Over 450 years ago, Elizabeth I became queen of England. She reigned over a ‘Golden Age’, withstood moral criticism and became adept at image management and power dressing. Women in power today relate to her experiences. But can we claim
Over 450 years ago, Elizabeth I became queen of England. She reigned over a ‘Golden Age’, withstood moral criticism and became adept at image management and power dressing. Women in power today relate to her experiences. But can we claim a 16th century monarch as a feminist?
MP Jess Phillips, curator Christine Riding, and artist Ishbel Myerscough reflect on Elizabeth’s story and share their insights into women, power and politics, past and present.
By Kate Wilkinson
Until recently, female royal heirs have been on unequal footing with their male counterparts. The custom of primogeniture meant that a younger son would inherit the title over an elder daughter, simply because he was male. Time passed, women were given the vote and rose to positions of power, but still this age-old inequality existed. In 2013, an Act of Parliament was passed that finally brought gender equality to the British royal succession. A female firstborn could now be first in line to the throne, meaning that if William and Kate’s first child had been a girl, she would eventually become queen.
Nearly five centuries earlier, on 17 November 1558, the 25-year-old Elizabeth Tudor became queen of England following a series of impossible-to-predict events. Throughout English history, there had been many queens who had reigned as regents and consorts, and a few who, for reasons of illness or incompetence, ruled as powers behind the throne. But Elizabeth became only the second female monarch to reign in her own right. The first being her half-sister, ‘Bloody’ Mary I.
‘Foolishe, madde and phrenetike’
The issue of female leadership was hotly debated during Elizabeth’s reign. In the year of her succession, prominent theologian John Knox had written an angry polemic entitled The First Blast of the Trumpet Against the Monstruous Regiment of Women. For Knox, female rulers were ‘repugneth to nature’, and compared to men, ‘foolishe, madde and phrenetike’.
Not only did Elizabeth’s status as a woman unsettle her position as a ruler, there were also legal questions about her right to the throne. She had been periodically declared illegitimate by her father Henry VIII and her half-brother Edward VI. When Mary, a Catholic, ruthlessly claimed power from Edward’s chosen heir, Lady Jane Grey (a Protestant), she also expressed her hostility to the Protestant Elizabeth, keeping her detained in Hatfield House. Critics of Elizabeth’s right to rule had hovered her since birth, and when Mary died childless, the England she inherited was fragmented and struggling for global significance.
Despite many challenges throughout her time on the throne, the period of Elizabeth’s reign is now referred to as a ‘Golden Age’. She was an extremely savvy manager of the royal court and saw England through a succession of religious, economic and political upheavals. In direct defiance of Knox’s polemic, Elizabeth modelled to the world the fact that women can cope, and indeed thrive, in power after all.
Female power in a man’s world
Competent to rule?
After surviving a quarter-century of dynastic conflict, Elizabeth’s transition to power was relatively smooth. According to legend, she was sitting under the boughs of an oak in the grounds of Hatfield House when she was informed that her sister had died and she would be the next queen. This moment has become hugely symbolic in the films and literature about her life, visually portraying her deep-rooted right to the English throne. From divine appointment under the indigenous tree, Elizabeth set up her new streamlined power centre within days of her accession.
Some believe that Elizabeth’s rule was heavily manipulated by her advisors. Indeed, in her first address, Elizabeth told her Privy Council, ‘I mean to direct all my actions by good advice and counsel.’ But Curator of the Queen’s House, Christine Riding, warns us not to take Elizabeth’s words at face value. ‘People perhaps made too much of an assumption that Elizabeth would not be competent to rule, and therefore was open to being a kind of cypher to very powerful male figures around her,’ she says. Elizabeth was a skilled manipulator of the men around her, and sometimes used them as a shield to justify and defend her own actions.
Though it’s true that Elizabeth was advised throughout her reign by a close group of trusted men, ultimately she had the final say. She was highly educated and could speak many languages, a skill which gave her an advantage in matters of international diplomacy. Members of her government needed her signature in order to act, and she often didn’t comply with the will of those around her. ‘They might try and manipulate her, they might try and manoeuvre her, they might even try to depose her, but she was in charge,’ Riding says. Elizabeth both reigned and ruled, even as a young queen.
The stereotyping of power
Being both a woman and young means that you have to be cleverer than everybody to be worthwhile, because there are two reasons for people to think you don’t know what you’re talking about.
When images of power are so often depicted as male, even today, it can be a struggle for women to define power in their own terms. Jess Phillips has been the Labour MP for Birmingham Yardley since winning her seat in the 2015 general election at the age