Henry VII's Dark Truths: The First Tudor King | Henry VII Winter King | Real Royalty

Sailing from France an invading army is about to land in Wales the leader of this army was a refugee a fugitive a man who had spent half of his 28 years on the run and had barely claimed the throne of England his name was Henry Tudor and as King Henry the Seventh would create the dynasty that bore his name, the Tudors, but Henry the Seventh remains obscure, overshadowed by the monarchy. He deposed Richard the Third for the glamor and notoriety of his wife, who killed his son Henry the Eighth, and the charisma of his granddaughter Elizabeth. . the

first

, but Henry the Seventh is possibly the most extraordinary story of all, with a hunger for power and an iron determination to cling to the throne at all costs.

He would rewrite history by ta

king

the crown and rebuilding the monarchy in his own image. becoming paranoid, later described as an infinitely suspicious ruler, a Dark Prince, his reign seen as a grim, wintry landscape for years. I've explored its murky history of spies and informants, intrigue and extortion, and found that the deeper you dig, the more fascinating glimpses you discover. of this manipulative

king

who created one of the strangest regimes in history, magnificent, oppressive and terrifying, this is the story of Henry the Seventh, the

first

Tudor, this is Henry, this is what remains of his funerary effigy that was paraded through the streets of London after his death dressed in his parliamentary robes and clutching his orb and scepter of state, we can see his fine-boned features and the distinctive hue of his left eye, but this is also a face emaciated and ravaged by illness. and stress.

It is the face of a man who has never known a Moment of Peace Henri's journey to fulfill his unlikely destiny took him to Milford Haven on Sunday, August 7, 1485. His small fleet appeared from the south and anchored silently in Mill Bay . Henry's ships drop anchor here and his men disembark and we can imagine them setting off. ammunition on the beach cannons horses crossing the waves Henry Wade is on the shore and when he reaches this beach to the sand he kneels he raises his eyes to heaven he puts his hands together in prayer and says judge me oh Lord and favor my cause Henry would need all the help that he could get for his army was a motley group of political dissidents in foreign mercenaries a mix of different axes filled the air.

Henry had deliberately chosen this distant, windswept corner of Wales that he wanted to sneak into undetected, giving him time to build support back home in Wales before facing Richard the Third's much larger army, so this invasion

real

ly feels more than anything else, it almost doesn't feel like an invasion, it feels very furtive and anxious, you know the odds are against you. Henry headed north. to the homeland of his stepfather, Lord Stanley, the powerful Stanley noble family had promised Henry their support, the plan was to head for London, but Richard's army was now hot on his heels, he had no choice but to turn and fight on the eve of battle.

Henry knew that Richard's army was only a few miles away and vastly outnumbered his own. It had come to this: tomorrow he would claim the throne of England or die trying early on the morning of August 22, 1485. Henry advanced from here to Richard's much larger army, arrayed on the ridge here, was for William Stanley with his men watching as the battle unfolded. Stanley kept his options open, only wanting to back a winner as Henry's army fragmented. Richard saw his opportunity and charged into the slaughter. two men fought face to face and Henry's standard bearer was cut down and it was at that moment probably when he saw Henry's standard beginning to fall that Sir William Stanley made his fateful decision at the crucial moment when Stanley's army was amassing from the Henry's side.

Richard was said to have fought bravely like a true king, one of Henry's men supposedly heard him shout, "I will die like a king this day or win," and Richard himself was swept away. Richard the Third, the King of England, was brutally beaten to death in the middle of the morning. it was all over Henry's men moved bitterly across the battlefield relieving the dead and dying of their valuables piling bodies onto carts on a nearby hill Lord Stanley placed the dead king's hoop on Henry's head at the screams of acclamation from his troops against all odds that Henry had achieved the impossible, this man who had been a refugee and fugitive half his life had won the crown of England, the battle of Bosworth may have been over, but the

real

fight was about to begin for over half a century no monarch had passed the crown without the agitation to build a dynasty would be a battle Henry would fight for the rest of his life.

I'm taking off my shoes because I'm about to step into what is one of the most extraordinary works of medieval art not only in England but in Europe, this is amazing, it feels amazing to be here, all the English kings and queens since 13: 8 have been crowned in this place precisely here and it was here on October 30, 14 85 that Henry VII was crowned. It was a glorious triumphant occasion and Henry must have felt that he had achieved almost the impossible. This was an affirmation of his victory at Bosworth. It was a vindication of all he had done that he prayed for on the beach at Milford Haven, but there After all, Henry had seen a crowned king, Richard, the third murdered, pampered, mutilated and trusted naked on the back of a donkey, without even a cloth to cover his genitals, and he knew that what had happened to Richard III could also happen to him.

Henry's claim to the throne was precarious, his mother Lady Margaret Beaufort providing the only thread of royal blood and the Henry's veins The Beauforts were a large but illegitimate Lancastrian family who were forbidden to claim the throne from the other side of their family. Henry's grandfather, Owen Tudor, a fast-talking Welsh servant, had secretly married Henry. against the widow Catherine, some fifty years earlier, was not exactly the ideal pedigree for a king. Henry was born a nobleman, the Earl of Richmond, but his education in exile had left him. With no experience in ruling, he had turned him into a keen observer and a man who gave nothing away to make England believe that Henry was the rightful king.

He needed to behave like one and that's exactly what he did. Parliament met at Westminster for For 800 years, official records of its debates, meetings and proceedings date back to the Middle Ages, at the beginning of November 1485. Henry the Seventh met the first Parliament. He would use it to address the uncomfortable truth of Richard the Third's reign and rework recent events to suit him. and here is the written proof, the parliamentary record showing how Richard the Third did precisely that in this record as the usurper Henry the Seventh is the rightful king, setting the record straight Richard the Third was referred to as the late Duke of Gloucester and after the fact and not writing King of England and his legislation is known as an act of false and malicious imaginations, but there was one thing in particular during this Parliament that Henry did that caused a wave of unrest in the Commons.

He rewrote history. It simply consists of a date here now, the Battle of Bosworth was fought on August 22, 1485, but here I am going to date his reign as the 21st in Roman numerals, the day of August last, that is, the day before it was fought. the battle, we might ask. What happens in a day? Well, by moving his reign back to the day before he defeated Richard III and became King Henry, he was effectively accusing everyone who had supported Richard III on the battlefield of treason. The Commons were surprised, but in practice there was very little. could do about it Henry had won his battle and was king and here he is enshrined in the parliamentary record with Parliament secured Henry's next move would further strengthen his position a marriage to cement all his dynastic ambitions it was a strategic partnership the fulfillment of a pact made while in exile the pact on which his invasion was founded the previous 30 years had seen England torn apart in what would become known as the Wars of the Roses the House of Lancaster represented by the red rose against the House of York represented by the White Rose Richard the thirds who came to the throne in 1483 divided the House of York he imprisoned his young nephews 2 princes in the tower and proclaimed himself King the princes were never seen again his supporters fled to Brittany where they found the young Henry of Lancaster, a refugee in exile, agreed to support Henry's challenge to the throne, but only if he married Elizabeth of York, daughter of the late King Edward IV, it would be a union that promised to reconcile a divided England, but Henry needed something to To reinforce this union, something that would link this new dynasty with the English crown in the minds of his subjects, so he brought decorators from Westminster, the seat of government, pasted his family emblems on the walls, ceilings and windows, They included such a powerful symbol in Because of its simplicity, we still recognize it to this day.

Of course, it is a Victorian building, but we can get an idea of ​​how Henry implemented and used these insignia and emblems. We can still see his mother's insignia, the Beaufort portcullis, and next to it the significant emblem of all Henry's red rose Henry's revival of a rather obscure Lancastrian emblem the red rose was a masterstroke which allowed him to do was to place his own rather sketchy credentials on a par with those of his wife Elizabeth of York's white rose and together, these two roses would combine to create the most potent and enduring emblem in English royal history, the red rose and white, the Tudor rose.

Henry was making his mark on the nation, but of course the Tudor rose could only be truly embodied by a vital air. If Henry were to build a dynasty and Henry did not have to wait long, named after King Arthur, the mythical King of Great Britain, Prince Arthur was born early in the rain on the last morning of September 20, 1486 in Winchester, the legendary seat of Camelot, this is a wonderful book and very rare it is a songbook of Henry the seventh chord and we can see in this songbook a song that celebrates the birth of Prince Arthur and it says precisely this I love the rose both red and white that runs is that your pure and perfect appetite to press talk about them is my delight, joy, that we are our prince to see and three roses, in other words, Arthur was the embodiment of the red and white rose, he was the embodiment of the Tudor Rose .

Henry and Elizabeth were lucky to have more children, including another son. Henry was constructing the myth that he and his family were the true and legitimate royal blood of England, but there were those who simply did not believe it; in fact, they would rewrite history on their own to expose Henry for the usurper that he was. What you have here is a genealogical paper, these family trees were the property of kings and nobles to describe and sometimes invent their glorious ancestors and it is this part that interests us in particular and that tells us why Henry was so afraid and that I was afraid.

If we start here without the third, the Plantagenet King from whom both the Yorkists and the Lancastrians traced their lines of descent, we can see here the Lancastrian line descending through Henry the fourth Henry the fifth Victor of Agincourt and Henry the sixth and then it stops because the Lancastrians are exterminated and this thick red line is what this scroll believes to be the main line of royal ancestry and it goes all the way back to the Yorkist king, all the way back to Edward IV and his wife Elizabeth Woodville. The main line of descent continues until Richard I. the third, but as we can see, the mine is finished, in fact it is unfinished.

Henry is noticeably absent from this glorious vision of English

royalty

. Henry the Seventh doesn't fit at all, he's squashed here and then a thick black line traces his descent all the way up. and goes beyond the Lancastrian line, is not meaningfully connected with it and goes on and on reaching here, not to any king, but simply to Owen Tudor, a chamber servant, so this role was composed for a family who had a very gloomy vision. of him with the ruling claim the throne, in fact, what is more, they believed that they were not the rightful kings of England, the role belonged to a great Yorkist family called John della Poole of Diller Poole, the Earl of Lincoln was related with the late King Richard. the third and claimed that Richard had named him heir to the throne.

John della pool, Earl of Lincoln, would indeed instigate Henry's first serious rebellion. Judgment reigned in 1487. Lincoln's forces clashed with Henry's troops in the East Midlands, but there would be no king killed, as there had been a Bosworth. Henry's battle-hardened army massacred Lincoln's men and Lincoln himself was massacred. Henry had won a decisive victory and eliminated a genuine Yorkist contender to the throne. Once this threat was eradicated, he dedicated himself to consolidating hisgovernment. looking for new ways to convey the power and permanence of his reign through magnificent architecture, an opulent home and the thing dearest to his heart, money, look, the first English girls are in the first pound as a currency, well, That is, it is an extraordinary privilege. really to see this Barry Cooke looks after the medieval coin collection at the British Museum Henry the Seventh is the first person to think I'm going to create a pound coin and he gives it this very special sovereign and what he's doing with the word sovereign is I mean , I am sovereign over my land, yes, the royal packet, this is not a currency that anyone uses in their daily life, it is a way for the King to show his power and authority, which spreads his message to put into circulation, literally, a message and, in some ways, the audience for this might not have been so much his own subjects but foreign visitors, so when the ambassadors were visiting, if he had given them a sort of royal gift bag, so to speak , and along with them I would have given them several of these.

Take the memory of hanging Henry in England, that's absolutely it. No, you have a huge gold coin, what does that tell you? The person who casually gives it to you usually only the monarch's head appeared, but here Henry sits full. -long on a great throne, Alban scepter in hand and the imperial crown on his head, the image of a king, but the most important part of the coin is on the reverse, this is a Tudor rose, isn't it? Again it is the tradition in In the medieval period there was a cross on the back of a coin, but now we have the double Tudor rose and the arms of England superimposed on it.

It very specifically associates the coat of arms of England with the symbols of the Tudor families which are in a more pronounced sense, an interrelated and inextricable reality of ABG for power, I mean, that's what these things are, the other way in which one ruler can convey the message to the greatest number of people before the other to the modern world and they are the only means of mass communication. what's in them is very important, but as Henry began to convince the international community that he was here to stay home, old rivalries simmered and the aftermath of the rebellion spread.

In early 1493, Henry learned of another plot that Yorkist exiles in Europe were preparing to A young man named Perkin Warbeck posed as one of the princes in the tower and were raising an army to invade England. For Enrique, this was a disaster. Many had accepted him as king only because the princess in the tower was now presumed dead with this supposed appearance. loyalties would be high after a decade of fighting to establish his dynasty this was a threat that Henry had to deactivate Henry wove a web of outside surveillance he was always calm and inscrutable he gave nothing away, but this masked a savage intensity he embedded spies in homes of the suspects He interviewed their servants and the chaplains and confessors to whom they open their souls and discovered their horror, but the trail of the conspiracy took him very close to home, in fact, right to the heart of the royal household, to its Lord Chamberlain , who was responsible for the king's personal security, this man was none other than Sir William Stanley, whose intervention had won Henry the Battle of Bosworth.

When Henry's men searched Stanley's house, they found a Yorkist livery collar studded with white roses and 10,000 pounds, enough money to finance an army. Henry began to feel that he would never be able to convince everyone that he was the rightful king, he would need to be even more alert, starting with how he ran his household, this is the fabulous Great Hall of Hampton Court, Henry's royal houses were destroyed centuries ago, but Hampton Court is presented in the same way, this is the impressive public face of the royal household and just to enter here you would have had to have been one of the many hundreds of servants who worked here on a regular basis or an accredited visitor . but the king was rarely seen here.

He resided in the state quarters that began behind this heavily guarded door and if his name was not written down he would not enter. This is one of the great public chambers and on court holidays. It would have been filled with noble courtiers, diplomats, petitioners of all kinds hoping to catch a glimpse of the king, but it was this door that people most wanted to pass through and behind which very few were admitted. Behind this door was a secret or private chamber. the private apartments where the King's work slept ate and relaxed and it was what happened behind this door that would become synonymous with Henry, the reign of judgment with the discovery of Stanley's plot, the private chamber was closed before In the security review, only those who best pleased the King were admitted, so at the heart of this brilliant house there was an institutional black hole whose operation was only known to the King himself.

Enrique. Inside the private chamber things were changing. Enrique was obsessed with control, especially when it came to money, the mandate of his private Treasury chamber was to expand these books, our chamber accounts, his payment books and the interesting thing about these books is that they represent the very personal control of Henry on finances. These account books are given to him and he will go through everything and We will sign it at the bottom, we have everything from salaries for trumpeters, barbers, queens, minstrels, princes, trumpeters, falcons brought from Hungary from a hungry and shining voyage. Berlin historian Sean Cunningham has been studying Henry's account books.

This shows money coming directly into Henry's personal coffers. and these pages are written by Henry himself. I love this post in particular. We have money given in heavy old crowns. You can allow me to weigh it in his hand. That's ok. Thinking of a heavy crown. Hey? That's good. And then and then and there like that. Good crowns. Yes, these are some good crowns we have here and their thousands of pounds of bullion that passed through the kings, literally through the King's hands to Henry's money, meant security and control, and the way he used it was key, there are all kinds of unofficial activity going on.

For example, we will have quite substantial rewards of tens or perhaps hundreds of pounds which will sometimes be given to strangers and we will reward people across the sea or certain people traveling on the King's business and here this one is interesting, Sean, who is this, it's probably a shell Somerset, he was one of the Kings' intelligence masters, yes, from a flood, a man from Flanders to after something or other about unofficial business, lack of full details, which is a little frustrating, well, it is always an indication, although it is not. If you don't have the details or get the feeling that he's in Her Majesty's Secret Service, Henry was building a dense network of spies and informants whose reach would extend to the farthest,

dark

est corners of the kingdom.

He would map the political situation. loyalties of his subjects who put under surveillance those who seemed likely to cause trouble in 1497. Warbeck, the Yorkist claimant who had caused Henry so much anxiety over the years, was captured and finally executed at the beginning of the new century. . Henry VII has been on the throne for 15 years. Only now did he feel really safe, things seemed good. Henry completed his magnificent new house on the Thames west of London and named it after his county, Richmond. Here, in his warren of rooms, Henry could monitor his allies and keep a close eye on his enemies, the Spanish.

The ambassador was clearly impressed by the state of the nation England; he said it was remarkably calm. Before writing, there had always been a number of competing claims to the throne, but now only the true blood of Henry the Seventh, Queen Elizabeth and her eldest son and heir Prince Arthur remained - not a drop of dubious royal blood left in the kingdom. The stage was now set for the most significant moment of Henry's reign so far: a royal marriage that had taken a decade to negotiate. His eldest son, Prince Arthur, would marry a The great Spanish princess Catherine of Aragon for Henry would be the culmination of everything he had fought for to seal his dynastic ambitions and the celebrations would be those of Deloria in the early afternoon of the Friday 12 November 15. 1 Catherine's procession entered the city Across London Bridge it was a damp, grey, rainy afternoon, but I would have waited for the spectacular to pass.

It was the first stage of the fortnight series of wedding celebrations that would be Henry's definitive public relations event and showcase his main source of political capital. London was in a carnival atmosphere, the crowded streets were a riot of color accompanying Catherine of Aragon in her procession through London. He was the king's youngest son, Prince Henry, ten years old, he loved being the center of attention, he was already a child with a popular touch, but one thing was It was clear to everyone and Catherine in particular that she was about to become part of something very special, but for one spectator this lavish occasion caused disquiet among the masses lining the room. and who were stretching out to catch a glimpse of the princess: it was a young law student named Thomas.

Moore Moore then described the procession. He had been taken by Catherine. She was so beautiful. She said her words couldn't do him justice, but she ended on a slightly hesitant note. I hope she said that these celebrations will be a happy omen. It was as if in their splendor and magnificence the festivities were somehow tempting fate the wedding was a triumph the Tudor myth was becoming reality but when Arthur and Catherine left London to begin their married life it would not be long before the words of Thomas More became a reality. It was fulfilled late on the 4th of April 15th on a ship docked at Greenwich where the king and queen resided on board there was a messenger who brought terrible news Prince Arthur had contracted the virulent sweating sickness and was dead Henry was devastated in st.

On St George's Day, Prince Arthur was buried here at Worcester Cathedral, far from Westminster, and in the glare of international attention, it was a funeral fit for a prince that reflected the scale of the tragedy as a Mass was sung of Requiem through this door, the West door and into the crowd. of the mourners wrote a man on horseback dressed in Arthur's own plate armor and clutching an ax blade downwards the man at arms wrote a black comparison dwarfs the nave and in the choir Arthur's coat of arms his sword and his shield the symbols of his land Roles were offered and his body coffin was lowered into his grave to have seen the cries when the offering was made wrote a Herald he had a hard heart the net no this is Arthur's Chapel his final resting place the political impact of Arthur's death was immense the Tudor dynasty now hung in the balance the future of the dynasty now rested on the shoulders of Arthur's younger brother Prince Henry, the king's only surviving son, but Elizabeth assured the king that they were still young enough to have more children and, sure enough, within a few months she was pregnant.

The royal house moved here to the tower where Elizabeth was going to give birth. She went into confinement surrounded by her ladies and gentlemen, but it was a traumatic and premature birth with a furious temperature. She went in and out of consciousness. Henry was out of his mind. Messengers rode through the night to summon specialists, but nothing worked. On February 11, 1503, Elizabeth died when she was 37 years old. Her marriage had been one of genuine love and Henry was devastated by the loss of her, but of course her marriage had also represented something else: the union of Lancaster. and York, the reunification of England after decades of Civil War, many had accepted Henry as king out of loyalty to Elizabeth's Yorkist family, now his death threatened to tear the country apart once again, perhaps nothing better summed up the situation in the one where Enrique was now that a poem that Thomas More wrote on the occasion of the death of Isabel, where are our castles now?

Moore's poem read where are our towers beautiful Richmond you will soon depart from me in Westminster that costly work of yours my dear Lord now I will never see Moore was referring to the new Chapel that Henry VII was building in Westminster Abbey, adorned with all the Familiar symbols of his reign, the arch, portcullis and Tudor Rose, the chapel was intended to be yet another monument to the splendor of Henry's dynasty, Thomas More's poem caught the eye. The crux of the matter Henry could build all the magnificent buildings he wanted, but without his wife the very foundations of his reign were shaking, usually in such inscrutable ways.

Henry's reaction to Elizabeth's death was one of complete physical collapse, retreating into the depths of Richmond,to the one who was close. death, but when he emerged six weeks later, the mast was back in place and his drive for control was even more relentless. The cornerstones of his reign, his wife and his heir, were gone and Henry's crown was more at risk than ever. Old enemies had resurfaced. John de leur Poole, who had instigated the first rebellion against Henry, had died 15 years earlier, but his younger brother, the Earl of Suffolk, was now a man and roaming the Continent, raising an increasingly suspicious army incapable of control. trust in people.

Henry saw conspiracies at every turn, but his determination was unwavering. He would cling to the crown at any price. If his subjects did not love him, they would be made to fear him. Henry was perfecting a very effective system of repression. His advisors were experts in extortion. They forced the people. to contract bonds and debts to the King, guarantee his good behavior and find people enormous sums of money that were unpayable for everyone, from nobles to merchants, it was like being on permanent bail, anyone who broke the conditions of these bonds faced punishment. financial ruin, now betraying the King was not only unthinkable, it was. unaffordable this terrifying system was applied by an obscure tribunal known as the Council learned in law which was to become the most notorious expression of Henry's rule and the minutes of its meetings are recorded here in this book it was not legally constituted it was not a court of record, but it was made up of several of Henry's most powerful legal advisors and this council responded directly and only to the king;

It was based on information provided by the regime's network of informants and spies who provided details about crimes committed or possible debts owed to the king and the interesting thing about the advice is that it overturned many of the normal processes of government and law; it could, for example, interrupt the normal legal processes that were going on and take them out of the process, take them out of the system. and keeping them in front of this group of counselors acts with total impunity is totally inexplicable this was a process that instilled fear, anger and frustration in those people who were trapped in their dealings with all the men associated with the nerd counselor perhaps the most infamous and powerful He was a silver-tongued lawyer named Edmund Dudley.

Dudley had spent six years working in the City of London networking and becoming intimately familiar with its power brokers, its key players and the intricate web of rivalry, opportunism and mistrust that linked guilds and businesses and saw first-hand the dealings dubious transactions and the corrupt dealings of the bankers and merchants who kept the city running when, in the fall of the year 15, when he resigned his office, a grateful city gave him a golden handshake, but what the city did not expect was that Dudley was going to work for the king Dudley was a poacher who became a gamekeeper and was quickly brought into royal service.

Henry handed him an unprecedented role. Dudley's expertise was in defining and enforcing the king's legal rights by examining pages and pages of financial documentation that he had long used. Forgotten laws to inflict crushing financial penalties on Henry's subjects. Dudley described the mandate he had been given here. Henry said that he wanted many people in danger to his liking subject to his excellency for large sums of money. What Dudley was doing was technically legal but he was bending the law. To its absolute limits it was, he said, extraordinary justice and nowhere was this extraordinary justice applied more thoroughly than on Dudley's own turf, the City of London, but as time went on the charges brought against people not only arose from obscure laws, sometimes they were completely Perhaps nothing better sums up the atmosphere of confusion and terror that reigns in the city at the moment than a heinous extortion case involving prosperous London haberdasher Thomas Sinneth and his wife Alice Dudley falsely accused son of IFS of murdering a newborn child and disposing of the body. in the Thames, the false charges were designed to make it appear that the son had broken an existing bond for good behaviour, the fine for doing so was £500, an enormous sum of money, if the son refused to pay, instead of That's why they took him to jail. help for three months when his case finally came to court, the jury was rigged and the judges, intimidated by King's lawyers, found him guilty with no prospect of release and fearing that he might have died in prison.

Thomas Sinneth finally broke and paid his bill. book dudley imposed a fine of 500 pounds for a pardon for the boy's murder as his men increased their control over the city

henry

had an incredible stroke of luck received an unexpected guest at court on January 15 6 Philip of Burgundy, the man The Earl of Suffolk, who was protecting him on the continent, was shipwrecked on the coast of England, taking advantage of the opportunity. Henry welcomed this powerful prince with lavish hospitality, but it was clear that Philip was trapped. Henry would free him only if he agreed to hand over Suffolk, and so mid-march a ship carrying the fugitive Earl docked in the port of London a heavily armed reception committee took him to the tower he would never leave the threat of Suffolk had finally disappeared, but two Decades spent defending against rebellion plots and conspiracy have left their perpetual mark.

The state of emergency had become a form of government and England was now in the grip of a system that people found both disorienting and terrifying. Henry's subjects were scared and resentful, but they knew that Henry could not remain imprisoned forever in Richmond, his hometown. health had been failing for years all eyes were on Prince Henry and what kind of King he was going to be since the death of Prince Arthur, the King had wrapped Prince Henry in cotton keeping him confined to the royal household for 15- 7 Prince Henry was becoming a bright, handsome and athletic teenager, but his father's control had begun to irritate the increasingly ill king.

He was only too happy to show off his son, allowing Prince Henry to organize the spring tournament, the prince would be displayed, but not in the way his The tournaments his father anticipated were spectacular events that lasted days and at their center with chivalric superheroes of the time, the Gauss Knights armed on horseback, but although he was proving to be a brilliant fighter, Prince Henry was not allowed to fight, his father had already lost a son and was not willing to lose another wealth of Toby Cap, he is the arms curator of the Wallace Collection and has first class experience hand in the joust.

There is always risk in anything worth doing well and now Sting would make no sense if he were completely confident when he looked at himself. what they're fighting, this one's safe, this one's the safe kind, you've got three spikes on your head and that keeps the spear from going too far in, but still, if you can imagine getting hit by one of these in your face at a speed of 40 miles per hour or more in a collision that is in all respects very similar to a car accident, the danger is what makes it significant. Strong bonds were formed in the jousting arena between the Knights, their loyalties forged in combat as brothers in arms. on a battlefield, so while Henry the Seventh demanded loyalty through financial control, his son, Prince Henry, would form his bonds on the battlefield.

He is clearly physically built very differently than his father, but he also thinks differently than him. Really, it's just a matter of Henry the Seventh being perfectly aware of the importance of chivalry and chivalric displays, but simply unwilling to back that up with his own body, while his son couldn't wait to get personally involved. Prince Henry's friends put on an exciting and violent jousting display. Taking the sport to its limits with blatant disregard for the rule book was a performance the king and his advisors found alarming, but Prince Henry was delighted to be caught on the occasion when he eagerly conversed with low-level gentlemen his directness was in stark contrast. with remote detachment from his father, so people began to see Prince Henry, even at the tender age of 15, as someone who would be a return to a traditional type of king who valued honor and glory above of money, he would privilege nobles over lawyers and accountants, a completely different proposal from the loyalties of his father, calculating and distant, began to change imperceptibly in January 59.

Henry the Seventh locked himself in Richmond. His health was failing once again, only this time there would be no recovery at eleven o'clock on the night of Saturday, April 21, 1509. Henry VII died, bringing the kingdom to the brink of almost, but not quite, dynastic succession. all. This is a pen and ink drawing of the scene around Henry's bed in his private chamber at the time of his death. Here we can see one of the kings. ash knights closing Henry's eyes at the moment of his death and we can see his doctors holding jars of urine among those present were some of Henry's oldest and closest servants in the last century the deaths of kings have brought violence and instability to England and they were determined To ensure that the same thing did not happen this time, the 14 people in this image were the only ones who knew that Henry the Seventh had died, they had a unique opportunity to order events for their own benefit and this is precisely what they did.

He agreed to keep the king's death a secret for two days until the court gathered for the Garter Feast on some George's Day, but paving the way for Prince Henry's succession would require scapegoats to take over. blame for mistakes. that have been made in the name of his father, the new regime had to send an emphatic statement that he would not be like the old non-essential one. Thompson George the day was Edmund Dudley he was in town Dudley had failed to understand how resentful and isolated his quickly acquired power had made him and consequently he did not watch his back he had become the unacceptable face of the old regime he was thrown into the tower under false charges of treason and finally executed as the seventeen-year-old man. old Henry VIII was proclaimed king.

He worked with a populist touch by issuing a general pardon that promised reform, justice and redress of grievances. Thomas More's coronation poem celebrated the arrival of this spectacular new young king and contrasted the rain that would come with the

dark

days he had just passed This day is the end of our slavery the beginning of our freedom the end of sadness a source of joy now he said there were no thieves of his slides holding hands and he is no longer afraid his secrets whispered in his ear this King is Beloved more he also said that the coronation of the new King was like the arrival of a new season but this reference to the seasons he also said something else, in fact he underlined a contrast that was emphasized more throughout his poem if there was to be a new spring of joy and freedom it had to follow a

winter

of repression and fear if Henry VIII was the spring Henry the Seventh had been the

winter

Henry the Seventh funeral procession processed through the streets of London his effigy displayed in a carriage drawn by five horses covered in black velvet but despite all the criticism of his reign, Henry VII had still achieved what was had proposed: he had passed the crown of England.

Westminster Abbey is a national shrine, the burial place of kings, politicians, poets and playwrights, and this is where Henry the Seventh was buried in the chapel he had been building for the last six years. It was one of the architectural wonders of the time. It was described in the 16th century. Its miraculous universality is the wonder of the entire world. And it really is an amazing building. This spectacular mausoleum is Henry's definitive statement to the world, not what we might expect from a miserly winter king, so here Henry is buried according to his last will and testament alongside his beloved wife Elizabeth.

These are idealized portraits of Henry and Elizabeth as they were in their prime, they are destined to be timeless figures of

royalty

and royalty more than 500 years after his death. Henry's Chapel remains at the heart of British political life and is a testament to his extraordinary determination and will to power to achieve all that he aspired and desired. Being from an isolated beach in Wales where he landed with few claims to the throne and even less hope He fought and won his battles He unified a kingdom He amassed immense wealth But his greatest legacy would only become clear as time runs around the tomb There is an inscription that says that Henry was the richest, the most intelligent, the most worthy, the most glorious of the kings and Isabel, his wife was the most beautiful, the most chaste and the most fruitful, notNot only had their marriage been happy but, crucially, it had also produced children, the inscription concludes by saying that the land of England should be considered particularly fortunate among the chief of those descendants, the current King Henry the Eighth, fortunate old England , Henry the Eighth's rain would be turbulent in the extreme, but it was also his father's greatest achievement.

Henry VII had created our most famous and notorious dynasty, the Tudors.