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late husband had left her twenty-four manors, and the tetchy, opinionated dowager used them to finance a life of luxury and convenience, expressing her opinions as and when they came to her. She wrote chatty letters full of unsolicited medical advice to Cardinal Wolsey, perhaps patronised poets including, quite possibly, the famous John Skelton, and made sarcastic quips at the expense of everyone from the royal court to her stepson the Duke of Norfolk.15 During an outbreak of the plague in 1528, she told a visitor that the reason the sickness had affected some of the duke’s servants was the slipshod management of his household staff.16 Time was to show that Agnes did not have a firm hand on the rudder of her own retinue either, but like most witty people she did not let accusations of hypocrisy stand in the way of a memorable put-down. She was a generous employer, an inveterate gossip, and conscious of the magnificence of her position – one of the many jewels she owned was a personalised initial ‘A’, crafted from pearls and set with diamonds.17 To her wards, the dowager duchess was a strict but inconsistent guardian. The pearls, the diamonds, and the lady herself were often away from Catherine for extended periods, mainly at court.18

      In the meantime, Catherine settled into life at Chesworth and its acres of fine deer-hunting country.19 Our image of a rough-and-tumble Tudor England, replete with belching men with earthy appetites gnawing at chicken legs, and buxom serving wenches, is not a world that Catherine or her contemporaries would have recognised. From infancy, she was expected to learn etiquette and to behave appropriately. Guides and manuals from the era laid out in great detail how the children of the gentry and nobility should behave from the moment they woke up in the morning – ‘Arise from your bed, cross your breast and your forehead, wash your hands and face, comb your hair, and ask the grace of God to speed you in all your works; then go to Mass and ask mercy for all your trespasses. When ye have done, break your fast with good meat and drink, but before eating cross your mouth, your diet will be better for it. Then say your grace – it occupies but little time – and thank the Lord Jesus for your food and drink. Say also a Pater Noster and Ave Maria for the souls that lie in pain’ – to how long they should nap and how they should enter a room.20 When Catherine was brought into her grandmother’s company she was expected to ‘enter with head up and at an easy pace’ and say ‘God speed’ by way of greeting, before sinking into a curtsey.21 Obeisance was worked on ad nauseam. A clumsy dip was an embarrassment that no girl could afford in Tudor high society; one Howard had a servant repeat a perfect bow a hundred times after the poor man had been in such a rush that he admitted his previous attempt had been made on ‘a running leg’.22 Catherine was told to look straight at whoever was speaking to her, to listen carefully to whatever they were saying, to make sure they knew that she was paying attention – ‘see to it with all your might that ye jangle not, nor let your eyes wander about’ – and ‘with blithe visage and diligent spirit’ set herself to the task of being as charming and interesting as possible. Her anecdotes and stories should be entertaining and to the point, since too ‘many words are right tedious to the wise man who listens; therefore eschew them’.23 Above all, she must learn to act like a lady in front of her relatives – to stand until they told her otherwise, to keep her hands and feet still, never to lean on anything, or scratch any part of herself, even something as innocuous as her face or arms.24

      This curriculum was part of the rationale behind the farming out of English aristocratic children to their relatives, a custom which foreign visitors often found peculiar. It was believed that parents might spoil or indulge their own children and thus neglect their education. Even if Edmund had not gone to Calais, Catherine would at some point probably have found herself attached to the dowager’s household. It was not just her new home, but her classroom and her finishing school where she would learn by example to behave like the great ladies of her family. Like the generation before her, Catherine was taught that good manners were essential to ‘all those that would thrive in prosperity’.25 Etiquette was drilled into her at a young age and into hundreds of other girls just like her. One of her cousins was praised for being ‘stately and upright at all times of her age’ and never ‘diminishing the greatness of birth and marriage by omission of any ceremony’.26 There were rhymes to help her remember the rules of placement, books aimed at children and adolescents that stressed how rude it was to point or to be too demonstrative in conversation – ‘Point not thy tale with thy fingers, use not such toys.’ There were rules that would hardly be out of place in a modern guide, such as enjoinders to keep one’s hands ‘washèd clean / That no filth in thy nails be seen’, not to talk with your mouth full, to keep cats and dogs away from the dinner table, and to only use one’s best dinner service for distinguished guests; but there were also instructions on where to put cutlery, how to cut bread (it was never to be torn with the hands), and a culture that almost elevated propriety into a religious duty.27 One children’s textbook on the proper way of doing things began with:

      Little children, draw ye near

      And learn the courtesy written here;

      For clerks that well the Seven Arts know,

      Say Courtesy came to earth below,

      When Gabriel hailed Our Lady by name,

      And Elizabeth to Mary came.

      All virtues are closed in courtesy,

      And vices all in villainy.28

      They were lessons that Catherine swallowed whole. For the rest of her life, she remained devoted to the niceties. Few things seemed to cause her greater stress or anguish than the fear that she might make a mistake in public. She seldom did. Compliments on her polite gracefulness followed her into the grave.

      This decorum subjugated and elevated Catherine, for while it kept her firmly kowtowing at the feet of her guardian, it also affirmed her superior position to those around her. Since the Victorian era, when the cult of domesticity was at its height, many writers have bewailed Catherine’s childhood as one of gilded neglect in which the poor young girl was cast adrift by a ‘proud and heartless relative’ to live amongst a group of servants who delighted in corrupting her.29 However, on looking closely at all the available evidence that has survived from Catherine’s life at Chesworth House, it is difficult to escape the conclusion that throughout her time there she was treated differently to the other young people. In almost every instance, it was Catherine who remained in control of her roommates, Catherine who confidently issued orders and had access to all the chambers and keys of the mansion. If she or her brother Henry entered a room, the servants were supposed to back away discreetly. This did not mean that they flung themselves against the wall, more that they gave them space, and they were expected to continue paying them attention for as long as they were speaking.30 Catherine was initially one of only two people under the roof who was the grandchild of a duke, and the deference she was shown throughout her childhood, even by those she counted as close friends, nurtured her confidence and habit of command.

      When the household ate, Catherine and her brother were on display, both before the rest of the household and under the watchful eye of the dowager or, if she had gone to court, her steward. At meals, often taken in the Great Hall, if the dowager was present and showed Catherine a sign of affection, such as allowing her to take a drink from the same cup, Catherine knew to reach out with both hands as she took it, then to pass it back to the servant who had brought it over to her. Even if there were no guests and the duchess chose to dine more privately, her establishment sat in order

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