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That Other Tudor History Page, London (2026)

10/06/2026

Henry VII and Richard III

The crown of England had many claimants during the conflict which came to be known as The Wars of the Roses. Civil war had raged in England from the 1450s until Henry Tudor defeated Richard III at Bosworth Field in August 1485, becoming King Henry VII.
Although Henry was descended from Edward III, it was a dubious claim to the throne, through his mother Margaret Beaufort and while the House of York dominated during the 1460s and 70s, it seemed that there were too many others set to rule before him. That changed in 1483 when Edward IV died suddenly in April, nobody could have envisioned the ultimate outcome.
Edward left behind two sons in the care of his brother the Duke of Gloucester. Twelve year old Edward V and Richard of Shrewsbury, Duke of York who was nine. Their uncle, Richard, Duke of Gloucester had been named as Lord Protector until the young king came of age.
Duke Richard had the boys lodged in the Tower of London, ostensibly to prepare for Edward’s coronation. Instead Duke Richard had the marriage of Edward IV and Queen Elizabeth declared null and void and their sons and daughters were declared illegitimate and unfit to rule.
Duke Richard then assumed the throne himself as the younger brother of Edward IV. The dowager queen was in sanctuary at Westminster and the boys remained isolated in the Tower. After the summer of 1483, the boys were never seen again.

Henry Tudor was in exile in France at the time of the disappearance of “The Princes in the Tower”. The disappearance of the boys shocked and confused contemporaries and is still a hotly debated topic today among historians. What happened to them? Were they murdered? Who did the vicious deed?
Regardless, the Duke of Gloucester became Richard III. The following year Richard’s only legitimate child, Prince Edward of Middleham, died at the age of ten, leaving his father without an heir. Henry Tudor then swore an oath at Rennes Cathedral to marry Elizabeth of York, the eldest daughter of Edward IV and oust Richard from the throne. The marriage would then unite the warring houses of Lancaster and York.
Henry’s first attempt to invade England failed, mainly due to his ships foundering in a storm at sea, but his second attempt went to plan and he landed in the south of Wales in 1485. Richard mustered his troops and intercepted Henry’s army at Ambion Hill near Market Bosworth on 22nd August 1485 and despite Richard outnumbering Henry’s army significantly, Richard was killed on the battlefield, the last English king to fall in battle.
Henry was crowned later that year and married Elizabeth of York, ending the Wars of the Roses and founding the Tudor dynasty.
Was it justice for the Princes in the Tower? Although it is unlikely to ever be solved, Richard remains a strong suspect for the princes murder. In 1674 workmen found the bones of two children under a staircase at the Tower. On the orders of Charles II the bones were interred in an urn and placed in Westminster Abbey, bearing the names of Edward V and Richard, Duke of York. Although many theories persist about the fate of the boys, Richard remains the person who had means and the motive to kill them. Was his death at Bosworth divine retribution for his nephews? Either way, his death paved the way for one of the most famous dynasties to sit on the English throne.

03/05/2026

Tudor propaganda:-

This portrait painted c. 1545 is of the family of Henry VIII. Painted after his Third Act of Succession was enshrined into law, it was used to demonstrate the absolute power of the monarchy and the succession of his children.
Sat upon a dais with his arm around his son, Prince Edward, and Edward’s mother, Jane Seymour at his left, this portrait is remarkable as Jane had been dead for eight years and Henry was actually married to Katherine Parr.
Standing on either side of the dais is Princess Mary to his right and Princess Elizabeth to his left. They had been reinstated into the line of succession, despite both being declared illegitimate, he had seen fit to restore them, albeit after Edward and his heirs.
So did Henry care about his daughters or was he out of options? There was certainly an element of paternal fondness for them, both were extremely well educated, even by the standards of the day. He provided for them both in his will and left them very well provided for. Certainly, the last few years of his reign he allowed them to have lodgings at court, where they spent a lot of time in the company of Queen Katherine.
This portrait declared to the world that the royal family and the succession was secure. It was both a declaration and a warning to potential pretenders that Henry felt secure in his children and their right to rule after him.

15/04/2026

Tudor propaganda was delivered to the populace through paintings and portraits, pamphlets and town criers, as well as literature and religion. This was largely to display the strength and majesty of the Tudor dynasty.
Henry VII combined the red rose of Lancaster with the white rose of York to show the world that civil war had ended and the warring houses were finally united.
The common population of England at the time, was largely illiterate, so propaganda had to be carefully managed in order to reach the majority of people, but this in itself also created issues.
Henry VIII’s lack of propaganda surrounding the Dissolution of the Monasteries failed to win popular support because people lacked understanding of the larger issues at stake. For example, Henry did not particularly wish to change doctrine, he simply wished to have control of Church affairs in England. He allowed the people to have the Bible in English so that they could hear and understand God’s word, not so that it could be debated.
Henry almost bankrupted the country by attending the Field of the Cloth of Gold, a large display of wealth, power and pageantry designed to show France how stable and rich he was, as well as secure on the throne.
His daughter, Elizabeth I, also maximised portraiture and pageantry to display her wealth and status, the Armada portrait being a testament to English victory over the Spanish. Edmund Spenser’s The Fairie Queen was an epic poem dedicated to Elizabeth as the heart and soul of England, in the 1590’s when her popularity was waning. This may have helped reaffirm her image as the “body politic” she had carefully created in the early years of her reign.

If it wasn’t for these pieces of contemporary art and literature, our understanding of the Tudor era may have been very different. Its purpose was to reach the general population, but it has echoed through the centuries, still finding purchase among people who remain fascinated with that era today.

24/03/2026

in 1603, Elizabeth I died at Richmond Palace aged 69.

Having ruled England from 1558, Elizabeth calmed England’s religious waters in the aftermath of the Marian Catholic Counter-Reformation. She was crowned in January 1559 at Westminster Abbey and the general population were ecstatic as Elizabeth had always been popular, a rebellion even rising with the intent of putting on her on the throne instead of her half-sister Queen Mary. Elizabeth had lived through a very difficult childhood, her mother had replaced Mary’s mother as Queen of England, making their relationship strained from the beginning. It improved somewhat after the death of Elizabeth’s mother, Anne Boleyn.
Having been declared illegitimate by her father Henry VIII, she still received a fine education and was restored to the line of succession by her father in 1544, behind her brother and Mary.
After the death of Henry VIII in 1547, she lived with her stepmother, Katherine Parr, until Katherine’s new husband Thomas Seymour, caused a scandal by entering the young princess’s bedchamber on several occasions. The scandal nearly ruined her.
Just before her brother King Edward VI died, he tried to disinherit both Mary and Elizabeth based on their illegitimacy. However, Henry VIII’s Third Act of Succession was watertight and enshrined in law, so despite Edward declaring his wish that their Protestant cousin Lady Jane Grey should succeed him, Mary did eventually succeed.
With Mary succeeding to the throne, old grievances and religious differences caused the sisters to become further estranged. Perhaps Mary was haunted by the fate of their mothers, or perhaps she was envious of Elizabeth’s youth and popularity. Either way, Mary had Elizabeth imprisoned in the Tower of London on suspicion of treason. Nothing could be proved and Elizabeth, protesting her innocence, was eventually sent to live under house arrest in the countryside.
On the death of Mary in November 1558, legend has it that Elizabeth was found reading under an oak tree at Hatfield Palace and declared
“This is the Lord’s doing, it is marvellous in our eyes!” And so began a relationship that defined her for the rest of her life-her marriage to England.
The only Tudor to give her name to an age, Elizabeth oversaw sea exploration, religious settlement, the golden age of arts and literature, the defeat of the Spanish Armada as well as threats from Scotland and France. She had several nicknames including Good Queen Bess, Gloriana and The Virgin Queen. She became the first woman in English history to demonstrate that a woman could rule at least as well as any man successfully and with the love of her people.
Excluding the fact that his line died with her, if he could have seen his daughter, old Henry VIII would have been proud.

08/03/2026

International Women’s Day! Some of the most influential women of their day graced the Tudor courts of the sixteenth century.

Lady Jane Grey bravely faced a fate that was not her choice and died for her beliefs.

Katherine Parr believed in family and successfully reunited Henry VIII with his daughters, whilst pursuing education and the reformed faith.

Elizabeth I proved that a woman could rule as well as any man, and won the love and respect from the majority of her subjects. She gave her name to a golden age and is remembered as one of the greatest monarchs to sit on the English throne.

Anne Boleyn, won the love of a king and endured huge unpopularity and scorn so that she could become Queen consort only to be betrayed by the king when she did not have a son. She died bravely on the scaffold.

Katherine of Aragon suffered miscarriages, stillbirths and infant deaths for the first ten years of her marriage, before being cast aside and abandoned by her husband. She never gave up her fight even signing her name as Katherine the Queen on her death bed.

Mary Stuart, Queen of Scots, a Scottish Queen raised Catholic at the French court, returned home to Scotland a widow, to an unfamiliar and unwelcoming country that eventually forced her abdication and took away her child. She eventually fled to England and was kept prisoner by her cousin Elizabeth, until her ex*****on.

Margaret Beaufort, against all odds became mother to the first Tudor king, Henry VII. Survived and conspired during the Wars of the Roses, was forced to live without her son, but continued to fight for his cause at home, until it was safe for him to return.

Mary I endured years of neglect and suffering after the drama of her parents divorce, remained true to her faith against the backdrop of the English reformation and growing discontent against catholics during the reigns of her father and brother. As Queen, she remained steadfast in her loyalty to Catholicism, despite how unpopular it made her.

All these women are worth remembering. None of them had it easy, all fought against the men who were prominent during their lifetime and have had numerous books, films and series created about them because of their extraordinary lives.

Happy International Women’s Day!

12/01/2026

Anne Boleyn: One of the most fascinating women in English history.

Part one:

Born to Thomas and Elizabeth Boleyn in approximately 1501, although this is contested, probably at Blickling Hall in Norfolk. She also spent some of her childhood at Hever Castle in the Kent countryside. She had an older sister called Mary and a younger brother, George.

Anne’s father worked for King Henry VIII as an ambassador to various courts in Europe and it was at the court of Margaret of Austria that Boleyn managed to secure a position for his younger daughter in the regent’s household, where she was to learn courtly ways and improve her language skills. Anne travelled to Mechelen in the Netherlands and thrived under the care of Margaret. It may have been in these years that Anne first became aware of religious controversies and the European reformation.

After her time at Mechelen, Anne and her sister were placed as Maids of Honour to Princess Mary Tudor, the younger sister of King Henry VIII when she travelled to France to marry the king of France. Here she served first Mary and then Claude of France, before being recalled to England by her father.

At this time, in the early 1520s Anne’s sister Mary was in the middle of an affair with King Henry himself. Anne may have been romantically involved with Henry Percy, son of the Earl of Northumberland. The Percy’s were great northern magnates, who considered Anne far too common to marry into their family. Cardinal Wolsey intervened, possibly by request of the King, and Anne was banished to Hever Castle and Henry Percy quickly married off.

By the middle of the 1520s, Anne was back at court and serving Queen Catherine of Aragon as a lady-in-waiting. Her sister’s affair with the King was over and Mary had been married to Sir William Carey. We can’t know for certain when Anne caught the eye of King Henry, only that she did. Perhaps it was the elegance and grace she had learned at the international courts she had attended or her sharp wit and intellect that had been cultivated during her formative years, but whatever it was, Anne was about to begin a journey that would not only seal her fate as one of Henry’s queens, but would change the course of English history forever.

Part two coming shortly.

21/12/2025

The burning of the Yule log:-

The Tudors celebrated Christmas a little differently to us in the 21st century.

The twelve days of Christmas were traditionally when the people who worked the land, would stop working to enjoy the celebrations. Christmas carols were popular in Tudor England, some that are recognisable today, such as The Holly and the Ivy and the haunting Coventry Carol. The Boars Head Carol was also popular and was sung at dinner as the pinnacle of the feast (The Boars Head) was brought in:-

“The boars head in hand bear I,
Bedecked with bay and rosemary,
And I pray you my masters, be merry
Quot estis in convivio

Caput apri defero
Reddens laudes Domino”

The last few lines translates to:- As many men as there are at the feast and the boars head bear I, Rendering praises to the Lord.

There was also the traditional bringing of the Yule log on Christmas Eve. This would be cut down from a nearby forest and burned in the fireplace for the entire twelve days of Christmas. The charred remains were often used as kindling the following year.

Another tradition was the Feast of Fools. A Lord of Misrule would be nominated to supervise the entertainment for the Christmas period, choosing games and dancing and general revelry.

Common people would visit their friends and neighbours and enjoy a minced pie, which would consist of thirteen ingredients that represented Christ and his apostles.

Work would reconvene on ‘Plough Monday’ which was the first Monday after the end of the twelve days.

That Other Tudor History Page

10/06/2026

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