Wives of Henry VIII

The six wives (queens consort) of Henry VIII of England were, in order: Catherine of Aragon (annulled), Anne Boleyn (beheaded), Jane Seymour (died, childbirth fever), Anne of Cleves (annulled), Catherine Howard (beheaded), and Catherine Parr. It is often noted that Catherine Parr "survived him"; in fact Anne of Cleves also survived the king and was the last of his queens to die. Of the six queens, Catherine of Aragon, Anne Boleyn and Jane Seymour each gave Henry one child who survived infancy — two daughters and one son, all three of whom would eventually accede to the throne. They were King Edward VI, Queen Mary I and Queen Elizabeth I.

Wives

1. Catherine of Aragon (December 16, 1485 – January 7, 1536; Spanish: Catalina de Aragón) was Henry's first wife. After the death of Arthur, her first husband and Henry's brother, a papal dispensation was obtained to enable her to marry Henry, though the marriage did not take place until after he came to the throne in 1509. Catherine bore him a daughter in 1516, Mary I, but no sons who survived past infancy since they were miscarriages and stillborn.

Henry, then a devout Roman Catholic, sought the Pope's approval for an annulment on the grounds that the marriage was invalid because Catherine had first been his brother's wife. Henry had begun an affair with Anne Boleyn, who is said to have refused to become his mistress (Henry had already consummated an affair with and then dismissed Anne's sister (Mary Boleyn), and Anne wanted to avoid the same treatment). Despite the pope's refusal, Henry separated from Catherine in 1533. In the face of the Pope's continuing refusal to annul his marriage to Catherine, Henry ordered the highest church official in England, Thomas Cranmer, Archbishop of Canterbury to convene a court to rule on the status of his marriage to Catherine. On May 23, 1533, Cranmer ruled the marriage to Catherine null and void. On May 28, 1533 he pronounced the King legally married to Anne Boleyn (with whom Henry had already secretly exchanged wedding vows, probably in late January 1533). This led to the break from the Roman Catholic Church and the later establishment of the Church of England.

2. Anne Boleyn (1501/1507–19 May 1536) was the second wife of Henry VIII of England and the mother of Elizabeth I of England. Henry's marriage to Anne, and her subsequent execution, made her a key player in the political and religious upheaval that was the start of the English Reformation. The daughter of Sir Thomas Boleyn and his wife, Lady Elizabeth Boleyn (born Lady Elizabeth Howard), Anne was of nobler birth than either Jane Seymour or Catherine Parr, two of Henry's later wives. She was educated in Europe, largely as a lady-in-waiting to Queen Claude of France. She returned to England in 1522.

In 1525, Henry VIII became enamoured with Anne and began his pursuit of her. Anne resisted the king's attempts to seduce her and she refused to become his mistress, as her sister, Mary Boleyn, had done. It soon became the one absorbing object of the king's desires to secure a divorce from his wife, Catherine of Aragon so he could marry Anne. When it became clear that Pope Clement VII was unlikely to give the king an annulment, the breaking of the power of the Roman Catholic Church in England began.

Anne Boleyn had Thomas Wolsey dismissed from public office and later had the Boleyn family's chaplain, Thomas Cranmer, appointed archbishop of Canterbury. In 1533, Henry and Anne went through a secret wedding service. She soon became pregnant and there was a second wedding service, which took place in London on 25 January 1533. On 23 May 1533, Cranmer declared the marriage of Henry and Catherine null and void. Five days later, Cranmer declared the marriage of Henry and Anne to be good and valid. Soon after, the pope launched sentences of excommunication against the king and the archbishop. As a result of Anne's marriage to the king, the Church of England was forced to break with Rome and was brought under the king's control.

Anne was crowned Queen Consort of England on 1 June 1533. Later that year, on 7 September, Anne gave birth to a baby girl who would one day reign as Queen Elizabeth I of England. When Anne failed to quickly produce a male heir her only son being stillborn, the king grew tired of her and a plot was hatched by Thomas Cromwell to do away with her.

Although the evidence against her was unconvincing, Anne was beheaded on charges of adultery, incest, and high treason in 1536. Following the coronation of her daughter Elizabeth as queen, Anne was venerated as a martyr and heroine of the English Reformation, particularly through the works of John Foxe. Over the centuries, Anne has inspired or been mentioned in numerous artistic and cultural works. Due to this fact, she has remained in the popular memory and Anne has been called "the most influential and important queen consort England has ever had."3. Jane Seymour (c. mid-1508–October 24, 1537) was Henry's third wife. He first became attracted to her while she was one of Anne Boleyn's ladies-in-waiting, and it is popularly believed she is the reason he disposed of Anne. After their marriage in 1536, she gave him his only male heir, later Edward VI, but died shortly after birth of puerperal fever.

4. Anne of Cleves (September 22, 1515 – July 16, 1557) was Henry's fourth wife, for only six months in 1540, from January 6 to July 9. She has become known as "The Flanders Mare" because the king is said to have disliked her appearance. Her pre-contract of marriage with Francis, Duke of Lorraine, was cited as grounds for an annulment. Anne agreed to this, claiming that the marriage had not been consummated, and she was given a generous settlement, including Hever Castle, former home of Henry's former in-laws, the Boleyns. She was given the name "The King's Sister", and became a friend to him and his children. She outlived both the king and his last two wives.

5. Catherine Howard (1520/1525? – February 13, 1542) was Henry's fifth wife 1540–1542, sometimes known as "the rose without a thorn". Henry was informed of her alleged adultery on November 1, 1541. After being deprived of the title of Queen, she was beheaded at the Tower of London. The night before, Catherine spent hours practicing how to lay her head upon the block, and her last words were for mercy for her family and prayers for her soul. She was buried next to her cousin Anne Boleyn. Her ghost is said to have haunted Henry for years later, and was even heard screaming by others.

6. Catherine Parr (about 1512 – September 7, 1548), also spelled Katharine, was the sixth and last wife of Henry VIII 1543–1547. She has a special place in history as the most married queen of England, having had four husbands in all; Henry was her third spouse. She had been widowed three times in rapid succession. After Henry's death, she married Thomas Seymour, uncle of Edward VI, to whom she had formed an attachment prior to her marriage with Henry. She had one child by Seymour, Mary, and died in childbirth. Mary's history is unknown, but she is believed to have died as a toddler.

A mnemonic for the fates of Henry's wives is "divorced, beheaded, died, divorced, beheaded, survived". An alternate version is "King Henry the Eighth, to six wives he was wedded: One died, one survived, two divorced, two beheaded." Some may dub these as misleading doggerel, and that Henry was never technically "divorced" from any of his wives, rather that his marriages to them were annulled. Likewise four marriages — not two — "ended" in annulments.

Marriage lengths

Diagram of Henry's VIII reign relative to his marriages.

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Further reading

Non-fiction, histories

* Book by Alison Weir, "The Six Wives of Henry VIII"
* Book by David Starkey, "Six Wives: The Queens of Henry VIII"
* Book by Antonia Fraser, "The Wives of Henry VIII", 1st American ed. (Knopf, 1992)
*

Fiction, novels

*Katharine, the Virgin Widow by Jean Plaidy (Katherine of Aragon)
*Murder Most Royal by Jean Plaidy (Anne Boleyn and Katherine Howard)
*The King's Secret Matter by Jean Plaidy (Katherine of Aragon)
*The Sixth Wife by Jean Plaidy (Katherine Parr)
*The Rose Without A Thorn by Jean Plaidy (Katherine Howard)
*Here Comes the King by Philip Lindsay (Katherine Howard)

* "The Other Boleyn Girl" by Philippa Gregory (Anne and Mary Boleyn)
* "The Constant Princess" by Phillipa Gregory (Katherine of Aragon)
* "The Boleyn Inheritance" by Phillipa Gregory (Katherine Howard, Jane Boleyn and Anne of Cleves)

Film and television

* BBC TV series, "The Six Wives of Henry VIII"
* Film, "The Private Life of Henry VIII" (1933).
* Film, "Anne of the Thousand Days" (1969).
* Film, "Henry VIII and His Six Wives" (1973).
* Showtime TV Series, "The Tudors" (2007).
* Film, "The Other Boleyn Girl (film)" (2008).

Music

*Progressive rock album by Rick Wakeman, "The Six Wives of Henry VIII".