Claire | November 22, 2022
On this day in Tudor history, 22nd November 1545, in the reign of King Henry VIII, Sir William Butts died after suffering from a “dooble febre quartanz”, a form of malaria. Sir William Butts was a royal physician and Henry VIII sent him to Hever Castle in 1528 to treat his sweetheart Anne Boleyn when […]
Claire | October 6, 2022
On this day in Tudor history, 6th October 1510, in the reign of King Henry VIII, John Caius was born at Norwich. John Caius served as a royal physician to Edward VI, Mary I and Elizabeth I, and he was also a theological scholar, founder of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge, and the author of […]
Claire | July 14, 2022
On this day in Tudor history, 14th July 1551, in the reign of King Edward VI, the sons of Catherine Willoughby, Duchess of Suffolk, and the late Charles Brandon, Duke of Suffolk, died at Buckden. Fifteen-year-old Henry Brandon, 2nd Duke of Suffolk, and his fourteen-year-old brother, Charles, 3rd Duke of Suffolk, had been taken ill […]
Claire | June 22, 2019
On 22nd June 1528, after eight years of marriage, Mary Boleyn, sister of Anne Boleyn, was widowed. Her husband, William Carey, died during the sweating sickness epidemic that hit the royal court that summer. Her first husband’s death had a major impact on Mary, who was left with two young children: Catherine, aged four, and […]
Claire | March 22, 2019
I’m back with my latest instalment in the “Questions about Anne Boleyn” series of videos. Sweating sickness was a strange illness which affected England in five outbreaks between 1485 and 1551. It caused panic because of just how fast it could kill. In Showtime’s “The Tudors”, we see Anne Boleyn, played by Natalie Dormer, coming […]
Claire | July 14, 2016
On 14th July 1551, fifteen year-old Henry Brandon, 2nd Duke of Suffolk, and his fourteen year-old brother, Charles, 3rd Duke of Suffolk, died of sweating sickness at the home of the Bishop of Lincoln in Buckden, Huntingdonshire. They were the sons of the late Charles Brandon, 1st Duke of Suffolk, and his fourth wife Catherine […]
Claire | June 22, 2016
On 22nd June 1528, eight years into their marriage, Mary Boleyn lost her first husband, William Carey to sweating sickness. Sweating Sickness, a disease that affected England with epidemics in 1485, 1508, 1517, 1528 and 1551, hit Henry VIII’s court in May 1528, causing the court to be broken up and the king and queen […]
Claire | July 14, 2015
Sweating sickness, or the English Sweat, was a horrible disease which decimated towns and took thousands of lives in its five epidemics in England in 1485, 1508, 1517, 1528 and 1551. It was a disease which killed quickly. Chronicler Edward Hall wrote of how it could kill within 2-3 hours, commenting “some merry at dinner […]
