Five hundred years ago an eighteen-year-old boy sat on this chair in Westminster Abbey to be crowned King of England. He would grow up to become the most infamous monarch in history. Henry VIII is the only King whose shape you remember. David Starkey, Henry: Mind of a Tyrant I, Channel 4 2009
One of the most important and original monarchs ever to have sat on the throne of England. ibid.
It was the beginning of the end for [Perkin] Warbeck’s extraordinary odyssey. Within a few months he too was in the Tower. ibid.
Within weeks of coming to the throne the seventeen-year-old had married. His Queen was Catherine of Aragon. David Starkey, Henry: Mind of a Tyrant II
Henry the warrior King had turned back into Henry the Playboy Prince. ibid.
On 19th May 1536 at the Tower of London Anne Boleyn, Queen of England, mounted the scaffold. David Starkey, Henry: Mind of a Tyrant III
A man changed and warped by a passionate love affair and a bitter divorce. ibid.
Anne: she was playing for higher stakes. ibid.
Who would prevail – the Minister [Wolsey] or the Mistress [Boleyn]? ibid.
Henceforth, the universal Church would be the Church of England. David Starkey, Henry: Mind of a Tyrant IV
The scars of Henry’s terrible vengeance are still visible ... They were ruthlessly suppressed. ibid.
He succumbed to septicaemia: he was 55 years old. ibid.
Henry’s love-letters to Anne gushed with desire to marry, but the Pope refused to grant him a divorce. Elizabeth I: The Secret Life, National Geographic 2011
King Henry married his third wife, Jane Seymour, and she gave him the son he had always wanted, Prince Edward. ibid.
Henry VIII will come to see these free-roving lords as a threat to his power, and men who need to be taught a lesson. Fergal Keane, The Story of Ireland 2/5, BBC 2011
I’ll leave you out of it. But you are my chancellor. I don’t take it kindly and I’ll have no opposition. A Man For All Seasons 1966 starring Paul Scofield & Wendy Hiller & Leo McKern & Orson Welles & Robert Shaw & Susannah York & Nigel Davenport & John Hurt & Corin Redgrave & Colin Blakely et al, director Fred Zinnemann
I give the devil benefit of law for my safety’s sake. ibid.
January 1547: this is the sorry end of the most tumultuous tyrannous reign in English history. Inside the Court of Henry VIII, Yesterday 2015
In 1509 Henry VII came to the throne. A vigorous young man with new ideas. ibid.
A mere commoner – Cardinal Thomas Wolsey – the man who ran England. Nobles dominate Henry’s court but not Henry’s government. ibid.
A radical alliance now hold power in court – Anne and Cromwell. ibid.
In April 1509, the seventeen-year-old Prince Henry assumed the throne as Henry VIII. The old King had been of sallow complexion, with black decayed teeth and thinning hair. The new King was as handsome as he was amiable, known both for his piety and his prowess, a young man acquainted with books as well as with jousts and hunting. In his coronation poem Thomas More described him as the glory of the era, renowned no less for learning than for virtue; truly this prince was about to inaugurate a new golden age. Peter Ackroyd, The Life of Thomas More p126
More's work as royal secretary was not confined to the correspondence between Wolsey and the King. If a member of the Council had important news for Henry, they would generally write to More. He also received the foreign post and was one of the principle agents in dealing with foreign courts and ambassadors; such was his legal expertise that it is likely he read over the first draft of treaties or diplomatic instructions. ibid. p201
But his real power and influence remained in his proximity to the King. While other courtiers waited in galleries and passages, hoping to catch the attention of the monarch as he passed, More was always beside him. ibid. p237
If More played no ostensible part in the matter of the King’s disputed marriage during this period, he was a necessary and visible agent of Wolsey's diplomacy. ibid. p261
Henry seems genuinely to have convinced himself that he had incurred divine displeasure by marrying his dead brother’s wife and that as a result he had merited the Biblical punishment of conceiving no male issue from the forbidden union. Yet at the same time he was pursuing Anne Boleyn with gifts and letters. ibid. p263
But eventually papal supremacy became for More a question of faith. It was not for him, therefore, a minor or peripheral matter. ibid. p265
So why had he [More] accepted the post of Lord Chancellor, when he was fully aware of the pressures which would be applied to him? ibid. p282
For thirty-one months Thomas More embodied the law of England. He was the presiding figure in Chancery and in the Star Chamber; he was known as ‘the keeper of the king’s conscience’ and, in that capacity, he was permitted to apply equity and more judgement in the strict application of the law. ibid. p287
More then ceremoniously handed to Henry VIII the pouch which contained the Great Seal of England. The King graciously received this symbol of office, and granted More leave to bestow the rest of his life in preparing his soul ‘in the service of God’. ibid. p305
The Act was one of several which, in the course of this parliamentary session, would utterly destroy the dispensation of a thousand years. The proponents of change claimed that they were only restoring the ancient privileges of the English Church, but the evidence suggests that this was a theory devised merely to justify wholesale ‘reformation’. ibid. p347
He [More] was now effectively a prisoner. He had rejected the oath and was therefore to be charged with ‘misprision of treason’. But he had refused to give his reasons for his fateful decision and, at this moment, he entered silence. ibid. p354
Divorced, beheaded, died; divorced, beheaded, survived: the story of Henry VIII and six wives is one of the best known in history. Six Wives with Lucy Worsley, BBC 2016
Ambition is something Catherine had instilled in her from a very early age. ibid.
Catherine enters confinement in spring 1510. Ahead now lies the ordeal of childbirth … Catherine’s bump had simply disappeared. ibid.
She’d done everything right; she had given him a son. This really was the high point of their marriage. ibid.
Henry and Anne hadn’t had sex yet … She wanted to be Queen of England. ibid.
Into the private worlds of Henry’s six wives … Six complex women who lived in a dangerous day, they struggled to survive being married to Henry VIII. Six wives whose names were tarnished by Henry’s propaganda machine. Six Wives with Lucy Worsley II
This is the ultimate story of love, lust and betrayal. ibid.
Anne Boleyn – she’s been accused of being a seductress, and adulteress, even a witch. ibid.
She was set upon by a mob of angry women. ibid.
Catherine … would never see her daughter again. ibid.
He could be the head of his own church. ibid.
After three tempestuous years of marriage Anne was arrested. ibid.
In this end she was the victim of her own strength, and the victim of the pitiless king. ibid.
Jane’s obedience to the King would be tested. ibid.
The religious tension playing out across the country was also felt within the palace walls. ibid.
Jane gave birth. It was a boy … It had taken him three wives to get to this point. ibid.
A visitor has arrived from Germany. They’ve never met … This time he was slightly pushed into it … Henry’s advisers had other ideas: they thought it was time for another Queen … Henry’s fourth wife would be a noblewoman called Anne … ‘The Flanders Mare’. Six Wives with Lucy Worsley III
History’s most awkward blind date. ibid.
She sent back her wedding ring with a request that it be broken into pieces. The King paid Anne off handsomely. ibid.
Teenage lady-in-waiting Catherine Howard – she would be the King’s fifth wife. Henry married Catherine just two weeks after the ending of his marriage to Anne of Cleves. ibid.
When Henry’s eye fell on her [Catherine], she couldn’t refuse. ibid.
We think of Christmas as a time for tradition that’s full of age-old customs and symbols. And yet if you wind back the clock five hundred years to when Henry VIII was on the throne a lot of the things that seem essential to Christmas disappear … What would a genuinely olden times Christmas have looked like? A Merry Tudor Christmas With Lucy Worsley, BBC 2019
Our ancestors partied hard for twelve whole days. ibid.
When Henry VIII came to the throne in 1509, over 90% of his subjects lived outside towns and cities. ibid.