British Monarchy and its influence upon governmental institutions
RICHARD III (1483-1485)
Richard III usurped the throne from the
young Edward V, who disappeared with his younger brother while under their
ambitious uncle's supposed protection. On becoming king, Richard attempted
genuine reconciliation with the Yorkists by showing consideration to
Lancastrians purged from office by Edward IV, and moved Henry VI's body to St
George's Chapel at Windsor. The first laws written entirely in English were
passed during his reign. In 1484, Richard's only legitimate son Edward
predeceased him. Before becoming king, Richard had had a strong power base in
the north, and his reliance on northerners during his reign was to increase
resentment in the south. Richard concluded a truce with Scotland to reduce his
commitments in the north. Nevertheless, resentment against Richard grew. On 7
August 1485, Henry Tudor (a direct descendant through his mother Margaret
Beaufort, of John of Gaunt, one of Edward III's younger sons) landed at Milford
Haven in Wales to claim the throne. On 22 August, in a two-hour battle at
Bosworth, Henry's forces (assisted by Lord Stanley's private army of around
7,000 which was deliberately posted so that he could join the winning side)
defeated Richard's larger army and Richard was killed. Buried without a
monument in Leicester, Richard's bones were scattered during the English
Reformation.
THE TUDORS
The five sovereigns of the Tudor dynasty are among the
most well-known figures in Royal history. Of Welsh origin, Henry VII succeeded
in ending the Wars of the Roses between the houses of Lancaster and York to
found the highly successful Tudor house. Henry VII, his son Henry VIII and his
three children Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I ruled for 118 eventful years.
During this period, England developed into one of the
leading European colonial powers, with men such as Sir Walter Raleigh taking
part in the conquest of the New World. Nearer to home, campaigns in Ireland
brought the country under strict English control.
Culturally and socially, the Tudor period saw many
changes. The Tudor court played a prominent part in the cultural Renaissance
taking place in Europe, nurturing all-round individuals such as William
Shakespeare, Edmund Spenser and Cardinal Wolsey. The Tudor period also saw the
turbulence of two changes of official religion, resulting in the martyrdom of
many innocent believers of both Protestantism and Roman Catholicism. The fear
of Roman Catholicism induced by the Reformation was to last for several
centuries and to play an influential role in the history of the Succession.
THE TUDORS
1485 - 1603
HENRY VII =
Elizabeth of York,
(1485–1509) dau. of EDWARD IV
Catherine of (1) = HENRY VIII = (2) Anne
Boleyn, = (3) Jane, dau. Margaret (1) = JAMES
IV,
Aragon, dau. (1509–1547) dau. of
Earl of Sir
John King of Scotland
of FERDINAND
V, of Wiltshire
Seymour (1488–1513)
first King of Spain
ELIZABETH
I EDWARD VI JAMES V, =
Mary of
MARY I (1547–1553)
(1558–1603) King of Scotland Lorraine,
(1553–1558)
(1513–1542) dau. of Duke
of
Guise
MARY, = Henry, Lord
Queen Darnley
of Scots
(1542–1567,
ex.1587)
THE STUARTS 1603 – 1714 Anne, dau.
of = JAMES VI OF SCOTLAND
FREDERICK II, AND I OF ENGLAND
King of Denmark (1567–1625)
(1603–1625)
Elizabeth = Frederick V, CHARLES
I = Henrietta Maria,
Elector Palatine
(1625– dau. of HENRY IV,
ex.1649)
King of France
Sophia = Ernest Augustus,
Elector of Hanover
CHARLES II Mary = WILLIAM II JAMES
II = Anne Hyde,
(1649–1685) of Orange
(1685– dau. of Earl of
GEORGE I
deposed 1688) Clarendon
(1714–1727)
WILLIAM III =
MARY II ANNE
(1689–1702) (1689–1694)
(1702–1714)
Joint Sovereigns
HENRY VII (1485-1509 AD)
Henry VII, son of Edmund Tudor and Margaret Beaufort,
was born in 1457. He married Elizabeth of York in 1486, who bore him four
children: Arthur, Henry, Margaret and Mary. He died in 1509 after reigning 24
years.
Henry descended from John of Gaunt, through the
latter's illicit affair with Catherine Swynford; although he was a Lancastrian,
he gained the throne through personal battle. The Lancastrian victory at the
Battle of Bosworth in 1485 left Richard III slain in the field, York ambitions
routed and Henry proclaimed king. From the onset of his reign, Henry was determined
to bring order to England after 85 years of civil war. His marriage to
Elizabeth of York combined both the Lancaster and York factions within the
Tudor line, eliminating further discord in regards to succession. He faced two
insurrections during his reign, each centered around "pretenders" who
claimed a closer dynastic link to the Plantagenets than Henry. Lambert Simnel
posed as the Earl of Warwick, but his army was defeated and he was eventually
pardoned and forced to work in the king's kitchen. Perkin Warbeck posed as
Richard of York, Edward V's younger brother (and co-prisoner in the Tower of
London); Warbeck's support came from the continent, and after repeated invasion
attempts, Henry had him imprisoned and executed.
Henry greatly strengthened the monarchy by employing
many political innovations to outmaneuver the nobility. The household staff
rose beyond mere servitude: Henry eschewed public appearances, therefore, staff
members were the few persons Henry saw on a regular basis. He created the
Committee of the Privy Council ,a forerunner of the modern cabinet) as an
executive advisory board; he established the Court of the Star Chamber to
increase royal involvement in civil and criminal cases; and as an alternative
to a revenue tax disbursement from Parliament, he imposed forced loans and
grants on the nobility. Henry's mistrust of the nobility derived from his
experiences in the Wars of the Roses - a majority remained dangerously neutral
until the very end. His skill at by-passing Parliament (and thus, the will of
the nobility) played a crucial role in his success at renovating government.
Henry's political acumen was also evident in his
handling of foreign affairs. He played Spain off of France by arranging the
marriage of his eldest son, Arthur, to Catherine of Aragon, daughter of
Ferdinand and Isabella. Arthur died within months and Henry secured a papal
dispensation for Catherine to marry Arthur's brother, the future Henry VIII;
this single event had the widest-ranging effect of all Henry's actions: Henry
VIII's annulment from Catherine was the impetus for the separation of the
Church of England from the body of Roman Catholicism. The marriage of Henry's
daughter, Margaret, to James IV of Scotland would also have later
repercussions, as the marriage connected the royal families of both England and
Scotland, leading the Stuarts to the throne after the extinction of the
Tudor dynasty. Henry encouraged trade and commerce by subsidizing ship building
and entering into lucrative trade agreements, thereby increasing the wealth of
both crown and nation.
Henry failed to appeal to the general populace: he
maintained a distance between king and subject. He brought the nobility to heel
out of necessity to transform the medieval government that he inherited into an
efficient tool for conducting royal business. Law and trade replaced feudal
obligation as the Middle Ages began evolving into the modern world. Francis
Bacon, in his history of Henry VII, described the king as such: "He was of
a high mind, and loved his own will and his own way; as one that revered
himself, and would reign indeed. Had he been a private man he would have been
termed proud: But in a wise Prince, it was but keeping of distance; which
indeed he did towards all; not admitting any near or full approach either to
his power or to his secrets. For he was governed by none."
HENRY VIII (1509-47 AD)
Henry VIII, born in 1491, was the second son of Henry
VII and Elizabeth of York. The significance of Henry's reign is, at times,
overshadowed by his six marriages: dispensing with these forthwith enables a
deeper search into the major themes of the reign. He married Catherine of
Aragon (widow of his brother, Arthur) in 1509, divorcing her in 1533; the union
produced one daughter, Mary. Henry married the pregnant Anne Boleyn in 1533;
she gave him another daughter, Elizabeth, but was executed for infidelity (a
treasonous charge in the king's consort) in May 1536. He married Jane Seymour
by the end of the same month, who died giving birth to Henry's lone male heir,
Edward, in October 1536. Early in 1540, Henry arranged a marriage with Anne of
Cleves, after viewing Hans Holbein's beautiful portrait of the German princess.
In person, alas, Henry found her homely and the marriage was never consummated.
In July 1540, he married the adulterous Catherine Howard - she was executed for
infidelity in March 1542. Catherine Parr became his wife in 1543, providing for
the needs of both Henry and his children until his death in 1547.
The court life initiated by his father evolved into a
cornerstone of Tudor government in the reign of Henry VIII. After his father's
staunch, stolid rule, the energetic, youthful and handsome king avoided
governing in person, much preferring to journey the countryside hunting and
reviewing his subjects. Matters of state were left in the hands of others, most
notably Thomas Wolsey, Archbishop of York. Cardinal Wolsey virtually ruled England
until his failure to secure the papal annulment that Henry needed to marry Anne
Boleyn in 1533. Wolsey was quite capable as Lord Chancellor, but his own
interests were served more than that of the king: as powerful as he was, he
still was subject to Henry's favor - losing Henry's confidence proved to be his
downfall. The early part of Henry's reign, however, saw the young king invade
France, defeat Scottish forces at the Battle of Foldden Field (in which James
IV of Scotland was slain), and write a treatise denouncing Martin Luther's
Reformist ideals, for which the pope awarded Henry the title "Defender of
the Faith".
The 1530's witnessed Henry's growing involvement in
government, and a series of events which greatly altered England, as well as
the whole of Western Christendom: the separation of the Church of England from
Roman Catholicism. The separation was actually a by-product of Henry's
obsession with producing a male heir; Catherine of Aragon failed to produce a
male and the need to maintain dynastic legitimacy forced Henry to seek an
annulment from the pope in order to marry Anne Boleyn. Wolsey tried repeatedly
to secure a legal annulment from Pope Clement VII, but Clement was beholden to
the Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor and nephew of Catherine. Henry summoned the
Reformation Parliament in 1529, which passed 137 statutes in seven years and
exercised an influence in political and ecclesiastic affairs which was unknown
to feudal parliaments. Religious reform movements had already taken hold in
England, but on a small scale: the Lollards had been in existence since the
mid-fourteenth century and the ideas of Luther and Zwingli circulated within
intellectual groups, but continental Protestantism had yet to find favor with
the English people. The break from Rome was accomplished through law, not
social outcry; Henry, as Supreme Head of the Church of England, acknowledged
this by slight alterations in worship ritual instead of a wholesale reworking
of religious dogma. England moved into an era of "conformity of mind"
with the new royal supremacy (much akin to the absolutism of France's Louis
XIV): by 1536, all ecclesiastical and government officials were required to
publicly approve of the break with Rome and take an oath of loyalty. The king
moved away from the medieval idea of ruler as chief lawmaker and overseer of
civil behavior, to the modern idea of ruler as the ideological icon of the
state.
The remainder of Henry's reign was anticlimactic. Anne
Boleyn lasted only three years before her execution; she was replaced by Jane
Seymour, who laid Henry's dynastic problems to rest with the birth of Edward
VI. Fragmented noble factions involved in the Wars of the Roses found
themselves reduced to vying for the king's favor in court. Reformist factions
won the king's confidence and vastly benefiting from Henry's dissolution of the
monasteries, as monastic lands and revenues went either to the crown or the
nobility. The royal staff continued the rise in status that began under Henry
VII, eventually to rival the power of the nobility. Two men, in particular,
were prominent figures through the latter stages of Henry's reign: Thomas
Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer. Cromwell, an efficient administrator, succeeded
Wolsey as Lord Chancellor, creating new governmental departments for the
varying types of revenue and establishing parish priest's duty of recording
births, baptisms, marriages and deaths. Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury,
dealt with and guided changes in ecclesiastical policy and oversaw the
dissolution of the monasteries.
Henry VIII built upon the innovations instituted by
his father. The break with Rome, coupled with an increase in governmental
bureaucracy, led to the royal supremacy that would last until the execution of
Charles I and the establishment of the Commonwealth one hundred years after
Henry's death. Henry was beloved by his subjects, facing only one major
insurrection, the Pilgrimage of Grace, enacted by the northernmost counties in
retaliation to the break with Rome and the poor economic state of the region.
History remembers Henry in much the same way as Piero Pasqualigo, a Venetian
ambassador: "... he is in every respect a most accomplished prince."
Ñòðàíèöû: 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 19
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