Last time on the Chrysalis Imaging Blog:
Henry the VIII married his brother's wife, Katherine of Aragon, whom he later divorced after Anne Boleyn set her sights on becoming Queen of England. Her ambitions, however, proved to be her Achilles Heel and she was beheaded after being found guilty on bogus charges. Next on deck, Jane Seymour (not Dr. Quinn, Medicine Woman - I keep putting that in because I know someone's gonna think "Wha? Henry the VIII was married to Dr. Quinn?"). She was a good wife and Henry never had reason to say "Off with her head!" because she died from complications of childbirth.
And now, the rest of the story . . .
After Jane died, a marriage was arranged with Anne of Cleves, a girl of German descent. Henry had only seen an artist's rendering of Anne and was appalled when he finally saw her in person. "I like her not!" he declared and refused to consummate the marriage. Anne was so naive that she didn't know her marriage hadn't been consummated. "The king comes to my bed every night and kisses me," she protested when her ladies in waiting tried to educate her. Definitely no heirs of any kind coming from that marriage. Henry, however, treated her with respect (largely because she never lost her respect for him) and allowed her to retain much of what she had been given in marriage after their divorce (or it might have been an annulment since they never sealed the deal).
After Anne was successfully dispatched to a lovely country estate, Henry fell in love with little Katherine Howard, who was all of fifteen when they got married. By this time Henry was around 50 or so and had grown to the bloated, elaborately dressed image we see in most of his portraits. He also had some ulceration on his leg that evidently stank and produced copious amounts of pus - I know, it's just sick. Not long after their marriage, information was obtained that the young queen had not come to the marriage the maiden she swore to be and was not honoring her vows to "cleave only to thee." She was accused of adultery and she ended up with her head being permanently detached from the rest of her body. In addition, the two men who were accused (with no absolute proof) were strung up, their bowels cut out while they were still alive and then beheaded and quartered. Kind of puts a little more ooomph to the term "fatal attraction."
This leaves only Katherine Parr. Henry was her third husband. She was rather bland compared to Henry's other wives, but she was well loved by both her husband and her subjects and provided much-need mothering to Henry's three children. There was a half-baked plot to expose her as a Protestant (which she was and which was also a big no-no at the time), but she managed to keep her anti-Catholic tendencies hidden and entered into history as a good and faithful wife. She outlived Henry, who died at the age of 55.
Now, keep in mind that the whole time he was married (except maybe when he was married to Katherine Howard), Henry was carrying on affairs with a number of different women. It was his RIGHT. Oh, the arrogance! HE was never punished, except for the fact that he failed at the one thing his father had told him was his number one priority as King of England: produce a male heir. Tsk, tsk, tsk. Guess he had to pay the piper, reap what he sowed, and lay in the bed he made, etc. And you know what? I would almost give a king's ransom (!) that he never realized the error of his ways.
No comments:
Post a Comment