The Tudors and the Greenwich Church of the Observant Friars

This post ties in with our Son Rise Morning Show discussion today of the correspondence between Queen Catherine of England and Blessed John Forest because it demonstrates the close ties between the founder of the Tudor Dynasty, King Henry VII and the church or chapel of the Observant Friars at Greenwich. From the Medieval Manuscripts blog of the British Library, evidence of that linkage:

Greenwich Palace was a favourite of England’s Tudor monarchs. Beside the palace stood the church of the Observant Friars, founded in 1482. Being so close to a royal residence, the church played a regular part in royal ceremonies — Henry VIII, Mary I and Elizabeth I were all baptised there. This church had political and religious importance, which is reinforced by two manuscripts digitised for the Library’s Medieval and Renaissance Women project. Egerton MS 2341/1 and Egerton MS 2341/2 contain instructions for the glaziers creating the stained glass for the church’s East window. These instructions demonstrate how that window was designed to strengthen the new Tudor dynasty.

Probably originally a single roll, the two manuscripts are undated. They must have been written after 1489, when Margaret Tudor was born, as she is one of the individuals to be depicted in the window. In turn, they presumably pre-date the death of Elizabeth of York, Henry VII’s queen, in February 1503, as the text refers to her in the present tense. They may have been made in the early 1490s, and before the church was consecrated by April 1494.

The post goes on to describe the saints to be depicted in the stained glass windows, particularly all the Anglo-Saxon female saints and concludes:

By focusing on royal women from before the Norman Conquest, the window placed Henry, his queen and his daughter among a cohort of royal women stretching back over a thousand years. He could claim direct descent from St Margaret, the ancestor of every English king from Henry II onwards. She, in turn, was linked to several of these Saxon saints. This window presented a Tudor history that looked beyond the dynastic squabbles of the 15th century, using these women to emphasise Henry VII’s link to a more distant and less contentious Anglo-Saxon past.

This does make sense because Henry VII's claim to the throne was through his mother's lineage, not his father's. One of the saints featured was Saint Margaret of Scotland, wife of King Malcolm III. She was an English princess, according to the old Encyclopedia Britannica:

the daughter of the English prince Edward, son of Edmund Ironside, and sister of Edgar Ætheling, and was probably born in Hungary. In 1067 the widow and children of Edward fled from Northumberland with a large number of followers and sought the protection of the Scottish king. The marriage of Malcolm and Margaret soon took place and was followed by several invasions of Northumberland by the Scottish king, probably in support of the claims of his brother-in-law Edgar. These, however, had little result beyond the devastation of the province. Far more important were the effects of this alliance upon the history of Scotland. A considerable portion of the old Northumbrian kingdom had been reduced by the Scottish kings in the previous century, but up to this time the English population had little influence upon the ruling element of the kingdom. Malcolm’s marriage undoubtedly improved the condition of the English to a great extent, and under Margaret’s sons, Edgar, Alexander I. and David I., the Scottish court practically became anglicized. Margaret died on the 17th of November 1093, four days after her husband and her eldest son Edward, who were slain in an invasion of Northumberland. She rebuilt the monastery of Iona, and was canonized in 1251 on account of her great benefactions to the Church.

Her feast is celebrated on November 16. Most of her relics were lost (discarded) during the Scottish Reformation. One of her daughters, Maud or Matilda, married King Henry I of England, so she was good choice for Henry VII to highlight. As the blog post notes, not only his mother (Margaret Beaufort), but his eldest daughter was named Margaret too:

Another famous saint to be featured in the window was Margaret of Scotland, the granddaughter of Edmund Ironside and wife of Malcolm III, king of Scots. Their daughter, Maud (or Matilda), married Henry I of England, while Margaret’s great-grandson himself became king as Henry II. In an interesting historical parallel, Margaret, Henry VII’s daughter, who was to appear in the pane below St Margaret, would marry a Scottish king, like her saintly namesake, and have a great-grandson who would become king of England: James VI and I.

Saint Margaret of Scotland, pray for us!

Blessed and Venerable Martyrs of the Observant Franciscans of Greenwich, pray for us!

A Delayed Coronation: Elizabeth of York

Henry VII delayed not only his wedding to Elizabeth of York, daughter of Edward IV, until after his coronation (on October 30, 1485), but also her coronation. They were married on January 18, 1486 and she was crowned on November 25, 1487 after their first son and heir, Prince Arthur was born on September 20, 1486. Her coronation may have been delayed but it was appropriately celebrated, according to the Memoir of Elizabeth York in Privy purse expenses of Elizabeth of York: wardrobe accounts of Edward the Fourth, With a memoir of Elizabeth of York edited by Nicholas Harris Nicolas. The ceremonies began on November 23 and continued with her procession from the Tower of London to Westminster on November 24:

On Friday, the 23rd, the Queen left Greenwich by water for her coronation, of which a very interesting narrative is extant [from John Leland]. Arrayed in the robes of royalty, she was accompanied by the Countess of Richmond, her mother-in-law, and by an extensive retinue of peers and peeresses, and was escorted by the Lord-mayor, sheriffs, and aldermen of London. Each Company furnished elegant barges, decorated with silk banners and streamers, richly emblazoned with the arms and badges, and rowed by men dressed in the proper liveries, of the respective crafts. Amidst the various objects of attraction, the Bachelor's barge claimed particular notice for its superior splendour, and from its carrying a red dragon, the ensign of the house of Tudor, which spouted fire into the Thames. Music of all kinds lent its aid to enliven the scene, and, thus attended, her Majesty arrived at the Tower. As she entered it, she was received by the King in the most gracious manner, or, to use the words of the narrator himself, "the King's highness welcomed her in such manner and form, as was to all the estates and others there being present a very good sight, and right joyous and comfortable to behold." Eleven Knights of the Bath were then created; and on the next day, after dinner, her Majesty being "royally apparelled, in a kirtle of white cloth of gold of damask, and a mantle of the same suit, furred with ermine, fastened before her breast with a great lace, curiously wrought of gold and silk, and rich knobs of gold at the end, tasselled; her fair yellow hair hanging down plain behind her back, with a call of pipes over it, and wearing on her head a circle of gold, richly garnished with precious stones," quitted her chamber of state. Her train was borne by her sister, the Lady Cecily, and being attended by a great retinue of lords, ladies, and others, she entered her litter, in which she was conveyed to Westminster.

On November 25, her coronation as Queen Consort took place:

The next morning she was arrayed in a kirtle and mantle of purple velvet, furred with ermine laced in front, and wore in her hair a circle of gold richly set with pearls and other jewels. In this dress, she proceeded to Westminster Hall, where she remained under a canopy of state until the procession was ready. From the place where she stood to the pulpit in the Abbey the ground was covered with new ray cloth, and the struggle of the crowd to cut it to pieces after she passed was extremely great. The Earl of Arundel bore the staff with the dove, the Duke of Suffolk the sceptre, and the Duke of Bedford, who was bareheaded, the crown. On one side, her Majesty was supported by the Bishop of Winchester, and on the other, by the Bishop of Ely, and she was immediately followed by the Princess Cecily, who held her train. In this order she entered the west door of Westminster Abbey, and took her seat near the pulpit, when the usual ceremonies were performed; after which she returned to the Palace at Westminster. The King was a spectator from a handsome latticed stage, between the pulpit and the high altar, where also stood his mother, and many other ladies of rank.

Notice that there's no description of "the usual ceremonies"! This blog provides some information, based upon the last coronation of a Queen Consort performed in England on May 12, 1937, when King George VI and Queen Elizabeth, the present Queen Elizabeth II's parents, were crowned:

Once the King receives the Sovereign’s Ring, the Sceptre and the Rod, the Archbishop places St Edward’s Crown on the Sovereign’s head and prayers start. If there is a Queen Consort, she is crowned at this point in a very simple ceremony immediately before homage is paid: the Queen is Crowned and anointed under the same canopy which was used for the King. Just like the King, the Queen Consort also has her Crown (typically, a new one made for her) and the Coronation Ring (the Consort’s Ring). Once the short ceremony is over, the Communion interrupted earlier is resumed and completed.

That coronation took place in the context of the King Regnant's ceremony, however. King Henry VIII had Anne Boleyn crowned as Queen Consort on June 1, 1533 but this description is rather lacking in detail too:

She prostrated herself before the High Altar, then, once more on her feet, received the Crown of St Edward, the rod and the sceptre, from the Archbishop of Canterbury. A Te Deum was sung, before Anne returned to preside over the extravagant coronation feast at Westminster Hall.

Like his father, Henry VIII waited until Anne was delivered of a baby who seemed likely to survive (the Princess Elizabeth) before crowning her. The changes that had taken place in England between 1487 and 1533 are remarkable, however, especially in religious practice and context.

"A Relic of Papistry?" The Simnel Cake

History Today shares this post about the history of the Simnel Cake, a lighter fruit cake enjoyed either on Laetare Sunday as a break from the Lenten fast or at Easter. Alexander Lee cites the tradition as described by Elizabeth Gaskell, novelist and biographer of Charlotte Bronte, as she grew up in Cheshire after her mother's death:

Writing to her friend, the poet Mary Howitt, on 18 August 1838, she recalled with delight the local festivals she had enjoyed as a girl. There was ‘Lifting Monday’ and ‘Lifting Tuesday’, when the village girls would burst into houses and lift the menfolk into the air until they were given a gift. Then there were the May Day celebrations, when the streets were decorated with coloured sand and branches were hung above everyone’s doors. But by far the tastiest time of year was mid-Lent Sunday – also known as Laetare or Mothering Sunday. For then, Elizabeth explained:

Instead of frumenty [a sort of sweet porridge], we eat Simnel cake: a cake made variously, but always with saffron for its principal ingredient. This I should fancy was a relic of Papistry, but I wonder how it originated. Lambert Simnel, the imposter in Henry the Seventh’s time was a baker’s son, I think. The show windows are filled with them, [and] high and low eat them.

Since Gaskell’s day, simnel cake has changed a great deal. Now eaten at Easter, rather than in the middle of Lent, it tastes – and looks – quite different from how it did in the early 19th century. Although it is still a light, rich fruit cake, packed with raisins, sultanas and lemon zest, saffron is now rarely used. Two layers of marzipan or almond paste – unknown to the Georgian recipe – are also added, one in the middle and one on top; and 11 marzipan balls – said to represent the 11 faithful apostles – are generally used for decoration. The method is different, too. Whereas it was once boiled, then baked, it is today baked and then grilled.

Lee explains the supposed Tudor connection:

For some time, simnel remained an ambiguous word. In the 15th and 16th centuries, it continued to be used primarily to describe a type of flour – or occasionally as a metonym for baking generally. Lambert Simnel, the Tudor pretender who briefly threatened the rule of Henry VII in 1487, was, as Gaskell noted, probably the son of a baker who owed his name to the flour that was his father’s stock in trade. But at the same time, simnel could also be used to refer to any sort of bread or cake made with the flour. When Myles Coverdale produced his English translation of the Bible in 1535, he rendered Ezekiel 16:19 – which in the Vulgate reads Et panem meum quem dedi tibi, similam, et oleum, et mel (‘And my bread, which I gave to you, the flour and oil and honey’) – as: ‘Thou didst eate nothinge but symnels, honney and oyle’; but when Thomas Cogan’s The Hauen of Health (1584) was published five decades later, it included a reference to ‘Cakes of all forms, Simnels, Cracknels, Bunnes … and other things made of wheate flour’.

Please read the rest there. Modern recipes: Mary Berry, Nigela Lawson, and the BBC.

Lambert Simnel was the pretender who survived during Henry VII's reign. He was pardoned, employed by the king in his kitchen and as a falconer, married, and died between 1525 and 1535. He may have been the father of Richard Simnel, an Augustianian canon at St. Osgth's Priory in Essex, suppressed in 1539.

One of the Last White Roses Decollated

Tower Hill execution site. Image credit.

Edward, the 17th Earl of Warwick, son of George, the Duke of Clarence and Isabel Neville, and brother of Margaret, later Margaret Pole, the Countess of Salisbury, was beheaded on Tower Hill, six days after Perkin Warbeck, the Pretender, was hanged at Tyburn in 1499. This blog considers the question of why (or even whether) Edward, who had been held in detention since the fall of Richard III in 1485, was a threat to the new Tudor Dynasty:

Edward was executed in 1499 because he had allegedly conspired with Perkin Warbeck to escape the Tower. It is not farfetched to believe that Henry VII set the pair up by providing them with guards who were amiable to their goals and gave them false hope. Whether they really did plot or Henry wanted everyone to believe they did, both were put to death in order to clear the way for the marriage of Prince Arthur to Katherine of Aragon.

Ferdinand and Isabella of Spain, Katherine’s parents, clearly saw Edward as a threat based upon their insistence on his removal. Henry was undoubtedly reluctant to execute his wife’s cousin when she had already lost so many to the Wars of the Roses, but, in the end, he decided that the favorable match was worth the loss of one more Plantagenet son. Maybe Edward did present a greater threat than we often give him credit for.

Edward is often referred to as the son of George of Clarence, but let us not forget that his maternal ancestry is no less impressive. Isabel Neville was the daughter of the infamous Kingmaker, and the house of Neville had been powerful enough to sway the Wars of the Roses in whichever direction they chose to place themselves upon. Should Edward have determined to make a claim for himself, he had deep roots of family ties to call upon that Tudor would have been challenged to compete with.

After his decollation, Henry VII paid to have his body interred in the church at Bisham Priory/Abbey, a house of Augustinian Canons (and briefly Benedictine monks), in Berkshire, where many Nevilles and Montagus were buried. Margaret Pole's second son Arthur, who died in 1532 was also buried there. The priory was founded by William Montagu, or de Montacute, the 1st Earl of Salisbury in 1337 on the grounds on his estate.

Of course, all these graves are lost, because after the Dissolution of the Monasteries, the abbey was suppressed and:

The whole of the monastic buildings of the house of Austin Canons founded by William de Montacute Earl of Salisbury in 1337 have been demolished. The abbey hall and church had been destroyed before the site and manor were granted to Sir Philip Hoby in 1553.' (fn. 7) From the surveyors' report made at the same time it would appear that the priory was entirely independent of the buildings occupied by the Templars, which were used as a mansion-house of Margaret Pole Countess of Salisbury at the time of her attainder in 1539, (fn. 8) and had probably been utilized as a residence by the Earls of Salisbury soon after the suppression of the order. (fn. 9) The buildings at the east end of the hall, which consist of the council chamber with the cellars and cloisters under, were erected in the 14th century, and form one side of a fair-sized quadrangle, the other three sides of which were demolished by the Hobys at the time of their alterations and rebuilding, though they had apparently always been parts of a private residence. (fn. 10)

The tombs of the earls who were buried at Bisham (including that of Warwick the Kingmaker) are said to have been removed to the present hall when the abbey church was destroyed. There is, however, no evidence of this in the existing building or any record of their having been removed. In the latter part of the 15th century the screens with the gallery above were erected at the west end of the hall, and about the same time a floor was inserted in the solar and a passage made along its east side against the west wall of the hall.

The suppression of the Augustinian priory in 1537, however, was followed by the brief establishment of a Benedictine house on Henry VIII's orders, after Thomas Cromwell had first made his own arrangements for the management of the house:

Cromwell, in his scheming for his friends and tools, desired to secure the appointment of prior of Bisham for William Barlow, who was at that time prior of Haverfordwest. He ordered the then prior to resign, and sent his instructions to Thomas Benet, LL.D., vicar-general of Sarum, to repair to the priory for the election, doubtless to see that his nominee was appointed. Benet, however, wrote to Cromwell on 16 April, 1535, stating that he would have executed his commands before, only the promised resignation of the incumbent had not been received; nevertheless he would proceed to Bisham on 23 April. A letter of Sir William Carew of 27 April stated that he had heard that the prior, by the persuasion of my Lady of Salisbury and other people, refused to resign, though these very people thought him very unmeet to continue, until they saw that Cromwell meant to prefer one contrary to their minds. (fn. 11)

So Margaret, the Countess of Salisbury, thought it best not to interfere in Cromwell's project--even though the priory was on her property!

Cromwell succeeded in forcing Barlow on Bisham Priory, but it is doubtful if he ever visited his new preferment, for he was speedily dispatched on an embassy to Scotland. Whilst absent in Scotland in January, 1536, Barlow was appointed bishop of St. Asaph, the first of the many sees that he held; in April he was translated to St. David's, but was allowed as a court favourite to hold the priory of Bisham in commendam.

The summary of the Valor of 1536 gives the income of this priory as £185 11s. 0½d., which would have brought it within the suppression of the lesser houses; but the full Valor for Berkshire is missing, and the abstract among the first fruits documents is obviously incorrect in some particulars. The ministers' accounts of the Augmentation Office give the total income as £327 4s. 6d.

The obsequious Barlow was ready, however, at once to comply with the desire of Henry and Cromwell, and on 5 July, 1536, he surrendered Bisham to the king. But now came about a singular state of things. Bisham alone among all the monasteries of England was selected by the fickle Henry VIII to be re-established on a much more imposing and wealthy scale, the priory being converted into an abbey.

On 6 July, 1537, John Cordrey, abbot of Chertsey, Surrey, with William the prior and thirteen monks, surrendered, on condition of being re-established as an abbey about to be founded by the king at the late priory of Bisham. On 18 December, 1537, the king granted a charter of portentous length to the new foundation of the order of St. Benedict 'out of sincere devotion to God and the Blessed Virgin His Mother.' It was to consist of an abbot and thirteen monks, and was founded by Henry to secure prayers for his good estate during life, and for the soul of Jane his late queen, also for the souls of his posterity and progenitors, and for the souls of all the faithful departed. This new abbey of the Holy Trinity was to be endowed with the house, lands, and all the appurtenances of the late priory of Bisham, and also with the lands of the late abbey of Chertsey, and of the priories of Cardigan, Beddgelert, Ankerwyke, Little Marlow, Medmenham, &c., to the annual value of £661 14s. 9d. Moreover, to give greater dignity to this new abbey, Henry granted his beloved John Cordrey licence to wear an episcopal mitre. (fn. 12)

Abbot Cordrey did not remain at Bisham long, because "the king's sorrow over the death of Jane Seymour soon evaporated, and with it seems to have gone his short-lived desire for prayers either for the living or for the dead. The abbey of Bisham lasted for exactly six months, and then John the abbot, William the prior, and the convent of monks were called upon to execute a second farcical 'surrender' of all their possessions, which they duly executed on 19 June, 1538, in favour of Richard Layton and Edward Carne, doctors of law, the king's visitors. (fn. 14)"

Margaret Pole would eventually follow her brother to the block, although she was beheaded inside the Tower precincts, on May 27, 1541. Her son Henry Pole, Baron Montagu was beheaded on Tower Hill like his uncle on January 9, 1539.

Bishop Robert Sherborne, RIP

Robert Sherborne or Shirbun, later the Bishop of Chichester, was born in around 1440 and rose quickly through the clerical ranks and in royal service after his education at Winchester College and Oxford:

On 1 May 1488 he received the prebend of Langford Manor in Lincoln Cathedral, which he exchanged for Milton Manor in the same cathedral on 27 Nov. 1493, but again exchanged to Langford on 29 Aug. 1494. On 26 Aug. 1489 he was given the prebend of Wildland in St. Paul's Cathedral, and he also held a canonry at Wells, which he resigned in 1493. On 2 Nov. in that year he was made prebendary of Holywell or Finsbury in St. Paul's Cathedral, and in 1496 he became archdeacon of Buckinghamshire (13 Feb.), of Huntingdon and of Taunton (16 Dec.). In July of the same year he was sent as envoy to the pope with the intimation of Henry VII's willingness to join the holy league, which aimed at keeping the French out of Italy (Rymer, xii. 639); in his letter to the Duke of Milan requesting a free passage for Sherborne, Henry describes him as his secretary (Cal. Venetian State Papers, i. 691, 712, 722). In 1498 he was appointed to levy fines on those of the clergy who had abetted Perkin Warbeck, and in the following year he was made dean of St. Paul's. In August 1500 he was employed in examining adherents of Warbeck (ib. xii. 766). 

Sherborne was involved with the future Henry VIII's marital affairs from the beginning:

He was apparently ambassador at Rome in 1502, and while there was instructed to go to the pope with the Spanish ambassador, announce Prince Arthur's death, and request a dispensation for the marriage of Prince Henry with Catherine of Aragon (Letters and Papers of Henry VIII, iv. 5467). On 4 May 1503 he was appointed commissioner to treat with Scotland concerning Margaret's dowry, and in 1504 was sent to Julius II to congratulate him on his election as pope.

Then he got a little too ambitious:

Early in 1505 Sherborne was made bishop of St. David's by a papal bull which he himself forged (Letters and Papers of Henry VII, ed. Gairdner, i. 246, ii. 169, 335, 337); the temporalities were restored on 12 April, and when the forgery was discovered Henry VII wrote to the Pope asking that Sherborne might be leniently treated (ib.). He does not seem to have been punished, and on 18 Sept. 1508 he was papally provided to the see of Chichester, the temporalities being restored on 13 Dec. On 23 July 1518 he met Cardinal Lorenzo Campeggio [q. v.] at Deal on his arrival in England to urge Henry VIII to join in a crusade against the Turks. In May 1522 he accompanied Thomas Grey, second marquis of Dorset [q. v.], to Calais to meet Charles V and conduct him to London. In April 1525 he was commissioned by Wolsey to visit the Premonstratensian monastery at Bigham and examine into the scandals there. In the same year he sent Wolsey books for his new college at Oxford, of which he was in other ways a benefactor (Letters and Papers, iv. 1708, 2340).

Then he worked on Henry VIII's Great Matter:

In September 1528 he again met Campeggio on his arrival to try the divorce of Catherine of Aragon. He acquiesced in the Reformation, but probably with secret reluctance. He signed the letter of the lords spiritual and temporal to Clement VII on 13 July 1530 begging him to grant Henry's desire for a divorce, and pointing out the evils of delay. In 1532 accusations against him were laid before Cromwell, but he was able to clear himself, and on 26 Feb. 1534–5 he renounced the jurisdiction of the pope. On Sunday 13 June following he preached ‘the Word of God’ in his cathedral, promulgating the king's commands as to his supremacy of the church, but asked to be relieved of further proceedings in the matter, owing to age and feeble health. 

Sherborne seems to have been a good company man and I can't find any reason for the author of his biography to have thought there was any reluctance, even secret reluctance. But something must have triggered those accusations to Cromwell. Perhaps he commented once that it was rather strange that Henry VIII wanted to undo what his father Henry VII had done working with the Pope. Here's an interesting overview of how the Catholic bishops of England renounced their loyalty to the universal Church and the Papacy.

Maybe he said something about protecting the shrine of St. Richard of Chichester?

One of Thomas Cromwell's officials visited Sherborne:

He was examined by Richard Layton [q. v.], the visitor of the monasteries, on 1 Oct. 1535; and early in June 1536 resigned his bishopric, to which Henry wished to appoint Richard Sampson [q. v.] He died in the following August. His will, dated 2 Aug., was proved on 24 Nov. At Chichester he kept a state second only in magnificence to that of Henry and Wolsey, and he left property worth nearly 1,500l. He founded the prebends of Bursalis, Exceit, Bargham, and Wyndham, to be held by alumni of New College or Winchester College (cf. Laud, Works, v. 485–6). He also founded about 1520 a grammar school at Rolleston, Staffordshire (Shaw, Staffordshire, i. 34).

Among his interesting legacies are the Lambert Barnard panels in Chichester Cathedral:

Lambert Barnard (1485 - 1567) was a local, early Tudor painter whose close twenty year collaboration with his patron Bishop Sherburne resulted in the creation of an exceptional and unique group of Tudor paintings.

The paintings are built in panels (14ft x 32ft) which are made from individual vertical oak panels being joined together with hessian and chalk glue. Due to their size and rarity they are among the most important surviving examples of Tudor painting in the Country.

The paintings represent an extraordinary piece of political theatre and propaganda. They offer us a rare opportunity to imagine how Henry VIII may have been seen by the ordinary people. . . .

More detail here.

Image credit: Bishop Sherborne's tomb in Chichester Cathedral.

Image credit: Panel painting by Lambert Barnard for Chichester Cathedral; depicts the event in 686 when King Cædwalla issued a charter confirming the rights and territories previously given to Wilfrid by King Aethelwealh and the estate of the Hundred of Pagham. Note: the man in white looking over the left shoulder of the king is believed to be a self-portrait of Barnard.

Monsignor Knox and King Henry VI

If Henry VII would have had his way, we would be celebrating the feast of Henry VI today. The son of Henry V died on May 21, 1471 in the Tower of London, probably killed at the orders of the newly re-crowned King Edward IV (although Thomas More cites Richard, the Duke of York as the responsible party). The official version was that Henry VI died of melancholy after hearing about the results of the Battle of Tewkesbury, which the House of York won and his son Edward, the Prince of Wales, had been killed.

This blog explains some aspects of the development of Henry VI's cult and cause for canonization, which was of course, cut short by Henry VIII's English Reformation:

The great mystery of Henry VI’s posthumous popularity has been grappled with for centuries. Many distinguished historians have dismissed the cult as a purely political phenomenon, and at first look this explanation is rather appealing. At the time of Henry VI’s oddly suspicious death from “pure displeasure” in that most hospitable of structures, the Tower of London, England had been embroiled in a bloody civil war for twelve long years [1]. The War of the Roses was fought between the House of Lancaster (represented by poor Henry), and the House of York, led by King Edward IV. Likely killed at the hands of his York cousins, rumors quickly spread of Henry’s murder by the creepiest of English uncles, Richard III. Most significantly, the supposedly violent homicide of Henry VI saw him reimagined in popular medieval culture as an innocent martyr. And political martyrdom, in late medieval England, was a particularly transformative process. It turned the unsuspecting victim into an impressively sacred figure, and bestowed the deceased monarch with a legitimacy denied him in life. As such, the initial impetus for Henry’s cult did rely upon his sacred political martyrdom.

Henry VII, who was the Lancastrian King’s half nephew, reinforced and strengthened the political nature of Henry VI’s posthumous cult. Defeating Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485, Henry Tudor shamelessly manipulated his uncle’s growing cultic popularity to legitimize his own claim to the throne. Not only was the long reigning “Martir by great Tormernting” continuously referred to in Henry VII’s inaugural pageants [2], the Tudor King also aggressively patronized the widespread cult, and petitioned three successive Popes to have his uncle canonized as a Saint. While Henry VI’s canonization was never secured, the process did produce a remarkable work titled The Miracles of King Henry VI [3]. This 1500 AD compilation of 174 miracle stories left out a staggering 300 accounts, and strongly suggests that Henry’s saintly popularity went much deeper than political manipulation.

The Miracles of King Henry VI demonstrates that the cult began, at least, with popular lay piety and not royal propaganda and patronage:

the English people worshipped Henry for his remarkable gentleness, compassion and leniency. Although odd qualities for a medieval King to possess, Henry’s renowned mercy and benevolence in life rendered him an extremely accessible royal figure. The late monarch was generous to the poor, commonly exempted dangerous criminals, and abhorred violence of any kind. As a Saint, he consequently appealed to those in great need of divine charity, which in bleak medieval times happened to be the majority of the English population. Saintly Henry aided criminals, madmen, plague sufferers, innocent children, lowly servants and stricken noblemen. The common theme in all his miracles was that his followers found themselves in critical emergencies, and yearned for divinely sympathetic intervention.

Henry VI posthumously provided such divine sympathetic intervention, and emerged as the patron saint of tragedy and all worldly suffering. During his catastrophic reign, Henry himself experienced extended bouts of mental illness, physical incapacitation and visible torment. His patent suffering invested the Lancastrian King with a unique saintly power, that of empathy. In The Miracles, Henry saves individuals from fatal fires, cures the terminally blind, and amazingly resurrects children from the dead. As a tormented monarch, Henry embodied both sacred power and profane suffering. His embodiment of sacral power and worldly misery explains much of his posthumous popularity, as Henry VI was never far from the minds of those in serious need.

Ronald Knox, the Catholic convert son of the evangelical Bishop of Manchester, developed a devotion to King Henry VI when he was at Eton, which Henry had founded in 1440 as The King's College of Our Lady of Eton besides Windsor. In 1923, just six years after he had become a Catholic and five years after becoming a Catholic priest, Cambridge University Press published his translation of The Miracles of King Henry VI. He also preached a sermon, included in the collection published by Ignatius Press, in which he asked the congregation to pray for the beatification of King Henry VI!

Well, even if Henry VII and Monsignor Ronald Knox had had their way and May 21 was the feast of King St. Henry VI, on this May 21, since it is on Monday the day after Pentecost, we would still be celebrating Mary, Mother of the Church, as determined by Pope Francis and the Congregation for Divine Worship and the Discipline of the Sacraments. In view of the devotion King Henry VI had to Our Lady, he would be most satisfied.

Mater Ecclesiae, ora pro nobis!

505 Years Ago Today at Cambridge

St. John's College was established on April 9, 1511 through the efforts of Margaret Beaufort and St. John Fisher. According to the college website:

St John's was founded in 1511. Its foundation charter, dated 9 April that year, was sealed by the executors of the foundress, Lady Margaret Beaufort mother of King Henry VII, who had died in 1509. She had begun the process of transforming the ancient hospital of St John the Evangelist, Cambridge (founded c. 1200), into a college for students in the liberal arts and theology. From a small nucleus of fellows and scholars subsisting in First Court (1511-16) on the College's endowments the numbers grew by 1545 to one hundred and fifty-two. Subsequently the admission of more undergraduates paying for their own board and tuition created pressure on existing accommodation. This led eventually to the building of Second Court 1599-1601, the first major expansion of the College. Other landmarks were the endowment of a new Library building by John Williams, Bishop of Lincoln and Keeper of the Great Seal to Charles I, in 1624-8, strikingly enlarged and complemented by a modern technically-enhanced extension in 1990-3; the bridging of the river and building of New Court 1826-31; the great chapel, designed by George Gilbert Scott, in 1863-9; and the provision of extensive undergraduate accommodation in the Cripps Building, straddling Bin Brook, in 1964-7.

Successive codes of statutes for the government of the College made by John Fisher, Bishop of Rochester and executor of the Foundress, between 1516 and 1530 were superseded by those given by the Crown in 1545 and 1580, until the nineteenth-century Royal Commissions ushered in a period of frequent reform and reorganization. The College is now governed by statutes made in 1926-7, under powers given to the Universities Commission in 1923, as amended by the Governing Body of the College and approved by the Privy Council, and as recently modified by Order of the University Commissioners in 1995.

Because Margaret Beaufort had just "begun the process of transforming the ancient hospital of St. John the Evangelist", Bishop John Fisher had to complete the process, gaining approvals from Henry VIII (who wanted the money), the Pope, and the Bishop of Ely. Beaufort had died in 1509 after serving briefly as Henry VIII's regent before he turned 18 (the son, Henry VII, predeceased the mother).

In his biography of St. John Fisher, Vincent McNabb OP describes how the bishop deeded his library to the College of St. John, with the proviso he should use them during his lifetime. After his arrest, however, one of Thomas Cromwell's men, Sir Richard Morrison went to Rochester and seized all of the poor bishops goods, including his fine library--so St. John's did not receive the books as promised.

The College of St John's honors its foundress in its grace after meals:

Infunde, quaesumus, Domine Deus, gratiam tuam in mentes nostras, ut his donis datis a Margareta Fundatrice nostra aliisque Benefactoribus ad tuam gloriam utamur; et cum omnibus qui in fide Christi decesserunt ad caelestem vitam resurgamus, per Jesum Christum Dominum nostrum. Deus pro sua infinita clementia Ecclesiae suae pacem et unitatem concedat, augustissimam Reginam nostram Elizabetham conservet, et pacem universo Regno et omnibus Christianis largiatur.

(Pour forth, we beseech thee, Lord God, thy grace into our minds, that we may use these gifts, given by Margaret our Foundress and other Benefactors, to thy glory, and together with all who have died in the faith of Christ rise again to life in heaven, through Jesus Christ our Lord. May God, of his infinite mercy, grant his Church unity and peace, preserve our most august queen, Queen Elizabeth, and grant peace to the whole Realm and to all Christians.)

It's too bad it doesn't mention the great bishop and founder, St. John Fisher! The college does display his portrait next to Lady Margaret's, and unfortunately also displays some errors in the on-line biography. (He was not canonized by Pope Leo XIII; he was executed on June 22, 1535, etc).

A Tea at Trianon Review: Elizabeth of York

Elena Maria Vidal reviews Alison Weir's biography of Elizabeth of York, Henry VII's queen. To quote:

I found the biography to be inspiring on a spiritual level as well. From earliest child hood, Elizabeth was carefully taught and trained in the practice of her Catholic Faith, being taken to Mass every day and learning to pray the Divine Office. As a little girl she was instilled with a great devotion to Mary which she nourished throughout her life by private devotions and by frequenting the many Marian shrines throughout the kingdom. Elizabeth saw being a queen as participating in the Queenship of the Mother of God. Her accounts show that she was constantly giving gifts to people of every estate, especially those who petitioned her. On the other hand, she was a recipient of gifts from the people, who would send her fruits and preserves (she appeared to have a fondness for cherries), game, wine, cloth, crafts, works of art, books, and anything else that they thought she could use. It seems Elizabeth made herself accessible to the people; she seriously considered their petitions and took the role of intercessor on the behalf of the multitudes. As a young woman she was referred to in a ballad as "Lady Bessy" which shows a certain fond familiarity. (p.145) Many tolerated Henry only because of Elizabeth, and loved her children because they were hers. She was Queen of Hearts, and it is claimed that the playing card is based upon Elizabeth of York.

After the sudden death of her eldest son Prince Arthur, Elizabeth's health began to fail. In spite of her poor health and her last pregnancy, Elizabeth spent the final months of her life traveling around England, praying at various shrines, as well as visiting her Plantagenet sisters and cousins. Weir thinks it might have been because she had finally had a falling out with Henry. (p. 389) It might also be supposed that she was unsettled by the recent confession of James Tyrell, under torture, that he had murdered her brothers at Richard III's command. (p.389) Even though an astrologer had prophesied that she would live to be ninety, it could be that she had a premonition of her own imminent passing. Elizabeth died on her 37th birthday, February 11, 1503, from complications due to childbirth. Her baby Katherine followed her in death. Henry VII had a complete collapse and became a near recluse, so in a way her surviving children, Henry, Margaret and Mary, lost both parents. The future Henry VIII never recovered from losing his beloved mother. Upon the hearing of the death of Elizabeth, Queen Isabel of Castile, who had corresponded with her, wrote to the the Spanish ambassador in England that he was to offer consolation to King Henry, who was "suffering the loss of the Queen his wife, who is in glory." (p.417)

The most tragic and bitter theme that occurs repeatedly throughout the book are in the descriptions of the beautiful shrines and chapels so loved by Elizabeth and endowed by either herself or her husband. Within the next fifty years they were to be destroyed by her son Henry VIII. One can almost be relieved that Elizabeth did not live to be ninety so she did not have to see the destruction of the symbols of her Faith, a Faith which carried her through a tumultuous era and which she valued more than life itself.

Read the rest there. Based on Vidal's strong recommendation, I purchased the book.

St. Joan of Arc and the English Reformation

Just a quick note about St. Joan of Arc and the English Reformation--listening to the EWTN radio broadcast of Mass yesterday I heard the celebrant mention that if she had not led France in defeating the English during the Hundred Years War, at least of part of France (more than Calais!) might have been under English control. And that would have had consequences.

St. Joan was burned alive at the stake on May 30 in 1431. In 1531, one hundred years later, Henry VIII started his break away from the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church by forcing the Convocation of Bishops to acknowledge his authority over the Church in England "as far as God allows", and proclaiming himself the Supreme Head and Governor of the Ecclesiae Anglicanae in the Act of Supremacy three years later. Thus if she had not helped rally France to defeat the English, "France" would have participated in the English Reformation, her great monasteries suppressed (250 years before the French Revolution's suppression), statues and paintings of Notre Dame crushed and burned along with other great Christian art, and many glorious Gothic cathedrals despoiled and destroyed, their shrines and relics, treasures and art plundered--Chartres without the Sancta Camisa, Sainte Chapelle without the relic of the Crown of Thorns--again anticipating much of the iconoclasm that did occur after the French Revolution. But without St. Joan of Arc, hearing the voices of the saints, going to her country's weak king, and leading France to victory, France would have been Anglican (Protestant) in the 16th century, and western culture, Catholic culture, would have lost the same things in France as were lost in England: art, music, visual beauty, books, monasticism, and worship.

This website suggests other aspects of an alternative history without St. Joan of Arc:

What events might not have happened without Joan of Arc saving France? Without Joan of Arc it is very doubtful that France would have become the strong unified nation that it became. Without a strong France many of the later events that occurred in Europe and around the world would have been much different. It is even conceivable that American independence from Britain would never have happened because it was the French military assistance that made the difference and directly caused the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown.

Do you think France would've existed to this day without Joan of Arc's actions? Joan helped to give the people of France a national identity. Before Joan people would identify themselves as being from parts of France such as people from the region of Burgundy calling themselves Burgundians. After Joan of Arc the people were much more likely to identify themselves as being French. It was having a national identity that helped forge the great nation that France became and still is today.

In one of those strange ironies, the Church of England honors Joan of Arc on their liturgical calendar--as a visionary (not necessarily because her visions were true, but because she listened to them)! The Catholic Church honors St. Joan of Arc as a martyr and virgin, unjustly condemned to death; a holy Maiden who loved Jesus and Notre Dame.

King St. Henry VI?

 

Desmond Seward writes about the veneration of Henry VI in spite of his failings as a monarch in the April issue of the BBC History Magazine. According to the article, which is not available free on-line of course, pilgrimage to his tomb at Windsor rivaled and even eclipsed the pilgrimage traffic to Canterbury and St. Thomas a Becket's tomb. He was never canonized even though Henry VII supported his  cause for sainthood and Henry VIII maintained devotion to him. This blog from the College of St. George at Windsor Castle provides some of the same background as Seward highlights:

 

The tomb of Henry VI became the object of veneration and the scene of miracles of healing attracted many pilgrims.  Miracles attributed to the King included those connected with one of his treasured relics – an old hat – the King’s Medicine against Headache.   Relics were kept at Windsor until the Reformation.  The metal collecting box for alms still stands beside the tomb. . . .

Henry VI was not considered a successful king but rather a good and holy man widely regarded as a saint.   His one lasting achievement was in education, founding Eton College and King’s College, Cambridge.  At Windsor we commemorate his birthday with the ceremony of the Lilies and Roses.  Boys from Eton College attend an obit service together with representatives from Eton and King’s to lay lilies and roses on the tomb of Henry VI while special prayers are said.

“Let Thy blessing O Lord, be upon the Colleges of Thy servant King Henry VI and as Thou has appointed unto them diversities of gifts, grant then also the same spirit, so that they may together serve Thee to the welfare of Thy realm, the benefit of all men, and Thy Honour and Glory; through Jesus Christ Our Lord”.

Seward notes that one reason Henry VI was held in veneration was his mistreatment and death: not accused or tried, but simply murdered in the Tower of London. Known for his piety, leniency and charity, Henry's death seemed so undeserved. Although Henry VII may have supported his Lancastrian cousin's cause for political reasons, it seems clear that the source of devotion to Henry was lay piety--at least two men condemned to death prayed to Henry and reported that he prevented their being hanged to death by placing his hand between their necks and the rope!

Although he was a failure as a monarch, Henry VI successfully founded two great institutions: King's College, Cambridge (The King's College of Our Lady and St. Nicholas at Cambridge), and Eton (The King's College of Our Lady at Eton besides Windsor), both in 1441. Seward also describes Henry's devotional life, as he was dedicated to spiritual reading, prayer, and monastic retreat--it seems he might have been a better monk than monarch.

I look forward to the May issue of the BBC History Magazine as it will feature an article by Jessie Childs about recusants during Elizabeth I's reign, based upon her book, God's Traitors!

William Cornysh and Our Sorrowful Mother

That's not William Cornysh on the cover of The Tallis Scholars CD of music by William Cornysh: that's King Henry VII. Cornysh the younger's music--and possibly that of his father of the same name, who died in 1502--is one of the highlights of what remains of the Eton Choirbook. The  younger Cornysh was employed by Henry VII and continued to serve as musician and composer for Henry VIII. According to the notes for this 1988 CD:

William Cornysh (d.1523) lived at a crucial moment in the development of English music. On the one hand he contributed to the last and most florid style to be found in the Eton Choirbook; and on the other he must have realised that this style could go no further, beginning to simplify his music and thus setting a technique for the future. There is therefore considerable variety in his small output and this recording, which contains all the sacred music by him which may be reconstructed and a selection of his secular compositions, reflects it: from the unparalleled complexities of the last phrases of the Magnificat to the naive directness of Ah, Robin.

Cornysh was an early and rare example of what is now called the Renaissance artist. A man of remarkable intelligence, he was well-known in his lifetime not only as an outstanding musician, but also as a poet, dramatist and actor. Unfortunately none of his dramatic writings has survived, though there is a poem by him in the British Library entitled A Treatise bitwene Trouth and Enformacion which was written while serving a jail sentence in the Fleet prison. In this he claimed that he had been convicted by false information and thus wrongfully accused, though it is not known exactly what the accusation was. As an actor he took part in many plays at court, some of which have survived, including The Golden Arbour (1511) and the Triumph of Love and Beauty (1514). But it was within the activities of the court masque that he would have had the ideal opportunity to show off his many talents. In 1501 he is reported as having devised the pageants and 'disguysings' for the marriage festivities of Arthur, Prince of Wales and Katherine of Aragon. More importantly, in June 1520 he led the Chapel Royal's ceremonies at the Field of the Cloth of Gold, which included not only singing but a full-scale pageant. In 1522 the Emperor Charles V visited England to negotiate with Henry VIII and on June 15 the court was entertained with a play by Cornysh which outlined in simple allegory the progress of the discussions and their expected outcome.

This BBC page holds that the father may have written the works in the Eton Choirbook, since the son was better known for Courtly masques and entertainments--but he was Master of the Children of the Chapel Royal for many years. On this Holy Saturday, however, what I am most interested in is the Stabat Mater, the title of the CD and the last work on the CD:

The Stabat mater is a masterpiece which contains frequent contrasts between ornate and simpler passages: these juxtapositions are something of a speciality of Cornysh's. That this setting is less well-known might be because the opening sections survive incomplete, though these have been magnificently reconstructed by Professor Frank Harrison. In general Cornysh's style is less introverted than that of his greatest contemporary John Browne. Cornysh always seemed to be striving for the most brilliant effect, or the most pathetic tone, a way of thinking which would have made him perfectly suited to the madrigal a hundred years later, and makes him reminiscent of Thomas Weelkes.

Cornysh is also the composer of Woefully Arrayed, performed here by Stile Antico, from their 2012 CD Passion and Resurrection:

Gimell Records even has a vinyl recording of the Tallis Scholars' CD of Cornysh music available--carefully preserved from the 20th century.

The Battle of Bosworth Field Fought Again

It's the Plantagenets against the Tudors again: Richard III vs. Henry VII. This blog post from History Today sums up the debate pretty well.

The discovery of the remains of Richard III is an archaeological find of the highest importance and the University of Leicester richly deserves its moment of glory. Much less deserving is the Richard III Society, who, predictably, are proclaiming the find as vindication of their long campaign to rehabilitate their hero. It is nothing of the sort.

For years the Society has protested that the idea of Richard as a hunchback with one shoulder higher than the other was pure propaganda by the Tudors. We now see that the Tudor propagandists (and indeed Sir Laurence Olivier) were entirely right: Richard had severe distortion of the spine and a shoulder markedly higher than the other. Tudors 1; Ricardians nil.

The Society has long claimed that the famous portrait of Richard III in the National Portrait Gallery is a piece of wicked Tudor propaganda designed to make him look evil. The reconstruction of Richard's face from his skull shows that the portrait is in fact a remarkably good likeness. Tudors 2; Ricardians nil.

The Society is always claiming that Richard was a popular, much-loved King. The bones cannot be expected to prove this one way or the other, but the evidence of a knife thrust into his corpse's backside does not appear to suggest that Richard's passing was mourned by those on the scene: it contrasts sharply, for example, with the reverence with which Charles I's body was treated after his execution. Not conclusive, I grant you, but judging strictly on the evidence of the bones: Tudors 3; Ricardians nil. [I think this is rather weak: Richard III was killed on the field of battle with emotions running high; Charles I was beheaded in an orderly, public, "legal" execution.]

Philippa Langley of the Richard III Society said on seeing the face, "It doesn't look like the face of a tyrant. I'm sorry but it doesn't." Well, I'm sorry, but my first thought on seeing the face was that I have never seen such ruthlessness in a human face in my life. We'll call that one a draw.
History Today also provides a summary of Richard III's life and reign with this interesting conclusion (different author than above, of course):

Richard might have been an excellent king if he had won the battle of Bosworth. Victory in battle would have vindicated him in the eyes of many and delivered God’s favourable verdict on the usurpation. His intelligence, vigour and vision might well have delivered a period of good rule. Instead, he died ‘fighting manfully in the thickest press of his enemies’, within yards of his nemesis, Henry Tudor. We can never know whether Edward V might have been a strong ruler, but the likelihood is that a power struggle would have ensued and the spectre of civil war would have been raised again. Richard’s character, and the trajectory of power he had experienced, made subjection and obedience to those he considered his inferiors impossible. The usurpation guaranteed the preservation of strong central authority, but it was the Tudors who benefited from it. The Yorkist achievement, in making royal administration more accountable and effective, did survive Richard’s death, even if the dynasty itself was all but destroyed.

But there are more debates occasioned by the identification of Richard III's body: where should Richard III be buried: York or Leicester? (That seems to be settled.) With what service: Catholic or Anglican? Surely, Catholic, since that is what he was. And can we dig up the bones of the Princes in the Tower buried at Westminster Abbey to figure out who killed them: Richard III or Henry VII? No, says the Abbey. The reputations of Shakespeare and St. Thomas More are also up for debate, ala Josephine Tey.

Out of all this debate, I'd say the most constructive thing is that it proves how important history is, how essential the past is to today as the battle of Bosworth Field rages on. We are still examining the structures of power, of religion, of truth and propaganda in the 15th and 16th centuries in the 21st: we want to know what is good, true and beautiful in the past and in the present. Truth, goodness, and beauty matter. We want to find them and be able to proclaim them. May I suggest that we are currently looking at the wrong grave? We should be looking at the Empty Tomb and the Resurrection of the One, Jesus, Who is the Way, the Truth, and the Life, in Whom Truth, Beauty and Goodness meet! Amen.

Erasmus and More Meet Prince Henry

From Tea at Trianon comes this link to a painting by Frank Cadogan Cowper:

The painting shows the interior of the medieval palace of Greenwich: a man in black kneels before three small children in gorgeous apparel. Behind him and to the right, a tall manstands in profile, leaning on a stick. The story is a charming one, and it is true. Erasmus of Rotterdam was the most famous scholar of his day. In 1499 he was visiting England. He was in Greenwich one day with his young friend Thomas More, who made him an intriguing invitation.

"I prithee, bear me company to a certain great house nigh to here. There thou shalt find friends, who have a great desire to see thee." - More.

The house turned out to be the royal palace, and the 'friends' were the royal children. One of them was the future Henry VIII, who was eight years of age at the time. The infant prince promptly demanded that the great scholar should write them a poem - which he did.

Cowper was a pre-Raphaelite painter who specialized in historical scenes.

Tomorrow, when I talk about the Catholic Church in England before the Reformation on my Radio Maria program on "The English Reformation Today", I will be discussing the reforming efforts of St. Thomas More and St. John Fisher, the latter of whom invited Erasmus to come to England during a subsequent visit to teach Greek at Cambridge. The meeting depicted above took place during Erasmus' first visit:

Erasmus visited England for the first time in the summer of 1499. He came in the company of young William Blount, lord Mountjoy, who had been one of his pupils in Paris. He seems to have resided, for a while, in London with Sir William Say, his pupil’s father-in-law; then, at a country-house belonging to lord Mountjoy at Greenwich. He spent about two months at Oxford in the college of St. Mary, an establishment for students of the Augustinian order presided over by prior Richard Charnock. He was back in London in the beginning of December; and, after a round-about journey by Dover, Calais and Tournehem, he arrived in Paris sometime about the end of January, 1500. His visit had been short, lasting about six months, just long enough to make him acquainted with the most prominent scholars in England; and his correspondence enables us to judge of the progress which the classical renascence had made there.

In a letter to Robert Fisher, “the kyng’s solicitor at Rome,” he instances four scholars whom he cannot praise too highly—John Colet, William Grocyn, Thomas Linacre and Thomas More. These men had learning neither hackneyed nor trivial, but deep, accurate, ancient Latin and Greek.

"When I hear my Colet, I seem to be listening to Plato himself. In Grocyn, who does not marvel at such a perfect round of learning? What can be more acute, profound and delicate than the judgment of Linacre? What has nature ever created more gentle, more sweet, more happy than the genius of Thomas More? I need not go through the list. It is marvellous how general and abundant is the harvest of ancient learning in this country."

Author Michael Davies describes the relationship between Erasmus and St. John Fisher thus:

Erasmus admired the holiness of John Fisher's life, and there can have been few men that he respected more. In a letter to a priest in Rome in 1512 he wrote: "Unless I am sadly mistaken, he is the one man at this time who is incomparable for uprightness of life, for learning, and for greatness of soul." In 1516 Erasmus published his Novum lnstrumentum. This was the Greek text of the New Testament with Erasmus's own translation into Latin. This work was the cause of Fisher deciding to learn Greek at the age of forty-eight, and he had the good fortune to receive his first instruction from Erasmus himself; who stayed with the bishop in Rochester for ten days in the same year. Fisher then went on to learn Hebrew. The fact that he was able to gain a good working knowledge of these languages despite his time-consuming duties as bishop, chancellor, and counsellor to the king provides a striking indication of his tenacity of purpose.

Blessed Margaret Pole's Brother

H/T to Tea at Trianon for this link. The Telegraph has a story about the last Plantagenet prince and Angers' bid for the British Crown Jewels:

Angers, in the Loire valley, was the capital of Anjou province and the geographical base of the Plantagenets, who ruled England from 1154 until 1485, providing some of the most celebrated monarchs in British history, including Richard the Lionheart and Henry V.

But when Edward Plantagenet, the Earl of Warwick, was executed for treason in the Tower of London in 1499, the house’s legitimate male line came to an end. “As redress for the execution of Edward, Angers today demands that the Crown Jewels of England be transferred to Angers,” reads a petition posted on the city’s official website.

Recalling 25-year-old Edward’s “unfair and horrible death” at the hands of henchmen working for Henry VII, England’s first Tudor king, the city believes it is owed an apology and 513 years’ worth of compensation.

According to this website:

EDWARD PLANTAGENET, EARL OF WARWICK, was the son of George, Duke of Clarence, brother of Edward IV. After the execution of his father in 1478, the young earl was kept in honourable confinement at the castle of Sheriff-Hutton in Yorkshire until Henry's accession to the throne in 1485, when the earl's Yorkist blood, and the strong claims it gave him to the crown of England, made it a very obvious necessity on the new king's part to have him placed in the more secure prison of the Tower of London. From this prison he never again emerged except on two occasions, viz., in 1487, when he was paraded through the principal streets of London to disprove the imposture of Lambert Simnel, and in 1499, when he was beheaded on a charge of being concerned with Perkin Warbeck, then also a prisoner in the Tower, in a conspiracy to get forcible possession of the Tower, and effect the overthrow of Henry's government.

The young Earl's close confinement, 14 years in the Tower of London, had left him unable to "tell a goose from a capon" according to Henry VII's latest biographer, Thomas Penn. He also recounts that the poor Earl was still confused at his trial in London's Guildhall, which Penn calls a farce. Henry VII had the records of the conspiracy locked up tightly and Warwick was beheaded on Tower Green, November 28, 1499. Perkin Warbeck was hung at Tyburn on November 23, 1499. Henry VII arranged the marriage of the last Plantagenet princess, Margaret, to a knight, making sure she was out of the way of the succession.

The State of England, 1509

Since Henry VII, founder of the Tudor dynasty, died on April 21, 1509, his 18 year old son, Henry, succeeded him on this date. His wedding with Catherine of Aragon and their coronations would follow on June 11 and June 23, respectively.

A recent popular history of the Tudor dynasty (The Tudors: The Complete Story of England’s Most Notorious Dynasty by G.J. Meyer) passes quickly over Henry VII as not being as interesting as the subsequent Tudors. He does not even merit his own chapter! I think that is an error, in part because Henry VII’s desire to protect the Tudor succession certainly established the policy and pattern of imprisoning and/or executing any rivals or threats that Henry VIII and his heirs would follow. But now, a new biography of Henry VII redresses that neglect.

David Knowles, in his study of the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Bare Ruined Choirs, establishes the significance of Henry VII’s reign—and the succession of Henry VIII as taking full advantage of certain trends—on a much more profound level:

". . . the minds of the early Tudor age found security in two pillars of strength. The one was the common law of the land, tangible, acknowledged by all, and applied by experts taken from their midst. The other was the command of the sovereign, drawing its strength from his claim of obedience in conscience."

Knowles points out that the authority of the sovereign had hitherto been limited or countered by the Church and canon law, by natural and divine law, and by the very limitations of centralized government – but:

"At the end of the fifteenth century all these limiting factors had vanished or diminished; all that was now wanting was a king with sufficient intelligence, tact, and self-assurance to supply his subjects with the governance they desired and with the sense of security they needed. A firm government that did not outrage too violently the proprieties of common law and the material interests of the propertied classes could draw on a limitless fund of loyalty and submission."*
With Thomas Wolsey’s help as Chancellor, Henry VIII fulfilled that model early in his reign, earning trust and obedience from the propertied classes. One of the economic aspects of the English Reformation is that with the Dissolution of the Monasteries, Henry VIII was able to distribute wealth to members of that class, binding them more surely to him in loyalty and submission.
Knowles comments that such a generalization about the intellectual and cultural milieu of late fifteenth century England shares the usual burden of generalization—that there are exceptions. If he is accurate in his depiction of the situation, however, it goes a long way to explaining why so many of the ruling class went along with Henry VIII in his commandeering of the Church as a part of the State. As long as it did not violate the common law as it affected them, they saw no reason to protest.

*David Knowles, Bare Ruined Choirs: The Dissolution of the Monasteries (Cambridge, England: Cambridge University Press, 1976), page 6.