The Waiting Game

Every Tudor Queen had ladies-in-waiting. They were her confidantes and her chaperones. Only the Queen's ladies had the right to enter her most private chambers, spending hours helping her to get dressed and undressed, caring for her clothes and jewels, listening to her secrets. But they also held a unique power. A quiet word behind the scenes, an appropriately timed gift, a well-negotiated marriage alliance were all forms of political agency wielded expertly by women.

The Waiting Game explores the daily lives of ladies-in-waiting, revealing the secrets of recruitment, costume, what they ate, where (and with whom) they slept. We meet Maria de Salinas, who travelled to England with Catherine of Aragon when just a teenager and spied for her during the divorce from Henry VIII. Anne Boleyn's lady-in-waiting Jane Parker was instrumental in the execution of not one, but two queens. And maid-of-honour Anne Basset kept her place through the last four consorts, negotiating the conflicting loyalties of her birth family, her mistress the Queen, and even the desires of the King himself. As Henry changed wives, and changed the very fabric of the country's structure besides, these women had to make choices about loyalty that simply didn't exist before. The Waiting Game is the first time their vital story has been told.

About the Author

Nicola Clark has a PhD in Early Modern History from Royal Holloway and is a Senior Lecturer in Early Modern History at the University of Chichester. Her research focuses primarily on women's dynastic and political roles across the late medieval and early modern period. Her first book, Gender, Family, and Politics: The Howard Women, 1485-1558, was published by Oxford University Press in 2018, and she also writes for public audiences, with work featured in History Today and on the History Extra website. She has spoken about her research at events for Historic Royal Palaces, the National Archives, various schools, and academic institutions.