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Henry VIII of England

2007 Schools Wikipedia Selection. Related subjects: Monarchs of Great Britain

                   Henry VIII
   Reign       22 April 1509– 28 January 1547
   Coronation  24 June 1509
   Born        28 June 1491
               Palace of Placentia
   Died        28 January 1547, aged 55
               Palace of Whitehall
   Buried      St George's Chapel at Windsor Castle
   Predecessor Henry VII
   Successor   Edward VI
   Consort     Catherine of Aragon (1509-1533)
               Anne Boleyn (1533-1536)
               Jane Seymour (1536-1537)
               Anne of Cleves (1540-1540)
               Catherine Howard (1540-1542)
               Catherine Parr (1543-1547)
   Issue       Mary I
               Elizabeth I
               Edward VI
   Royal House Tudor
   Father      Henry VII
   Mother      Elizabeth of York
   Silver groat of Henry VIII, minted c. 1540. The reverse depicts the
   quartered arms of England and France
   Silver groat of Henry VIII, minted c. 1540. The reverse depicts the
   quartered arms of England and France

   Henry VIII ( 28 June 1491 - 28 January 1547) was King of England and
   Lord of Ireland, later King of Ireland, from 22 April 1509 until his
   death. He was the second monarch of the House of Tudor, succeeding his
   father, Henry VII. Henry VIII is famous for having been married six
   times, and ultimately breaking with the Roman Catholic Church. He
   wielded perhaps the most unfettered power of any English monarch, and
   brought about the Dissolution of the Monasteries and the union of
   England and Wales.

   Henry VIII was the younger son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. His
   elder brother, Arthur, Prince of Wales, died in 1502, leaving Henry as
   heir to the throne.

   Many significant pieces of legislation were enacted during Henry VIII's
   reign. They included the several Acts which severed the Church of
   England from the Roman Catholic Church and established Henry as the
   supreme head of the Church in England.

   Henry VIII is known to have been an avid gambler and dice player. In
   his youth, he excelled at sports, especially jousting, hunting, and
   real tennis. He was also an accomplished musician, author, and poet;
   his best known piece of music is Pastyme With Good Company ("The Kynges
   Ballade"). Henry VIII was also involved in the original construction
   and improvement of several significant buildings, including Nonsuch
   Palace, King's College Chapel, Cambridge and Westminster Abbey in
   London. Many of the existing buildings Henry improved were properties
   confiscated from Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, such as Christ Church, Oxford,
   Hampton Court Palace, palace of Whitehall, and Trinity College,
   Cambridge.

Early life and first marriage

   The future Henry VIII was born at the Palace of Placentia in Greenwich
   in 1491
   The future Henry VIII was born at the Palace of Placentia in Greenwich
   in 1491

   Born at the Palace of Placentia at Greenwich, Henry VIII was the third
   child of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York. Only three of Henry VIII's
   six siblings — Arthur (the Prince of Wales), Margaret and Mary —
   survived infancy. In 1493, Henry was appointed Constable of Dover
   Castle and Lord Warden of the Cinque Ports. In 1494, he was created
   Duke of York. He was subsequently appointed Earl Marshal of England and
   Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, though still a child. As a youth, Henry was
   also given a first-rate education from leading tutors (along the way
   becoming fluent in Latin, French, and Spanish). This training was in
   anticipation of him having a career in the Church, not as monarch, as
   that was a role reserved for his older brother, Prince Arthur.
   Nevertheless, upon the sudden death of Arthur in 1502, Henry became
   Prince of Wales and heir to the throne.

   Despite losing his first-born son and heir, Henry's father refused to
   give up his efforts to seal a marital alliance between England and
   Spain. In place of the dead Arthur, Henry was offered to Spain for
   marriage to Catherine of Aragon, youngest surviving heir of King
   Ferdinand II of Aragon and Queen Isabella I of Castile. In order for
   the new Prince of Wales to marry Arthur's widow, a dispensation had to
   be obtained from the Pope to overrule the impediment of affinity.
   (Catherine maintained that her first marriage was never consummated; if
   she were correct, no papal dispensation would have been necessary —
   merely a dissolution of ratified marriage would be needed.) Both the
   English and Spanish parties agreed on the necessity of a papal
   dispensation for the removal of all doubts regarding the legitimacy of
   the marriage. Due to the impatience of Catherine's mother, Queen
   Isabella, the Pope granted his dispensation in the form of a Papal
   Bull. Thus, fourteen months after her young husband's death, Catherine
   found herself betrothed to his brother, the new Prince of Wales. By
   1505, however, the king lost interest in an alliance with Spain, and
   Henry was forced to declare that his betrothal had been arranged
   without his assent.

   Continued diplomatic manoeuvring over the fate of the proposed marriage
   lingered until the death of Henry VII in 1509. Young King Henry VIII,
   able to decide the issue for himself without a regent by virtue of
   having just turned eighteen, decided to proceed with the marriage to
   Catherine. They married on June 11, two weeks before their formal
   coronations.

Early reign

   Henry VIII proved by nearly all accounts to be a popular and energetic
   monarch at the outset of his reign. Gifted not only with his father's
   considerable intelligence and erudition but also with charm and
   athletic ability, Henry soon transformed his court into a leading
   centre of humanism in Western Europe by attracting and promoting
   talented men of the new learning, such as Thomas Wolsey and Sir Thomas
   More, to key positions in his government. Many of these men were from
   middle class backgrounds and as such, complemented Henry's general
   policy of advancing the gentry to offset the power of the old nobility,
   which was still weakened from the War of the Roses. Left with a large
   surplus in the Treasury by his father, Henry lavished funds on arts,
   learning and advancing his new favourites at court. Even more was to be
   spent in carving out a prominent new role for England in European
   affairs..

   The first such opportunity offered itself in 1512, when Henry was able
   to join the Holy League, which then included the Papal States, Spain
   and Venice in alliance against France's efforts to dominate the Italian
   peninsula. While few tangible military successes resulted from Henry's
   subsequent continental campaign, his forces were able to add yet
   another entry to the long list of resounding victories over Scottish
   arms at the Battle of Flodden Field in September 1513 — a victory
   which, along with Henry's capture of Tournai two weeks later, allowed
   the king sufficient manoeuvring room to make peace with France the
   following year. Nonetheless, the ancient Anglo-French rivalry was
   intensified by the accession in 1515 of Francis I of France, who
   competed with Henry for prestige as a fellow gifted, magnetic young
   monarch. This personal and political rivalry reached an ostentatious
   climax of sorts in Henry's extravagant meeting with Francis at the "
   Field of Cloth of Gold" near Calais, France, in 1520. Results from the
   conference proved as fleeting as the Holy League war, however. In the
   end, it proved merely an expensive and glittering interlude in a
   larger, three-way struggle for power between Henry, Francis and the new
   Spanish king, Charles of Hapsburg, whose power was enormously augmented
   by his election as Holy Roman Emperor Charles V in 1519. Aided by his
   adroit Lord Chancellor, Thomas (now Cardinal) Wolsey, Henry soon
   resurrected the Spanish alliance with Charles, but ultimately played a
   limited role in the ensuing war with France over Italian lands. The
   king of France spent the next several years contesting Emperor Charles
   for control of Italy, losing control of Milan and ultimately being
   captured by Charles at Pavia in 1525. Faced with the age-old papal
   nightmare of imperial dominance of Italy come again to life, Pope
   Clement VII solicited Henry to join a new alliance, the League of
   Cognac, against the emperor.

   Henry had ample religious and increasing personal motives for achieving
   a closer alliance with the papacy. His early theological education had
   inculcated in him a deep interest in religious issues, and he quickly
   carved out a record as a staunch supporter of the Catholic Church in
   the controversies of the era. Henry capped these efforts by authoring a
   blistering attack on Martin Luther titled Assertio Septem
   Sacramentorum, a tract vindicating the Church's dogmatic teaching on
   the sacraments, the sacrifice of the mass, and papal supremacy — all
   doctrines which had come under assault by Luther. The authorship of the
   Assertio was questioned at the time, not least by Luther, although most
   modern scholars attribute a major share of the writing to the king.
   Henry's tract earned him the honorific title Defensor Fidei (Defender
   of the Faith) from Pope Leo X (a title which all subsequent monarchs of
   England have retained).

   This theological prestige, coupled with Henry's papal military
   alliance, increasingly entered Henry's dynastic calculations in 1526-27
   as it became increasingly clear that his wife, Queen Catherine, was
   unlikely to provide a male heir for the Tudor throne. Now over 40,
   Catherine was considered unlikely to mother any sequels to a
   disappointing maternal record — three short-lived sons, a miscarriage,
   and one surviving child, Princess Mary (later Mary I of England).
   Unwilling to accept a female heir yet convinced of his own continuing
   ability to sire healthy offspring (thanks to reputed illegitimate issue
   from his mistresses), Henry increasingly pondered the possibility of
   obtaining Church sanction for invalidating his marriage to Catherine,
   whose Spanish birth and connect were increasingly a liability in
   Henry's anti-imperial foreign policy.

Religious upheaval and divorce from Queen Catherine

   Part of the series on
   Anglicanism
   Anglican Communion
            Background

   Christianity
   English Reformation
   Apostolic Succession
   Catholicism
   Episcopal polity
              People

   Lancelot Andrewes
   Thomas Cranmer
   Henry VIII
   Richard Hooker
   John Henry Newman
   Jeremy Taylor
   William Temple
   Desmond Tutu
   Rowan Williams
       Instruments of Unity

   Archbishop of Canterbury
   Lambeth Conferences
   Anglican Consultative Council
   Primates' Meeting
        Liturgy and Worship

   Book of Common Prayer
   High Church · Low Church
   Broad Church
   Oxford Movement
   Thirty-Nine Articles
   Book of Homilies
   Doctrine
   Ministry
   Sacraments
   Saints in Anglicanism

   King Henry's increasing impatience with Catherine's inability to
   produce the desired heir was given a new spur when he became attracted
   to a charismatic young courtier in the Queen's entourage, Anne Boleyn,
   in 1525. Henry ordered Cardinal Wolsey to begin formal proceedings with
   Rome to annul his marriage, sending the king's secretary, William
   Knight, to Rome to petition for an annulment of Henry's marriage with
   Catherine on the grounds that her brief marriage to Henry's dead
   brother Arthur had, indeed, been consummated. Pope Clement VII was
   highly reluctant to grant the king’s request, however, for fear that it
   would anger Charles V, who was Catherine’s nephew. Clement's reluctance
   was only magnified after the sack of Rome in 1527, a disaster which
   left him effectively Charles's prisoner. Wolsey's efforts to lobby for
   the divorce were unavailing. These failures, concomitant with his
   growing estrangement from Anne Boleyn, finally led to Wolsey's
   dismissal as Chancellor by Henry in 1529. His replacement, Sir Thomas
   More, seemed an even less likely candidate to secure Henry's desired
   end, given his scruples about the suit and devout loyalty to Rome.

   At the same time, however, Henry discovered and promoted other men of a
   different temper; chief among these were two gifted young clerics,
   Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer. It was Cromwell who first suggested
   in 1529 that Henry should consult the great universities of Europe for
   an opinion about the validity of his marriage. The project, abetted by
   apparent bribes and favours, achieved the hoped-for success, with
   favourable opinions offered to the English Parliament in 1530.
   Cranmer's support of the King's efforts to put aside the Queen was
   rewarded with a position as ambassador to the imperial court, and
   shortly thereafter, he was appointed to replace William Warham as
   Archbishop of Canterbury upon the latter's death. Cromwell, meanwhile,
   earned a position as chief advisor to the king with his even more
   daring — and fateful — proposal that Henry consider abolishing papal
   supremacy and declare himself head of the Church in England. Both
   Cromwell and Cranmer were protégés of Boleyn, who shared her growing
   sympathies with Protestant doctrines taking shape on the continent —
   and soon had a chance to put them in practice. Threats of withheld
   papal tithes having failed to move Clement VII to action, Henry finally
   took matters into his own hands: he secretly married Boleyn in January
   1533, and shortly thereafter, had his allies in Parliament pass a
   statute forbidding further appeals to Rome. Archbishop Cranmer quickly
   moved to declare Henry's marriage to Catherine invalid and his new one
   to Anne Boleyn valid. Boleyn was crowned Queen of England on June 1,
   and gave birth to a daughter, Elizabeth (later Elizabeth I of England)
   three months later.

   The Pope reacted by moving to excommunicate Henry in July 1533.
   (Historians disagree on the exact date of the excommunication;
   according to Winston Churchill's History of the English Speaking
   Peoples, the bull of 1533 was a draft with penalties left blank and was
   not made official until 1535. Others say Henry was not officially
   excommunicated until 1538, by Pope Paul III). Considerable religious
   upheaval followed. Urged by Cromwell, Parliament passed several Acts
   that enforced the breach with Rome in the spring of 1534. The Statute
   in Restraint of Appeals prohibited appeals from English ecclesiastical
   courts to the Pope. It also prevented the Church from making any
   regulations without the King's consent. The Ecclesiastical Appointments
   Act 1534 required the clergy to elect bishops nominated by the
   Sovereign. The Act of Supremacy 1534 declared that the King was "the
   only Supreme Head in Earth of the Church of England"; the Treasons Act
   1534 made it high treason punishable by death to refuse to acknowledge
   the King as such. The Pope was also denied sources of revenue such as
   Peter's Pence.

   Rejecting the decisions of the Pope, Parliament validated the marriage
   between Henry and Anne with the Act of Succession 1533. Catherine's
   daughter, the Lady Mary, was declared illegitimate, and Anne's issue
   were declared next in the line of succession. Included in this
   declaration was, most notably, a clause repudiating "any foreign
   authority, prince or potentate". All adults in the Kingdom were
   required to acknowledge the Act's provisions by oath; those who refused
   to do so were subject to imprisonment for life. The publisher or
   printer of any literature alleging that Henry's marriage to Anne was
   invalid was automatically guilty of high treason, and could be punished
   by death.

   Opposition to Henry's religious policies was quickly suppressed in
   England. A number of dissenting monks were tortured and executed. The
   most prominent resisters included John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester, and
   Sir Thomas More, Henry's former Lord Chancellor, both of whom refused
   to take the oath and were subsequently convicted of high treason and
   beheaded at Tyburn in 1535. Thomas Cromwell, for whom was created the
   post of "Vicegerent in Spirituals", was authorized to visit
   monasteries, ostensibly to ensure that they followed royal
   instructions, but in reality to assess their wealth. In 1536, an Act of
   Parliament allowed Henry to seize the possessions of the lesser
   monasteries (those with annual incomes of £200 or less). These
   suppressions in turn contributed to further resistance among the
   English people, most notably in the Pilgrimage of Grace, a large
   uprising in the north of England in October of the same year. After
   negotiations with the Pilgrimage's leaders broke down, Henry ordered
   its leaders, including its chief, Robert Aske, arrested and executed
   for treason. Dissolution of the remaining, larger monasteries followed
   a subsequent authorizing act by Parliament in April 1539 (See main
   article: Dissolution of the monasteries).

Execution of his second wife, Queen Anne

   Though she was instrumental in helping to bring about these radical
   religious changes, the King's relationship with his Queen quickly
   soured. After the Princess Elizabeth's birth, Queen Anne had two
   pregnancies that ended in either miscarriage or stillbirth,
   resurrecting old frustrations that Henry had experienced with
   Catherine. Determined to father a male heir, and perhaps encouraged by
   Thomas Cromwell, Henry had Anne arrested on charges of using witchcraft
   to trap him into marrying her, of having adulterous relationships with
   five other men, of incest with her brother George Boleyn, Viscount
   Rochford, of injuring the King and of conspiring to kill him, which
   amounted to treason; the charges were most likely fabricated. The court
   trying the case was presided over by Anne's own uncle, Thomas Howard,
   3rd Duke of Norfolk. In May 1536, the Court condemned Anne and her
   brother to death, either by burning at the stake or by decapitation,
   whichever the King pleased. The other four men Queen Anne had allegedly
   been involved with were to be hanged, drawn and quartered, however
   their sentences ultimately commuted to decapitation. Anne and her
   brother George were also beheaded soon thereafter. At her final Mass,
   the Queen publicly swore to her innocence in the presence of a priest
   and various witnesses.

Birth of a Prince and death of his third wife, Queen Jane

   One day after Anne's execution in 1536 Henry got engaged to, and 10
   days later married Jane Seymour, one of the Queen's ladies-in-waiting
   to whom the King had been showing favour for some time. The Act of
   Succession 1536 declared Henry's children by Queen Jane to be next in
   the line of succession, and declared both the Lady Mary and the Lady
   Elizabeth illegitimate, thus excluding them from the throne. The King
   was granted the power to further determine the line of succession in
   his will. Jane gave birth to a son, Prince Edward the future Edward VI,
   in 1537, Jane died at Greenwich Palace on 24 October 1537 of puerperal
   fever. After Jane's death, the entire court mourned with Henry for some
   time. Henry also considered her to be his only "true" wife, being the
   only one who had given him the male heir he so desperately sought.

Major Acts in the Kingdom

   At about the same time as his marriage to Jane Seymour, Henry granted
   his assent to the Laws in Wales Act 1535, which legally annexed Wales,
   uniting England and Wales into one unified nation. The Act provided for
   the sole use of English in official proceedings in Wales,
   inconveniencing the numerous speakers of the Welsh language.

   Henry continued with his persecution of his religious opponents. In
   1536, an uprising known as the Pilgrimage of Grace broke out in
   Northern England. To appease the rebellious Roman Catholics, Henry
   agreed to allow Parliament to address their concerns. Furthermore, he
   agreed to grant a general pardon to all those involved. He kept neither
   promise, and a second uprising occurred in 1537. As a result, the
   leaders of the rebellion were convicted of treason and executed. In
   1540, Henry sanctioned the destruction of shrines to Roman Catholic
   Saints. In 1542, England's remaining monasteries were all dissolved,
   and their property transferred to the Crown. As a reward for his role,
   Thomas Cromwell was created Earl of Essex. Abbots and priors lost their
   seats in the House of Lords; only archbishops and bishops came to
   comprise the ecclesiastical element of the body. The Lords Spiritual,
   as members of the clergy with seats in the House of Lords were known,
   were for the first time outnumbered by the Lords Temporal.

Henry's mistresses

   Historians are only sure of the names of two of Henry's mistresses:
   Elizabeth Blount and Mary Boleyn ( Anne's sister). Elizabeth Blount
   gave birth to Henry's illegitimate son, Henry Fitzroy, and there are
   numerous rumours of Mary Boleyn giving birth to Henry's illegitimate
   child, though there is no proof of this. There is also evidence to link
   him to several other women such as: Jane Popicourt,1510, a Frenchwoman
   at the court and a mistress of the kidnapped Duc de Longueville; Lady
   Anne Stafford, in 1514, sister of the duke of Buckingham and wife of
   Lord Hastings; and Margaret Shelton, in 1534-5, cousin of Anne & Mary
   Boleyn. There are also references to a lady he housed in a manor house
   (unknown year), an 'unknown lady' in 1534 and a lady from Tournai, in
   his excursions into France in 1513.

Henry's innovative court

   Henry was the quintessential Renaissance Man, and his court was a
   centre of scholarly and artistic innovation. The discovery of America
   or "The New World" set the stage for Henry's innovative attitude. Henry
   was among the first European rulers to learn about the true geography
   of the world, a revolutionary discovery. In 1507, the cartographers
   Martin Waldseemüller and Matthias Ringmann published the first "modern"
   map of the world, the first map to accurately depict the American
   Continent and a separate Atlantic and Pacific Ocean, a radical thought
   for the time. This discovery created an atmosphere of exploration and
   discovery in the arts and sciences which Henry took full advantage of
   in his court and daily life, setting the stage for his descendent
   Elizabeth the Great.

Later years

   Henry was shown the above picture of Anne of Cleves
   Henry was shown the above picture of Anne of Cleves

   Henry desired to marry once again to ensure that a male could succeed
   him. Thomas Cromwell, 1st Earl of Essex suggested Anne, the sister of
   the Protestant Duke of Cleves, who was seen as an important ally in
   case of a Roman Catholic attack on England. Hans Holbein the Younger
   was dispatched to Cleves to paint a portrait of Anne for the King.
   After regarding Holbein's flattering portrayal, and urged by the
   complimentary description of Anne given by his courtiers, Henry agreed
   to wed Anne. On Anne's arrival in England, Henry is said to have found
   her utterly unattractive, privately calling her a "Flanders Mare". She
   was painted totally without any signs of her pockmarked face.
   Nevertheless, he married her on 6 January 1540.

   Henry desired to end the marriage, not only because of his personal
   feelings but also because of political considerations. The Duke of
   Cleves had become engaged in a dispute with the Holy Roman Emperor,
   with whom Henry had no desire to quarrel. Queen Anne was intelligent
   enough not to impede Henry's quest for an annulment. She testified that
   her marriage was never consummated. Henry was said to have come into
   the room each night and merely kissed his new bride on the forehead
   before sleeping. The marriage was subsequently annulled on the grounds
   that Anne had previously been contracted to marry another European
   nobleman. She received the title of "The King's Sister", and was
   granted Hever Castle, the former residence of Anne Boleyn's family. The
   Earl of Essex, meanwhile, fell out of favour for his role in arranging
   the marriage, and was subsequently attainted and beheaded. The office
   of Vicegerent in Spirituals, which had been specifically created for
   him, was not filled.

   On 28 July 1540 (the same day Lord Essex was executed) Henry married
   the young Catherine Howard, Anne Boleyn's first cousin. He was
   absolutely delighted with his new queen. Soon after her marriage,
   however, Queen Catherine had an affair with the courtier, Thomas
   Culpeper. She also employed Francis Dereham, who was previously
   informally engaged to her and had an affair with her prior to her
   marriage, as her secretary. Thomas Cranmer, who was opposed to the
   powerful Catholic Howard family, brought evidence of Queen Catherine's
   activities to the King's notice. Though Henry originally refused to
   believe the allegations, he allowed Cranmer to conduct an
   investigation, which resulted in Queen Catherine's implication. When
   questioned, the Queen could have admitted a prior contract to marry
   Dereham, which would have made her subsequent marriage to Henry
   invalid, but she instead claimed that Dereham had forced her to enter
   into an adulterous relationship. Dereham, meanwhile, exposed Queen
   Catherine's relationship with Thomas Culpeper.

   Catherine's marriage was annulled shortly before her execution. As was
   the case with Anne Boleyn, Catherine Howard could not have technically
   been guilty of adultery, as the marriage was officially null and void
   from the beginning. Again, this point was ignored, and Catherine was
   executed on 13 February 1542. She was only about eighteen years old at
   the time.

   Henry married his last wife, the wealthy widow Catherine Parr, in 1543.
   She argued with Henry over religion; she was a radical, but Henry
   remained a conservative. This behaviour almost led to her undoing, but
   she saved herself by a show of submissiveness. She helped reconcile
   Henry with his first two daughters, the Lady Mary and the Lady
   Elizabeth. In 1544, an Act of Parliament put them back in the line of
   succession after Edward, Prince of Wales, though they were still deemed
   illegitimate. The same Act allowed Henry to determine further
   succession to the throne in his will.

   A mnemonic for the fates of Henry's wives is "divorced, beheaded, died,
   divorced, beheaded, survived". An alternative version is "King Henry
   the Eighth, to six wives he was wedded: One died, one survived, two
   divorced, two beheaded". The doggerel, however, may be misleading.
   Firstly, Henry was never divorced from any of his wives; rather, his
   marriages to them were annulled. Secondly, four marriages — not two —
   ended in annulments. The marriages to Anne Boleyn and Catherine Howard
   were annulled shortly before their executions.

   The cruelty and tyrannical disposition of Henry became more and more
   apparent as he advanced in years and failed in health. And the fearful
   series of political executions, which had commenced with that of Edmund
   de la Pole, Duke of Suffolk in 1513, was terminated by that of Henry
   Earl of Surrey, in January, 1547. According to Holinshed, the number of
   executions in this reign amounted to 72,000.

Death and succession

   King Henry VIII died in the Palace of Whitehall in 1547
   King Henry VIII died in the Palace of Whitehall in 1547

   Later in life, Henry was grossly overweight, with a waist measurement
   of 54 inches (137 cm), and possibly suffered from gout. The well known
   theory that he suffered from syphilis was first promoted approximately
   100 years after his death. More recent support for this idea has come
   from a greater understanding of the disease and has led to the
   suggestion that Edward VI, Mary I, and Elizabeth I all displayed
   symptoms characteristic of congenital syphilis. Henry's increased size
   dates from a jousting accident in 1536. He suffered a thigh wound which
   not only prevented him from taking exercise, but also gradually became
   ulcerated and may have indirectly led to his death, which occurred on
   28 January 1547 at the Palace of Whitehall. He died on what would have
   been his father's 90th birthday. Henry VIII was buried in St George's
   Chapel in Windsor Castle, next to his wife Jane Seymour. Almost a
   hundred years later Charles I would also be buried in his grave. Within
   a little more than a decade after his death, all three of his children
   sat on the English throne, and were his only descendants.

   Henry VIII had another child, Henry Fitzroy by a mistress, Elizabeth
   (Bessie) Blount. The young boy was made Duke of Richmond in June 1525
   in what some thought was one stop on the path to legitimatising him.
   This never occurred, however, and Fitzroy never acceded to the throne.
   In 1533, he married Mary Howard of the Norfolk Howards. Henry died only
   three years later without any successors.

   Under the Act of Succession of 1543, Henry's only surviving son,
   Edward, inherited the Crown, becoming Edward VI. Edward was the first
   Protestant monarch to rule England. Since Edward was only nine years
   old at the time, he could not exercise actual power. Henry's will
   designated 16 executors to serve on a council of regency until Edward
   reached the age of 18. The executors chose Edward Seymour, 1st Earl of
   Hertford, Jane Seymour's elder brother, to be Lord Protector of the
   Realm. In the event of a death without children, Edward was to be
   succeeded (in default of his issue) by Henry VIII's daughter by
   Catherine of Aragon, the Princess Mary. If Princess Mary did not have
   children, she was to be succeeded by his daughter by Anne Boleyn,
   Princess Elizabeth. Finally, if Princess Elizabeth also did not have
   children, she was to be followed by the descendants of Henry VIII's
   deceased sister, Mary Tudor, Duchess of Suffolk. Mary, Queen of Scots,
   was Henry's older sister Margaret Tudor's granddaughter and therefore
   exempt from succession according to this act.

Legacy

   No account of the legacy of Henry VIII can overlook its dominating fact
   — the launching of the English Reformation. Though mainly motivated by
   dynastic and personal concerns, and despite never really abandoning the
   fundamentals of the Catholic faith, Henry ensured that the greatest act
   of his reign would be one of the most radical and decisive of any
   English monarch. His break with Rome in 1533-4 was an act with enormous
   consequences for the course of modern English history well beyond the
   end of the Tudor dynasty: not only in making possible the subsequent
   transformation of England into a vibrant (albeit very distinctive)
   Protestant society, but also in the shift of economic and political
   power from the Church to the gentry, chiefly through the seizure and
   transfer of monastic lands and assets — a short-term strategy with long
   term social consequences. Henry's decision to entrust the regency of
   his son Edward's minor years to a decidedly Protestant regency council
   dominated by Edward Seymour — most likely for the simple tactical
   reason that Seymour seemed likely to provide the strongest leadership
   for the kingdom — ensured that the Protestant reformation would be
   consolidated and even furthered during his son's reign. Such ironies
   marked other aspects of his legacy. He fostered humanist learning and
   yet was responsible for the deaths of several outstanding English
   humanists. Obsessed with securing the succession to the throne, he left
   no heirs but an unhealthy minor male heir and two daughters. The power
   of the state was magnified, yet so too (at least after Henry's death)
   were demands for increased political participation by the middle class.
   Henry worked with some success to once again make England a major
   player on the European scene but depleted his treasury in the course of
   doing so, a legacy that would remain an issue for English monarchs
   through the very end of the Tudor dynasty.

   Together with Alfred the Great and Charles II, Henry is traditionally
   called one of the founders of the Royal Navy. There are good reasons
   for this — his reign featured some naval warfare and, more
   significantly, large royal investment in shipbuilding (including a few
   spectacular ' great ships' such as Mary Rose), dockyards (such as HMNB
   Portsmouth) and naval innovations (eg the use of cannon on-board ship -
   although archers were still deployed on medieval-style forecastles and
   bowcastles as the ship's primary armament on large ships, or
   co-armament where cannon were used). However, it is a misnomer since
   Henry did not bequeath to his immediate successors a ' navy' in the
   sense of a formalised organisation with structures, ranks, formalised
   munitioning structures etc, but only in the sense of a set of ships
   (albeit some spectacular ones). Elizabeth I still had to cobble
   together a set of privately owned ships to fight off the Spanish Armada
   (which was consisted of about 130 war ships and converted merchant
   ships) and in the former, formal sense the modern British navy, the
   Royal Navy, is largely a product of the Anglo-Dutch naval rivalry of
   the seventeenth century.

   By his break with Rome, Henry incurred the threat of a large-scale
   French or Spanish invasion. To guard against this he strengthened
   existing coastal defence fortresses (such as Dover Castle and, also at
   Dover, Moat Bulwark and Archcliffe Fort — he personally visited for a
   few months to supervise, as is commemorated in the modern exhibition in
   Dover Castle's keep there). He also built a chain of new 'castles' (in
   fact, large bastioned and garrisoned gun batteries) along Britain's
   southern coast from East Anglia to Cornwall, largely built of material
   gained from the demolition of monasteries. These were also known as
   Henry VIII's Device Forts.

   In 2002, Henry VIII placed 40th in a BBC-sponsored poll on the 100
   Greatest Britons.

Ancestors

   CAPTION: Henry VIII's ancestors in three generations

   Henry VIII Father:
   Henry VII of England Paternal Grandfather:
   Edmund Tudor, 1st Earl of Richmond Paternal Great-grandfather:
   Owen Tudor
   Paternal Great-grandmother:
   Catherine of Valois
   Paternal Grandmother:
   Lady Margaret Beaufort Paternal Great-grandfather:
   John Beaufort, 1st Duke of Somerset
   Paternal Great-grandmother:
   Margaret Beauchamp of Bletso
   Mother:
   Elizabeth of York Maternal Grandfather:
   Edward IV of England Maternal Great-grandfather:
   Richard Plantagenet, 3rd Duke of York
   Maternal Great-grandmother:
   Cecily Neville
   Maternal Grandmother:
   Elizabeth Woodville Maternal Great-grandfather:
   Richard Woodville, 1st Earl Rivers
   Maternal Great-grandmother:
   Jacquetta of Luxembourg

In popular culture

Film

   There have been many films about Henry and his court, notably The
   Private Life of Henry VIII ( 1933), starring Charles Laughton, whose
   performance as Henry earned him an Academy Award, and The Six Wives of
   Henry VIII ( 1973), starring Keith Michell, based on an earlier TV
   series (see below). Richard Burton and Geneviève Bujold were nominated
   for Academy Awards for Best Actor and Best Actress for their roles as
   Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn in Anne of the Thousand Days ( 1969). Henry,
   played by Robert Shaw, also appears as one of the main characters in
   the multiple- Oscar-winning movie about Thomas More, A Man for All
   Seasons ( 1966), based upon Robert Bolt's play of the same name. Also,
   Henry VIII (again played by Charles Laughton) was a featured character
   in a movie about the early years of Elizabeth I, Young Bess ( 1953).

Television

   Henry has also made many television appearances. In drama, a notable
   example is the 1970 BBC series The Six Wives of Henry VIII, starring
   Keith Michell, made up of six television plays, one per wife, each by a
   different author. Another is the 2003 ITV feature-length Henry VIII,
   with Ray Winstone as Henry, critically panned for portraying Henry as
   an East End gangster, speaking with Winstone's characteristic Cockney
   tones, surrounded by a court speaking in Received Pronunciation.

   In 2006, Showtime announced a new series dramatizing Henry VIII as a
   young man called The Tudors (TV series). The 2007 series will star
   Jonathan Rhys-Meyers as the young king.

   In documentary, the leading academic on Henry, David Starkey, produced
   the Channel 4 series Henry VIII and The Six Wives of Henry VIII - the
   latter gave one episode each to Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn,
   one jointly to Jane Seymour and Anne of Cleves, and another jointly to
   Catherine Howard and Catherine Parr. Henry also has an episode to
   himself in the more recent series Monarchy.

Music

   In 1910. Fred Murray and R. P. Weston wrote a music hall song, "I'm
   Henery the Eighth, I Am", which plays off Henry VIII's numerous wives,
   although the lyrics make it clear that it is actually about a man named
   Henry who is the eighth with that name to have married the woman
   alluded to in the song. It became a signature song of Harry Champion,
   and became a Number 1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 in the United States
   when it was revived in 1965 by British rock band Herman's Hermits.

Style and arms

   Henry VIII was the first English monarch to regularly use the style
   "Majesty", though the alternatives "Highness" and "Grace" were also
   used from time to time.

   Several changes were made to the royal style during his reign. Henry
   originally used the style "Henry the Eighth, by the Grace of God, King
   of England, France and Lord of Ireland". In 1521, pursuant to a grant
   from Pope Leo X rewarding a book by Henry attacking Martin Luther and
   defending Catholicism, the royal style became "Henry the Eighth, by the
   Grace of God, King of England and France, Defender of the Faith and
   Lord of Ireland". After the breach with Rome, Pope Paul III rescinded
   the grant of the title "Defender of the Faith", but an Act of
   Parliament declared that it remained valid.

   In 1535, Henry added the "supremacy phrase" to the royal style, which
   became "Henry the Eighth, by the Grace of God, King of England and
   France, Defender of the Faith, Lord of Ireland and of the Church of
   England in Earth Supreme Head". In 1536, the phrase "of the Church of
   England" changed to "of the Church of England and also of Ireland".

   In 1541, Henry had the Irish Parliament change the title "Lord of
   Ireland" to " King of Ireland" (see Crown of Ireland Act 1542) after
   being advised that many Irish people regarded the Pope as the true head
   of their country, with the Lord acting as a mere representative. The
   reason the Irish regarded the pope as their overlord was because
   Ireland had originally been given to the English King Henry II by Pope
   Adrian IV in the twelfth century as a feudal territory under papal
   overlordship. The meeting of Irish Parliament that proclaimed Henry
   VIII King of Ireland was the first meeting attended by the Gaelic Irish
   chieftains as well as the Anglo-Irish aristocrats. The style "Henry the
   Eighth, by the Grace of God, King of England, France and Ireland,
   Defender of the Faith and of the Church of England and also of Ireland
   in Earth Supreme Head" remained in use until the end of Henry's reign.

   Henry's motto was Coeur Loyal (true heart) and he had this embroidered
   on his clothes in the form of a heart symbol and with the word
   'loyall'. His emblem was the Tudor rose and the Beaufort portcullis.

   Henry VIII's arms were the same as those used by his predecessors since
   Henry IV: Quarterly, Azure three fleurs-de-lys Or (for France) and
   Gules three lions passant guardant in pale Or (for England).

Issue

                           Name Birth Death Notes
    By Catherine of Aragon (married June 11, 1509 annulled May 23, 1533;
                          she died January 6, 1536)
            Miscarried daughter January 31, 1510 January 31, 1510
           Henry, Duke of Cornwall 1 January 1511 22 February 1511
                   Unnamed son November 1513 November 1513
             Henry, Duke of Cornwall December 1514 December 1514
   Queen Mary I 18 February 1516 17 November 1558 married 1554, Philip II
                             of Spain; no issue
              Unnamed child November 10, 1518 November 10, 1518
       By Anne Boleyn (married January 25, 1533 annulled 1536; she was
                           executed May 19, 1536)
    Queen Elizabeth I 7 September 1533 24 March 1603   never married, no
                                    issue
   " Henry Tudor" 1534 1534 Historians are uncertain if the child was born
    and died shortly after birth, or if it was a miscarriage. The affair
       was hushed up and we cannot even be certain of the child's sex.
               " Edward Tudor" 29 January 1536 29 January 1536
      By Jane Seymour (married May 30, 1537; she died October 25, 1537)
                 King Edward VI 12 October 1537 6 July 1553
   By Anne of Cleves (married January 6, 1540 annulled 1540; she died July
                                  17, 1557)
                                  no issue
      By Catherine Howard (married July 28, 1540 annulled 1541; she was
                         executed February 13, 1542)
                                  no issue
      By Catherine Parr (married July 12, 1543; died September 5, 1548)
                                  no issue
                             By Elizabeth Blount
   Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Somerset 15 June 1519 18 June 1536
         illegitimate; married 1533, the Lady Mary Howard; no issue
    By The Lady Mary Boleyn ( many historians now reject the legend that
           the following two children were fathered by Henry VIII)
     Catherine Carey c. 1524/1529 15 January 1568 reputed illegitimate;
                   married Sir Francis Knollys; had issue
     Henry Carey, Baron Hunsdon 4 March 1525/ 1526 23 July 1596 reputed
              illegitimate; married 1545, Ann Morgan; had issue
                              By Mary Berkeley
   Sir Thomas Stucley c. 1525 August 4, 1578 reputed illegitimate; married
                           Anne Curtis; had issue
    Sir John Perrot c. 1527 September 1592 reputed illegitimate; married
                (1) Ann Cheyney and (2) Jane Pruet; had issue
                               By Joan Dyngley
      Etheldreda Malte c. 1529 aft. 1555 reputed illegitimate; married
               1546–1548 to John Harrington; no known issue

   * Note: Of Henry VIII's reputedly illegitimate children, only the Duke
   of Richmond and Somerset was formally acknowledged by the King. The
   paternity of his other alleged illegitimate children is not fully
   established. There may also have been other illegitimate children born
   to short-term unidentified mistresses.

Trivia

     * Technically, Henry was only married twice. Four of his marriages
       were annulled which means they never took place.
     * His court jester was named Will Somers.
     * The only surviving piece of clothing worn by Henry VIII is a cap of
       maintenance, awarded to the Mayor of Waterford, along with a
       bearing sword, in 1536. It currently resides in the Waterford
       Museum of Treasures.
     * It is widely believed (but almost certainly wrongly) that he
       composed the song Greensleeves for his lover and future Queen, Anne
       Boleyn.
     * Henry VIII was the first member of the English Royal Family to wear
       silk stockings.

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