On this day in Tudor history, 28th April, just a few days before Anne Boleyn’s arrest, the royal council was meeting frequently; a man involved in the falls of two queens died; an 82-year-old priest was executed; and Elizabeth I’s funeral took place…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 15th April, kings’ champion Sir Robert Dymoke died; Robert Devereux, 2nd Earl of Essex, was sworn in as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, little knowing it would lead to his undoing; and privy chamberer Sir John Scudamore was buried…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 2nd April, Henry VII’s eldest son, Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales, died at Ludlow Castle; Anne Boleyn’s almoner, John Skip, preached a controversial sermon; and fourteen-year-old Edward VI fell ill with measles and smallpox…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 1st April, Chapuys, the imperial ambassador, reported that Henry VIII had sent Jane Seymour a purse of money; physician William Harvey, who discovered the circulation of blood, was born; and author and soldier Thomas Churchyard died…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 26th March, the Vestments Controversy of Elizabeth I’s reign was started; Sir Robert Carey arrived at Holyrood to inform King James VI of Scotland that he was now King of England; and John Dee, astrologer, mathematician, alchemist, antiquary, spy, philosopher, geographer and adviser to Elizabeth I, died..
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 23rd January, King Ferdinand II of Aragon died, the half-brother of Mary, Queen of Scots, was assassinated, and Elizabeth I opened the Royal Exchange in London…
[Read More...]
What happened on this day in Tudor history?
Lots!
Find out more about this day in the Tudor period…
[Read More...]
What happened on this day in Tudor history, 5th January, in Tudor times?
Let me share with you some events from 5th January during the reigns of the Tudor kings and queens…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 12th October 1555, Peregrine Bertie, 13th Baron Willoughby of Willoughby, Beck, and Eresby, was born at Wesel in Cleves.
Bertie was the son of Richard Bertie and his wife, Katherine (née Willoughby), Duchess of Suffolk and widow of Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk. Bertie was born while his Protestant parents were in exile during Mary I’s reign.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 6th October 1557, John Capon (also known as John Salcot), former Benedictine monk and Bishop of Salisbury, died, probably from influenza. He was buried in the choir at Salisbury Cathedral.
Capon appeared to have reformist leanings in the reigns of Henry VIII and Edward VI, but became a conservative Catholic again in Mary I’s reign, and was involved in the examination of those deemed to be heretics.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 19th September 1580, Katherine Bertie (née Willoughby) died after a long illness. She was buried in Spilsby church, Lincolnshire.
Katherine was known for her Protestant faith and her patronage of Protestant scholars and clergymen, and also for her marriage to Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 6th September 1572, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, Sir Henry Jerningham (Jernegan) died at his manor of Costessey in Norfolk. He was buried in the parish church there.
Jerningham served Henry VIII and Mary I, and his offices in Mary’s reign included privy councillor, Vice-Chamberlain of the Household, and Captain of the Yeomen of the Guard. He was instrumental in helping Mary in the succession crisis of 1553.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 2nd (or 3rd) September 1507, in the reign of King Henry VII, Thomas Savage, Archbishop of York, died at Cawood Castle in Yorkshire.
He was buried at York Minster, but his heart was buried at Macclesfield, at St Michael’s Church.
Savage also served as King Henry VII’s Lieutenant and High Commissioner in York and as a diplomat.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 23rd August 1553, just over a month after Mary I had been proclaimed queen, Stephen Gardiner, Bishop of Winchester, was made Lord Chancellor.
Here are some facts about Stephen Gardiner, a man known as “Wily Winchester”…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 11th August 1556, politician Sir John Kingsmill, a man who had been close to Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Wriothesley, died.
He served as a sheriff in the reign of Henry VIII and as a commissioner for the dissolution of chantries in 1548 to Edward VI.
Here are some more facts about Sir John Kingsmill:
[Read More...]
As yesterday was the anniversary of the martyrdom of Catholic Thomas Abell, on 30th July 1540, I thought he could be this week’s #MondayMartyr.
Here are some facts about this Henrician martyr:
– Thomas Abell’s birthdate is unknown but he’d been ordained as a Catholic priest by 1513.
– He studied at the University of Oxford, attaining a BA in 1514 and an MA in 1518.
– In 1522, Abell became rector at Great Berkhamsted in Hertfordshire…
On this day in Tudor history, 21st June 1509, England’s new king, the nearly 18-year-old Henry VIII, travelled from Greenwich to the Tower of London.
Chronicler Edward Hall recorded:
On the 21st day of this month of June, the king came from Greenwich to the Tower, over London Bridge, and so by Grace Church, with whom came many a well appareled gentleman, but in especial the Duke of Buckingham, which had a gowne all of goldsmithes work, very costly.
It was traditional for monarchs to stay at the Tower of London, where they would create Knights of the Bath, before their coronations. Henry and his new bride, Catherine of Aragon, were due to process through the streets of London to Westminster on 23rd June, and their coronation would take place on 24th.
On this day in Tudor history, 13th June 1535, or possibly 14th, Tudor courtier and nobleman, George Neville, 3rd Baron Bergavenny, died at his home at Eridge in Sussex.
He fell from favour after the fall of his father-in-law, the Duke of Buckingham, in 1521, but managed to rise again.
This week’s #MondayMartyr is Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, who was beatified in 1886 by Pope Leo XIII as a Catholic martyr.
She was executed in 1541 in what was a truly awful botched execution, and for a crime she did not commit…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 27th April 1536, John Stokesley, Bishop of London, was approached to see if Henry VIII could “abandon” his second wife, Anne Boleyn.
Eustace Chapuys, the imperial ambassador, recorded that Stokesley replied that he would only give his opinion to the king himself, and that before doing so he needed to be clear what the king wanted. He certainly didn’t want to endanger himself by offending the king or the queen.
[Read More...]
A few weeks ago, my father and I were able to get away for a morning to visit Hever Castle in Kent. It’s somewhere that you may have been to before, and it’s a castle that is very close to our hearts – we LOVE the way the grounds are kept and how the castle evokes the history of the Boleyn family, the time Anne of Cleves spent there AND, more recently, how the Astor family lived and renovated the whole area.
For a long time, Hever castle was quite static in its displays – not much changed, which was fine if you’d never visited before, but since we had visited so many times, it was rare to see anything new. That’s no longer the case.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 12th April 1533, Anne Boleyn caused quite a stir by attending mass wearing cloth of gold and the richest jewels, and attended by sixty ladies.
Why the stir?
Well, because her marriage to Henry VIII was still a secret. The royal council had only just been informed.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 10th March 1572, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, nobleman and administrator William Paulet, 1st Marquess of Winchester, died at his home Basing House in Hampshire. He was said to be 97 years of age at his death. He was laid to rest in the parish church at Basing on 28th April.
Paulet’s offices under Henry VIII included Lord Treasurer, Great Master of the Household and Lord Great Chamberlain, and he also served the king’s children, Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I, in their reigns.
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 15 February 1503, Henry Deane, administrator and Archbishop of Canterbury, died at Lambeth Palace at around the age of 63. He was laid to rest at Canterbury Cathedral in a lavish funeral.
Deane was the last monk to become Archbishop of Canterbury.
Let me give you a few facts about this archbishop…
[Read More...]
On 3rd February 1478, in the reign of King Edward IV, Edward Stafford, 3rd Duke of Buckingham, was born at Brecon Castle.
His father, the 2nd Duke of Buckingham, was executed as a traitor in Richard III’s reign and Edward came to the same end in 1521, in King Henry VIII’s reign.
Let me tell you a bit more about this Duke of Buckingham…
[Read More...]
On this day in Tudor history, 21st January 1556, imperial ambassador Eustace Chapuys died in Louvain, the place he had retired to in 1549. He was laid to rest in the chapel of Louvain College, the college he had founded.
Chapuys is one of my favourite sources for the reign of Henry VIII because his dispatches to the emperor and his fellow ambassadors are so detailed.
But who was Eustace Chapuys? Let me tell you a bit more about him…
[Read More...]
On 14th January 1515, in King Henry VIII’s reign, Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, was sent to France to bring back the king’s sister, Mary Tudor, Queen of France.
Eighteen-year-old Mary had married fifty-two-year-old King Louis XII on 9th October 1514, but the marriage had been short-lived as Louis died on 1st January 1515.
Before marrying Louis, Mary had made her brother promise that if the French king died she could marry a man of her choosing. That man ended up being Suffolk, Henry VIII’s best friend, and the very man sent to fetch her.
[Read More...]
On 11th January 1584, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, Blessed William Carter was executed for treason.
Printer William Carter, who was about thirty-six years of age at his death, had been found guilty of treason for printing a book which allegedly contained a passage inciting the queen’s assassination. He was hanged, drawn and quartered at Tyburn.
[Read More...]
I’ve received quite a few questions recently regarding the practice of heart burial in Tudor times, so I thought I’d share these talks on heart burial, and burial in general, from our archives…
[Read More...]
