On this day in Tudor history, 13th February 1564, in the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, astrologer and physician John Harvey was baptised at Saffron Walden in Essex.
Harvey was the third son of farmer and rope maker John Harvey and his wife, Alice. His brothers were renowned scholar Gabriel Harvey and astrologer and theologian Richard Harvey.
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In this second part of This Week in Tudor History for week beginning 8th February, I talk about two parliamentary acts that allowed a king to execute his wife and to execute people showing signs of madness; a miscarriage of justice which led to a priest being executed in Elizabeth I’s reign; an Elizabethan astrologer who was ridiculed after his prophecies didn’t come true, and a man known as William Waste-all.
11th February 1542 – King Henry VIII gave his assent “in absentia” to an act of attainder against his fifth wife, Catherine Howard, and her lady-in-waiting, Jane Boleyn, Lady Rochford. A bill allowing people showing signs of lunacy was also passed, an awful thing, but the king was determined to take revenge.
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