Royal assent of the Crown, standing on the sovereign's right, then read aloud the titles of the bills (in earlier times, the entire text of the bills). The Clerk of the Parliaments, standing on the sovereign's left, responded by stating the appropriate Norman French formula. A new device for granting assent was created during the reign of King Henry VIII. In 1542, Henry sought to execute his fifth wife, Catherine Howard, whom he accused of committing adultery; the execution was to be authorised not after a trial but by a bill of attainder, to which he would have to personally assent after
Catherine Carey, Countess of Nottingham at Hatfield House as a child during the reign of Elizabeth's elder sister Mary. On Elizabeth's accession, Catherine and her younger sister Philadelphia came to court as maids of honour under the auspices of their aunt, Catherine Carey, the queen's first cousin and a Lady of the Bedchamber. In July 1563, Catherine married Charles Howard (1536–1624), later 2nd Baron Howard of Effingham, Lord High Admiral of England, and first Earl of Nottingham (1597). Catherine was appointed First Lady of the Bedchamber by 1572. Her daughter Elizabeth, the queen's goddaughter, was a maid of honour from 1576 until 1583, the year