On this day in Tudor history, 8th November, Henry VIII made a rather strange speech explaining his troubled conscience about his marriage to Catherine of Aragon (1528); and scholar, literary patron and chamberlain to Catherine of Aragon, William Blount, 4th Baron Mountjoy, died at Sutton on the Hill (1534)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 6th November, Catherine of Aragon met Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales, for the first time (1501); and Catherine Howard, Henry VIII’s fifth wife, was abandoned by her husband the king at Hampton Court Palace. She would never see him again (1541)…
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On this day in history, 5th November, Mary Tudor, sister of Henry VIII, was crowned Queen of France at Saint-Denis (1514); and Gunpowder Plot conspirator, Guy Fawkes, was discovered with 36 barrels of gunpowder in a cellar beneath Westminster (1605)…
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On this day in history, 29th October, Henry VIII bid farewell to his “loving brother”, his French counterpart, Francis I (1532); and courtier, explorer, author and soldier Sir Walter Ralegh was executed (1618)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 27th October, Anne Boleyn, Marquess of Pembroke, made a dramatic entrance to the great banquet held by Henry VIII in Calais in honour of Francis I of France; and the extremely talented Mary Herbert (née Sidney), Countess of Pembroke, writer and literary patron, was born at Tickenhall, near Bewdley in Worcestershire…
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On this day in Tudor history, 15th October, the infant Prince Edward (Edward VI) was christened in the Chapel Royal at Hampton Court Palace (1537); and teacher and Welsh language poet Richard Gwyn (White) was hanged, drawn and quartered for his Catholic faith (1584)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 14th October, statesman, diplomat and poet Thomas Chaloner died (1563); and the trial of Mary, Queen of Scots began at Fotheringhay Castle (1586)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 11th October, Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn set sail from Dover for Calais for a meeting with Francis I (1532); and there was a solemn procession with prayers for Queen Jane Seymour, who was in labour (1537)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 10th October, Queen Elizabeth I was taken ill with what was thought to be a cold, but was actually smallpox (1562); and Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, was buried in the Beauchamp Chapel of the Collegiate Church of St Mary, Warwick (1588)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 9th October, Henry VIII’s sister, Mary Tudor, married Louis XII of France at Abbeville; and Miguel de Cervante, author of Don Quixote, was baptised in Alcalá de Henares…
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On this day in Tudor history, Henry VIII’s niece, Lady Margaret Douglas, was born; and Henry VIII forced his daughter, Mary, to write to the pope and to Mary of Hungary, the emperor’s sister…
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On this day in Tudor history, 7th October, Pope Clement VII wrote to Henry VIII telling him that his marriage to Catherine of Aragon would not be annulled; and George Gascoigne, a gifted poet who was involved in Robert Dudley’s last ditch attempt to woo Elizabeth I, died…
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On this day in Tudor history, Mary Tudor, sister of Henry VIII, set sail from Dover to travel to France to marry Louis XII of France; and reformer and Bible translator William Tyndale’s book “The Obedience of a Christian Man” was published, a book which Anne Boleyn shared with Henry VIII…
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On this day in Tudor history, 26th September, Sir Francis Drake returned from his 3-year circumnavigation of the Globe; and Sir Amias Paulet, who had served as Mary, Queen of Scots’ gaoler, died…
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On this day in Tudor history, 25th September, explorer, navigator and naval administrator Stephen Borough was born; and Pope Clement VII died in Rome. It was rumoured that he died from eating death cap mushrooms or from fumes from poisoned candles…
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Today is the traditional date given for the birth of Anne of Cleves, fourth wife of Henry VIII; and it’s also the anniversary of the burial of Amy Dudley (née Robsart), wife of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, at St Mary’s Church, Oxford…
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On this day in Tudor history, 20th September, Henry VII’s eldest son and heir, Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales, was born at Winchester; and Anthony Babington and his fellow Babington Plot conspirators were executed…
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On this day in Tudor history, Walter Devereux, 1st Viscount Hereford and a man with a distinguished court career, died at Chartley; and loyal courtier and soldier Henry Manners, 2nd Earl of Rutland, died during an outbreak of the plague…
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On this day in Tudor history, 15th September, John Morton, Archbishop of Canterbury, cardinal and Henry VII’s Lord Chancellor, died; and in the French Wars of Religion, the Battle of Arques began…
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On this day in Tudor history, 14th September, Henry VIII had a 12th century religious shrine destroyed; and Sir William Kingston, Constable of the Tower of London, died…
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On this day in Tudor history, 12th September, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer’s trial started in Oxford – he was in big trouble! And Protestant reformer and leading politician in the reign of Mary, Queen of Scots, Archibald Campbell, 5th Earl of Argyll, died suddenly at Barbreck…
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On this day in Tudor history, 11th September, Mary, Queen of Scots, began a rather eventful first royal progress in Scotland; and Barnaby Fitzpatrick, 2nd Baron of Upper Ossory, a good friend of Edward VI, died in Dublin…
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On this day in Tudor history, 10th September, Elizabeth, daughter of Henry VIII and Anne Boleyn, was christened at Greenwich; and England defeated the Scots at the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh during the War of the Rough Wooing…
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On this day in Tudor history, the English force defeated the Scots at the Battle of Flodden while Catherine of Aragon was regent (1513); and the infant Mary, Queen of Scots, was crowned queen at Stirling Castle (1543)…
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On this day in Tudor history, 8th September, Amy Dudley (née Robsart), wife of Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, died after falling down some stairs; and John Shakespeare, father of playwright William Shakespeare, was buried at Holy Trinity Church in Stratford-upon-Avon…
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On this day in Tudor history, 7th September, Queen Anne Boleyn gave birth at Greenwich Palace to a daughter who would become Queen Elizabeth I; and forty-nine-year-old Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, married his fourteen-year-old ward, Catherine Willoughby…
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On this day in Tudor history, 1st September, Henry VIII elevated Anne Boleyn to the peerage, making her Marquess of Pembroke; and Elizabethan actor and theatre entrepreneur Edward Alleyn was born…
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On this day in Tudor history, Henry VIII and Louise of Savoy agreed the Treaty of the More, and Catherine Parr, Queen Dowager and wife of Thomas Seymour, Baron Seymour of Sudeley, gave birth to a daughter, Mary…
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On this day in Tudor history, 28th August, Edward VI’s half-sister, Mary, was ordered to stop celebrating the Catholic mass, and an ailing Robert Dudley, Earl of Leicester, wrote his final letter to his queen and childhood friend, Elizabeth I…
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On this day in Tudor history, 18th August, John Dudley, Duke of Northumberland and former Lord President of the king’s council, was tried for treason and found guilty, and Virginia Dare, the first child born to English settlers in the New World, was born in the Roanoke colony…
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