astute and worldly wise. Sir John Seymour was over sixty at the inception of the King’s romance with his daughter (and would in fact die before the end of the year 1536); even before that the dominant male figure in Jane’s life seems to have been her eldest surviving brother Edward, described by one observer about this time as both ‘young and wise’. Being young, he was ambitious, and being wise, able to keep his own counsel in pursuit of his plans. Contemporaries found him slightly aloof – he lacked the easy charm of his younger brother Thomas p but they did not doubt his intelligence. Edward Seymour was cultivated as well as clever; he was a humanist and also, as it turned out, genuinely interested in the tenets of the reformed religion (unlike his sister Jane) … The vast family of Sir John Seymour began with four boys: John (who died), Edward, Henry and Thomas, born in about 1508. A few years later the King would speak ‘merrily’ of handsome Tom’s proverbial virility. He was confident that a man armed with ‘such lust and youth’ would be able to please a bride ‘well at all points’. Then came Jane, probably born in 1509, the fifth child but the eldest girl. After that followed Elizabeth, Dorothy and Margery; two sons who died in the sweating sickness epidemic of 1528 made up the ten. Apart from her presumed fertility, what else did Jane Seymour, now in her mid-twenties (the age incidentally at which Anne Boleyn had attracted the King’s attention), have to offer? Polydore Vergil gave the official flattering view when he described her as ‘a woman of the utmost charm both in appearance and character’, and the King’s best friend Sir John Russell called her ‘the fairest of all his wives’ – but this again was likely to loyalty to Jane Seymour’s dynastic significance. From other sources, it seems likely that the charm of her character considerably outweighed the charm of her appearance: Chapuys for example described her as ‘of middle stature and no great beauty’. Her most distinctive aspect was her famously ‘pure white’ complexion. Holbein gives her a long nose, and firm mouth, with the lips slightly compressed, although her face has a pleasing oval shape with the high forehead then admired (enhanced sometimes by discreet plucking of the hairline) and set off by the headdress of the time. Altogether, if Anne Boleyn conveys the fascination of the new, there is a dignified but slightly stolid look to Jane Seymour, appropriately reminiscent of English medieval consorts. But the predominant impression given by her portrait – at the hands of a master of artistic realism – is of a woman of calm and good sense. And contemporaries all commented on Jane Seymour’s intelligence: in this she was clearly more like her cautious brother Edward than her dashing brother Tom. She was also naturally sweet-natured (no angry words or tantrums here) and virtuous – her virtue was another topic on which there was general agreement.

 ... Her survival as a lady-in-waiting to two Queens at the Tudor court still with a  spotless reputation may indeed be seen as a testament to both Jane Seymour’s salient characteristics – virtue and common good sense . A Bessie Blount or Madge Shelton might fool around, Anne Boleyn might listen or even accede to the seductive wooings of Lord Percy: but Jane Seymour was unquestionably virginal. In short, Jane Seymour was exactly the kind of female praised by the contemporary handbooks to correct conduct; just as Anne Boleyn had been the sort they warned against. There was certainly no threatening sexuality about her. Nor is it necessary to believe that her ‘virtue’ was in some way hypocritically assumed, in order to intrigue the King (romantic advocates of Anne Boleyn have sometimes taken this line). On the contrary, Jane Seymour was simply fulfilling the expectations for a female of her time and class: it was Anne Boleyn who was – or rather who had been – the fascinating outsider.

-          Antonia Fraser, The Wives of Henry VIII

“Whilst Jane was always denied a political role, her political interests are clear. She favoured Mary, attempted to save the monasteries and sympathized with the rebels during the Pilgrimages of Grace. Jane’s politics were largely conservative. Her strong character is visible both by her ruthlessness in watching the fall of Anne Boleyn and in the way in which she ruled her household. Jane could have been a queen as strong and influential as Catherine of Aragon or Anne Boleyn had been in the early years of their marriages. Unfortunately for Jane, when the opportunity finally arose with the birth of her son, she did not survive. Had Jane lived, as the mother of the king’s heir, she could have asserted her authority safe in the knowledge that her position was finally secure. After Henry’s death, when Jane’s son was only nine years old, she would have had a very strong claim to the regency as the mother of the king. Jane Seymour could have been so much more and, whilst it is possible to glimpse her potential, much of what she could have achieved will forever be speculation. Jane did not live to take on the political role that would have been open to her as the mother of the heir to the throne and her real legacy is her son, Edward VI, and the prominence of her brothers, Edward and Thomas Seymour. Although Henry would go on to have another three wives after Jane’s death, Edward was his only son and, on Henry’s death in January 1547, he became king aged nine as Edward VI Edward was hailed by many in England as a future great king and Jane would have been proud of her son. Edward’s tutor, Sir John Cheke, for example, wrote of the king that ‘I prophesy indeed, that, with the lord’s blessing, he will prove such a king, as neither to yield to Josiah in the maintenance of the true religion, nor to Solomon in the management of the state, nor to David in the encouragement of godliness’. Roger Ascham, the tutor of Edward’s sister, Elizabeth, also sang the youth king’s praises, writing that ‘he is wonderfully advanced of his years’. Edward was raised to be a king and received a formidable education, writing very advanced letters even in early childhood (even if is clear that he must have received some assistance in the earlier letters). In one letter to his father, Edward wrote: In the same manner as, most bounteous king, at the dawn of day, we acknowledge the return of the sun to our world, although by the intervention of obscure clouds, we cannot behold manifestly with our eyes that resplendent orb; in like manner your majesty’s extraordinary and almost incredible goodness so shines and beams forth, that although present I cannot behold it, though before me, with my outward eyes, yet never can it escape from my heart. Edward was raised to be king in the manner of his father but in his appearance, with his pale skin and fair hair, he always resembled Jane. Jane’s greatest regret, when she came to realize that she was dying, was that she would not live to see her son grow up … 

Jane’s legacy is also her own reputation and her relationship with Henry VIII. Jane never inspired the deep obsession in the king that he felt for Anne Boleyn or the admiring love that he, at first, felt for Catherine of Aragon. Instead, he married her almost on a whim. She was the woman best placed at the perfect time. There is even some evidence that Henry came to regret his haste in marrying Jane after seeing some other beautiful ladies at his court. Jane never raised the passion in Henry that some of his other wives did. Throughout their marriage, it is clear that Henry did not entirely view his marriage to Jane as permanent. It was essential that Jane fulfilled her side of the bargain and that was to bear a son. Until that time, as Jane was very well aware, she was entirely dispensable. In spite of this, with her death in giving him the son he craved, Henry’s feelings towards Jane entirely changed and he came to look back on their marriage through rose-tinted spectacles. A commemoration to Jane was written some time after her death and perhaps best sums up how Henry came to view her: Among the rest whose worthie lyves Hath runne in vertue’s race, O noble Fame! Persue thy trayne, And give Queene Jane a place. A nymphe of chaste Dianae’s trayne, A virtuous virgin eke; In tender youth a matron’s harte, With modest mynde most meeke.

Jane spent her entire marriage trying to prove to Henry that she was his ideal woman and, posthumously, she succeeded.

-      Elizabeth Norton, Jane Seymour: Henry VIII’s True Love

“How a woman like Jane Seymour became Queen of England is a mystery. In Tudor terms she came from nowhere and was nothing. Chapuys confronted the riddle in his dispatch of 18 May 1536, which was addressed to Antoine Perrenot, the Emperor’s minister, rather than to the Emperor Charles V himself. Freed from the decorum of writing to his sovereign, the ambassador expressed himself bluntly. ‘She is the sister’, he began, ‘of a certain Edward Seymour, who has been in the service of his Majesty [Charles V]’; while ‘she [herself] was formerly in the service of the good Queen [Catherine]’. As for her appearance , it was literally colourless. ‘She is of middle height, and nobody thinks she has much beauty. Her complexion is so whitish that she may be called rather pale.’ This is a neat pen-portrait of the woman whose mousy, peaked features and mean, pointed chin, are denred by Holbein with his characteristic, unsparing honesty.  So much Chapuys could see. But when he turned to her supposed moral character he gave his prejudices full rein. ‘You may imagine’, he wrote Perrenot, man-to-man, ‘whether, being an Englishwoman, and having been so long at Court, she would not hold it a sin to be virgo intacta.’ ‘She is not a woman of great wit,’ he continued. ‘But she may have’ -and here he became frankly coarse- ‘a fine enigme.’  ‘Enigme’ means ‘riddle’ or ‘secret’, as in ‘secret place’ or the female genitalia. ‘It is said’, he concluded, ‘that she is rather proud and haughty.’ ‘She seems to bear great goodwill and respect to [Mary]. I am not sure whether later on the honours heaped on her will to make her change her mind.’ Whatever was there here -a woman of no family, no beauty, no talent and perhaps not much reputation (though there is no need to accept all of Chapuys’s slanders)- to attract a man who had already been married to two such extraordinary women as Catherine and Anne? But maybe Jane’s very ordubarubess was tge oiubt, Anne had been exciting as a mistress. But she was too demanding, too mercurial and tempestuous, to make a good wife. Like the Gospel which she patronised, she seemed to have come ‘not to send peace but the sword’ and to make ‘a man’s foes ... them of his own household’ (Matthew 10.34-6). Henry was weary of scenes and squabbles, weary too of ruptures with his nearest and dearest and his oldest and closest friends. He wanted his family and friends back. He wanted domestic peace and the quiet life. He also, more disturbingly, wanted submission. For increasing age and the Supremacy’s relentless elevation of the monarchy had made him ever more impatient of contradiction and disagreement. Only obedience, prompt, absolute and unconditional, would do. And he could have none of this with Anne. Jane, on the other hand, was everything that Anne was not. She was calm, quiet, soft-spoken (when she spoke at all) and profoundly submissive, at least to Henry ...”

-          David Starkey, Six Wives: The Queens of Henry VIII

Images: Jane Seymour painted by Hans Holbein the Younger. Variousa actresses from costume dramas that have played Henry VIII’s third consort. Elly Condron from the documentary drama Secrets of the Six Wives documentary presented by Lucy Worsley. Anne Stallybras from the BBC miniseries The Six Wives of Henry VIII (1970). Jane Asher from the BBC film Henry VIII & his Six Wives (1972). Lastly, Kate Phillips from Wolf Hall (2014).