Jane Boleyn with Philippa Gregory

Not Just the Tudors

History Hit

History

4.8 • 3K Ratings

🗓️ 27 October 2025

⏱️ 58 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Jane Boleyn has long been called the most hated woman in Tudor history. Wife to Anne Boleyn's brother George, Jane served as lady-in-waiting to five of Henry VIII's six wives, and when Anne Boleyn fell from grace, George was accused of incest with his sister. For centuries, historians claimed Jane sealed their fates with malicious lies. But was she truly a villain or just fighting for her own life? Professor Suzannah Lipscomb welcomes bestselling author Philippa Gregory to discuss Jane Boleyn, examine historical records and explore the steps women had to take to survive in the Tudor court.

MORE:

Normal Women with Philippa Gregory

Catherine Howard: Henry VIII's Fifth Wife

Presented by Professor Suzannah Lipscomb. The researcher is Max Wintle, audio editor is Amy Haddow and the producer is Rob Weinberg. The senior producer is Anne-Marie Luff.

All music courtesy of Epidemic Sounds.

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Transcript

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0:00.0	Hello, I'm Professor Susanna Lipscomb.
0:02.6	If you'd like not just the Tudors ad-free to get early access and bonus episodes, sign up to History Hit.
0:10.5	With a History Hit subscription, you can also watch hundreds of hours of original documentaries,
0:16.0	including my own recent two-part series, A World Torn Apart, The Dissolution of the Monastries, and enjoy a new release every week.
0:25.2	Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com forward slash subscribe.
0:32.0	Hello, I'm Professor Susanna Lipscomb and welcome to not just the Tudors from History Hit, the podcast in which we explore everything from Anne Boleyn to the Aztecs, from Holbein to the Huguenots, from Shakespeare to Samarise.
0:46.8	Relieved by regular doses of murder, espionage and witchcraft. Not in other words, just the Tudors, but most definitely also the Tudors.
0:59.9	Jane Berlin, born Jane Parker, and later Viscountess Rochford, had an extraordinary career
1:06.2	as a courtier. She served five of Henry the Eighth's queens. Married to George Berlin, she was the sister-in-law of one of them,
1:14.7	and she's long been associated with the downfall of two queens of England, both of them her kinswoman.
1:20.9	She's long been accused of being the jealous source of the rumours that Anne Boleyn and her brother
1:25.4	committed incest and that Henry VIII was impotent.
1:29.4	Anne is certain that after the execution of her husband and sister in Laura May 1536,
1:35.0	her return to court was surprisingly swift and enduring. She was the lady of the bedchamber to Jane
1:40.0	Seymour and carried Princess Mary's train at Jane's funeral.
1:49.4	It was she, apparently, who advised Anne of Cleaves on what was necessary for the making of a child,
1:53.3	evidence that allowed Henry a way out of his despised fourth marriage,
1:58.6	and it is she who was blamed by Thomas Colpepper for having provoked him much to love the Queen,
2:02.0	Catherine Howard, acting as the couples go between and the facilitator of their secret trists. She was condemned by act of attainder and
2:08.3	died a childless widow on Tower Green on the 13th of February 1542. But underneath these facts,
2:16.8	what do we know of her? Surviving 20 years at the Tudor Court in a position of influence, she was evidently a woman of some substance. But what sort of person was she? The records are silent. But into that space has stepped the imagination of one of Tudor England's best and best love novelist,
2:36.4	Philippa Gregory, who brought us the other Berlin girl and the Berlin inheritance, along with my
	...

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