The Life of Elizabeth I Quotes

“She was not so forbearing when it came to bad breath. After receiving one French envoy, she exclaimed, ‘Good God! What shall I do if this man stay here, for I smell him an hour after he has gone!’ Her words were reported back to the envoy, who at once betook himself back to France in shame.”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“At Sandwich, in 1579, she paid the magistrates’ wives a great compliment when, without employing a food taster, she sampled some of the 160 dishes they had prepared for her and even ordered some to be taken to her lodgings so that she could eat them later.”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“Again, she may have made the equation that sexual involvement was inextricably linked with death.”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“The Queen, seeing her own generation of friends and councillors gradually disappearing, had to adjust to a court under the influence of a younger, less congenial generation, whose ideas and tastes were unlike her own, and who were becoming increasingly dismissive of the attitudes of their elders.”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“a difficult job which he had carried out energetically, and at times brutally, but with little success.”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“...the most resplendent sun setteth at last in a western cloud.”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“One French ambassador, having witnessed the royal temper, confided, ‘When I see her enraged against any person whatever, I wish myself in Calcutta, fearing her anger like death”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“between Scylla and Charybdis,”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“assiduous”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“Agnus Dei;”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“opprobrium”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“prevaricated”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“recusancy,”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“allayed,”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“abeyance,”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“Clytemnestra,”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“attainder,”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“sycophancy”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“large and excellent joints, the delicacies and cleanliness customary in Italy were wanting”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“importuned”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“d”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“Shrovetide.”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“Maundy Thursday”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I

“crack of”
― Alison Weir, The Life of Elizabeth I