History UsefulNotes / TheHouseOfTudor

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** ''Series/TheWhiteQueen'' (2013), starring Creator/RebeccaFerguson as Elizabeth Woodville (based on ''The White Queen'', ''The Red Queen'' and ''The Kingmaker's Daughter'').
** ''Series/TheWhitePrincess'' (2017), starring Creator/JodieComer (based on the titular novel).

Even ignoring this, it is ''obvious'' from a cursory analysis of Henry VIII's well-known sexual history that he had reproductive health issues. Considering seven undisputed sexual relationships of Henry VIII (Catherine of Aragon, Bessie Blount, Mary Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Madge Shelton, Jane Seymour and Katherine Howard)[[note]] Henry is well-known to have never slept with Anne of Cleves, and it is unclear if his marriage to Catherine Parr was ever consummated;[[/note]] four of the seven women became pregnant. [[note]] There are theories that at least one of Mary Boleyn's children was fathered by Henry rather than her first husband, but if that ''was'' the case he never acknowledged them.[[/note]] Of these four women, there were 12 pregnancies. Of these 12 only 5 would be carried to full-term. Comparatively, Henry VII's father impregnated Elizabeth of York eight times (possibly nine), with most of those children being delivered full-term.

Henry seems to have been overjoyed by Elizabeth’s birth; there’s no evidence whatsoever that he was angry or upset, and in fact we have letters written in Henry’s hand before her birth pleading with the midwives to put Anne’s life before that of the child ''even if the child was a boy''. But then further into their marriage Anne miscarried at least two separate pregnancies, both boys, each in the second trimester, and after three years the qualities which had attracted Henry in the first place (especially her strong-minded wilfulness) began to repel him. It didn't help Anne's case that, unlike Catherine, she was apparently unpopular with the common folk, her enemies at court actively hated her, and none of her relatives or friends were powerful enough/willing to support and protect her -- ''or'' to kick up a fuss should anything obviously untoward happen to her...

She then married an English nobleman, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Why? They were half-cousins; they were both grandchildren of Henry VIII's older sister Margaret. This gave them each substantial claims to the English throne, if Good Queen Bess died childless. Marriage united and strengthened their claims[[note]]Which of them had the better claim depends on who you ask. Mary's was the senior claim by strict law of descent; she was the daughter of Margaret Tudor's elder son from her indisputably legitimate first marriage, but both Mary and her father had been born in Scotland and were not English citizens. Darnley was the son of Margaret Tudor's daughter from her annulled (and therefore sketchy) second marriage, but both he and his mother had been born and lived in England. Darnley was also that rarest of unicorns, a male Tudor who lived long enough to shave, while Mary was already an anointed queen in her own right. Their marriage patched up the weaknesses in each other's claims and meant they would be competing directly with Elizabeth and the other potential heirs, not each other. On the other hand, their grandmother renounced the claims of herself and her descendants to the throne, and Henry VIII explicitly disinherited Margaret's entire line in his will. So, you know, who you ask.[[/note]] and their son, James, did in fact succeed Elizabeth. But that was later; at the time, Elizabeth forbade the match. Or didn't -- some historians believe that Elizabeth knew Darnley was ''such a prick'' that anyone who married him would tire of him and get rid of him, and that she knew ''exactly what she was doing'' when she sent him to Scotland with Robert Dudley and that everything that happened with him and Mary was planned to bring Mary down!

He was far more extravagant than his father. This was the man responsible for quite possibly the most extravagant diplomatic summit in history, the Field of the Cloth of Gold. There he proceeded to have a wrestling match with the King of France, Francis I. The French guy won; the English guy was displeased.

He had a PetTheDog moment when he gave one of the defeated pretenders (a commoner named Lambert Simnel who happened to bear a resemblance to one of the dead Yorkist princes, and had been a puppet by rebel nobles) a job in his kitchens instead of executing him.[[note]]Simnel lived to a ripe old age, and is known to have had at least one son, who became a priest.[[/note]] This gesture was even extended to the next pretender, Perkin Warbeck; but when Warbeck attempted to escape (presumably to restart another rebellion), he was quickly captured and confined at the Tower of London. He was later tortured and subsequently hanged.

The man with six[[note]] If we want to be really technical, the correct number is actually '''two''', or three (if you are Catholic). Wives number 1 (for Anglicans only), 2, 4, and 5 were ''annulled'', which is a legal {{retcon}} claiming that the pair never got married in the first place). Catholics accept the same, except wife 1 is included in the list.[[/note]] wives. Every Briton can remember what happened to them -- "divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived" (and every pedant will reply, "annulled, annulled and beheaded, died, annulled, annulled and beheaded, survived"). Arguably the best-known monarch in history, yet he was not even born to the throne and is a fine upshot of the royal marital tradition of producing ''"an heir and a spare"'' — he was actually the "[[SpareToTheThrone spare]]", but ended up in line to the throne after his older brother Arthur died... and he also married the guy's widow, [[UsefulNotes/CatherineOfAragon Catherine of Aragon]] (Catalina de Aragón), a literal Spanish Princess, Aragon and Castile having been united by the marriage of her parents as part of the Spanish Catholic Reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula from [[UsefulNotes/MoorishSpain Moorish Spain]]. Marrying his brother's widow raised a few eyebrows, but it did carry with it several advantages. For one thing, it continued to link the new House of Tudor to the powerful House of Trastámara, granting the Tudors legitimacy; and since Catherine's sister Juana (heiress to the Spanish throne, as her parents had no living sons by that point) was married to Philip "the Handsome" Habsburg of Burgundy, son and heir of the [[UsefulNotes/HolyRomanEmpire Holy Roman Emperor]], the three-way political alliance thus cemented was absolutely fantastic (and conveniently completely surrounded France). Second, it gave Henry a very desirable out from the international royal marital lottery. Unlike many royal spouses, Catherine and Henry were already well-acquainted and, even better, seemed to like one another. They were close in age, Catherine only being five years older than him, and intellectual matches; not only was she friends with the scholars Erasmus and Sir UsefulNotes/ThomasMore, but she had served as ambassador to the English court for her father, making her the first female ambassador in European history. They were also both widely regarded as attractive and -- perhaps best of all -- Henry was marrying someone who already knew her way around that whole monarch thing. He was only 18 when he came to the throne and engaged in some WackyFratboyHijinx in his early years as King; he and some male buddies once burst into the Queen's bedchamber dressed as RobinHood and his Merry Men. A redhead, he does remind one of his contemporary namesake, Prince Henry of Wales ([[UsefulNotes/TheBritishRoyalFamily Prince Harry]]). Plus, there was the small matter of not then having to return Catherine's dowry. The marriage took place, and by most accounts, it was largely happy for the first several years.

Anyways, Henry did separate England from Rome. Unlike what Whig history implies, he didn't do it specifically because of his desire for UsefulNotes/AnneBoleyn either. [[HeirClubForMen He did it because his only heir was Mary, a daughter, and Henry wanted at that point to make absolutely sure that she would never become Queen in her own right – after all, you couldn't possibly make a strong dynasty out of women rulers...]] (At this point, there had ''never'' been a Queen Regnant of England -- discounting the unfortunate 12th-century Matilda, granddaughter of [[UsefulNotes/TheHouseOfNormandy William the Conqueror]], who was usurped by her cousin Stephen, fought a great civil war against him, and never really got a chance to rule... though her [[UsefulNotes/TheHouseOfPlantagenet descendants]] did.) This meant that he couldn't divorce Catherine like many an heirless king had done to a barren wife before; he needed an annulment, something far more serious that would have made Catherine a whore and Mary a bastard in the eyes of almost anyone who mattered. The only way to get an annulment was to apply to the Pope. Unfortunately for Henry the Holy Roman Emperor Charles V, Catherine's nephew, was at that very moment holding the Pope hostage.

This search took longer than expected, and it was nearly three years before Henry married again. This was partly due to the fluctuating politics in Europe that left Henry and his government constantly uncertain about who they needed to be allied with; and partly because the European marriage market, ''shockingly,'' was not that keen on a king who had gone through three wives in five years, with Anne Boleyn's fate standing out in particular. Apparently when Mary of Guise -- a French noblewoman who would later marry Henry's nephew James V of Scotland and give birth to [[UsefulNotes/MaryOfScotland Mary Queen of Scots]] -- learned that Henry had told the French ambassador that he was big in person and had need of a big wife, she glibly replied, "I may be a big woman, but I have a very little neck." When Henry's ambassadors were plying his suit to her, Christina of Denmark supposedly said, "If I had two heads, one should be at the King of England's disposal." While these stories might well be apocryphal, Christina at least made ''no'' secret of her aversion to marrying Henry, particularly since Catherine of Aragon was ''her great-aunt.'' When she posed for a portrait by Hans Holbein the Younger (whom Henry had sent to paint all the prospective candidates for wife Number Four) she wore mourning dress, and given that she had been widowed over two years prior her choice of wardrobe was very telling. The wooing of both ladies went nowhere, and several other marriage negotiations also fell through.

The "lucky" lady ended up being, Anne of Cleves (German: ''Anna von Jülich-Kleve-Berg''). Henry was introduced to her via one of the aforementioned Holbein portraits, now on display in The Louvre. Her father was the Duke of Cleves, an important mover and shaker in the emerging Protestant Schmalkaldic League who presumably judged having England in his back pocket would be worth whatever risk his daughter might face marrying Europe's most notorious serial monogamist. Her elder sister Sybelle, meanwhile, was married to the Elector of Saxony who led the League. After Catherine of Aragon, she was Henry's only wife who would be considered a "royal", as the daughter of a sovereign prince. Henry found her so unattractive in person that the marriage was annulled six months later without it having been consummated. (History does not record what Anne thought of Henry, who by this time weighed about 350 pounds and had nasty pus-spewing abscesses on both legs.) The strange part was that [[HollywoodHomely she wasn't really that unattractive]] -- at least, none of the English courtiers who wrote about her after Henry's death mentioned her being anything but remarkably pleasant-looking and that Hans Holbein - known for painting realistic, rather than flattering, portraits - had produced a faithful image of her. At least one said she was the best-looking of all of Henry's queens; Charles de Marillac, the French Ambassador, said at the time that, while she was no great beauty, she was quite attractive, pleasant, and dignified. ''But'' she was also docile, tall, quite large-breasted, and largely trained in the domestic arts, and Henry tended to like them feisty, tiny, boyish, and with a classically-trained intellect -- plus Anne's heavy and unflattering German clothing did her no favours. More than one historian has wondered if Henry had become impotent by this point and blamed Anne instead of his weight.

In the end, Anne, who by now knew exactly what happened to Queens One ''and'' Two (and had her decision greatly simplified by the fact that ''she was provably as pure and virgin as the day she was married''), signed the annulment papers at the King's first suggestion, and thereby got a ''very'' generous settlement - including several castles, a metric fuck-tonne of money, and no one to tell her what to ''do'' with it - from a very relieved King Henry, which allowed her to outlive (and get richer than) the other five. But Henry genuinely ''liked'' Anne as a person even though he didn't want to be married to her; for the rest of his life he treated her as an [[LikeBrotherAndSister honorary sister]], and she was even referenced publicly as "the King's good sister". She got on incredibly well with both of his daughters, was provided with a household and allowance, and was invited to all the events at court. Henry was so thankful for her acquiescence that her title of "the King's good sister" came with lofty status, and it was understood that, apart from the King's wife and daughters, she outranked ''everybody else at court.'' Clearly, Anne was no fool -- good for her! She never remarried and was the last of Henry's six wives to die, ten years after Henry, though Catherine of Aragon had a longer lifespan. She was also the first of Henry's wives to lack strong religious convictions; born and baptized Catholic, she was raised in a Protestant environment and most of her close relatives became leading lights of the early Protestant movement, but she herself only converted to Anglicanism to marry Henry, and then converted back to Roman Catholicism when her former stepdaughter Mary took the throne.

So Henry moved on to Catherine Howard, a cousin of Anne Boleyn. Catherine was one of Anne's ladies-in-waiting, and [[BrokenRecord (go figure)]] everything Anne was not: tiny, boyish, spirited, frivolous, and auburn-haired. She was also in love with (and probably legally married to) another man, but that didn't matter: by that time, Henry wasn't taking no for an answer from anyone. After the marriage, Catherine, who, unlike Anne of Cleves, probably ''was'' a fool and also probably all of fifteen years old at this point, found a new boyfriend -- Henry's closest body servant -- and carried on with him behind the King's back.[[note]]According to all sources, however, when the court was on progress to the house of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, and his second wife, Katherine Willoughby, the young queen ''actually behaved herself''. What that says about the Duchess of Suffolk, who was able to keep Catherine in line, is up to you.[[/note]] Bad idea. When Henry found out, he naturally had both the current and former boyfriends killed, [[DramaticallyMissingThePoint then sat around for months whining about how all women are whores.]] Given Catherine's age and other events in her life [[note]]She was likely around ''thirteen'' when she had her first 'relationship' with Henry Mannox, her music teacher, who was at least ten years older than her and may even have been in his mid-thirties. During her interrogation Catherine claimed that Francis Dereham, the aforementioned man to whom she was probably legally married (due to a pre-contract), essentially forced himself upon her. While witnesses from Norfolk House (where both of them were living at the time of their affair) refuted this and said Catherine enjoyed Dereham's attentions, please recall that Catherine was still likely no more than fifteen at this point, and Dereham, again, was more than ten years older than her, meaning he might have pressured her into accepting said attentions. As for the man with whom she was accused of adultery, Thomas Culpeper (who was, once more with feeling, [[RuleOfThree at least ten years older than Catherine]]) theories have been raised that he might have had knowledge of her previous affairs and hoped to use them to gain leverage and power over the young Queen. He may also have been a rapist; in 1539 a Thomas Culpeper was accused of, and granted a royal pardon for, raping a park-keeper's wife and then murdering a villager... though admittedly this might have been Culpeper's elder brother, confusingly also called Thomas.[[/note]] there are historians who now suspect she may have been coerced into the relationship and quite possibly raped -- and then beheaded for it.

In mid-1546 she and Henry celebrated their third wedding anniversary, which doesn't seem like much of a milestone until you realize that she was only the ''second'' of Henry's wives to reach it. Although Henry provided for any children he might have with her in his Third Succession Act of 1544 (behind only his son Edward and ahead of both Mary and Elizabeth), it was clear by this point that he was incapable of fathering any more children - and perhaps she had fertility issues as well, as she'd had no children with her previous two husbands. Certainly the priority of having more sons - which had driven each of his previous marriages - was not a paramount concern with Catherine, who was in any event already over 30 when she married the king. Only Anne Boleyn had been older, and then only if you accept her year of birth as 1501.

Shortly after this, Henry VIII died. Taking a page out of his playbook, Catherine married ''her'' lover a month after Henry died, becoming the most-married (x4) queen in English history. As much to her own surprise as anyone else's, she soon found herself pregnant for the first time, at the age of 35. Sadly, she would die in agony of childbed fever, shortly after her 36th birthday. Yeah, "lucky" Catherine.

Her death has been mythologised somewhat, not helped by Paul Delaroche's painting "The Execution of Lady Jane Grey", which depicts a blindfolded Jane dressed in white, struggling to find the block as she kneels down in a dark room. For a start, records say that she was dressed in black, and was executed outside, although was granted the rare honour of being beheaded in private and not in front of a public crowd. Historians will also often recite words that she said before she died, none of which are written about in the original text and instead come from an underground Protestant press a while after her death.

England's very first Queen Regnant, Mary I was Henry VIII's daughter and his only surviving child by UsefulNotes/CatherineOfAragon. As a little girl, she was doted on by both of her parents, especially as time passed and she continued to be their only surviving child. She was declared Princess of Wales in all but actual title (and some of her contemporaries actually did refer to her as "the Lady Mary, Prince of Wales"), being given the colors of the Prince of Wales to use for her livery and allowed to use the official seal of Wales on her correspondence.[[note]]The reason she was not formally created as Princess of Wales (apart from her parents fully expecting a son at some point) is because it's a courtesy title reserved exclusively for the wife of the Prince of Wales. To call Mary "Princess of Wales" would actually have been a sort of step ''down'' in title from what she was throughout her childhood, which was heir apparent. A few centuries later, the future Elizabeth II was not made Princess of Wales for the exact same reason.[[/note]] As a girl, she was sent with her household to Ludlow, then the traditional seat of the Prince of Wales, to continue her education. Everything changed for Mary, however, when Anne Boleyn became queen. With her parents' marriage declared invalid, Mary was declared a bastard, struck from the succession, stripped of her title as "Princess", separated from her mother, and forced into her baby half-sister's service as a lady-in-waiting. When ordered to recognize Anne Boleyn as Queen of England and Elizabeth as Princess, Mary declared that she knew of no Queen but her mother, and no Princess but herself -- she might, however, call Elizabeth her sister, as she called Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Henry VIII's illegitimate son, her brother.

Elizabeth did not have a particularly nice pre-monarch life. She was declared illegitimate, almost executed by her own sister, and had a man 25 years her senior "engage in horseplay" with her when she was fourteen, although many modern historians prefer to call it exactly what it was: "sexual abuse". That man was Thomas Seymour, brother to Jane Seymour, and husband of Catherine Parr after Henry VIII died, who was also reputed to have had designs on Lady Jane Grey and Princess (later Queen) Mary. A certified charmer and distinguished ladies' man, he was also ''very'' ambitious, having intended to use all of his connections to all the aforementioned to gain money and power. He was pretty transparent in his envy of his eldest brother, Edward Seymour, Lord Protector (acting regent for the boy-king Edward, effectively in charge of the country), and not at all discreet in his attempts to plot a coup against him, even trying to buy the king’s favour by slipping him extra pocket money (no, seriously). Eventually, his ambitions led him to break into Hampton Court in an attempt to kidnap the king (again, seriously). Arrested in the Privy Garden, having woken and then slaughtered one of the king’s pet spaniels, he was charged with 33 counts of high treason and, unsurprisingly, ended up between a block and a sharp axe. One wonders if the axe and block were friends by now? They certainly met enough!

She then married an English nobleman, Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley. Why? They were half-cousins; they were both grandchildren of Henry VIII's older sister Margaret. This gave them each substantial claims to the English throne, if Good Queen Bess died childless. Marriage united and strengthened their claims[[note]]Which of them had the better claim depends on who you ask. Mary's was the senior claim by strict law of descent; she was the daughter of Margaret Tudor's elder son from her indisputably legitimate first marriage, but both Mary and her father had been born in Scotland and were not English citizens. Darnley was the son of Margaret Tudor's daughter from her annulled (and therefore sketchy) second marriage, but both he and his mother had been born and lived in England. Darnley was also that rarest of unicorns, a male Tudor who lived long enough to shave, while Mary was already an anointed queen in her own right. Their marriage patched up the weaknesses in each other's claims and meant they would be competing directly with Elizabeth and the other potential heirs, not each other. On the other hand, their grandmother renounced the claims of herself and her descendants to the throne and Henry VIII explicitly disinherited Margaret's entire line in his will. So, you know, who you ask.[[/note]] and their son, James, did in fact succeed Elizabeth. But that was later; at the time, Elizabeth forbade the match. Or didn't -- some historians believe that Elizabeth knew Darnley was ''such a prick'' that anyone who married him would tire of him and get rid of him, and that she knew ''exactly what she was doing'' when she sent him to Scotland with Robert Dudley and that everything that happened with him and Mary was planned to bring Mary down!

Mary was forced to abdicate in favor of her infant son, then went to England and threw herself on Elizabeth's "mercy" which, in this case, was almost non-existent; having been in the same situation herself - having to rely on the monarch for mercy - Elizabeth was taking no chances on someone being the threat to her that ''she'' had been (however unwillingly) to her half-sister. But Elizabeth was initially willing enough to shelter her cousin; some historians believe that she had genuine sympathy for Mary's plight, being twice widowed, forced away from her child, and unable to return to her beloved homeland. Mary was kin, after all, and an anointed queen just like Elizabeth herself. So at first she consented to the arrangement, and for several years Mary lived in what amounted to fancy jail.

Being a Catholic, she became a focus for Catholic opposition to Elizabeth (who had already been excommunicated by Pope Pius V). Eventually, Elizabeth had enough and after a trial on treason charges that may or may not have been true, Mary was beheaded. Because regicide looked rather bad back then (especially when it was your own cousin), Elizabeth allegedly arranged for the death warrant to be sent "accidentally". A softer view says that it actually ''was'' sent accidentally. Elizabeth blamed Sir William Cecil, who tended to say things that made Elizabeth unhappy, and a diplomat, William Davison. When the news of the execution reached Elizabeth she was extremely indignant, and her wrath was chiefly directed against Davison; Davison, she asserted, had disobeyed her instructions not to seal the warrant. However, this instruction did not arrive until 2 February 1587, and Cecil had already taken the initiative. The secretary was arrested and thrown into the Tower, but although he defended himself vigorously, he did not say anything about the Queen's wish to get rid of Mary by assassination. Charged before the Star Chamber with misprision and contempt, he was acquitted of evil intention, but was sentenced to pay a fine of 10,000 marks and to imprisonment during the Queen's pleasure. Owing to the exertions of several influential men, he was released in September 1588, after the invasion crisis had passed; the Queen refused to employ him again in her service, but he kept his office, and probably never paid the fine. At the end of the day, Cecil was usually right, and Elizabeth knew it.

Years later, the Spanish tried landing troops in Ireland to aid Hugh O'Neill (Irish: ''Aodh Maer a Naoill'') against Elizabeth. O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, was the leader of the Irish rebels during the Nine Years War (1594-1603). Elizabethan Ireland was not a pleasant place, and Elizabeth's mixture of parsimony and aggression went down very badly with the native Irish. O'Neill was eventually brought to heel in 1603 after the bloodiest and most expensive war in Elizabeth's reign that had seen at least 100,000 Irish and 30,000 English killed, and England nearly bankrupted. Though O'Neill actually managed to outlast Elizabeth (she died before he surrendered, though he was not informed until after he signed the terms), he would be pressured to flee a few years later, leading to the Ulster Plantations. But we get ahead of ourselves...

In other matters, that whole "Virgin Queen" thing? Debatable. Good Queen Bess had at least two well-publicized affairs -- the question is whether the hard-headed Elizabeth would have taken the risk of the damage an illegitimate royal pregnancy would have caused[[note]]One notable historian, Dr Paul Doherty, claims that ''Unkempt and exhausted, 800 miles from England the shipwrecked young man prepared to meet his interrogators in a Madrid courtroom one June day in 1587. Suspected of spying after his ship ran aground just days earlier in the Bay of Biscay, the unshaven sailor feared for his life. But it was not the threat of incarceration that troubled him, but the repercussions of the secret he was about to reveal. Asked to identify himself, he replied: "I am the bastard son of Queen Elizabeth of England and her lover Robert Dudley."'', though whether there is any truth to this is unknown.[[/note]]. The first, long-lasting one was with Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, her [[VictoriousChildhoodFriend childhood companion]]. If she was ever in love with anyone, she was in love with him and he was certainly in love with her and had been since she they met when she was ''eight'' and just an illegitimate child, so the rumours of him wanting her for the crown are somewhat unjustified (because he probably saw that as a juicy bonus too!) -- but, alas, sadly for Elizabeth, he was married, until his first wife Amy died under dubious circumstances that made their marriage impossible.[[note]]A number of modern medical historians believe that her death was caused by breast cancer; however, she was ''found dead from a fall down a flight of stairs'', which didn't look very good at the time. An inquest was held and her husband was found innocent, but the damage to his chances of marrying Elizabeth was done.[[/note]] Leicester died shortly after the defeat of the Armada. Elizabeth mourned for a few months, and then took up with the second Earl of Essex, also named Robert. He was, essentially, her boy-toy. She had reigned longer than he'd been alive. Incidentally, he was also Leicester's stepson through Leicester's second marriage. Unlike his stepfather, however, this Robert didn't know how to keep his mouth shut and got a big head. Bess was mildly displeased by this, so, like they did many times before, axe and head and block met again. As for political matches, it seems that she took her courtship with Francis (French: François), Duke of Anjou, at least somewhat seriously. Despite their age difference (Elizabeth was considerably older than her suitor) they seem to have been quite fond of one another. For a time Elizabeth even wore a frog shaped earring Francis sent her, a likely reference to her nickname for him ("my little frog").

Elizabeth's status as the Virgin Queen served to inspire a cult of loyalty in her subjects, who often portrayed and imagined her as a goddess or the Virgin Mary. Elizabeth, in turn, referred to her subjects as "all her husbands." The "marriage question" also served as a handy, quick-and-dirty foreign policy tool -- so long as the question remained open, so to speak. But was she really a virgin? Modern sensibilities tend to assume that any romantic involvement involves sex, and as far back as the Victorian era, historians laboured to find a reason why Elizabeth never married that went beyond "good politics". Some believed that Elizabeth's exposure to her father -- and, more importantly, how her father [[OffWithHisHead treated his wives]] -- might have scared her off marriage[[note]]Would ''you'' blame her? I wouldn't![[/note]], while others suggested she had a reproductive defect of some kind. (The most fanciful even suggested that she was a ''man''; never mind the numerous gynecological examinations she endured during marriage negotiations, or the fact that if Henry had had a son, the course of English history would've been entirely different.) Some historians have [[NotThatTheresAnythingWrongWithThat speculated]] on Elizabeth's sexual orientation, despite her clear affection for and attraction to both Roberts Dudley and Devereux as well as the fact that many royals throughout history who are today recognized as gay have [[LieBackAndThinkOfEngland done their royal duty]] and produced offspring for the good of the realm and the family.[[note]]See: in England: (Possibly) Elizabeth's own ancestor [[UsefulNotes/TheHouseOfPlantagenet Edward II]]; See also: in France: UsefulNotes/LouisXIV's younger brother [[AgentPeacock Philippe]], [[MassiveNumberedSiblings Duc d'Orléans]].[[/note]] Modern historians who recognize Thomas Seymour's predations for what they were have posited that the abuse rendered her afraid of sex. All of that said, a case can easily be made that Elizabeth would have been a fool to engage in premarital sex if there was any chance of pregnancy, and would have been a fool to marry and give up all her power to a subject or a foreign prince.

Henry seems to have been overjoyed by Elizabeth’s birth; there’s no evidence whatsoever that he was angry or upset, and in fact we have letters written in Henry’s hand before her birth pleading with the midwives to put Anne’s life before that of the child ''even if the child was a boy''. But then further into their marriage Anne miscarried at least two separate pregnancies, both boys, each in the second trimester, and after three years the qualities which had attracted Henry in the first place -- her strong-minded wilfulness, especially -- began to repel him. It didn't help Anne's case that, unlike Catherine, she was apparently unpopular with the common folk, her enemies at court actively hated her, and none of her relatives or friends were powerful enough/willing to support and protect her -- ''or'' to kick up a fuss should anything obviously untoward happen to her...

What also didn't help, and modern historians now believe was a key factor, was Henry having a near-fatal jousting accident. Not only did the news of the event actually trigger one of Anne's miscarriages, but the accident caused two serious injuries for Henry. One was probable brain damage from his horse rolling over him (which altered his personality and made him erratic); the other was a severe leg injury which would cause him to endure constant pain for the rest of his life (which made him irritable and easily angered). This incident put an end to most of the athletic Henry's many physical activities, leading him to become the overweight figure we recognize today, which also contributed to his frequent mood swings. Conveniently, at about this time Catherine of Aragon died [[note]]there were the inevitable whispers that she had been poisoned, due to a black spot being discovered on her heart during her embalming, but medical experts today think her death was probably due to cancer; rather spookily, Anne's last miscarriage happened the same day as Catherine's funeral[[/note]] and so if Henry were to end his marriage to Anne, there would be no more pressure for him to go back to her. And if he now remarried someone ''else'', all parties would consider the new marriage legitimate, as Catholics and those sympathetic to Catherine now considered him a widower.

''At least we're not as rude as... Simon Cowell!"''

England's very first Queen Regnant, Mary I was Henry VIII's daughter and his only surviving child by Catherine of Aragon. As a little girl, she was doted on by both of her parents, especially as time passed and she continued to be their only surviving child. She was declared Princess of Wales in all but actual title (and some of her contemporaries actually did refer to her as "the Lady Mary, Prince of Wales"), being given the colors of the Prince of Wales to use for her livery and allowed to use the official seal of Wales on her correspondence.[[note]]The reason she was not formally created as Princess of Wales (apart from her parents fully expecting a son at some point) is because it's a courtesy title reserved exclusively for the wife of the Prince of Wales. To call Mary "Princess of Wales" would actually have been a sort of step ''down'' in title from what she was throughout her childhood, which was heir apparent. A few centuries later, the future Elizabeth II was not made Princess of Wales for the exact same reason.[[/note]] As a girl, she was sent with her household to Ludlow, then the traditional seat of the Prince of Wales, to continue her education. Everything changed for Mary, however, when Anne Boleyn became queen. With her parents' marriage declared invalid, Mary was declared a bastard, struck from the succession, stripped of her title as "Princess", separated from her mother, and forced into her baby half-sister's service as a lady-in-waiting. When ordered to recognize Anne Boleyn as Queen of England and Elizabeth as Princess, Mary declared that she knew of no Queen but her mother, and no Princess but herself -- she might, however, call Elizabeth her sister, as she called Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Henry VIII's illegitimate son, her brother.

As the daughter of Catherine of Aragon and granddaughter of King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella of Spain, Mary I was Catholic in a big way. Prosecutions for heresy were resumed with great vigour during her reign; there were more burnt at the stake in the Marian period than in any other Tudor reign. (Henry tended to have his noble victims beheaded, while his less exalted victims were hanged until half-dead, cut down, castrated, and disemboweled while still alive. Thomas More handled the few executions by burning which had occurred in Henry's reign.) Mary herself was not personally ferocious, but she was, like her husband Philip, morbidly conscientious and absolutely convinced that the extirpation of Protestantism was a moral imperative. The logic employed was that, by burning Protestants and 'giving them a taste' of what awaited them in hell, they would be persuaded to recant in their final moments and die good Catholics, thereby ensuring their entry to heaven. It kind of backfired because many of those burned ''still'' refused to recant, despite the utter horror.[[note]]Being burnt at the stake is a particularly agonizing death, because what exactly kills you can vary. The fire destroying your body is slow and painful, as is suffocating from the smoke and all of the oxygen being used up. It was considered a mercy to hang a bag of gunpowder around the victim's neck, in the hopes that it would explode and kill them more quickly. Anne Boleyn agreed to have her marriage annulled and Princess Elizabeth declared a bastard in exchange for her death sentence being commuted from burning to the relatively quicker beheading, by a skilled French swordsman.[[/note]] This forbearance in the face of indescribable agony created a lot of martyrs and convinced many that ''Protestantism must really be something if people are willing to suffer for their faith. I mean, look what the Catholic Queen is doing.''

Henry was introduced to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves (German: ''Anna von Jülich-Kleve-Berg''), via a lovely Holbein portrait that now can be seen in The Louvre. Her father was the Duke of Cleves, an important mover and shaker in the emerging Protestant Schmalkaldic League who presumably judged having England in his back pocket would be worth whatever risk his daughter might face marrying Europe's most notorious serial monogamist. Her elder sister Sybelle, meanwhile, was married to the Elector of Saxony who led the League. After Catherine of Aragon, she was Henry's only wife who would be considered a "royal", as the daughter of a sovereign prince. Henry found her so unattractive in person that the marriage was annulled six months later without it having been consummated. (History does not record what Anne thought of Henry, who by this time weighed about 350 pounds and had nasty pus-spewing abscesses on both legs.) The strange part was that [[HollywoodHomely she wasn't really that unattractive]] -- at least, none of the English courtiers who wrote about her after Henry's death mentioned her being anything but remarkably pleasant-looking and that Hans Holbein - known for painting realistic, rather than flattering, portraits - had produced a faithful image of her. At least one said she was the best-looking of all of Henry's queens; Charles de Marillac, the French Ambassador, said at the time that, while she was no great beauty, she was quite attractive, pleasant, and dignified. ''But'' she was also docile, tall, quite large-breasted, and largely trained in the domestic arts, and Henry tended to like them feisty, tiny, boyish, and with a classically-trained intellect -- plus Anne's heavy and unflattering German clothing did her no favours. More than one historian has wondered if Henry had become impotent by this point and blamed Anne instead of his weight.

Henry was introduced to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves (German: ''Anna von Jülich-Kleve-Berg''), via a lovely Holbein portrait that now can be seen in The Louvre. Her father was the Duke of Cleves, an important mover and shaker in the emerging Protestant Schmalkaldic League who presumably judged having England in his back pocket would be worth whatever risk his daughter might face marrying Europe's most notorious serial monogamist. After Catherine of Aragon, she was Henry's only wife who would be considered a "royal", as the daughter of a sovereign prince. Henry found her so unattractive in person that the marriage was annulled six months later without it having been consummated. (History does not record what Anne thought of Henry, who by this time weighed about 350 pounds and had nasty pus-spewing abscesses on both legs.) The strange part was that [[HollywoodHomely she wasn't really that unattractive]] -- at least, none of the English courtiers who wrote about her after Henry's death mentioned her being anything but remarkably pleasant-looking. At least one said she was the best-looking of all of Henry's queens; Charles de Marillac, the French Ambassador, said at the time that, while she was no great beauty, she was quite attractive, pleasant, and dignified. ''But'' she was also docile, tall, quite large-breasted, and largely trained in the domestic arts, and Henry tended to like them feisty, tiny, boyish, and with a classically-trained intellect -- plus Anne's heavy and unflattering German clothing did her no favours. More than one historian has wondered if Henry had become impotent by this point and blamed Anne instead of his weight.

In the end, Anne, who presumably had by now read up on what happened to Queens One ''and'' Two (and had her decision greatly simplified by the fact that ''she was provably as pure and virgin as the day she was married''), signed the annulment papers at the King's first suggestion, and thereby got a ''very'' generous settlement - including several castles, a metric fuck-tonne of money, and no one to tell her what to ''do'' with it - from a very relieved King Henry, which allowed her to outlive (and get richer than) the other five. But Henry genuinely ''liked'' Anne as a person even though he didn't want to be married to her; for the rest of his life he treated her as an [[LikeBrotherAndSister honorary sister]], and she was even referenced publicly as "the King's good sister". She got on incredibly well with both of his daughters, was provided with a household and allowance, and was invited to all the events at court. Henry was so thankful for her acquiescence that her title of "the King's good sister" came with lofty status, and it was understood that, apart from the King's wife and daughters, she outranked ''everybody else at court.'' Clearly, Anne was no fool -- good for her! She never remarried and was the last of Henry's six wives to die, ten years after Henry, though Catherine of Aragon had a longer lifespan. She was also the first of Henry's wives to lack strong religious convictions; born and baptized Catholic, she was raised in a Protestant environment and most of her close relatives became leading lights of the early Protestant movement, but she herself only converted to Anglicanism to marry Henry, and then converted back to Roman Catholicism when her former stepdaughter Mary took the throne.

Henry had to deal with a couple of pretenders to his throne along the way, but he strengthened his claim by marrying Elizabeth of York, the eldest daughter of King Edward IV, meaning that he secured his tie to the opposing family. The Tudor rose (depicted above) is emblematic of their marriage, being a joining of the red rose of Lancaster and the white rose of York; to this very day, it stands as the floral heraldic emblem of England. The Tudor line's famous tendency toward red hair was also introduced by her. Elizabeth was intelligent, attractive, pious, and beloved by the people. Theirs was probably a PerfectlyArrangedMarriage, as Tudor historians seem to agree that she and Henry were genuinely attached to one another[[note]]Whether this was from the moment of marriage or developed is unknown; it's probably the latter, as they were complete strangers on their marriage![[/note]]. Unusually for the time period (and especially when compared with his son), Henry is not known to have ever had any mistresses. Henry and Elizabeth had several children, the first being born just eight months after the wedding, and although Elizabeth didn't exert much political influence[[note]]She did, however, occasionally put her foot down. There is a recorded instance of Henry appointing a bishop that his wife chose over one his mother chose and another recorded instance of Elizabeth convincing Henry -- with the help of her mother-in-law, Margaret Beaufort -- not to send Princess Margaret to Scotland in 1502 as she was "too young"; Henry, ultimately, acquiesced to her wishes and sent Princess Margaret in June 1503 instead, four months after Elizabeth was dead.[[/note]], Henry respected her deeply. When their eldest son died in his teens, it was Elizabeth who comforted her husband and encouraged him to have another child; the birth of said child would, unfortunately, end Elizabeth's life. Her death sent Henry into such deep mourning that he actually became gravely ill, allowing no one to come near him except for his own mother; this was so unusual for the austere King that the members of his court were alarmed. He was young enough to remarry and it would have been politically advantageous to do so, but he had no interest. Even when he finally did give his advisers permission to find him a new bride, his list of desired qualities was recognised as basically being a carbon copy of Elizabeth, which of course they knew they would never be able to find -- indeed, the King remained a widower until the moment of his death.

The six monarchs of England between 1485 and 1603. Their dynasty is attributed as the beginning of the Renaissance in England. They enjoyed chopping off people's heads. Note: The name not is pronounced “Chew-der”, nor “Two-der”, but rather “Tue-der”.

The six monarchs of England between 1485 and 1603. Their dynasty is attributed as the beginning of the Renaissance in England. They enjoyed chopping off people's heads. Note: The name is pronounced “Chew-der”, not “Two-der”.

What also didn't help, and modern historians now believe was a key factor, was Henry having a near-fatal jousting accident. Not only did the news of the event actually trigger one of Anne's miscarriages, but the accident caused two serious injuries for Henry. One was probable brain damage from his horse rolling over him (which altered his personality and made him erratic); the other was a severe leg injury which would cause him to endure constant pain for the rest of his life (which made him irritable and easily angered). This incident put an end to most of the athletic Henry's many physical activities, leading him to become the overweight figure we recognize today, which also contributed to his frequent mood swings. Conveniently, at about this time Catherine of Aragon died (there were the inevitable whispers that she had been poisoned, due to a black spot being discovered on her heart during her embalming, but medical experts today think her death was probably due to cancer; rather spookily, Anne's last miscarriage happened the same day as Catherine's funeral) and so if Henry were to end his marriage to Anne, there would be no more pressure for him to go back to her. And if he now remarried someone ''else'', all parties would consider the new marriage legitimate, as Catholics and those sympathetic to Catherine now considered him a widower.

You have to pity Pope Clement. On one hand he couldn't annul the marriage, since the man holding him hostage would have literally killed him for the insult to his aunt and cousin. On the other hand he could hardly just say "no" to a powerful king like Henry. Thanks to siding with the losers (chiefly France) in the Italian Wars (the reason Charles was holding him hostage), the rise of Protestantism in Germany, and the encroaching Ottoman Empire in the east, Clement didn't have too many friends left other than England. So he temporized. He held hearings, he reserved judgments, he delayed things again and again, probably praying that one of them would just go off and die before things came to a head. [[note]] To Henry's eternal fury though, the Pope gave an annulment to Henry's sister Margaret, Queen of Scotland. Then again, Margaret wasn't married to anyone who would kill the Pope if their marriage was annulled.[[/note]]

Actually a descendant of the secret marriage between Catherine of Valois (Henry V's widow) and Owen Tudor. The Tudors were originally a minor noble family from Wales, and played it to the hilt when amassing followers before Bosworth Field (Henry's personal standard at the battle was the Welsh red dragon) and subsequently (he spent a good bit of money trying to prove he was descended from Myth/KingArthur, and named his eldest son Arthur to cement the connection). [[ScrewTheRulesIMakeThem Henry's claim to the throne was incredibly weak]]; his mother, Margaret Beaufort, was the granddaughter of an illegitimate grandson of Edward III who was ''explicitly'' disinherited. On the other hand, with every other claimant dead or imprisoned, the Lancastrians really weren't in a position to say much... or anything at all for that matter! From birth until his coronation he was the 2nd Earl of Richmond (and is thus often called "Richmond" in many histories, including ''Theatre/RichardIII''), having been born the posthumous son of his father.[[note]]He was attainted after Edward IV took the throne in 1461, restored to his former title with the Readeption of Henry VI in 1470, and then attainted ''again'' after 1471 when Edward IV took the throne back.[[/note]] This is the reason Richmond-upon-Thames in London is so named, as he built a palace there in his reign and named it for his (former) dignity. (It had previously been called ''Sheen''.) He was an only child; his mother was ''13'' when he was born and the difficult labour probably rendered her sterile. By all accounts, he was a MommasBoy, and Lady Margaret (who [[OutlivingOnesOffspring survived her son]], albeit by less than a year) was the dominant lady at his court throughout his reign, even over his Queen. She was styled "My Lady the King's Mother," though with her son's permission she signed letters and documents as "Margaret R," signifying her position as honorary Queen Mother.

Actually a descendant of the secret marriage between Catherine of Valois (Henry V's widow) and Owen Tudor. The Tudors were originally a minor noble family from Wales, and played it to the hilt when amassing followers before Bosworth Field (Henry's personal standard at the battle was the Welsh red dragon) and subsequently (he spent a good bit of money trying to prove he was descended from Myth/KingArthur, and named his eldest son Arthur to cement the connection). [[ScrewTheRulesIMakeThem Henry's claim to the throne was incredibly weak]]; his mother, Margaret Beaufort, was the granddaughter of an illegitimate grandson of Edward III who was ''explicitly'' disinherited. On the other hand, with every other claimant dead or imprisoned, the Lancastrians really weren't in a position to say much... or anything at all for that matter! From birth until his coronation he was the 2nd Earl of Richmond (and is thus often called "Richmond" in many histories, including ''Theatre/RichardIII''), having been born the posthumous son of his father.[[note]]He was attainted after Edward IV took the throne in 1461, restored to his former title with the Readeption of Henry VI in 1470, and then attainted ''again'' after 1471 when Edward IV took the throne back.[[/note]] This is the reason Richmond-upon-Thames in London is so named, as he built a palace there in his reign and named it for his (former) dignity. (It had previously been called ''Sheen''.) He was an only child; his mother was ''13'' when he was born and the difficult labour probably rendered her sterile. By all accounts, he was a MommasBoy, and Lady Margaret (who survived her son, albeit by less than a year) was the dominant lady at his court throughout his reign, even over his Queen. She was styled "My Lady the King's Mother," though with her son's permission she signed letters and documents as "Margaret R," signifying her position as honorary Queen Mother.

Henry was introduced to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves (German: ''Anna von Jülich-Kleve-Berg''), via a lovely Holbein portrait that now can be seen in The Louvre. Her father was the Duke of Cleves, an important mover and shaker in the emerging Protestant Schmalkaldic League who presumably judged having England in his back pocket would be worth whatever risk his daughter might face marrying Europe's most notorious serial monogamist. After Catherine of Aragon, she was Henry's only wife who would be considered a "royal", as the daughter of a sovereign prince. Henry found her so unattractive in person that the marriage was annulled six months later without it having been consummated. (History does not record what Anne thought of Henry, who by this time weighed about 350 pounds and had nasty pus-spewing abscesses on both legs.) The strange part was that [[HollywoodHomely she wasn't really that unattractive]] -- at least, none of the English courtiers who wrote about her after Henry's death mentioned her being anything but remarkably pleasant-looking. At least one said she was the best-looking of all of Henry's queens; Charles de Marillac, the French Ambassador, said at the time that while she was no great beauty she was quite attractive, pleasant and dignified. ''But'' she was also docile, tall, quite large-breasted, and largely trained in the domestic arts, and Henry tended to like them feisty, tiny, boyish, and with a classically-trained intellect -- plus Anne's heavy and unflattering German clothing did her no favours. More than one historian has wondered if Henry had become impotent by this point and blamed Anne instead of his weight.

In the end, Anne, who presumably had by now read up on what happened to Queens One ''and'' Two (and had her decision greatly simplified by the fact that ''she was provably as pure and virgin as the day she was married''), signed the annulment papers at the King's first suggestion, and thereby got a ''very'' generous settlement - including several castles, a metric fuck-tonne of money and no one to tell her what to ''do'' with it - from a very relieved King Henry, which allowed her to outlive (and get richer than) the other five. But Henry genuinely ''liked'' Anne as a person even though he didn't want to be married to her; for the rest of his life he treated her as an [[LikeBrotherAndSister honorary sister]], and she was even referenced publicly as "the King's good sister". She got on incredibly well with both of his daughters, was provided with a household and allowance, and was invited to all the events at court. Henry was so thankful for her acquiescence that her title of "the King's good sister" came with lofty status, and it was understood that, apart from the King's wife and daughters, she outranked ''everybody else at court.'' Clearly, Anne was no fool -- good for her! She never remarried and was the last of Henry's six wives to die, ten years after Henry, though Catherine of Aragon had a longer lifespan. She was also the first of Henry's wives to lack strong religious convictions; born and baptized Catholic, she was raised in a Protestant environment and most of her close relatives became leading lights of the early Protestant movement, but she herself only converted to Anglicanism to marry Henry, and then converted back to Roman Catholicism when her stepdaughter Mary took the throne.

Even ignoring this, it is ''obvious'' from a cursory analysis of Henry VIII's well-known sexual history that he had reproductive health issues. Considering seven undisputed sexual relationships of Henry VIII (Catherine of Aragon, Bessie Blount, Mary Boleyn, Anne Boleyn, Madge Shelton, Jane Seymour and Katherine Howard)[[note]] Henry is well-known to have never slept with Anne of Cleves, and it is unclear if his marriage to Catherine Parr was ever consummated;[[/note]] four of the seven women became pregnant. [[note]] There are theories that at least one of Mary Boleyn's children was fathered by Henry rather than her first husband, but if that ''was'' the case he never acknowledged them.[[/note]] Of these four women, there were 12 pregnancies. Of these 12 only 5 would be carried to full-term. Comparatively, Henry VII's father impregnated Elizabeth of York six times (possibly seven), with five of those children being delivered full-term.

Henry seems to have been overjoyed by Elizabeth’s birth; there’s no evidence whatsoever that he was angry or upset, and in fact we have letters written in Henry’s hand before her birth pleading with the midwives to put Anne’s life before that of the child ''even if the child was a boy''. But then further into their marriage Anne miscarried at least two separate pregnancies, both boys, each in the second trimester, and after three years the qualities which had attracted Henry in the first place -- her strong-minded wilfulness, especially -- began to repel him. It didn't help Anne's case that, unlike Catherine, she was apparently unpopular with the common folk, her enemies at court actively hated her, and she ''didn't'' have any relatives or friends either within or without the realm who were powerful enough/willing to support and protect her -- ''or'' to kick up a fuss should anything obviously untoward happen to her...

Henry seems to have been overjoyed by Elizabeth’s birth; there’s no evidence whatsoever that he was angry or upset, and in fact we have letters written in Henry’s hand before her birth pleading with the midwives to put Anne’s life before that of the child ''even if the child was a boy''. But then further into their marriage Anne miscarried at least two separate pregnancies, both boys, each in the second trimester, and after three years the qualities which had attracted Henry in the first place -- her strong-minded willfulness, especially -- began to repel him. It didn't help Anne's case that, unlike Catherine, she was unpopular with the general public, she had enemies at court who actively hated her, and she ''didn't'' have any relatives or friends either within or without the realm who were powerful enough/willing to support and protect her -- ''or'' to kick up a fuss should anything obviously untoward happen to her...

What also didn't help, and modern historians now believe was a key factor, was Henry having a near-fatal jousting accident. Not only did the news of the event actually trigger one of Anne's miscarriages, but the accident caused two serious injuries for Henry. One was probable brain damage from his horse rolling over him (which altered his personality and made him erratic); the other was a severe leg injury which would cause him to endure constant pain for the rest of his life (which made him irritable and easily angered). This incident put an end to most of the athletic Henry's many physical activities, leading him to become the overweight figure we recognize today, which also contributed to his frequent mood swings. Conveniently, at about this time Catherine of Aragon died (there were the inevitable whispers that she had been poisoned, but historians today think it was probably due to cancer; rather spookily, Anne's last miscarriage happened the same day as Catherine's funeral) and so if Henry were to end his marriage to Anne, there would be no more pressure for him to go back to her. And if he now remarried someone ''else'', all parties would consider the new marriage legitimate, as Catholics and those sympathetic to Catherine now considered him a widower.

Famous as a [[IllBoy sickly]] [[AChildShallLeadThem boy-king]] whose early death made rather a mockery of his father's long and tempestuous campaign for a male heir, the reputation of Edward as a frail child has been recently debunked. He almost died of 'quartan fever' (a relatively benign malaria) at age four, but afterwards was healthy up to the age of 15. To be fair, though, he did then contract what was apparently 'consumption' (tuberculosis) and snuffed it without reaching his majority.

What also didn't help, and modern historians now believe was a key factor, was Henry having a near-fatal jousting accident. Not only did the news of the event actually trigger one of Anne's miscarriages, but the accident caused two serious injuries for Henry. One was probable brain damage from his horse rolling over him (which altered his personality and made him erratic); the other was a severe leg injury which would cause him to endure constant pain for the rest of his life (which made him irritable and easily angered). This incident put an end to most of the athletic Henry's many physical activities, leading him to become the overweight figure we recognize today, which also contributed to his frequent mood swings. Conveniently, at about this time Catherine of Aragon died (historians think it was probably of cancer; rather spookily, Anne's last miscarriage happened the same day as Catherine's funeral) and so if Henry were to end his marriage to Anne, there would be no more pressure for him to go back to her. And if he now remarried someone ''else'', all parties would consider the new marriage legitimate, as Catholics and those sympathetic to Catherine now considered him a widower.

What also didn't help, and modern historians now believe was a key factor, was Henry having a near-fatal jousting accident. Not only did the news of the event actually trigger one of Anne's miscarriages, but the accident caused two serious injuries for Henry. One was probable brain damage from his horse rolling over him (which altered his personality and made him erratic); the other was a severe leg injury which would cause him to endure constant pain for the rest of his life (which made him irritable and easily angered). This incident put an end to most of the athletic Henry's many physical activities, leading him to become the overweight figure we recognize today, which also contributed to his frequent mood swings. Conveniently, at about this time Catherine of Aragon died (probably of cancer; rather spookily, Anne's last miscarriage happened the same day as Catherine's funeral) and so if Henry were to end his marriage to Anne, there would be no more pressure for him to go back to her. And if he now remarried someone ''else'', all parties would consider the new marriage legitimate, as Catholics and those sympathetic to Catherine now considered him a widower.

Even ignoring this, it is ''obvious'' from a cursory analysis of Henry VIII's well-known sexual history that he had reproductive health issues. Considering six undisputed sexual relationships of Henry VIII (Catherine of Aragon, Bessie Blount, Anne Boleyn, Madge Shelton, Jane Seymour and Katherine Howard)[[note]] Henry is well-known to have never slept with Anne of Cleves, and it is unclear if his marriage to Catherine Parr was ever consummated; there are theories that at least one of Mary Boleyn's children was also fathered by Henry rather than her husband, but if that ''was'' the case he never acknowledged them.[[/note]] 4 of the 6 women became pregnant. Of these four women, there were 12 pregnancies. Of these 12 only 5 would be carried to full-term. Comparatively, Henry VII's father impregnated Elizabeth of York six times (possibly seven), with five of those children being delivered full-term.

Even ignoring this, it is ''obvious'' from a cursory analysis of Henry VIII's well-known sexual history that he had reproductive health issues. Considering six undisputed sexual relationships of Henry VIII (Catherine of Aragon, Bessie Blount, Anne Boleyn, Madge Shelton, Jane Seymour and Katherine Howard)[[note]] Henry is well-known to have never slept with Anne of Cleves, and it is unclear if his marriage to Catherine Parr was ever consummated; there are theories that at least one of Mary Boleyn's children was also fathered by him, but if that ''was'' the case he never acknowledged them.[[/note]] 4 of the 6 women became pregnant. Of these four women, there were 12 pregnancies. Of these 12 only 5 would be carried to full-term. Comparatively, Henry VII's father impregnated Elizabeth of York six times (possibly seven), with five of those children being delivered full-term.

Even ignoring this, it is ''obvious'' from a cursory analysis of Henry VIII's well-known sexual history that he had reproductive health issues. Considering six undisputed sexual relationships of Henry VIII (Catherine of Aragon, Bessie Blount, Anne Boleyn, Madge Shelton, Jane Seymour and Katherine Howard)[[note]] Henry is well-known to have never slept with Anne of Cleves, and it is unclear if his marriage to Catherine Parr was ever consummated. Also as noted above it is unclear if Mary Boleyn's children were Henry's bastards.[[/note]] 4 of the 6 women became pregnant. Of these four women, there were 12 pregnancies. Of these 12 only 5 would be carried to full-term. Comparatively, Henry VII's father impregnated Elizabeth of York six times (possibly seven), with five of those children being delivered full-term.

In the first nine years of their marriage, Catherine bore Henry three boys and three girls. Unfortunately, two were stillborn, three died in infancy, and only one, Mary, survived. [[labelnote:more]]In order: 1. a stillborn girl, not named; 2. a son, named Henry and nicknamed "Little Prince Hal," made Duke of Cornwall, christened with great pomp, died at 52 days old, received royal funeral; 3. a stillborn boy, not named; 4. a son, named Henry, made Duke of Cornwall, survived less than a month; 5. a daughter, Mary I, see below; 6. a daughter, not named, survived less than a week. Had they all (or even just ''one'' of the boys) survived, things would have been very different. Furthermore, given the House of Trastámara's predisposition towards mental illness (which Catherine of Aragon seems to have dodged) it is possible European royal history might have been even more dramatic.[[/labelnote]] Henry carried on his husbandly duty and waited, in vain, for further issue, his worry and impatience at his lack of an heir growing as the years passed. How much of the fertility problems were down to Catherine -- whose family had a history of dying in childbirth or giving birth to children who died young[[note]]Her sister, Isabella, had a son who died young at the age of 2 and she died in childbirth ''having'' him; her sister Maria had lots of living children -- 8 out of 10 of her children survived to adulthood -- but only two living Portuguese grandchildren: Maria Manuela -- who had a son who was totally bat-shit insane -- and João Manuel, Prince of Portugal, who had diabetes, married his double first cousin, and died young leaving only one son... who later died young in battle anyway; her sister, Juana, did relatively well with ''no'' stillborn children, but had the whole "possibly being crazy" thing for her, and the Trastamaras on the throne died out anyway due to incest, so take from that what you will; and John got his wife pregnant, died, and then the baby was stillborn anyway[[/note]] -- and who had a habit of ''fasting'' while in prayer, ''while pregnant'', is still hotly debated.

That, and during his reign he had at least 10,000 people executed, including some of England's greatest thinkers such as Bishop John Fisher and Sir Thomas More (not to imply the other deaths were any less tragic). Some historians put the number at closer to 70,000. His daughter, the so-called 'Bloody' Mary, gets a bad rap for killing around 300, so it only seems fair to flag this up.[[note]]Doing the math, Henry took at least 260 heads for each year of his reign, while Mary took about 60 for each year of hers. Yeah... Bloody, Bloody Henry.[[/note]]

He's most famous for starting the Church of England even though he didn't actually start the Church of England (that honour goes to his daughter, Elizabeth). Make sense? Not really, but it's what Whig historians in Victorian times believed, and like so much in British history the popular belief is based on what the Victorians made up. What Henry really did was to separate the Catholic Church in England from the Roman Catholic Church, making himself Supreme Head in place of the Pope. Meanwhile the ceremonies, vestments, church hierarchy (with the obvious exception of the Pope), and liturgy remained essentially Catholic. He'd have cut off your head had you accused him of being Protestant. He ''loathed'' Protestantism. It's just that by creating a separate Church tied to the sovereign rather than to Rome, it didn't necessarily remain Catholic in future any more than the monarchs did.

Henry seems to have been overjoyed by Elizabeth’s birth; there’s no evidence whatsoever that he was angry or upset, and in fact we have letters written in Henry’s hand before her birth pleading with the midwives to put Anne’s life before that of the child ''even if the child was a boy''. But then further into their marriage Anne miscarried at least two separate pregnancies, both boys, each in the second trimester, and after three years the qualities which had attracted Henry in the first place -- her strong-minded wilfulness, especially -- began to repel him. It didn't help Anne's case that, unlike Catherine, she was unpopular with the general public, she had enemies at court who actively hated her, and she ''didn't'' have any relatives or friends either within or without the realm who were powerful enough/willing to support and protect her -- ''or'' to kick up a fuss should anything obviously untoward happen to her...

What also didn't help, and modern historians now believe was a key factor, was Henry having a near-fatal jousting accident. Not only did the news of the event actually trigger one of Anne's miscarriages, but the accident caused two serious injuries for Henry. One was probable brain damage from his horse rolling over him (which altered his personality and made him erratic); the other was a severe leg injury which would cause him to endure constant pain for the rest of his life (which made him irritable and easily angered). This incident put an end to most of the athletic Henry's many physical activities, leading him to become the overweight figure we recognize today, which also contributed to his frequent mood swings. Conveniently, at about this time Catherine of Aragon died (probably of cancer; rather spookily, Anne's last miscarriage happened the same day as Catherine's funeral) and so if Henry were to end his marriage to Anne, there would be no more pressure for him to go back to her. And if he now remarried to someone ''else'', all parties would consider the new marriage legitimate as Catholics and those sympathetic to Catherine now considered him a widower.

Ten days later Henry married Jane. A year and a half later, Jane died after giving birth to Henry's only legitimate son, Edward VI. Common wisdom has it that "she had the good fortune to bear a male heir, and the good sense to die almost immediately afterward, before the King could tire of her". That said, it’s unlikely that Jane saw her slow, agonizing death of puerperal infection and the loss of everything she was and everyone she knew at the age of 29 as ‘good fortune’ or ‘smart’. To her, her death must have been the worst possible outcome, and those who call her ‘smart’ to have died young in agony might wish to remember that.

Henry was introduced to his fourth wife, Anne of Cleves (German: ''Anna von Jülich-Kleve-Berg''), via a lovely Holbein portrait that now can be seen in The Louvre. Her father was the Duke of Cleves, an important mover and shaker in the emerging Protestant Schmalkaldic League who presumably judged having England in his back pocket would be worth whatever risk his daughter might face marrying Europe's most notorious serial monogamist. After Catherine of Aragon, she was Henry's only wife who would be considered a "royal", as the daughter of a sovereign prince. Henry found her so unattractive in person that the marriage was annulled six months later without it having been consummated. (History does not record what Anne thought of Henry, who by this time weighed about 350 pounds and had nasty pus-spewing abscesses on both legs.) The strange part was that [[HollywoodHomely she wasn't really that unattractive]] -- at least, none of the English courtiers who wrote about her after Henry's death mentioned her being anything but remarkably pleasant-looking. At least one said she was the best-looking of all of Henry's queens; Charles de Marillac, the French Ambassador, said at the time that while she was no great beauty she was quite attractive, pleasant and dignified. ''But'' she was also docile, tall, quite large-breasted, and largely trained in the domestic arts, and Henry tended to like them feisty, tiny, boyish, and with a classically-trained intellect -- plus Anne's heavy and unflattering German clothing did her no favours. More than one historian has wondered if Henry had become impotent by this point and blamed Anne instead of his weight. In the end, Anne, who presumably had by now read up on what happened to Queens One ''and'' Two (and had her decision greatly simplified by the fact that ''she was provably as pure and virgin as the day she was married''), signed the annulment papers at the King's first suggestion, and thereby got a ''very'' generous settlement - including several castles, a metric fuck-tonne of money and no-one to tell her what to ''do'' with it - from a very relieved King Henry, which allowed her to outlive (and get richer than) the other five. Henry, who genuinely ''liked'' Anne as a person even though he didn't want to be married to her, treated her as an [[LikeBrotherAndSister honorary sister]], and she was even referenced publicly as "the King's good sister"; she got on incredibly well with both of his daughters, was provided with a household and allowance, and was invited to all the events at court. Henry was so thankful for her acquiescence that her title of "the King's good sister" came with lofty status, and it was understood that, apart from the King's wife and daughters, she outranked ''everybody else at court.'' Clearly, Anne was no fool -- good for her! She never remarried and was the last of Henry's six wives to die, ten years after Henry, though Catherine of Aragon had a longer lifespan. She was also the first of Henry's wives to lack strong religious convictions; born and baptized Catholic, she was raised in a Protestant environment and most of her close relatives became leading lights of the early Protestant movement, but she herself only converted to Anglicanism to marry Henry, and then converted back to Roman Catholicism when her stepdaughter Mary took the throne.

UsefulNotes/CatherineParr, who again was everything her predecessor was not (bookish, serene, twice-widowed, proper, obedient, quiet, and almost scary-smart) was the sixth and last wife. Unlike Henry, she actually ''was'' a Protestant. An intellectual, Catherine published two books on her religious philosophy, though she was explicitly careful to toe to her husband's Catholic line. Henry was so impressed by her that she was largely responsible for choosing the tutors for his younger children, Edward and Elizabeth -- and she chose Protestants, quietly ensuring that the next Head of the Church of England would be one as well.

In mid-1546 she and Henry celebrated their third wedding anniversary, which doesn't seem like much of a milestone until you realize that she was only the ''second'' of Henry's wives to reach it. Although Henry provided for any children he might have with her in his Third Succession Act of 1544 (behind only his son Edward and ahead of both Mary and Elizabeth), it was clear by this point that he was incapable of fathering any more children - and perhaps she had fertility issues as well, as she'd had no children with her previous two husbands. Certainly the priority of having more sons - which had driven each of his previous four marriages - was not a paramount concern with Catherine, who was in any event already over 30 when she married the king. Only Anne Boleyn had been older, and then only if you accept her year of birth as 1501.

Even ignoring this, it is ''obvious'' from a cursory analysis of Henry VIII's well-known sexual history that he had reproductive health issues. Considering six undisputed sexual relationships of Henry VIII (Catherine of Aragon, Bessie Blount, Anne Boleyn, Madge Shelton, Jane Seymour and Katherine Howard)[[note]] Henry is well-known to have never slept with Anne of Cleves, and it is unclear if his marriage to Catherine Parr was ever consummated. Also as noted above it is unclear if Mary Boleyn's children were Henry's bastards.[[/note]] 4 of the 6 women became pregnant. Of these four women, there were 12 pregnancies. Of these 12 only 5 would be carried to full-term. Comparatively, Henry VII's father impregnated Elizabeth of York six times (possibly seven) with 5 children being delivered full-term.

Famous as a [[IllBoy sickly]] [[AChildShallLeadThem boy-king]] whose early death made rather a mockery of his father's long and tempestuous campaign for a male heir, the reputation of Edward as a frail child has been recently debunked. He almost died of 'quartan fever' (a relatively benign malaria) aged four, but afterwards was healthy up to the age of 15. To be fair, though, he did then contract what was apparently 'consumption' (tuberculosis) and snuffed it without reaching his majority.

Edward's death occurred in July of 1553, and Jane (again, unwillingly -- notice a running trend here, folks?) was crowned Queen four days later. Her reign lasted nine days before a justifiably annoyed Mary I showed up with an army. Unfortunately for Northumberland, he'd failed in his attempt to secure the princess in person before proclaiming Jane as queen instead (well used to watching her own back, Mary had sprung into action on the first news of Edward’s death, and was already on her way to seek support in East Anglia by the time Northumberland’s men arrived at her home), and he'd grossly underestimated Mary's popularity with the likes of conservatives, Catholics, and those who were loyal to the memory of her mother and believed Catherine had been treated unfairly. Catherine of Aragon being absolutely beloved by the English people as a whole, it was a ''big'' army. Heads rolled, right into a basket.

England's very first Queen Regnant, Mary I was Henry VIII's daughter and his only surviving child by Catherine of Aragon. As a little girl, she was doted on by both of her parents, especially as time passed and she continued to be their only surviving child. She was declared Princess of Wales in all but actual title (and some of her contemporaries actually did refer to her as "the Lady Mary, Prince of Wales"), being given the colors of the Prince of Wales to use for her livery and allowed to use the official seal of Wales on her correspondence.[[note]]The reason she was not formally created as Princess of Wales is because it's a courtesy title reserved exclusively for the wife of the Prince of Wales. To call Mary "Princess of Wales" would actually have been a sort of step ''down'' in title from what she was throughout her childhood, which was heir apparent. A few centuries later, the future Elizabeth II was not made Princess of Wales for the exact same reason.[[/note]] As a girl, she was sent with her household to Ludlow, then the traditional seat of the Prince of Wales, to continue her education. Everything changed for Mary, however, when Anne Boleyn became queen. With her parents' marriage declared invalid, Mary was declared a bastard, struck from the succession, stripped of her title as "Princess", separated from her mother, and forced into her baby half-sister's service as a lady-in-waiting. When ordered to recognize Anne Boleyn as Queen of England and Elizabeth as Princess, Mary declared that she knew of no Queen but her mother, and no Princess but herself -- she might, however, call Elizabeth her sister, as she called Henry Fitzroy, Duke of Richmond and Henry VIII's illegitimate son, her brother.

Mary was forced to abdicate in favor of her infant son, and went to England and threw herself on Elizabeth's "mercy" which, in this case, was non-existent; having been in the same situation herself - having to rely on the monarch for mercy - Elizabeth was taking no chances on someone being the threat to her that ''she'', probably unwillingly, had been to her half-sister. At first, Elizabeth was willing enough to shelter her cousin, and for several years Mary lived in what amounted to fancy jail.

Contrary to Hollywood, Mary and Elizabeth never met in person.

When Mary was kicked off the Scottish throne, the heir to the English throne became her son, James VI, who like his mother had ascended to the throne of Scotland as an infant. James VI was a Protestant. Realising that he couldn't get a Catholic onto the English throne any other way, Philip II of Spain (yes, the man who was married to Mary I), also rather annoyed at English support for the United Netherlands (which were [[UsefulNotes/TheEightyYearsWar rebelling against him rather ferociously]]) and privateering (overt state-sponsored piracy) on his treasure ships, got a blessing from Pope Sixtus V and moved on to the second key aspect of the reign of Elizabeth I:

Years later, the Spanish tried landing troops in Ireland to aid Hugh O'Neill (Irish: ''Aodh Maer a Naoill'') against Elizabeth. O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, was the leader of the Irish rebels during the Nine Years War (1594-1603). Elizabethan Ireland was not a pleasant place, and Elizabeth's mixture of parsimony and aggression went down very badly with the native Irish. O'Neill was eventually brought to heel in 1603 after the bloodiest and most expensive war in Elizabeth's reign that had seen at least 100,000 Irish and 30,000 English killed, and England nearly bankrupted. Though O'Neill actually managed to outlast Elizabeth (she died before he surrendered, though he was not informed until after he signed the terms) he would be pressured to flee a few years later, leading to the Ulster Plantations. But we get ahead of ourselves...

As noted above, there was also a guy called Sir Francis Walsingham, who effectively got the whole British espionage system going (including 007, which is how John Dee, a prominent scholar and occultist, signed his letters). English drama flourished under her reign, particularly two gentlemen named Creator/WilliamShakespeare and Creator/ChristopherMarlowe. Diplomatic ties were established with the Ottoman Empire, Barbary States and Japan which led to the expansion of trade. She also granted Sir Walter Raleigh a charter to explore and plant a colony north of Spanish Florida, which would come to be called "Virginia" (perhaps named after her).

* In the AU fic ''Fanfic/{{Handmaid}}'', Anne Boleyn is chosen to be a ''handmaid'' (basically, Henry and Katherine's surrogate) instead of Henry's second wife, changing the course of Tudor England history. Notable differences: [[spoiler: Mary and Elizabeth never become queens of England; Edward is now illegitimate because Henry's dalliance with Jane Seymour was an affair during Anne's second pregnancy (which both Katherine and Anne ignored for their own reasons -- Katherine was used to Henry's cheating, and Anne's love and affections were for ''Katherine''); and the next king of England is ''Edmund'', Elizabeth's twin brother, who eventually unites Great Britain decades early by marrying Mary, Queen of Scots.]]

* The ''Literature/{{Shardlake}}'' books by C.J. Sansom are set during the latter years of Henry VIII's reign, -- events such as the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the Royal Progress to the North, and the French invasion attempt of 1545 form a backdrop to the central stories. Sansom takes some liberties with history in an effort to avoid confusing the casual reader, but lists the changes and the reasons for them in author's notes, as well as providing a short bibliography of the reference texts he used.