The Constant Princess

The Constant Princess is a historical novel by the English writer Philippa Gregory, published in 2005. It tells the early life of Katherine of Aragon in a heavily fictionalised form.

The novel covers the period from Katherine's arranged marriage to Arthur, Prince of Wales to her rivalry with Anne Boleyn over the position of queen consort of England. Katherine is born Catalina, the Spanish Infanta, to parents who are both rulers and warriors, and she is four years old when she is betrothed to the English prince. In Gregory's account the marriage develops into a loving relationship and the two of them share plans to rule England side by side, and it ends three months in when Arthur succumbs to the sweating sickness. The book also carries a large cast of historical figures around her, among them Henry VII, Henry VIII, Elizabeth of York, Lady Margaret Beaufort, Isabella I of Castille, Ferdinand II of Aragon, Joanna of Castile, Henry, Duke of Cornwall, and Mary I of England.

Gregory writes historical novels about the women of the English royal line, and this one treats a queen usually remembered as the barren first wife of a notorious king as a political figure with a story of her own.