[1] See _Anne Boleyn_, by P. Friedman; _The Early Life of Anne Boleyn_, by J.H. Round; and J. Gairdner in _Eng. Hist. Review_, viii. 53, 299, and x. 104. [2] According to the _Chronicle of King Henry VIII._, tr. by M.A.S. Hume, p. 68, she was his mistress. [3] Of this there is no direct proof, but the statement rests upon contemporary belief and chiefly upon the extraordinary terms of the dispensation granted to Henry to marry Anne Boleyn, which included the suspension of all canons relating to impediments created by "affinity rising _ex illicito coitu_ in any degree even in the first." Froude rejects the whole story, _Divorce of Catherine of Aragon_, p. 54; and see Friedman's _Anne Boleyn_, ii. 323. [4] _Cat. of St. Pap. England and Spain_, iii. pt. ii. p. 327. [5] According to Cranmer, _Letters and Papers of Henry VIII._ vi. p. 300, the only authority; and Cranmer himself only knew of it a fortnight after. The marriage was commonly antedated to the 14th of November 1532. [6] _Cat. of St. Pap. England and Spain_, v. 198. [7] _Letters and Papers of Henry VIII._, x. pp. 374, 381, 385. [8] According to the most trustworthy accounts, but see _Letters and Papers_, x. p. 382. The well-known letter to Henry VIII. attributed to her is now recognized as an Elizabethan forgery. [9] _Archaeologia_, xxiii. 64. [10] _Letters and Papers_, x. 358. [11] "Sanuto Diaries," October 31, 1532, in _Cal. of St. Pap. Venetian_, iv. p. 365. [12] _Original Letters_, ed. by Sir H. Ellis, 1 ser. ii. 37, and _Cal. of St. Pap. Venetian_, iv. 351, 418.