Eric Ives

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Eric William Ives, OBE (born 12 July 1931) is a well-respected British historian and an expert on the Tudor period (1485 - 1603).

Ives is particularly noted for his work on the life of Anne Boleyn, the second wife and queen of King Henry VIII of England, whom he began researching about 1979, eventually publishing an acclaimed biography of her in 1986. He has also written extensively on the History of Law, the development of modern higher education, the politics of Henry VIII's reign and the lives of various other Tudor courtiers - including the Welsh land-owning magnate William Brereton, who was unjustly condemned to death in 1536 on the false charge of being Anne Boleyn's lover. Ives's biography of Anne Boleyn was modified and expanded for re-publication in 2004 under the new title of The Life and Death of Anne Boleyn. His theories on her life have drawn him into fierce debate with the American historian Retha Warnicke, who wrote The Rise and Fall of Anne Boleyn in 1989 to challenge Ives's findings.

Ives is currently Emeritus Professor of English History at the University of Birmingham and in 2000 the University of Birmingham Press published The First Civic University: Birmingham, 1880-1980 - An Introductory History, which he co-authored with Diane K. Drummond and Leonard Schwarz. In 2001 he was awarded the prestigious Order of the British Empire by Queen Elizabeth II in recognition of his services to history.