On this day in Tudor history, Thursday 12th September 1555, in the reign of Catholic Queen Mary, the trial of Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury, began in Oxford.
Archbishop Cranmer, who had, of course, played his part in the annulment of Mary I's parents' marriage (King Henry VIII and Queen Catherine of Aragon) was accused of heresy. Cranmer, however, did not recognise the authority of the court. His intelligent answers to his accusers were to do no good, and he became one of the famous Oxford Martyrs in 1556.
Find out more about what happened at his trial, and what happened next, in this talk.
Find out more about Thomas Cranmer in these videos:
Also on this day in history:
- 1542 – Death of Sir Edmund Knightley, lawyer and Sergeant-at-Law. He was buried at Letheringham in Suffolk.
- 1544 – Baptism of Richard Bancroft, Archbishop of Canterbury in the reign of James I, at Prescot, near Farnworth, in Lancashire.
- 1559 – Death of Marten Micron (Martin Micronius), Dutch theologian and Protestant minister in the strangers' churches of London, from the plague at Norden in Lower Saxony, Germany.
- 1573 – Sudden death of Archibald Campbell, 5th Earl of Argyll, Protestant reformer and a leading politician in the reign of Mary, Queen of Scots, at Barbreck. He had got married six weeks earlier and had shown no signs of illness before retiring to bed. He was laid to rest in the family mausoleum at Kilmun Church on the Holy Loch.