During the 15th century the throne of England was claimed by representatives of two rival groups. The power of the greatest nobles, who had their own armies, meant the constant challenges to the position of the monarch were possible. The Lancastrians, whose symbol was a red rose, supported the descendants of the Duke of Lancaster, and the Yorkists, whose symbol was a white rose, supported the descendants of the Duke of York. The struggle for power led to the Wars of the Roses between 1455 and 1485. (The name was coined by the 19th-century novelist Sir Walter Scott, but it is a convenient shorthand for these battles between the powerful House of York and that of Lancaster.) One of the nastiest things about these
wars was the number of people who were executed with or without a trial, off the field of battle. Perhaps the best known of these murders was that of young princes, Edward and Richard of York, said to have been smothered while imprisoned in the Tower of London in 1483. The guilt of their uncle, Richard III as described by Shakespeare, has never been proved. The circumstances of Richard’s own death are well known though. He was killed during the Battle of Bosworth, Leicestershire, where Shakespeare had him offering his kingdom for a horse, while his crown rolled into a nearby bush.
Both dynasties died in the war and that’s why a new dynasty of Tudors took the English throne. Henry Tudor, who defeated Richard III and became Henry VII (1485-1509), was a distant relative of the Lancaster family. To put an end to the wars Henry married Elizabeth of York (in 1485). This united the two roses and put the country under the rule of the Tudors.
The year of 1485 is traditionally considered the Watergate (водораздел) and the beginning oа the Tudor Age (Тюдоровское столетие). From that time there was the period of stability and strong government (1485-1603).
During the Tudors reign the Parliament was split into the House of Lords and the House of Commons. Henry VII shaped the English type of absolute monarchy, which opposed the power of old barons and disbanded their armies to prevent further feudal wars. The financial policy of Henry VII filled the Treasury, strengthened the throne and the Church position, and improved the contacts with Rome. The king skillfully steered through the complexities of the European politics.
One of the most notorious kings of this dynasty was Henry VIII. He is well-known in English history mostly because he married six times and thus had six wives during his life. He was cruel, wasteful with money and interested in pleasing himself. He wanted to become an important influence in European politics. Henry disliked the power of the Church in England because, since it was an international organization, he couldn’t control it. Thus the power of the Catholic Church in England could work against his own authority, and the taxes paid to the Church reduced his own income. But Henry VIII had another reason for taking the power from the Church.
In 1510 Henry VIII had married Catherine of Aragon, the widow of his elder brother Arthur. But by 1526 she had still not had a son to pass the crown to, and was now unlikely to do so. That’s why Henry tried to persuade the Church to allow him to divorce Catherine and marry his new love, Anne Boleyn. He hoped Anne would give him a son.
But Anne gave him a daughter (a future Elisabeth I), and Henry was disappointed. To rid of his new wife he accused her of being unfaithful and publicly beheaded her. To have a son he married for the third time. His third
wife was Jane Seymour. He truly loved her, but she died giving him the son he wanted. His next three marriages were motivated by his desire to find a suitable step-mother for his son, and other children.
The fate of the king’s spouses, the queens is ‘humorously’ described by some school teacher with the following rhyme:
divorced, beheaded, died,
divorced, behead, survived.
Henry VIII died in 1547, leaving behind six wives and three children: Mary, the eldest, was the daughter of Catherine of Aragon; Elisabeth was the daughter of
