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The first of Henry VIII's wives was Catherine of Aragon, the pious Catholic princess who suffered years of miscarriages and still births and yet failed to produce a male heir.

An abused child, yet confident of her destiny to reign, a woman in a man's world, passionately sexual yet, she said, a virgin, Elizabeth I was to be famed as England's most successful ruler. This absorbing new book, by concentrating on the early years from her birth in 1533 to her accession in 1558, shows how her experiences of danger and adventure formed her remarkable character and shaped her opinions and beliefs.

In all of human history there has never been an era as richly endowed with human creativity as the Italian Renaissance. When the economic boom of the Late Middle Ages had allowed a flourishing and wealthy merchant class to emerge, a plethora of artists, sculptors, architects, and thinkers followed in their wake. In an astonishingly short period of time, Italy was transformed mentally, physically, and spiritually.