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Weekly History essay writing: Week 2

Week 2

How significant was religion in succession disputed from 1534 to 1558

The Allegory of the Tudor succession, clearly epitomises how important religion was to the succession. Even though the painting is not in real-time, it represents what time was like. On the right you have the Protestants of Edward VI and Elizabeth I and this shows an innocuous and amicable setting, however on the left it shows the Catholics, with Mary I and Philip II, in which it shows a dangerous setting, in which this is emphasised by the use of Mars, the God of War. This picture shows how important religion was, to the extent that it was able to separate a family, in which one religion was prioritised, and this is also shown with Henry being closer to the Protestants, and simply the Catholics have been ostracized away, showing how succession did factor in the religion of that person. Religion was also significant and that was because of the reformation. This is because after the reformation, this did set-up England to be a one-religion country, in which before the reformation it was a very politique society, showing how the reformation acted as a catalyst what would change the line further down (with Edward’s decision between Mary and Elizabeth). The reformation is key because it sets off a reaction that resulted in the 1536 Pilgrimage of Grace, but the most important idea would be the 1540 excommunication of Henry VIII by Pope Paul III. This affected the succession because it now meant Henry had nothing to lose, in which he knew that Mary’s theology would not work in this monarchy. However, it is important to know, and this is emphasised by Historian JJ Scarisbrick in his book “Henry VIII”, that even though the reformation was occurring, Henry VIII was still a Catholic, and that was shown throughout. For example, when Thomas Cromwell brought in the 10 articles (replacing transubstantiation to consubstantiation for example), Henry thought that he was going too fast and introduced the 6 articles, bringing back Catholic ideas, like the Veneration of Mary, images, celibacy of Saints and transubstantiation. Also Henry was seriously pious, utilising the idea of the Divine Right of Kings (that God chose him to be the King) throughout his reign. But also when Henry read in the Bible about Leviticus 18:16 (what said his marriage to Catherine was besmirching his brother) it changed him mentally. Historian G.R. Elton writes in “England under the Tudors” that “It was one of the main factors that led Henry to wanting to annul his marriage.” The fact of the matter is that with these pieces of evidence it showed that Henry was serious about religion, so when it came to successors, especially before 1537 when Edward was not alive, religion would have been the top of the key. Furthermore, to show how important religion was, is the marriage to Anne of Cleves. The main reason why Henry chose to marry Anne of Cleves was to join with the only major Protestant force at this time (through the hard work of Luther and his reforms), showing how a marriage (as sacred as it was) was decided by religion (and the work of Hans Holbein the Younger), simply showing how much succession depended on religion. Also another reason why religion was so important was because of the factions, especially throughout Edward VI. This is because with Edward coming to the end of his life he needed to pick an heir, and at the start he said in his “device for a succession” that one of the grey’s sons (Jane, Elizabeth or Mary) would become King, but at the end he picked Jane, and this clearly showed the religious importance. Also on the topic of Royal wills, in Henry’s will it was almost indoctrinated by Protestants, showing because Stephen Gardiner and Thomas Howard, 3rd Duke of Norfolk, two main Catholics, were both omitted from the will and placed in the Tower, showing how important religion was at this time, and how it reciprocated onto succession. Out all of the female women, he picked the most, as A.F. Pollard described it, “ardent and dutiful Protestant”, and that is due to the fact that the main person who was running the court was of John Dudley, 1st Duke of Northumberland. He was powerful, showing this with his leadership with defeating Robert Kett in Norfolk, in which Elton said “Wawrick (his title at the time) crushed Kett”, but also he showed his power through crushing Scotland at Pinkie Cleugh, and through successfully neutralizing the power of the Duke of Somerset in 1550, what lead to his execution in 1552. Basically, he was the Thomas Howard, 2nd Duke of Norfolk, equivalent of Protestant England, in which he replicated this with his religion. Historian G.R.Elton describes Dudley as a “man who switched religion too much depending on the monarch at that time”, and throughout the reign of Edward, it was Protestant. He showed this power to marry his son, Sir Guildford Dudley to Lady Jane Grey, and ultimately a surge in religion, created by Dudley, acted as a spotlight that attracted Edward to make her successor to the throne, showing how significant religion was. Another example would be Mary’s marriage to Philip. Now even though the Venetian Ambassador Michieli said that Mary was “extraordinarily in love” with Philip, it was all down to religion. To show this, when Wyatt’s rebellion was put down, Mary even placed her step-sister Elizabeth Tudor in the Tower of London for 2 months and then placed her under house arrest at Woodstock palace. But also on Philip’s side his ambassador said that: “the marriage was concluded for no fleshly consideration, but in order to remedy the disorders of this kingdom and to preserve the Low Countries." That is also linked to religion because of threat that Calvinism had in the low countries with William the Silent and others, and this potential threat was displayed with the Dutch Revolt, in which many Historians agree saying that Philip wanted a Catholic baby so that he could also carry on putting down Protestant surges.

On the other hand, there are also other things that were significant towards the succession. The first idea would be gender. There had not been a Queen, since Mary, that was undisputed for 400 years, and that was Queen Matilda. Personally, I think that because of the problems that Matilda created along with her relative of Stephen, what resulted in a civil war, now known as the anarchy, this created this fixated impression that women were unable to rule the throne.Chroniclers described the period as one in which "Christ and his saints were asleep" and Victorian historians called the conflict "the Anarchy" because of the chaos. Going back to the Allegory of the Tudor succession, it is also important to look at Edward compared to the other two children of Henry VIII. Edward is small, Mary and Elizabeth are not, Edward looks inexperienced, with a lack of education compared to the much older Mary and Elizabeth. Edward is the closest to Henry VIII, holding the globus cruciger, symbolising the importance of gender. Also in the official Tudor family photo by an unknown artists, Henry’s arm is around Edward, and Mary is almost ostracized away from him, and that was the same in real-life. Gender was a very interesting topic, in the patriarchal society full of misogynistic men. A perfect example would be John Knox’s “First Blast of the Trumpets against the monstrous regiment of women.” Knox said "God, by the order of his creation, has [deprived] woman of authority and dominion" and from history that "man has seen, proved, and pronounced just causes why it should be.” Gender was also important for Henry VIII in which it has been argued that it is the main reason why he wanted an annulment, in which he broke from the Catholic church in 1532 just so he could gain a male. A monarch who wrote: “The defence of the seven sacramets” against Luther’s 95 theses in 1520, what led to Pope Leo X giving him the title “Defender of the Faith”, and the same monarch who burnt William Tynedale at the stake for the translation of the Bible into English, was the same person who broke from Rome, just to get a male heir, showing the importance. Another factor is legitimacy, and that was shown with firstly when Edward (with Northumberland) was writing “devise for a succession” he made it clear that the heir had to be legitimate, and that showed the simple importance of legitimacy, what restricted Mary for a smooth transition over to be the first Queen to be coronated. The importance of legitimacy is shown through the 3 act of successions (1533. 1536 and 1544). Also in the time of Henry VIII, legitimacy was important for the throne and that was because Henry (in 1534) had a son by the name of Henry FitzRoy, but it was illegitimate with a lady in his courts named Elizabeth Blount. To show the gravity of this topic, Henry placed in his diary: “this legitimacy problem will be the bane of my life.” Also another factor that could factor Tudor succession, could be race. As the reformation continued throughout time, this leads to certain reformers becoming the most popular, in which the main one would be Martin Luther. Luther wrote about Jews very provocatively, using very pejorative language against them. At first, he thought that Jews were just ostracized away from Christianity, and that they needed to be invited into Christianity, in which he wrote: “ That Jesus Christ Was Born a Jew”, however after Jews ignored him, this is when he wrote the crude work of “The Jews and their lies”, in which he inspires people to burn down synagogues, killing jews, stop Rabbits from giving sermons and also to burn the Torah. This work was very influential to others at the time, for example a Jewish Journalist named Josel of Rosheim asked for the Strasbourg government to ban the book, however, they thought it was great so they did not. However they were forced to ban it when a Priest told people to kill Jews during a sermon. However, in Tudor England (especially during the reign of Edward VI) there were a lot of Jews, but also when Catharine of Aragon came to England a lot of black people came to England, and subsequently the works of a Protestant had an effect on a Protestant country, in which a lot of Jews were sent out of the country, and that did affect the throne, and that is argued by Historian John Guy, not in his books, but in general, lecturing, that Jews were linked to the throne, especially a lot of males that were linked to the Brandon family, but because of the “sin” that having a Jew in your family was, a lot of them were exiled or just wiped away from their history, taking them out of the succession conversation, and this did subsequently make it harder for Edward VI, because there was no male heir, ready for when he dies. It is hard to understand how effective Luther’s “The Jews and their lies” was, and just to show the effect it had, many Historians, including Diarmaid MacCulloch and Daniel Goldhagen have argued that Luther was actually the influencer for the Nazi Party, in which for example, Heinrich Himmler frequently quoted Luther, and the official Nazi Newspaper, Die Sturmer, would also quote Luther from that book. Reinhold Lewin writes that anybody who "wrote against the Jews for whatever reason believed he had the right to justify himself by triumphantly referring to Luther." According to Michael, just about every anti-Jewish book printed in the Third Reich contained references to and quotations from Luther.Furthermore, the editor for Die Sturmer, Julius Streicher was given a fuirst edition of the book for his birthday, in whicht he same copy was placed in a glass cabinet during the Nuremberg rallies. On the topic of birthdays, many Historians argue that the reason why Kristallnacht was started on the 11th November was because it was the birthday of Martin Luther, showcasing the influence of Luther, and how much that would have been magnified and projected in the 16th century, and in England (a historically racist country who also historically hated Jews, but still had them).

Overall I think religion was the most important factor and that is because of the fact that it stayed relevant throughout the reign of Henry VIII to Elizabeth I. Historian G.R. Elton writes in his “Reformation Europe”, that: “Europe in the early to mid 16th century remains a magnet to student and reader alike”, and “it remains the most gripping Tudor time topic to date”, showing how indecipherable it would be to think how important and salient it was at that time, and this was all opened up and marshalled by Luther’s opposition to the Papal Authority, and as this surged into Switzerland with Zwingli, Strasbourg with Bucer, Geneva with Calvin, Scotland with Knox and many more, England was also grasped by it. When talking about the Duke of Somerset in his book, Historian G.R. Elton described England as the “Mecca for reformers”, and a lot of people came in order to lead a much more tamer country, for example Peter Martyr from Italy and Bucer from Strasbourg. The antithesis of this was gender, because i think that Gender was only paramount until the start of the Mary’s reign. At the start people thought that Mary would be pushed to the side when she was to marry an English man (for example like Reginald Pole or Edward Courtney), but when she married Philip II nothing changed, because of the acts passed by Parliament, and to show this lack of change, on the coins at the time, Mary was in front of Philip II, as if he was a concierge to her, and this idea of Women being on the throne was still seen as weird, in which they were called, “she-wolves”. However, the eventual reign of Mary for 5 years and then Elizabeth for 45 years, definitely nullified and assuaged the problem of Gender. Also on the topic of race, many Historians disagree on the influence of Luther. Johannes Wallmann argues that Luther's writings against the Jews were largely ignored in the 18th and 19th centuries, and that there was no continuity between Luther's thought and Nazi ideology and Uwe Siemon-Netto also agreed, arguing that it was because the Nazis were already antisemites that they revived Luther's work. Without the religious schisms and the now the radical view of religion, with the rising of the Anabaptist, things like Gender and race would not have been a problem. A prime example, is that many scholars like Erasmus and Johannes Oecolampadius argued that Genesis 2:22 showed that women were inferior to men, due to the fact that Adam came before Eve and that she was created from him, and with that idea, it plagued this idea of women not being able to rule, and even though the rule of Matilda has been attributed to the patriarchal, the genesis 2:22 idea has always been theorised, but because it was in the time of the reformation this acted as a catalyst, meaning now more people understood the bible (through the introduction of catechisms and vernacular language and the Vulgate), and when society says something, the monarchy usually will conform to it or face it, showing the influence religion had on the succession line.

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