His account of Henry's government is more contentious than he lets on. [51], Henry VII was one of the first European monarchs to recognise the importance of the newly united Spanish kingdom; he concluded the Treaty of Medina del Campo, by which his son Arthur, Prince of Wales, was married to Catherine of Aragon. He died shortly afterwards in Carmarthen Castle. Henry Tudors claim to the throne was, therefore, weak and of no importance until the deaths in 1471 of Henry VIs only son, Edward, of his own two remaining kinsmen of the Beaufort line, and of Henry VI himself, which suddenly made Henry Tudor the sole surviving male with any ancestral claim to the house of Lancaster. Only through the deaths of more obvious claimants, and after the accession of Richard III in 1483, when Henry was 26, did he become a leading candidate. At the same time, Flemish merchants were ejected from England. Letters to relatives have an affectionate tone not captured by official state business, as evidenced by many written to his mother Margaret. The rebels were defeated (June 1487) in a hard-fought battle at Stoke (East Stoke, near Newark in Nottinghamshire), where the doubtful loyalty of some of the royal troops was reminiscent of Richard IIIs difficulties at Bosworth. Indeed he was born in winter, on January 28th 1457, in Pembroke Castle, in Wales and that is one of the reasons why the Welsh dragon always formed part of his insignia. Blair Worden's The English Civil Wars is published by Phoenix. England had been ravaged for decades by conspiracy, violence, murders, coups and countercoups. 24th April 2023 - courses open for registrations. A King from upstart usurper to renaissance monarch to Machiavellian schemer. Based on the terms of the accord, Henry sent 6000 troops to fight (at the expense of Brittany) under the command of Lord Daubeney. Still, as Penn observes, the national sense of relief in 1509 was palpable. He spent most of the next 14 years under the protection of Francis II, Duke of Brittany. I found this really interesting, but Im a history nut. Effectively an orphan, he had spent wretched years as a fugitive in Brittany. I have to admit to being a history geek. Hence, the king was plagued with conspiracies until nearly the end of his reign. Their main aim was money. [79], Amiable and high-spirited, Henry was friendly if dignified in manner, and it was clear that he was extremely intelligent. The new prince was the embodiment of the red and white rose, he was the Tudor rose incarnate. Elizabeth of York (11 February 1466 11 February 1503) was Queen of England from her marriage to King Henry VII on 18 January 1486 until her death. We know that Henry attended the wedding celebrations of Arthur and his bride . It was a fantastic programme and I highly recommend Thomas Penns book on Henry VII Winter King. I would read more by this author. At Rennes Cathedral on Christmas Day 1483, Henry pledged to marry Elizabeth of York, the eldest daughter of Edward IV. 1509. (We certainly can, and do, decide what sort of king Henry was based on what he had his government get up to, however.). [19] He marched toward England accompanied by his uncle Jasper and John de Vere, 13th Earl of Oxford. Happy St Davids Day! With the assistance of the Italian merchant banker Lodovico della Fava and the Italian banker Girolamo Frescobaldi, Henry VII became deeply involved in the trade by licensing ships, obtaining alum from the Ottoman Empire, and selling it to the Low Countries and in England. Penn notes something else about the paeans on the son's accession: later in the Tudor period, apologists for the regime would remember Henry VII as the restorer of national peace and unity, but in 1509 it was the king's death, not his rule, that was held to have ended a long era of dark instability. To strengthen his position, however, he subsidised shipbuilding, so strengthening the navy (he commissioned Europe's first ever and the world's oldest surviving dry dock at Portsmouth in 1495) and improving trading opportunities. [citation needed], In 1506, Grand Master of the Knights Hospitaller Emery d'Amboise asked Henry VII to become the protector and patron of the Order, as he had an interest in the crusade. Soon after his fathers burial on 10 May, Henry suddenly declared that he would indeed marry Catherine, leaving unresolved several issues concerning the papal dispensation and a missing part of the marriage portion. His host was Francis, the Duke of Brittany, who saw Henry Tudor as a pawn in the game between Edward VI and the King of France. He paid very close attention to detail, and instead of spending lavishly he concentrated on raising new revenues. In 1485 Henry landed at Milford Haven in Wales and advanced toward London. The marriage between Arthur, Prince of Wales, and Catherine of Aragon would be the culmination of everything that Henry VII had fought for at the Battle of Bosworth, so in 1501 there was a fortnight of marriage celebrations and London was in a carnival mood. Both parties realised they were mutually disadvantaged by the reduction in commerce. Well written and really interesting about an often ignored king. Henry Tudor is a familiar name to students of English history, especially the military side of it. Stanleys betrayal led to a complete security overhaul and his privy chamber going into lockdown. [citation needed], To secure his hold on the throne, Henry declared himself king by right of conquest retroactively from 21 August 1485, the day before Bosworth Field. It is a sobering reflection for professional historians that the apparently unpromising territory of Henry's reign has recently produced two memorable books, both of them written outside their ranks: this one, and Ann Wroe's biography of the pretender, Perkin (2003), a longer work on a shorter subject. (1): (April 24, 1883. As we know, Henry VII was true to his word, married Elizabeth and they founded the Tudor dynasty between them. Before taking the throne, he was known as Henry Tudor, earl of Richmond. I thought the way he controled the nobility was fascinating - keeping them in check as well a raising vast sums of money at the same time. But now, sensitivity readers are pushing back . He led attempted invasions of Ireland in 1491 and England in 1495, and persuaded James IV of Scotland to invade England in 1496. Four good reasons to indulge in cryptocurrency! The Lancastrian Henry and his Yorkist wife Elizabeth strove to reconcile the factions, but unreconciled Yorkists, to whom he was no more than a usurper, harassed his reign. For instance, the Stanley family had control of Lancashire and Cheshire, upholding the peace on the condition that they stayed within the law. My obsession is European history from the 12th through 17th centuries - especially British history - so of course, when I was offered the chance to review this book, my interest was piqued immediately. However, such a level of paranoia persisted that anyone (John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, for example)[27] with blood ties to the Plantagenets was suspected of coveting the throne. After his victory at Bosworth Field, Henry married Edward IV's daughter Elizabeth of York. Yorkist malcontents had strength in the north of England and in Ireland and had a powerful ally in Richard IIIs sister Margaret, dowager duchess of Burgundy. Through luck, guile and ruthlessness, Henry VII, the first of the Tudor kings, had clambered to the top of the heap--a fugitive with a flimsy claim to England's throne. ||sitemap_index.xml Henry showed remarkable clemency to the surviving rebels: he pardoned Kildare and the other Irish nobles, and he made the boy, Simnel, a servant in the royal kitchen where he was in charge of roasting meats on a spit. Henry then consolidated his reign with magnificent architecture, an opulent household and money. Henry VII, grown rich from Morton's Fork and other squeezes, was far from a bumpkin trying to break into the royal circles of western Europe--he was being courted, and he knew very well to play Castile (Hapsburg) and Aragon off against one another after Isabella died (and Catherine might very well have been packed off home to marry someone else, it was common). Henry VII introduced stability to the financial administration of England by keeping the same financial advisors throughout his reign. [64] This made Henry VII's second son, Henry, Duke of York, heir apparent to the throne. Thus, Henry Tudor had no choice but to gather together an army including mercenary soldiers as well as his own supporters, and he landed in Wales in August, 1485. We use cookies to ensure that we give you the best experience on our website. [3] Henry's paternal grandfather, Owen Tudor, originally from the Tudors of Penmynydd, Isle of Anglesey in Wales, had been a page in the court of King Henry V. He rose to become one of the "Squires to the Body to the King" after military service at the Battle of Agincourt. Henrys throne, however, was far from secure. It was presented by historian Thomas Penn, author of Winter King and was an excellent examination of the King who, as Penn pointed out, tend to be eclipsed by Richard III, the glamour and notoriety of Henry VIII and the charisma of Elizabeth I. It seems that Henry was skilful at extracting money from his subjects on many pretexts, including that of war with France or war with Scotland. There he found more English fugitives, willing to invade England in support of Henry, and bearing news that Richard III had serious plans to marry the princess Elizabeth himself. Shakespeare later turned to Henry's son and successor Henry VIII, whose rule brought marital sensation, renaissance spectacle and the reformation. Reading this, I got a much better understanding of where Henry VIII came from, and why he was destined to be the colorful ruler he became, as an antidote to his own father. Sometimes, Penn explained, charges against people were fabricated so that they would have to pay a fine, for example, a man who was charged with murdering a child and who was found guilty because the jury was rigged. Up to a point, he succeeded. A fresh look at the endlessly fascinating Tudorsthe dramatic and overlooked story of Henry VII and his founding of the Tudor Dynastyfilled with spies, plots, counterplots, and an uneasy royal succession to Henry VIII. Penn explained how Henry reworked recent events to suit him. Henry's father, Edmund Tudor, 1st Earl of Richmond, a half-brother of Henry VI of England and a member of the Welsh Tudors of Penmynydd, died three months before his son Henry was born. Famed British author Thomas Penn takes an extraordinary journey into the dark and chilling world of the first Tudor King, Henry VII. Their chief task was to see that the laws of the country were obeyed in their area. [citation needed], By 1509, justices of the peace were key enforcers of law and order for Henry VII. Penn ended the programme by visiting the tombs of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York in Henrys chapel at Westminster Abbey, a chapel that remains at the heart of political life. However, with the help of the forces of his step-father, Lord Stanley, he defeated Richard and Richard was killed on the battlefield. At any rate, the Wars of the Roses had ended with a victory by which the winner took all, and regardless of his somewhat dubious Plantagenet ancestry. [4] Owen is said to have secretly married the widow of Henry V, Catherine of Valois. The king's own death seven years later had to be kept secret until his nervous entourage had ensured the succession. His dynasty was hanging by a thread and all his hopes had to rest on his youngest son, Henry, and Elizabeth of York producing another son, a spare. Henry's mother, Margaret Beaufort, was a descendant of the Lancastrian branch of the House of Plantagenet. [13] When the Yorkist Edward IV regained the throne in 1471, Henry fled with other Lancastrians to Brittany. All the information is from Thomas Penn. In many ways, it highlights that Henry VIII was a feckless inheritor of the tools of Machiavellian power, but had no idea to what productive end to put them. Lincoln was killed in battle and Henry was victorious. enry VII can look a dull king, so dull that Thomas Penn's title omits his name. The country was in a perpetual state of emergency and Henrys subjects were scared and resentful. King Henry the VII and King Henry the VIII both feared being invaded by foreign countries. Their powers and numbers steadily increased during the time of the Tudors, never more so than under Henry's reign. [35] In 1499, Henry had the Earl of Warwick executed. He became paranoid and made the decision that if his people couldnt love him then they should fear him. Henry spared Richard's nephew and designated heir, John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln, and made the Yorkist heiress Margaret Plantagenet Countess of Salisbury suo jure. Categories: Monarchy, NewsTags: birth of Tudor dynasty, Henry Tudor, Henry VII, Thomas Penn, Tudor dynasty, Winter King, Copyright 2023 The Anne Boleyn Files Henry VII was also shown, but his black line just traced back to Owen Tudor, a chamber servant. MP3 CD. Doubtless the plotters were encouraged by the deaths of Henrys sons in 1500 and 1502 and of his wife in 1503. The parts on how he abused his position and the law to enrich himself while an entire nation watched helplessly are, frankly, pretty relevant to now. While there, he feigned stomach cramps and delayed his departure long enough to miss the tides. Otherwise, at the time of his father's arranging of the marriage to Catherine of Aragon, the future Henry VIII was too young to contract the marriage according to Canon Law and would be ineligible until age fourteen. ), Humphrey Stafford, 1st Duke of Buckingham, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Henry_VII_of_England&oldid=1141813382, Wikipedia articles needing page number citations from September 2021, Articles incorporating a citation from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia with Wikisource reference, Articles incorporating text from the 1913 Catholic Encyclopedia with Wikisource reference, Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the ODNB, Pages containing links to subscription-only content, Wikipedia articles needing page number citations from August 2021, Wikipedia articles incorporating a citation from the 1911 Encyclopaedia Britannica with Wikisource reference, Short description is different from Wikidata, Wikipedia indefinitely semi-protected pages, Articles with unsourced statements from October 2020, Articles needing additional references from October 2020, All articles needing additional references, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, Katherine (2 February 1503 10 February 1503), This page was last edited on 26 February 2023, at 23:16. When he died, his only surviving son, Henry VIII, succeeded him without a breath of opposition. [15], By 1483, Henry's mother was actively promoting him as an alternative to Richard III, despite her being married to Lord Stanley, a Yorkist. [70] Henry VII falls among the minority of British monarchs that never had any known mistresses, and for the times, it is very unusual that he did not remarry: his son Henry was the only male heir left after the death of his wife, thus the death of Arthur created a precarious political position for the House of Tudor. This was excellent. Catherine's mother Isabella I of Castile had died and Catherine's sister Joanna had succeeded her; Catherine was, therefore, daughter of only one reigning monarch and so less desirable as a spouse for Henry VII's heir-apparent. 4. By 1900 the "New Monarchy" interpretation stressed the common factors that in each country led to the revival of monarchical power. Henry was a remarkable man. [20] He amassed an army of about 5,0006,000 soldiers. February 7 Sir Francis Bryan loses an eye and Henry VIII has a new love, An interview with historical novelist Sandra Byrd, Henry VIII and His Six Wives event open for registration. [citation needed], All Acts of Parliament were overseen by the justices of the peace. Henry VII was born on 28 January 1457 at Pembroke Castle, in the English-speaking portion of Pembrokeshire known as Little England beyond Wales. He was supported in this effort by his chancellor, Archbishop John Morton, whose "Morton's Fork" was a catch-22 method of ensuring that nobles paid increased taxes: those nobles who spent little must have saved much, and thus could afford the increased taxes; in contrast, those nobles who spent much obviously had the means to pay the increased taxes. There's a lot of cloak-and-dagger stuff here, something Henry and certain of his counselors seemed especially skilled at, and it was those parts that I particularly enjoyed. Stanley was accused of supporting Warbeck's cause, arrested and later executed. Henry the eighth was a renaissance King. There's a (relatively) brief explanation of Henry's rather tumultuous childhood and his rise to the throne, before Penn really gets into the nitty gritty details during the second half of Henry's reign, focusing on his intricate foreign policy, his increasing use of finance as a means of control over his subjects and, most entertaining to me, the various plots and conspiracies of Henry's enemies. [72] Immediately afterwards, Henry became very sick and nearly died himself, allowing only his mother Margaret Beaufort near him: "privily departed to a solitary place, and would that no man should resort unto him. Years of instability, factionalism and his predecessors' penchant for war had seen royal finances severely battered. [46] In 1506 he resumed the construction of King's College Chapel, Cambridge, started under Henry VI, guaranteeing finances which would continue even after his death. [66], Henry wanted to maintain the Spanish alliance. This is why he named the book the Winter King. It was the end of the union of Lancaster and York and many had only accepted Henry as King because of his wifes Yorkist roots, so Henry was once more on shaky ground with his old enemies resurfacing and raising armies. His first son and heir apparent, Arthur, Prince of Wales, died suddenly at Ludlow Castle, very likely from a viral respiratory illness known at the time as the "English sweating sickness". Penn showed a genealogical roll that had belonged to the de la Pole family which showed Henry VI being the end of the Lancastrian line and the Yorkist line continuing on to Richard III. Henry needed an heir to secure his reign and fortunately an heir came quickly. Overblown prose trumpeting his reign seemed to be the order of the day. Its goals, relentlessly pursued until Henry's death in 1509, were the establishment of a royal house, the elimination of opposition, and the steady accumulation of power and wealth. Swynford was Gaunt's mistress for about 25 years. To unite the opponents of Richard III, Henry had promised to marry Elizabeth of York, eldest daughter of Edward IV; and the coalition of Yorkists and Lancastrians continued, helped by French support, since Richard III talked of invading France. The Lancastrians triumphed under the leadership of a 28-year-old exile named Henry Tudor. The baby died and Elizabeth, herself, died on 11th February 1503, her 37th birthday. [28], Henry had Parliament repeal Titulus Regius, the statute that declared Edward IV's marriage invalid and his children illegitimate, thus legitimising his wife. One of their sons was Edmund, Henry's father. The Great Debasement (1544-1551) was a currency debasement policy introduced in 1544 England under the order of Henry VIII which saw the amount of precious metal in gold and silver coins reduced and in some cases replaced entirely with cheaper base metals such as copper. He was the first monarch of the House of Tudor. Early life The last few years of his reign were ones of repression. During Henry's early years, his uncle Henry VI was fighting against Edward IV, a member of the Yorkist Plantagenet branch. In 1621 Francis Bacon's history of the reign called Henry "a dark prince, and infinitely suspicious". The rest, as we say, is history; Richard III was defeated at the Battle of Bosworth and Henry Tudor had arrived out of nowhere and avenged the death of the little princes in the tower, although there is some debate as to who was actually responsible for their murder.