*This blog post
will be focusing on books about the Tudor family and era as a whole, but I will
also be writing future posts recommending Tudor fiction and biographies.
** I have left
links to Amazon to buy the following books, but please do consider buying from
and supporting your local bookshops if you can!
So, you love the
Tudors and you want to start adding Tudor books to your history bookshelf,
however, there is an awful lot to choose from! The following are from my bookshelves
and I think the selection of books I have chosen for this post is a great place
to start if you are thinking of learning more about the Tudors.
The Private Lives
of the Tudors by Tracy Borman
This is one of my
all-time favourite books, I could not put it down! The Private Lives of the
Tudors by Tracy Borman is bursting with information and I refer to it very
often. As well as following the story of the Tudor’s from the beginning of
Henry VII’s reign to Elizabeth I death, it gives you a behind the scenes look
at the monarchs most private moments, from Henry VIII’s bathroom habits to how
Elizabeth I cleaned her teeth. Tracy is one of my favourite Historians and I
trust her research and what she writes. I also highly recommend her other books
and TV programmes. Link to buy
How to be a Tudor
by Ruth Goodman
After reading about
the private lives of the Tudor Monarchs in Tracy Borman’s book, it is time to
read about the private lives of the regular Tudor folk. Ruth Goodman is a
Method Historian, meaning, as well as researching the facts she has also lived and
experimented with them, which brings How to be a Tudor to life. This
book will answer how the Tudors slept and was it comfortable? What a day’s work
was like and what were their hygiene habits? It is a dawn till dusk guide to a
Tudor person’s life. There is so much information in this book you may need to
read it a few times! Link to buy
The History of
England Volume II: Tudors by Peter Ackroyd
Surprisingly, I do
not have many books which just focus on the story of the Tudor family from
start to finish, I need to rectify this! I enjoyed this book by Peter Ackroyd, and I think it would be a great
introduction to the Tudor dynasty. It is a nice easy-going book with lots of
information. My only complaint is that it starts with the death of Henry VII
instead of including him. Link to buy
On This Day in
Tudor History by Claire Ridgway
An extremely useful
book for finding the dates of significant events during the Tudor era. It is
set out as 365 days with events and information listed each day. There are
multiple ways to use this book, it is interesting to see what was happening on
today’s date or on your birthday for example, as well as being very handy to
have if you are researching or learning about the Tudors. Link to buy
Discovering Tudor
London by Natalie Grueninger
As well as having
the Talking Tudors podcast and the website On the Tudor Trail,
Natalie also writes books! Discovering Tudor London is like a Tudor guidebook
of London. If like me, going sightseeing has been put on hold for you because
of the pandemic, then you can still use this guidebook as a way to get to know
all about the various places you can visit with Tudor history attached in and
around London. When you first start learning about the Tudors, you will notice certain
places crop up a lot and the various castles, homes and cathedrals etc can get
quite confusing, so this guidebook will help you learn more about them. You can
even make a list of places you want to visit once you are ready to go exploring
again! Link to buy Natalie has also recently started a new account on Instagram: Women’s
History Circle (@womenshistorycircle) which promotes women
working within the History community. It is a great account full of women supporting
women, do join us!
So, those are my
book recommendations! I hope you have fun building your Tudor bookshelf
collection. If you buy/borrow any of these fabulous books do tell me your
thoughts on them. I will do more posts like this in the future because I have a
LOT of books! I also look forward to reviewing more books on the blog too.
I have two book
reviews for you to read in the meantime:
https://lifelonghistorylover.blogspot.com/2020/08/book-review-six-wives-of-henry-viii-by.html
https://lifelonghistorylover.blogspot.com/2020/07/review-of-anna-of-kleve-queen-of.html
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