1520: The Field of the Cloth of Gold

1520 explores the characters of two larger-than-life kings, whose rivalry and love-hate relations added a feisty edge to European relations in the early 16th century. What propelled them to meet, and how did each vie to outdo the other in feats of strength and yards of gold cloth? Everyone who was anyone in 1520 was there. But why were the flower of England’s nobility transported across the Channel, and how were they catered for? What did this temporary, fairy-tale village erected in a French field look like, feel like and smell like? This book explores not only the political dimension of their meeting, and the difficult triangle they established with Emperor Charles V, but also the material culture behind the scenes. While the courtiers attended masques, dances, feasts and jousts, an army of servants toiled in the temporary village created specially for that summer. Who were the men and women behind the scenes? And what was the long-term result of the meeting, of that sea of golden tents and fountains spouting wine?

Amy Licence is the author of In Bed With the Tudors, Anne Boleyn, and Living In Squares, Loving In Triangles: The Lives and Loves of Virginia Woolf and the Bloomsbury Group.