The Tudors for Dummies (AvaxHome Download) (41 page)

Building work began in April 1538 to specifications by the German architect

Stephen Haschnperg, who'd also worked on the fortifications at Carlisle near

the Scots border. Due to the project's urgency, 1,400 workers were employed,

and Anne of Cleves was entertained at a huge banquet there when she landed

at Dover in 1540.

The Great Court of Trinity College, Cambridge

Cambridge is the second oldest university in the country after Oxford, and

the series of colleges were built by the Church or private individuals from the

13th century onwards.

Henry VIII rebuilt the King's Hall and Michaelhouse as Trinity College in 1546.

The Great Court dates back to 1428 and was developed by Dr Thomas Neville,

master of the college from 1593�1615. The Great Gate was begun about 1490

and completed in the 1530s, and the chapel was built between 1554 and 1561.

The Great Hall and the Old Library both date from the end of Elizabeth's

reign, as does the Queen's Gate, from 1597. In the centre of the court is an

octagonal fountain that was built between 1601 and 1602. Like much Tudor

building, it's crumbled, and the one you see there today was rebuilt to the

original design in 1716.

The figure of Henry VIII stands over the main gate, carved in stone and sur-

rounded by heraldry. Next time you're at Trinity College, check out the scep-

tre in the king's hand � it's a wooden chair leg!

Hampton Court, London

The most famous royal palace didn't start off royal at all. The original build-

ing belonged to the Medieval warrior-monks of the Order of St John and

Henry VIII's lord chancellor, Thomas Wolsey, bought the place and did it up.

Because he was richer than Henry VIII in the 1520s, Wolsey was able to spend

a fortune on the palace, creating new kitchens, courtyards, galleries and mag-

nificent rooms for Henry, who was sure to visit.

In 1528 Wolsey gave Hampton Court as a present to Henry VIII because he

realised his career was on the way down (see Chapter 4). The king then

added the chapel, the Great Hall and a magnificent lavatory with no fewer

than 28 seats! Because of the drop of the land from the spring at Kingston the

palace had running water from a tank on the roof and Henry's apartments

even had hot running water, which must have been unique in England at the

time. Eventually, the compound included gardens, a tiltyard (for jousting),

tennis courts and a large hunting park.

Hampton Court was one of Henry VIII's favourite homes, and he spent more

than 800 nights there � more than at any other palace apart from Greenwich.

Many of the Tudor buildings at Hampton Court were demolished in the late

17th century to make way for the present apartments, but the chapel, the

Great Watching Chamber (where the king conducted his business) and the

Great Hall survive.

Some modern visitors claim to hear the ghost of Catherine Howard scream-

ing as she runs down the corridors to beg Henry VIII to forgive her before her

execution (see Chapter 5 for the details of her death).

Hardwick Hall, Derbyshire

The new Hardwick Hall was built in the 1590s by Elizabeth, dowager count-

ess of Shrewsbury, better known as Bess of Hardwick (see Chapter 17). Bess

inherited Hardwick Hall from her father, and with the wealth she gained from

the death of her fourth husband, George Talbot, in 1590, she was able to

afford to build a much more impressive house, which still stands today.

Glass is one of the standout features of Hardwick Hall. In the late 16th century

glass was very expensive and showed the wealth of its owner more effectively

than the size of the house. The important rooms had more and bigger win-

dows. These spaces were located on the top levels, where the family lived, to

take advantage of the most light. The servants' quarters, in contrast, had small

windows.

Hardwick Hall doesn't include a great hall, and so communal dining was

clearly not a feature of life at the house. But the Tudor building does have

a Great Gallery, which is one of the longest and widest to survive from the

period and the only one to retain its original tapestries and pictures. In the

16th century tapestries, mostly imported from France, were extremely expen-

sive and woven with cloth of gold and silver. They brought the rooms alive

with colour. In fact, many of the rooms have survived as they were in Bess's

time, along with beautiful embroidery stitched by Bess and her ladies.

This magnificent chapel is the most superb example of Tudor architecture.

If you look up at the roof you can see that it has 15th-century heraldry with

ornate fan vaulting and Tudor heraldry of roses and dragons all over the place.

The chapel was originally designed as the final resting place of Henry VI. At

the time the dead king was a candidate for sainthood and so this mausoleum

would have become another place of pilgrimage, built as it was so close to

the shrine of the 11th-century king Edward the Confessor, and would have

brought in lots of cash for the church.

Work began in 1502, when the existing 13th-century lady chapel dedicated

to the Virgin and the nearby chapel of St Erasmus were demolished to make

way for the new structure. Actual building began in January 1503, and by the

time Henry VII died in 1509 about �15,000 had been spent and a further �5,000

authorised.

But Henry VIII's priorities were different from those of his father, and Henry

VI remained buried at Windsor. Instead, Henry VII and his wife, Elizabeth

of York, lie in the chapel, side by side in the magnificent tomb designed for

them by the brilliant Italian sculptor Pietro Torrigiano.

If you can get close enough, have a look at the face of Henry VII � we know

he looked exactly like that. But even better is the nearby tomb of his mother,

Margaret Beaufort, which is so lifelike you almost expect the old dear to sit

up and smile at you. The chapel also includes the tombs of Elizabeth I, Mary I,

James I and Mary Queen of Scots.

Penshurst Place, Kent

Penshurst, 30 miles south-east of London, was the medieval home of Sir John

de Pulteney, who was lord mayor of London four times, and much of his origi-

nal building survives. In the 15th century it became the home of Henry V's

brothers � John, duke of Bedford, and then Humphrey, duke of Gloucester.

After Pulteney's death three generations of the Stafford family, dukes of

Buckingham, owned the house. Each duke added to the building, and their

additions remain to this day. 312 Part V: The Part of Tens

Edward, the third duke, entertained Henry VIII at Penshurst with a lavish ban-

quet in 1519, but such hospitality didn't prevent Henry from having him exe-

cuted for high treason two years later, at which point Penshurst returned to

the Crown because, in theory, all land in England belonged to the king under

the medieval feudal system which had almost, but not quite, disappeared.

Although Henry visited Penshurst, he doesn't seem to have undertaken any

work there.

In 1552 Edward VI gave the house to Sir William Sidney, whose son, Henry,

added the Queen Elizabeth Room. The magnificent Long Gallery, which pres-

ently houses a collection of tapestries and portraits, was added by Sidney's

younger son, Robert, who was a very wealthy man in his own right. He was

the nephew of Robert Dudley, earl of Leicester (Elizabeth's favourite; see

Chapter 12) and Ambrose, earl of Warwick. Queen Elizabeth I visited the

house many times.

Ten Major Tudor Events In This Chapter

Assuming the crown

Revising religion

Waging major military battles

B eing confronted by a lot of dates can be offputting, but they're actually

pretty handy. When exploring history, try thinking of dates as being

like children's clothes pegs. You hang things on them � events, conflicts and

actions, � so that you can find them again.

This chapter highlights ten major events and essential dates for the Tudor

period. Although some historians may debate our choice of events, the epi-

sodes we look at here mark important shifts in the evolution of the Tudor

monarchy. Taken together, you get a picture of a dynamic period during

which England's self-confidence grew and became increasingly bloody.

The First Tudor King, Henry VII (1485)

School books often say that 1485 marks the division between medieval and

modern history, with the beginning of a new monarchy. Although the distinc-

tion between these periods makes sense today, matters didn't look that way

in 1485!

Some people welcomed the death of the unpopular Richard III and hoped that

his passing would mark the end of the feud between the Houses of York and

Lancaster (which we describe in Chapter 2), especially when Henry Tudor

(Henry VII) married Elizabeth of York. Others saw Henry VII as yet another

usurper. In a sense both groups were right, because a rebellion occurred in

1486, and within ten years two claimants were pursuing the crown. The right-

ful Yorkist claimant, Edward, Earl of Warwick was kept in the Tower until his

execution in 1499, while Henry VII kept the throne.

Henry VII did indeed establish a new dynasty, but he was a medieval king in

his style of governing, relying on traditional methods and institutions to

govern. (Flip to Chapter 4 for more about Henry VII.)

Henry VIII's Coronation (1509)

The young, magnificent and handsome Henry VIII married the beautiful and

intelligent Catherine of Aragon soon after he became monarch in 1509, and

not long afterwards they were crowned together in Westminster Abbey. The

episode was a gorgeously executed piece of political propaganda.

English chronicler and lawyer Edward Hall recorded the coronation scenes in

vivid detail, describing the elaborate work of tailors, embroiderers and gold-

smiths who dressed both the courtiers and their horses. The King and Queen

processed through the City of Westminster along streets hung with tapestries

and cloths of gold. Henry was dressed with diamonds and rubies, so many

that the actual material of his garments was almost obscured.

They entered the abbey under embroidered canopies and walked along a

strip of cloth, which was cut up as soon as they passed, as souvenirs for

onlookers. William Warham, Archbishop of Canterbury, carried out the

crowning. Afterwards everyone went to Westminster Hall for an enormous

and sumptuous banquet with jousting and feasting followed by weeks of cel-

ebrations. (Turn to Chapter 4 for more on Henry VIII's early years.)

Breaking with Rome (1534)

The Act of Supremacy in 1534 ended papal power in England and made Henry

VIII Supreme Head of the Church of England, breaking centuries of tradition.

Pope Julius II had given Henry permission to marry Catherine, his brother's

wife. But Henry became convinced that his marriage to Catherine of Aragon

was against the law of God, which was why she failed to bear him a son. For

her part, Catherine was sure that her marriage was legitimate, and she had

the support of her nephew, Charles V, the supremely powerful Holy Roman

Emperor who had raided Rome and held the Pope Clement VII prisoner.

When Henry's new love Anne Boleyn became pregnant in the autumn of 1532,

he was certain that the child would be a boy and married her. The ceremony

was performed by Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury who declared

the marriage to Catherine null and void, believing that Henry was right and

ready to break his oath of allegiance to the pope. (You can read more about

the break with Rome in Chapter 7.)

Henry VIII moved heaven and earth to marry Anne, a woman whose sexual

grip on him didn't relax through six long years of courtship and frustration.

However, she was suddenly cast aside because Henry believed that she'd

committed both adultery and incest; and adultery by the Queen was always

treason because it threatened the legitimate succession.

Anne's fate shows the volatility of Henry's temperament � his gullibility, his

ruthlessness and the personal nature of Tudor politics. Anne had given birth

to Elizabeth, but she failed to bear a son � just like Catherine. Again, the King

had doubts about the lawfulness of his second marriage. Was God punishing

him again?

Anne was the leader of a family-based political faction that had attracted

Henry's powerful secretary, Thomas Cromwell. Cromwell was allied to the

Boleyn family until the end of 1535 because Anne's marriage had been the

result of the Act of Supremacy, which Cromwell had drafted and put through

the English Parliament.

When Catherine died in 1536, alliances changed. Cromwell played on Henry's

doubts about Anne and her flirtatious nature, and Henry ordered her arrest.

The evidence against Anne was weak and she was almost certainly innocent,

but Henry believed her to be guilty and so she was beheaded at the Tower.

(We describe the fate of Anne and all Henry's wives in Chapter 6).

Dissolution of the Monasteries (1540)

The Dissolution of the Monasteries, also known as the Suppression of the

Monasteries, was more than a decree with religious and political overtones; it

was an act of vandalism. Great libraries were destroyed or dispersed, works

of art confiscated and great buildings left to fall into disrepair and ruin.

The year of 1540 ended a process of dissolution that began in 1523, and

closed a part of English religious life that had existed for a thousand years.

Monks and nuns were forced to return to the everyday world and their

lands returned to the Crown, which acquired property worth many millions

of pounds � about 20 per cent of the landed wealth of England. Thomas

Cromwell carried out a survey of monastic wealth, published as the Valor

Ecclesiasticus in 1536. This report showed the vast amount of land the clergy

owned and how the inhabitants gave taxes to the papacy, a sum known as

Peter's Pence.