minervacasterly: On Saturday 21st of April 1509, Henry VII died at Richmond Palace. He was the first

minervacasterly:OnSaturday 21st of April 1509, Henry VII died atRichmond Palace. He was the first monarch of the Tudor dynasty and while he hasbeen eclipsed by his larger than life son, Henry remains one of the mostfascinating figures of the modern era. “Thereality of Henry Tudor’s ascent to the throne –his narrow escapes from death,his failures and anxieties, complete with constant uncertainty of his situation… was a far less welcome tale. It remains nonetheless just as remarkable;against all the odds, at Bosworth Henry achieved victory that he should nothave won.” (Skidmore)He created a new symbol called the Tudor Rose whichwas nothing more than a device, an alternate tale to explain the roots of theconflict known today as the “wars of the roses”. The wars was a more complexconflict than what we are told and involved as many players as we can imagine.The warring Houses known as Lancaster and York, had many sigils. The white andthe red rose where the emblems chosen by Henry Tudor to represent both Housesto give a new narrative of this conflict. It was an effective device that wouldbecome to represent not just the union of both Houses that came about withHenry VII’s marriage with Elizabeth of York, but of his descendants. On January1559, fifty years after his death, his granddaughter, Elizabeth I rode from theTower of London to Westminster on the eve of her coronation, and on her way sheencountered five pageants, one of which showed“two personages representing King Henry the Seventh and Elizabeth his wife,daughter of King Edward the Fourth” seated together, above each head wasthe red rose and white rose respectively “outof which [these] two roses sprang two branches gathered into one, which weredirected upward to a second stage wherein was placed one representing thevaliant and noble prince King Henry [VIII]”.Clearly, the Tudor rose was seen not just as avalidation to his descendants’ right to the throne, but as somethingpreordained by God, something that told the people that with them, the wars ofthe roses had come to a close, and peace had finally reigned in England.Whether this was true or not, and nobles believed it or not, is up to dispute.But nobody can deny that it was an effective piece of propaganda that convincedthe people that war had come to an end, and that this new dynasty would bringthem peace and prosperity. Tudor and Elizabethan literature helped a great dealwhen they continued to use this device to explain the reasons behind theconflict, reducing it to a dynastic conflict between two warring houses.“Thefrontispiece was such a popular motif that it was repeated and reused on other,unconnected works: the same family tree appeared unmodified in John Stow’s 1550and 1561 editions of Chaucer’s works, introducing the section on the CanterburyTales. Just as John, Duke of Bedford, had plastered occupied France withgenealogies advertising the legitimacy of the joint monarchy during the 1520s;just as Edward IV had obsessively compiled genealogies tracing his rightful royaldescent from centuries long gone; so too did the Tudors drive home the messageboth of their right to rule and of their version of history. By Elizabeth’sreign the mere sight of red and white roses entwined was enough to evokeinstantly the whole story of the fifteenth century: the Crown had been throwninto dispute and disarray by the Lancastrian deposition of Richard II in 1399;this had prompted nearly a century of warfare between two rival clans, whichwas a form of divine punishment for the overthrow of a rightful King; finallyin 1485, the Tudors had reunited the families and saved the realm. It was thatsimple.” (Jones)And yet all of Henry’s hard work, to maintainstability in his new realm, his marriage and his family, suffered a hugesetback when his eldest son and beloved heir, Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales andLord of Snowdonia died as a result of the plague in early April 1502. He andhis wife were utterly devastated. “Theshadow cast by Arthur’s death” writes Dan Jones “was long and dark” but not as dark as historians Amy Licence andAlison Weir add, that of Elizabeth of York’s death a year later. Their deathswere too much for the aging King, who began to isolate himself from the public,coming out only for state occasions. When Henry’s condition worsened, hismother (Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond) who was sick herself, orderedthat her son be moved to Richmond that March.“Herhands, now cramped with arthritis, were so painful that she would sometimes cryout ‘Oh Blessed Jesus help me!’ But to watch her son suffer was so much worse.The dying King sobbed as he reflected on the lives he had ruined. His lastagonies began at about 10 pm Friday 20 April.” (de Lisle)Margaret brought her confessor, John Fisher, to hearhis confession and give him his last rites. And then on the morning of April 21st,Henry died. She immediately began to make preparations for hergrandson’s coronation and kept the King’s death a secret for three days. Sheorganized a meeting with his councilors and co-executors at his will at Greenwichto discuss, among many things, her son’s burial and the upcoming regency duringher son’s short minority. Henry VIII was not yet eighteen and Margaret wantedto make sure that he was safely installed in his throne, before he took on thereins of government. Margaret had great experience in this since she had been achild of nine attending the court of her cousin, Henry VI, to repudiate herbetrothal to de la Pole. The meeting took place on the celebration of the Orderof the Garter –an Order she was a member of. Her grandson was present and whilehe was anxious to start his new reign, he recognized his grandmother’sexperience, and respected her authority. Later that night, Henry’s death wasannounced and sadly (at least to Margaret, it must have been) nobody mournedhis death and according to contemporary chroniclers, they greeted his deathwith celebration. To many historians, Thomas Penn included, Henry VII is amiserly figure who was consumed by darkness of his own making and who willforever be remember as a somber and cold figure. But this, as Linda Porter inher recent biography of the Tudors and Stewarts points out, is “an unfair assessment”. “Hewas comely personage, a little above just stature, well and straight-limbed,but slender. His countenance was revered, and a little like a churchman, and asit was not strange or dark so neither was it winning or pleasing, but as theface of one well disposed. But it was to the disadvantage of the painter, forit was best when he spoke.” Although written over a century after his death,Francis Bacon’s description of the first Tudor King, is right on the spot. LindaPorter adds:“[Hewas] A considered person, not given to great public displays of emotion,somewhat ascetic in appearance, not exactly handsome but with an interestingand by no means unattractive face, the whole man only at his most appealingwhen he was animated. His portraits show that he did, indeed, have something ofthe churchman about him: a calm and also inscrutability, a sense that you wouldnever entirely know that he was thinking. It gave him an air of authority.”Henry VII was an energetic young man at the time ofhis exile, yet he was also controlled and cautious as the descriptions above,provide. He loved to laugh, joke and gamble but whereas some kings and leaderswere known for their vices, Henry was not known to have any. Some of those whomet him during his exile, were surprised how someone who had lived and survivedthrough so much, could be so controlled and yet not bitter. When he becameKing, he kept some of the measures that King Edward IV had introduced, he keptthe Star Chamber on a tight leash, terminated private liveries which meant thatnobles could no longer have private armies, and defeated the pretender forcesof Lambert Simnel who posed as Edward, Earl of Warwick (George, Duke ofClarence and Isabel Neville’s son) and Perkin Warbeck who posed as Richard ofShrewsbury, Duke of York. Henry never forgot those who had helped him get towhere he was and in his last will he names those “lords as well of our blood asother, and also knights, squires and divers our true loving subjects andservants’ who had ‘faithfully assisted us, and divers of them put themselves inextreme jeopardy of their lives, and losses of their lands and goods, inserving and assisting us, as well about the recovery of our Right and Realm ofEngland.’ And in one final tribute to his victory in battle twenty four yearsbefore, the dying King requested that a wooden image, wrought with plate offine gold, should be made, ‘representing our own person … in the manner of anarmed man’, to be equipped with an enameled coat of the arms of England andFrance, together with a sword and spurs. The statue was to be placed kneelingon a silver table, ‘holding betwixt his hands the crown which it pleased God togive us, with the victory over our enemy at our first field.’ The statue was tobe dedicated to St. Edward the Confessor, and set in the middle of his shrine,with detailed instructions as to the exact measurements of the statue, so thatit would seem as if Henry was almost offering up his crown to St. Edward inthanks.” (Skidmore)Henry’s body remained in Richmond for two weeks untilit was finally laid to rest in Westminster Abbey, inside the Lady Chapel thatHenry had ordered constructed for him, his wife and his descendants. He wasburied right beside her. Above them, standing a massive golden effigy,representing both of them.Sources: Henry VII by SB ChrimesThe Winter King by Thomas PennTudors vs Stewarts: The Fatal Inheritanceof Mary, Queen of Scots by Linda PorterThe Wars of the Roses: The Fall of thePlantagenets and the Rise of the Tudors by Dan JonesThe Rise of the Tudors by Chris SkidmoreTudor. Passion. Manipulation and Murder:The Story of England’s Most Notorious Family by Leanda de Lisle·      -- source link

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