Joel | March 7, 2022
This day in Tudor history, 7th March 1556, was one of the days on which the Great Comet, or the Comet of Charles V, was seen and recorded by Paul Fabricius, mathematician and physician at the court of Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. Find out all about the Great Comet of 1556, what it looked […]
Joel | December 17, 2021
On this day in Tudor history, 17th December 1559, fifty-five-year-old Matthew Parker was consecrated as Queen Elizabeth I’s Archbishop of Canterbury. It was an office which Parker did not want and would not have accepted if “he had not been so much bound to the mother”. What did he mean by that? Well, when he […]
Claire | December 17, 2015
On 17th December 1538, Pope Paul III announced the excommunication of King Henry VIII. Pope Clement VII had threatened the king with excommunication in March 1530 after he had found out from Catherine of Aragon that Henry had boasted that he would take a second wife “notwithstanding the inhibition and mandate against him”.1 Then, in […]
Claire | July 11, 2015
On 11 Pope Clement VII declared that Henry VIII’s marriage to Anne Boleyn was null, as was the annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, and threatened the King with excommunication if he did not abandon the pregnant Anne and return to Catherine. Read more… Also on this day in history… 1536 – Death […]
Claire | December 17, 2014
On this day in history, 17th December 1538, Pope Paul III announced that Henry VIII had been excommunicated from the Catholic Church. The original bull of excommunication had been issued on 30th August 1535, but the excommunication had been suspended in the hope that Henry would mend his ways. The final straw for the Pope, […]
Claire | July 11, 2014
On 11th July 1533, just over a month after Anne Boleyn’s coronation, Pope Clement VII declared that Henry VIII’s marriage to Anne Boleyn was null, as was the annulment of his marriage to Catherine of Aragon, and threatened the King with excommunication if he did not abandon the pregnant Anne and return to Catherine. The […]
Claire | July 11, 2013
On 11th July 1533, Pope Clement VII declared his sentence on the annulment of the King’s marriage to Catherine of Aragin and his subsequent marriage to Anne Boleyn: “Sentence of Clement VII. against Henry VIII., declaring his divorce from Katharine and marriage with Anne Boleyn null; and pronouncing the King to have incurred the greater […]
