In his 1618 summary of England, the Venetian ambassador, Antonio Foscarini, noted of the Stuart queen consort, Anna of Denmark, that she was the “daughter, sister and wife of a king, which cannot to-day be said of any other.”Footnote 1 For Foscarini, Anna’s unparalleled regal status—by birth and marriage—was a key piece of political information to offer the ruling powers in Venice. It was a status that was likewise appreciated by Anna’s husband, James VI & I, who valued his wife as a conduit to a powerful network in northern Europe and the German lands. This network, in conjunction with trade opportunities and a respectable dowry of £150,000 Scots, had led James to seek a Danish bride, and such factors continued to influence international diplomacy throughout his reign.Footnote 2 For Anna, her birthright had similarly enduring effects, and even as she transitioned from a princess of Denmark to a queen consort of Scotland, and then a queen consort of England, she continued to identify first and foremost as a member of the Oldenburg dynasty. Additionally, her birthright emphatically shaped her understanding of court etiquette and royal magnificence, her cultural interests and patronage, and her sense of rank and entitlement.

Birth

The second daughter of Frederik II of Denmark-Norway (1534–1588) and Sofie of Mecklenburg-Güstrow (1557–1631), Anna was born at Skanderborg Castle in Jutland, Denmark on 12 December 1574. She spent the majority of her childhood, along with her older sister, Elisabeth (1573–1625), and her younger brother, the future Christian IV (1577–1648), in Güstrow under the care of her maternal grandparents, Ulric and Elisabeth, the Duke and Duchess of Mecklenburg-Güstrow.Footnote 3 Nevertheless, as King Frederik’s diary attests, the royal children frequently spent time with their parents at court.Footnote 4 It was here that Anna witnessed the Danish court transition into one of European baroque splendour: her father patronised a number of leading poets, artists, astronomers, and historians; he poured significant amounts of money into dramatic waterworks; and his building projects introduced Denmark to a classicising language of architecture. In addition, the Danish court hosted a permanent band of musicians, as well as a wide array of travelling performers who staged elaborate pageants, plays, and mummings (festivities performed in disguises or masks). The resultant cultural climate had a lasting effect on the Oldenburg children’s own interest in, and patronage of, such expressive media as art, architecture, garden design, music, and theatre, which came to distinguish their respective courts.Footnote 5

From Denmark to Scotland

On 20 August 1589, Anna married James VI of Scotland, with George Keith, Earl Marischal, as proxy. On 5 September, the newly wed Queen and her Danish contingent sailed for Scotland, but they made little progress. Inclement weather thwarted their course and they took shelter in Norway, off the island of Flekkerøy, wherefrom Anna wrote to James that “we have already put out to sea four or five times but have always been driven to the ports from which we left by contrary winds and other problems which arose, which is the cause why … all this company … [will] make no further attempt at this time but to defer the voyage until the spring.”Footnote 6 As is now legendary, James grew “very impatient and sorowful for hir lang delay” and decided to set sail over the North Sea. He joined Anna in Oslo, where he married her in person, on 23 November 1589 at the Bishop’s Palace, and then journeyed with her to Denmark, where they spent the winter, before returning with her to Scotland in the spring.Footnote 7

Anna’s marital journey from Denmark to Scotland provided the Oldenburg dynasty with an international stage for demonstrating their wealth, subject loyalty, and cultural sophistication. Sparing little expense, a fleet of sixteen ships was dispatched to transport the Danish princess, together with an extensive retinue and baggage train, across the North Sea. The quantity of personnel and calibre of the material goods had the intended effect, for onlookers marvelled at Anna’s “guard, horses, ships, plate, jewels, apparel” that were “all so costly it is strange to hear,” and enchanted reports claimed that Anna came with “many jewels … especially pearls,” while her “rich provision of apparel” had “more than 500 tailors and embroiderers … at work upon it for three months.”Footnote 8 Indeed, the Danes had specifically referred to Anna’s jewellery in the marriage treaty, stating that her dowry was separate to “the princely gems and other decorations which it is fitting for princesses to wear.”Footnote 9 Such jewellery, in conjunction with Anna’s material possessions, was displayed to emphasise the princess’s royal birthright and, by extension, her suitability as Queen of Scots.

The Scottish and English Coronations

On 1 May 1590, James and Anna sailed into Leith harbour to be met by celebratory cannon fire, large crowds, bonfires, and streets decorated with cloth.Footnote 10 On Sunday, 17 May 1590, after a fortnight of entertaining the Danish delegation, the new Queen of Scots was crowned at Holyrood Abbey. The ceremony was officiated by the Reformed minister Robert Bruce in both Latin and French, and the new Queen was provided with an elaborate furred robe of purple velvet, lined with white taffeta and trimmed with gold passementerie, which cost a substantial £866.4s.10d. Scots.Footnote 11 However, this sartorial expenditure paled in comparison to that outlaid for Anna’s second set of coronation robes some thirteen years later.

On 25 July 1603 at Westminster Abbey in London, Anna was crowned alongside her husband, who had succeeded to the English throne following the death of his childless cousin, Elizabeth I. For this event, both James and Anna were furnished with two robes each—one of purple velvet, the other of crimson velvet—and Anna’s was complete with kirtle, train, hood, bodies, and sleeves. Furred with ermine and miniver, the robes were trimmed with crimson and purple laces, knotted finger work of gold, and finished with silk tassels and large gold buttons. In addition, they were perfumed using musk, civet, and ambergris, and together they cost more than £4100 Sterling.Footnote 12 With the plague raging in London, the Stuarts travelled to Westminster in two sumptuously decorated barges to avoid the crowded streets.Footnote 13 The ceremony was officiated by John Whitgift, Archbishop of Canterbury, and, as had been the case at her Scottish coronation, Anna’s pan-European network was embodied by a number of honoured ambassadors, visiting from Brandenburg, Braunschweig-Lüneburg, Denmark-Norway, and Württemburg.Footnote 14

The Mother of Kings

The passage of motherhood was central to the success of a queen consort. It was through the birth of legitimate children that the dynasty was secured, and the social and political stability of the kingdom was protected. A royal Stuart pregnancy and birth were thus eagerly anticipated and richly celebrated by both the monarchy and the country. When Anna was safely delivered of her first child, Prince Henry—a healthy son, and legitimate heir—at Stirling Castle, on 19 February 1594, joyous celebrations erupted throughout the kingdom, for the news “wes a great comfort and maiter of joy to the haill pepill, and movit thame to great triumphe, wantonnes, and play, for beanefyres [bonfires] wer set out, and dancing and playing vsit [used] in all pairtes, as gif the pepill had bein daft for mirthe.”Footnote 15 Four more children followed in Scotland with the births of Princess Elizabeth at Dunfermline on 19 August 1596; Princess Margaret at Dalkeith on 24 December 1598; Charles, Duke of Albany, at Dunfermline on 19 November 1600; and Robert, Duke of Kintyre on 18 January 1602, also at Dunfermline.

Anna gave birth to two more children in England, with Princesses Mary and Sophia born at Greenwich Palace on 8 April 1605, and 22 June 1606, respectively. In addition to seven full-term pregnancies, Anna suffered at least two miscarriages—one in mid-September 1590 and the other in May 1603—although little survives in the archival record to illuminate the Queen’s health at these times.Footnote 16 The Stuarts lost more children with the deaths of Margaret in August 1600 and Robert in May 1602. In England, further tragedy struck as Princess Sophia only survived for one day, passing away on 23 June 1606, and Princess Mary later succumbed to pneumonia on 16 September 1607. Another huge loss later befell the Stuarts with the death of their eldest son, and heir to the Stuart kingdoms, Prince Henry, on 6 November 1612, when he was eighteen and “at the very flower of his high hopes.”Footnote 17 Henry’s passing stunned the court and left his parents deeply bereaved, turning James into “the saddest father in the world” and putting Anna’s life “in the greatest danger owing to her grief.”Footnote 18 Of the three children, only Henry was accorded a state funeral, which was officiated by George Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury, on 7 December 1612 at Westminster Abbey, but they were all interred in the Abbey.

As Henry was James and Anna’s first son, the political stakes surrounding his birth were extraordinarily high and, not surprisingly, much less fanfare greeted the subsequent Stuart children.Footnote 19 Yet, the safe arrival of each legitimate child was still a political triumph for the strength and longevity of the dynasty. Additional sons provided substitute male heirs in the case of accident or death, and marriageable daughters extended and reinforced the dynastic network. James himself articulated as much when he wrote to congratulate Christian IV on the birth of his second child in April 1603, asserting that “we are moved both for your sake and the sake of the kingdom itself, over which you are ruling; because as children are a source of solace to parents, thus are they a source of support for kings; for the more children there are, the deeper are the roots and the more numerous are the supports, upon which the stability of a kingdom rests.”Footnote 20

James’s sentiment was borne out in his actions two years later with the birth of Princess Mary, on 8 April 1605, at Greenwich Palace. With three children having survived infancy, the Stuart succession was already secure, but James’s personal response to the occasion and the material and ceremonial display surrounding the birth and baptism underscores the significance of the event. As the first Stuart born in England, the new princess dramatically increased the popularity and legitimacy of what many still considered to be a foreign ruling house and, for her father, James, she represented a milestone in the unification of his Scottish and English kingdoms. The day after Mary’s birth, James wrote to Christian IV to inform him that “our dearest wife had born a most delightful offspring for us … this child which has been so happily conceived and born,” and crucially added that “although this is not our first child, it may nevertheless seem to be the first since it is the first to have occurred for us after the most happy union of our kingdoms.”Footnote 21

The political triumph of Mary’s safe arrival was celebrated in the lavish baptismal celebrations that followed at Greenwich on 5 May 1605. Significant building work was ordered to ready the palace for accommodating numerous guests, while the chapel, buttery, cellar, banqueting house, cockpit, tiltyard, and bear-baiting pit were refurbished.Footnote 22 Costly garments in regal colours and fabrics were ordered for the Princess, who was carried to the chapel in a “bearing mantle with a train of purple velvet, embroidered with a fine border of silver and gold … lined with powdered ermine.”Footnote 23 In keeping with religious and civic practice, Anna remained in confinement awaiting her churching ceremony and was therefore absent from the baptism. The Queen’s natal family was physically represented through the figure of Anna’s brother, Ulrik, Duke of Holstein, who had arrived in England on 12 November 1604.Footnote 24 Ulrik played a central, ritualised part in the proceedings and, as one of the godparents, he symbolised the investment of the Oldenburg dynasty in the life of the Stuart child.

The Royal Relationship

The royal Stuart relationship was defined by co-operation and accommodation. On the one hand, Anna exercised an unprecedented degree of legal, financial, and geographic independence. Not only did she maintain an entirely separate household to the King, but she also received an independent income, followed her own, separate, court calendar, sheltered factions and opinions contrary to James, and in England, had her own judiciary court to deal with the legalities of her jointure estates.Footnote 25 On the other hand, Anna was below James in the hierarchy of the court and, as it was for all elites and courtiers, her preservation of harmonious inter-court relations was vital to her survival, success, and preferment. Thus, Anna was notable in assisting James in the fulfilment of his self-styled persona of rex pacificus (a king who brought peace and transcended faction), enabling his itinerant style of kingship, and supporting his dynastic and diplomatic aim of aligning the Stuart realms with the Spanish Habsburgs.Footnote 26 In addition, and perhaps most importantly, Anna provided the Stuart dynasty with crucial access to multiple international networks, which were central to James’s foreign policy—raising his international rank and, by extension, allowing him to play the role of peacemaker in Europe and to be the head of the Protestant Union.

Anna’s familial network was pan-European, extending from Denmark-Norway into the German lands of the Holy Roman Empire and including Brandenburg, Braunschweig-Wolfenbüttel, Electoral Saxony, Holstein, Mecklenburg, and Schleswig. Throughout his reign, James remained conscious of the important intermediary position that Anna held, and it was one of the central reasons that James had chosen her to be his wife. This he made expressly clear to Anna when, in a letter from May 1603, he reminded her that “for the respect of youre honorable birthe and discente I married you.”Footnote 27 At the time of Anna’s death, on 2 March 1619, such sentiments continued to colour James’s epistolary output. He wrote to his brother-in-law, Christian IV, that “although this heroine, your sister by whose marriage our affinity was established, has suffered [died], the intimacy of our future affairs might continue as long as it seems too good to the one who despenses [sic] lifetimes to kingdoms.”Footnote 28 In seeking reassurance from Christian that Anna’s death did not signal the end of the Stuart–Oldenburg alliance, James acknowledged the essential role that Anna played in connecting the House of Stuart with Denmark-Norway and its associated dynastic houses in the German territories.

Knowledge of Anna’s prestigious connections did not stop at James, and they were well known at court. When, for example, Foscarini updated the Doge and Senate on the progression of a marriage match for Prince Henry, he sagely opined that “a German match would not gain him [James] anything, as all the German Princes are allied to him or to the Queen by blood.”Footnote 29 Furthermore, as Anna frequently reminded court attendees, her network also included the House of Habsburg, with one observer faithfully recounting that the Queen is “descended on the female side from the House of Austria in which she takes great pride. She has an intimate friendship with the Infanta archduchess [Isabel Clara Eugenia] and calls her sister.”Footnote 30 In fact, Anna was related to the Habsburgs on both sides of her family, for Isabella of Austria, sister of the all-powerful Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, had married Christian II of Denmark-Norway—Anna’s first cousin twice removed. On her maternal side, Anna’s great-great-great grandmother was Elisabeth of Austria. Beyond verbal reminders of the “greatness of her house,” Anna frequently wore visual demonstrations of her consanguineal and affinal bonds in the form of miniatures—notably of Christian IV and Isabel Clara Eugenia—and figurative cipher jewels.Footnote 31 Anna received some of these as gifts, but she also ordered quantities from her jeweller, George Heriot, who she likewise charged with their repair after they sustained damaged during wear.Footnote 32 Thus, even when not speaking directly about her kinship bonds, Anna ensured that they remained visible through her bodily adornment.

As well as heightening James’s international profile, Anna assisted his itinerant style of kingship. This was fuelled not only by James’s passion for the hunt, but also by his keen understanding of the political benefits of mobility. In Scotland, he rarely stayed in one place for more than three weeks at a time, constantly moving between the royal palaces of Dunfermline, Falkland, Holyroodhouse, Linlithgow, and Stirling.Footnote 33 He also frequented a large number of noble residences, and covered large parts of his kingdom during the summer months while hunting or travelling.Footnote 34 Anna occasionally joined James on progress, and she used the same palaces as James, but King and Queen kept divergent calendars, which meant that they usually visited their residences at different times.Footnote 35 As a result, geographic distance was a defining feature of the Stuart couple’s relationship.

This distance became even more apparent in England. At ceremonial points of the year—particularly Easter and Christmas—the royal family gathered together at Whitehall Palace, and the King and Queen often spent parts of early summer in May and/or June at Greenwich Palace together.Footnote 36 On the whole, however, James never spent more than six months of any given year in London, and he frequently spent as little as three months. Forthright about his need for “open air and exercise,” James spent the majority of his time at his hunting residences of Royston, Newmarket, Thetford, and Theobalds, which extended some 70 to 120 kilometres away from London.Footnote 37 But, while the King was dotted about the countryside, the Queen remained a steadfast figure of monarchy in the administrative and ceremonial heart of Stuart London. Anna spent most of the year at her centralised residences of Somerset House and Greenwich, where she was a visible symbol of the Stuart monarchy and was readily accessible for ambassadors and visiting dignitaries; she was valued as a conduit to the King as, they believed, James “tells her [Anna] any thing she chooses to ask, and loves and esteems her.”Footnote 38

Importantly, the geographical distance between the Stuarts did not indicate poor marital relations. Children continued to be born in England, and the pair frequently wrote to each other, exchanged gifts, and James often sent Anna the spoils from his hunt—stags, hinds, and all manner of birds.Footnote 39 In January 1605, James formally acknowledged Anna’s importance to his itinerant mode of kingship, when he ordered that during his absences the Privy Council would meet “once every weeke … in such places as our dearest wife shall keepe her courte.” In addition, Anna was the trusted recipient for some of the King’s correspondence, as James added that the councillors were to “receive dispatc” at Anna’s court and that these would “depend upon our [James’s] owne directions to you [Anna].”Footnote 40 Even if Anna was only to play a token role in the monarchical theatre of power, it was still an important and necessary part: visibly stationed in London, she was a legitimate and accessible representative of monarchy; one who guarded against the mistaken impression that, in the absence of the King, councillors and courtiers took full and unfettered run of his court and kingdoms. Indeed, ambassadorial dispatches and records of the pipe office of the period are filled with accounts of Anna giving independent audiences.Footnote 41

This was a role that Anna continued to play when she was away from London. On four occasions, and completely independent of James, Anna progressed to Bath. Yet again, however, this separatism from James bought distinct advantages for the crown.Footnote 42 While ostensibly undertaken for reasons of “health and recreacon,” these journeys were still a matter of state.Footnote 43 Taking Anna to parts of England that James had never visited (Bristol, Bath, Warminster, and Wells), the Queen promoted the image of Stuart authority, generosity, and loyalty. An observer of the Queen’s 1613 visit to Wells, for example, noted that “all the nobility of the province gathered together. Because the king has never been here, all sorts of people hasten to see the queen and show their pleasure at seeing her, by offering the greatest honours and service.”Footnote 44 In this way, as with the court calendar more generally, Anna’s independent activities furthered the reach and loyalty of the monarchy.

The Stuart Marriages

Anna’s opinions on the marriage of her children were readily sought and eagerly discussed at court. For her sons Henry and Charles, Anna’s preference was, almost unwaveringly, to marry them to the Spanish Habsburgs. In this, she supported James who, as is now well known, pursued a Spanish match for his two sons as part of his diplomatic strategy to secure European peace. That court attendees understood Anna’s position as indicative of Stuart policy is evidenced by numerous ambassadorial dispatches. In the early months of 1610, for example, Anna was credited with the likely success of the match as it was excitedly reported that “there was a close understanding … between England and Spain, thanks to the Queen … [Henry] Prince of Wales would presently be sent to Spain and the Queen was anxious that he should marry the Infanta.”Footnote 45 This was a pattern that repeated itself throughout the lengthy negotiations for the second Spanish match between Prince Charles and the Infanta, María Ana.Footnote 46 Yet, it was only the marriage of her daughter, Princess Elizabeth to Friedrich, Elector Palatine, on 14 February 1613, that came to fruition during her lifetime.

Anna’s involvement in the Palatinate marriage is relatively under-reported––especially compared to her actions concerning the marriages of her sons––but she remained an influential and meaningful figure. The Queen was aware of the rights and privilege of the Electors Palatine, and the wider hierarchical rankings of the empire, for her natal house of Oldenburg was linked to many ruling houses throughout the German Empire, including prestigious Electoral Saxony, where her brother-in-law was currently in power. Nevertheless, she evidently wanted her only daughter to mirror her own dynastic success—a princess by birth who became a queen through marriage—for she warned Elizabeth that this match would reduce her from royal princess to “goodwife palsgrave.”Footnote 47 However, Anna’s reservations quickly abated after Friedrich’s arrival in London, as glowing reports of his conduct and appearance issued forth; the Queen was noted “not to taste it [the marriage] so well at first,” but has “since so come about that she doth all she can to grace it, and takes speciall comfort in” Friedrich.Footnote 48

For the marriage ceremony, Anna engaged in sumptuous sartorial display that underscored the political, financial, and dynastic value of the bride by wearing “in her hair a great number of pear-shaped pearls, the largest and most beautiful there are in the world; and there were diamonds all over her person, so that she was ablaze.”Footnote 49 Anna subsequently accompanied Elizabeth for the first part of her bridal journey from London to Kent. While James and Friedrich went hunting, Anna directed her daughter through her first series of public receptions and engagements as a wife and electress.Footnote 50 Although the Queen did not travel further than Rochester, she retained a degree of authority and connection to Elizabeth by selecting several of her own musicians, artisans, and householders to make the journey to Heidelberg, which, in addition, assisted in the translation of cultural traditions and fashions from the Stuart to the Palatine court.Footnote 51

Cultural Endeavours

In the cultural realm, as it was in the political, Anna’s natal lineage and experiences coloured her interests and activities. Like her father, Frederik II, and her brother, Christian IV, Anna oversaw extensive building programmes and remodelled the gardens at her four main palaces: Dunfermline, Somerset House, Greenwich Palace, and Oatlands Manor. Most of this work was paid through the centralised office of the exchequer, but Anna’s influence is discernible in the choice of artisans, the style of architectural and garden structures, and in the language of the surviving accounts. Beyond Anna’s well-known, extensive refurbishment of Somerset House, which was, in the words of Simon Thurley, the “single most important and expensive royal domestic architectural work of the early Stuart period,” Anna also instigated the construction of a series of innovative and influential court spaces—united by a classical aesthetic—at her other principal palaces of Dunfermline, Greenwich, and Oatlands.Footnote 52 The Queen’s requirements also saw renovations or new construction being undertaken at a range of Stuart properties beyond those in her jointure. For example, rooms (variously titled cupboards, closets, studies) for Anna to enjoy solitude or engage in social display were not only built and refurbished at Somerset House and Greenwich, but also at Whitehall and Hampton Court.Footnote 53

Earthworks, fountains, and built structures distinguished the grounds of Anna’s main residences, with notable examples including a large, ornate grotto aviary (or “the quenes birdcage,” as it was called) being erected in the gardens at Greenwich. Requiring the expertise of the French designer and engineer Salomon de Caus, it had a five-arched frontage that extended more than 50 feet (15.25 m) and was interspersed with niches, which may have been entry points for birds in the manner of a dovecote.Footnote 54 De Caus embarked on a more ambitious project for Anna at Somerset House where he oversaw the construction of a large water feature of Mount Parnassus—with a basin diameter of 100 feet—next to the Thames. Iconographically and hydraulically complex, the mount aligned Anna with several renowned Italian gardens that boasted fountains of Parnassus or Pegasus: Villa Lante at Bagnaia, the ‘Park of Monsters’ in Bomarzo, Villa Medici at Pratolino, and Villa d’Este at Tivoli.Footnote 55 Yet, it also connected Anna back to Denmark-Norway, for her father was interested in the dramatic effects of hydraulic engineering—of the type that De Caus was renowned for—and at Kronborg Castle, he commissioned a towering fountain, six metres in height, topped with a rotating statue of Neptune (the father of Pegasus), while Tycho Brahe’s famed complex on Hven included the mythic figures of Apollo and the Muses and several other automaton powered by wind and/or water.Footnote 56

It was also Anna’s father, Frederik, who served as inspiration for her most historically renowned commission: a garden lodge at Greenwich, now known as the Queen’s House. Just as Frederik had used Sparepenge (garden buildings) and hunting residences for recreational and diplomatic purposes, Anna envisioned the Greenwich lodge to be a space where she could escape the stress and bustle of the court, entertain select guests, and watch the hunt. For this ambitious project, Anna appointed Inigo Jones as the designer and “accompaunte” and paid him directly from her privy purse. After ordering Jones to submit a second, revised design, the resultant building was to be articulated in a classicising language of architecture that was still uncommon in England.Footnote 57 Anna’s decision to insist upon, or at least accept, this style may also be partly indebted to Frederik, and one building in particular bears mention here: Lundehave. This was an Italianate garden structure that Frederik had built on the grounds at Kronborg Castle during Anna’s teenage years. Finished in 1587, it was characterised by “an open loggia, a balcony, and a flat roof behind a balustrade,” which likewise became identifying features at Greenwich some thirty years later.Footnote 58 These ventures, and many other areas of Anna’s patronage, were informed by a consistent “interest in Italian culture,” but, importantly, the Queen was often drawing on her personal knowledge of these forms and traditions that she had been exposed to during her childhood at the Oldenburg court.Footnote 59

The Queen’s Oldenburg identity and pride extended to the interior spaces of her main palaces. There, Anna’s identifying badges—cipher, personal motto, and/or the Danish coat-of-arms—appeared with notable frequency on chimneypieces, curtains, pillows, cushions, mattresses, quilts, tapestries, blankets, carpets, upholstered pieces of furniture, canopies, cloths of state, and even the frames of mirrors, silver andirons, fire shovels, and comb cases.Footnote 60 This natal signposting also extended to Anna’s display of portraits, which were dominated by her relatives, by blood and marriage, while portraits of her husband and children were conspicuously rare.Footnote 61

Italian traditions and her court upbringing likewise served as the inspiration for Anna’s later engagement in theatre and the court masque. In England, Anna consistently favoured Samuel Daniel, whose interest in neoclassical Italian literature was well known, and Thomas Campion who, in contrast to Ben Jonson (supported by James), was heavily influenced by the Florentine intermedi with an emphasis on music and dance over poetry.Footnote 62 She commissioned and/or participated in seven masques, as well as being the “privileged spectator” of Cupid’s Banishment, which was performed for her honour at Greenwich Palace in 1617.Footnote 63 Beyond the cultural significance of the masque, literary scholars have mapped its extensive political, diplomatic, and social resonances and recognise that Anna successfully used the art form to gather together a highly select, influential courtly audience; she strictly guarded invitations, which turned them into a sign of monarchical favour, and carefully selected jewellery and apparel to visualise her support of specific policies and alliances.Footnote 64

Moreover, contemporaries acknowledged Anna’s determinative guidance. Ben Jonson unequivocally attributed the conceit of The Masque of Blackness (1605) to the Queen, stating that it was “her Majesty’s will” to have the masquers presented as “blackamores at first,” and he later credited her with inspiring him to develop the anti-masque, reflecting on the Masque of Queens (1609) that Anna “commanded me to think on some dance or show that might precede hers and have the place of a foil or false masque.”Footnote 65 The previous year, when Anna and her ladies danced The Masque of Beauty (1608), the Venetian ambassador confidently identified the Queen as the “authoress of the whole.”Footnote 66 Anna’s involvement with courtly theatre set a new standard for female performance and inspired the masquing activities of King James and their sons, Princes Henry and Charles.

Death and Funeral

By May 1615, Anna was suffering from dropsy (oedema) and, under the care of her French physician, Theodore de Mayerne, was confined to Greenwich for long periods of time.Footnote 67 The condition eventually proved fatal, and the Queen died on 2 March 1619 at Hampton Court, aged 44. In consideration of Anna’s status, her corpse was disembowelled and embalmed, and her remains were interred in the Henry VII Chapel at Westminster.Footnote 68

In the mourning period and funeral that followed Anna’s death, the Stuart respect for, and pride in, the Queen’s ancestral pedigree and networks were given central stage. James spared no expense to commemorate his wife’s death in a suitably magnificent manner, sanctioning expenditure of £20,000, which resulted in a triumph of state pageantry.Footnote 69 The majority of the financial outlay went through the great wardrobe for fabric that was primarily used to dress the royal spaces of Somerset House, Whitehall Palace, and Westminster Abbey, upholster furniture and new clothes of state, adorn two hearses, attire the Queen’s effigy, clothe the vast number of mourners who walked in the procession, and provide the supports for more than 800 banners, flags, pencells, pennants, escutcheons, and bannerols. The total cloth disbursed was in excess of 14,700 yards.Footnote 70

Maximilian Colt, the royal sculptor, was paid to construct a full-length wooden effigy of the Queen, complete with articulated joints.Footnote 71 Heightened naturalism was achieved by having the Serjeant-Painter, John de Critz, paint the face, crown, and sceptre, and orders were given for a new crimson satin petticoat, a crimson velvet gown, a perfumed robe, and a wig.Footnote 72 An important and revered object, the effigy combined the natural and social body of the queen and throughout the lengthy mourning period, and the funeral procession and ceremony, it remained highly visible as Anna’s proxy. On the day of the funeral, 13 May 1619, the wooden effigy, atop the Queen’s leaded corpse, processed from Somerset House to Westminster Abbey in chariot drawn by a team of richly caparisoned horses.Footnote 73 The voluminous procession—including at least 1358 people—stretched before and after the coffin. The majority of the processors were drawn from the late Queen’s household, but there were also members of the Scottish and English nobility and gentry, servitors of King James and Prince Charles, centralised officeholders, merchants and artificers, doctors, chaplains, and members of the poor. With representatives of the major social groups of the nobility, judiciary, court, and church, the large number of processors visibly demonstrated the continuing power and popularity of the monarchy.

In death, as in life, Anna’s body was surrounded by visual manifestations of her dynastic pedigree. Nine leading banners, each towering some thirteen feet above the crowd, were interspersed throughout the cortege, and twelve bannerols were ordered around the coffin, which collectively showcased the Queen’s armigerous connections: the kingdoms of Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Scotland, England; the dynastic house of Oldenburg; the historic Danish ancestral tribes of the Vandals and the Goths; the territories of Schleswig, Holstein, Stormarn, Dithmarschen, Schauenburg, Stormarn, and Sponheim; the duchies of Saxony, Mecklenburg, and Pomerania, and the Margraviate of Brandenburg, as well as the personal arms of Anna’s father, Frederik II.Footnote 74

At Westminster, the Queen’s coffined remains were placed within the “greate hearse,” which John Chamberlain opined was “the fairest and stateliest that I thincke was ever seene there.”Footnote 75 Lavish and broadly classicising, the structure was adorned with Anna’s armorial achievements creating an imposing and dignified tribute to the Queen’s status and pedigree and visualising James’s imperial pretensions.Footnote 76 The heraldic display echoed the processional flags by underscoring the importance of Anna’s natal family—and associated lands—to James’s concept of the dynastic identity and strength of his house. Five great escutcheons with complex quarterings paid homage to the empire of Great Britain, with the arms of Scotland, England, Ireland, and France impaled with the multiple territorial claims of the house of Oldenburg beneath closed imperial crowns. The hearse therefore announced that the Stuart–Oldenburg alliance, solidified by the marriage of James and Anna, had resulted in a powerful, Protestant imperium, with territories extending from the British Isles, through Scandinavia, and into the German lands.

The Queen’s obsequies were delivered by George Abbot, Archbishop of Canterbury, and were, according to Chamberlain, extremely lengthy: “yt was full sixe a clock at night before all the solemnities was don[e] at church.” While the remains and effigy of the Queen were formally interred, the great hearse remained visible in the main body of the abbey “till the next terme” and was still in place on 12 July 1619.Footnote 77 Standing tall and proud, richly bedecked in velvet and strewn with escutcheons, it was to be the last ceremonial vestige of the magnificent funeral of Anna of Denmark, first queen consort of the composite Stuart kingdom of Scotland, England, and Ireland.