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orn just 13 months before Columbus set off from Spain on his first voyage of discovery, Henry was the second son and third child of King Henry VII (formerly Henry Tudor) and his wife Elizabeth of York. His older brother, Arthur, was Prince of Wales and heir to the throne. Young Henry, second in line to the throne, prepared for a future as a kind of vice president: a heartbeat away from the throne. His education was lavish, and generalized, but with a concentration in religion. The Renaissance was underway, and, like a young de' Medici, Prince Henry received instruction in art, languages, science, religion, music, mathematics, the classics, and geography. Henry was an athlete, a sportsman, and a knight of the realm who participated in and won jousting tournaments. Prince Henry was set for life: handsome, strong, tall, rich, powerful, educated, and, at leisure. Then the fates intervened. |
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enry Tudor, aka King Henry VII of England, was dead at the age of 52. Founder of the Tudor Dynasty, Henry VII took the throne of the United Kingdom on the battlefield, beating the royal army and killing King Richard III at Bosworth Field, the famous battle where Shakespeare imagined Richard would gladly trade his crown and empire for a horse and escape. After Bosworth, Henry Tudor shrewdly had himself declared king retroactive to the day before the battle, thereby making anyone who opposed him on the battlefield a traitor against the crown.
Portrait by an unknown
artist of |
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 The new King Henry VII was only 28 years old but already acutely aware of the greatest issue perennially challenging the English monarchy: royal succession. His designer marriage to Elizabeth of York was calculated to put off any challenges to his right to reign by claimants of either of the two Plantagenet lines – York and Lancaster – who had been fighting the fratricidal civil war of attrition called the Wars of the Roses for at least thirty years. Henry VII was obsessed with solidifying the monarchy and shoring up the nation. The Plantagenet dynasty had lasted over 330 years—the bulk of the Middle Ages—producing several great kings who strengthened and expanded the English Empire, but also witnessing several very unstable periods where disputes over the rights to the crown nearly crippled the nation. Henry Tudor stopped the chaos and ended the troubled Plantagenet dynasty by recombining the contested bloodlines and by eliminating challengers: first in the battle to capture the monarchy and afterwards by consigning rivals to prison or worse in the Tower of London. Most importantly, Henry VII ensured national security by producing two indisputably legitimate and healthy male heirs, Arthur and Henry. Henry VII’s 23-year reign ended the troubled Plantagenet dynasty by joining competing royal bloodlines into the amalgamation called the Tudors. |
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All the paranoiac stress of Henry VII’s quest for a stable
monarchy was not lost on his two sons and two daughters. When
Crown
Prince Arthur
died of illness in 1502 at the age of 15, he had already been married
for five months to the Spanish princess
Catherine of Aragon,
herself not quite 16. Although only middle teenagers, the young royal
couple were expected to begin a family immediately, to ensure future
national stability by producing a crown prince of their own. When Arthur
died childless, his brother, Henry, replaced him as crown prince, and,
seven years later with the special dispensation of the Pope in Rome,
replaced Arthur as husband to Catherine of Aragon. |
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become King Henry
IX, died within two months of his
birth. A second son arrived during 1513, but prema-turely, and he did not
live. In December of 1514 Catherine bore a
fourth child—and a third son—but he, too,
was either stillborn or died shortly after birth. This boy was named for
his father, Henry. |
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western Europe, introducing
revolutionary ideas of literature, music, poetry, science, art,
architecture, and religion as it spread along trade routes west and
north. Powerful and wealthy city-states emerged from regional trading
centers and became vibrant centers of the arts, education, technology,
humanistic ideas, and, importantly, politics. |
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Henry VIII wanted England to be, in today’s vernacular, a
“player” in the turbulent international politics of 16th century Europe.
He sided with his Spanish in-laws and the Pope in a war against France
from 1511-16. While Henry invaded France leading the English army, the
French arranged for their ally,
King James IV of Scotland,
to invade England. Queen Catherine of Aragon, acting as temporary head
of state with her husband in England, directed English troops to meet
the Scots in battle. At
Flodden Field in
northern England the Scots suffered a calamitous defeat that ended their
aggression and cost them their king’s life. James IV left a widow,
Queen Margaret,
elder sister of Henry VIII, whose great-grandson established the
Stewart dynasty
as King James I of
England and replaced the Tudors at the
start of the 17th century. |
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But the summit was an opportunity for both kings to demonstrate the impressive wealth and enlightened power of their kingdoms at the height of the Renaissance. Both kings made a great show, but the alliance between France and England remained a tenuous one, and King Henry hedged England’s bets by maintaining ties with his Spanish relative and France’s enemy, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. By maintaining relations with both principal European powers, Henry bought the time to build a powerful navy and lay the foundations for what would soon become a growing, modern British Empire. |
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THIS ARTICLE FIRST APPEARED DECEMBER, 2008. |
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