Description

Henrietta Maria is British historys most reviled queen consort Condemned in her lifetime as the Popish brat of France an adulteress and a traitor she remains in popular memory the wife who wore the breeches in her marriage the woman who turned her husband Catholic and so caused the English Civil War and a cruel and bigoted mother

This cleareyed biography unpicks the myths and considers the story from Henrietta Marias point of view A portrait emerges of a woman whose closest friends included Puritans as well as Catholics who crossed swords with Cardinal Richelieu and led the antiSpanish faction at the English court A witty conversationalist Henrietta Maria was a patron of the arts and a champion of the female voice as well as a mediatrix for her persecuted fellow Catholics

During the civil war the queens enemies agreed that Charles would never have survived as long as he did without the She Generalissimo Seeing events through her gaze reveals the truth behind the claims that she caused the war explains her estrangement from her son Henry and diminishes the image of the Restoration queen as an irrelevant crone In fact Henrietta Maria rose from the ashes of her husbands failuresa phoenix queenpresiding over a court judged to have had more mirth even than that of the Merry Monarch Charles II