Wolf Hall ping
Fascinating! Thanks for posting.
In those days, it’s hardly surprising — politics could get rough and personal, and the Pope was as much into the game as any king.
The Church has seen the likes of Obama everywhere throughout history. At this point, he is barely rising to the level of “nuisance” on their 2000 year old scale.
Clement VII was a Medici and was as adept at taking and maintaining power through force or murder as was Henry or any other monarch of the time.
in the hope of producing a male heir.
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Henry had already “produced a male heir” with Catherine..
a couple of them in fact...
One at least was a healthy boy who Henry insisted be taken out soon after he was born into the freezing weather to be baptized in the unheated palace chapel ...the baby caught cold and died...
Henry had about 6 children with Catherine of Aragon..
Only Mary survived past infancy..
Henry also closed down all the monasteries and oratories established to pray for the dead in England, confiscated their goods and property, and handed some of it out to his favorites. He said the monks were “greedy”—kind of like Obama closing down or raising taxes on coal and oil companies because they are greedy. Maybe some of them are, but not as greedy as the Absolute Monarch, which is what Obama thinks he is.
Then, when Henry VIII died, he asked in his will that the monks should pray for his soul in Purgatory. Unfortunately, there weren’t any monks left to do it. They had all been dispersed.
A very important moment in world history. I’d argue that Henry’s break from the Catholic Church led to the Anglosphere maintaining a world dominance economically and militarily for the last 400 odd years.
29.5 foot wide parchment. That must have been one hell of a letter!!
To be fair, in the previous century England had gone through a forty or so year civil war, with massive devastation of the country and loss of life, ending only with Henry’s father’s accession to the throne.
Lack of a male heir was presumed at the time to be the best possible way to start up another round of the wars.
The ironic part is that Henry’s two daughters both ruled, one reasonably competently (though wildly unpopular) and the other as perhaps the greatest monarch in English history.
Just ask Thomas More. He did go bravely.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gP-DYiJfw6g