The Monarchs of the House of Tudor
History Page
King Henry VII derived his claim to the throne from his mother, Lady Margaret Beaufort, from her descent from the third marriage of John of Gaunt, Duke of Lancaster. In fact, Lady Margaret, who outlived her son, might have called herself Queen of England; but even is she had been allowed to reign, it would have been her son who would have ruled.
Through his father, Edmund Tudor, Herny VII was descended from kings of France and native princes of Wales. Henry's paternal grandmother was Cathering of France, daughter of King Charles VI. As the widow of England's King Henry V, she had retired into such obscurity that for years no one discovered that she had married her squire, Owen Tudor. Henry VI, her son by her first marriage, created his Tudor half-brothers earls of Richmond and Pembroke, and they responded by supporting him in his fight against the Yorkists. Through the Tudors, Henry VII was a descendant of Rhodri Mawr(the great) who had unified most of Wales under his rule in the 9th century. In 1301 Llwelyn ap Gruffydd, the last native prince, was defeated in battle by England's King Edward I, who in 1301 declared his own son Prince of Wales, a title borne by the eldest son of the sovereign ever since that time.
Two decades into his reign, Henry VIII still lacked a male heir. Had he died then, the crown would have been disputed between rival claimants, and England would again have been a battlefield.
It was this prospect that prompted Henry to seek an annulment of his marriage, so that he might marry a woman who could give him a son. Although annulments of royal marriages were not unusual, the Pope could not oblige Henry, for fear of the Queen's nephew, the Holy Roman Emperor and kind of Spain. After years of frustration, the king solved the problem by having his Archbishop of Canterbury declare the marriage void on his own authority. Immediatly Henry married again, but his second wife also failed to produce a son. The third was more satisfactory: the future King Edward VI was born amidst great rejoicing in 1537.
Henry VIII initially intended only a denial of papal power in England, but by the end of his reign it was obvious that the doctrines of the Continental Reformation had gained adherents in his kingdom. Religious persecution, of both Catholics and Protestants, blighted the rest of the century. Henry's son had been dearly bough.
After the death of Edward VI, John Dudley, the Duke of Northumberland, placed his daughter-in-law, Lady Jane Grey, on the throne, in right of her descent form Henry's sister, Mary, on the grounds that Henry's daughters Mary and Elizabeth were both illegitmate. Jane's reign lasted only nine days, when the rightful queen, Mary I, daughter of Henry VIII by Catherine of Aragon, dethroned her. At her death, Mary was succeeded by her half-sister Elizabeth I, Henry's daughter by his second wife Anne Boleyn. At her death, she name her Scottish cousin James VI as heir.
