Elizabeth

Elizabeth was born on September 7, 1533. She was the only daughter of King Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn. She was considered to be the heir to the English throne at birth. Two months before her third birthday, her mom was executed in order to allow Henry to marry his third wife, Jane Seymour. Although she was still raised well by relatives, she was considered by many as a “bastard”. During the ruling of her half brother Edward VI, Elizabeth stayed with Thomas Seymour and Catherine Parr. Apparently, Elizabeth and Thomas had intimate relations, and when Catherine found out, she sent Elizabeth away. Edward died in 1553 but Elizabeth didn’t take the thrown. Instead, it was taken by Henry's first daughter, Mary. Mary was very aggressive in persecuting people of the Protestant faith, and Elizabeth happened to be Protestant. With all of the hostility towards most of England, the people started getting stressed. They wanted someone else to take over or overthrow her. Most of them looked to Elizabeth for help. Mary had her jailed in the tower of London, even though she wasn’t the one behind most or all of the uprisings. When Mary died, Elizabeth was next in line to take the throne.

Schooling

Elizabeth I was very smart queen. She loved learning and got a great education. Elizabeth got the same level of schooling as her half brother, Edward, which was lucky, because she wasn’t very important in the family. Many tutors were called to help her learn, even some from Cambridge University. She was taught at first by Katherine Champernowne, and she is credited with helping Elizabeth a lot. Katherine taught Elizabeth in the areas of language, religion, grammar, rhetoric, logic, philosophy, literature, geography, history, mathematics and astronomy. These areas were common for the royal family. She was a very quick learner, and by five or six, had she could read and write comparing to a ten year old. Eventually, Katherine became challenged in keeping up with Elizabeth....