In this groundbreaking new biography, G. W. Bernard offers a fresh portrait of one of Englands most captivating queens. Through a wide-ranging forensic examination of sixteenth-century sources, Bernard reconsiders Boleyns girlhood, her experience at the French court, the nature of her relationship with Henry, and the authenticity of her evangelical sympathies.He depicts Anne Boleyn as a captivating, intelligent, and highly sexual woman whose attractions Henry resisted for years until marriage could ensure legitimacy for their offspring. He shows that it was Henry, not Anne, who developed the ideas that led to the break with Rome. And, most radically, he argues that the allegations of adultery that led to Annes execution in the Tower could be close to the truth.