Arthur Tudor

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Arthur, Prince of Wales, when he was around fifteen

Arthur Tudor (born September 20, 1486 in Winchester , † April 2, 1502 at Ludlow Castle ) was the eldest son of King Henry VII from the House of Tudor and the Elizabeth of York from the House of York . He was born the Duke of Cornwall and was named the eighth Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester on November 29, 1489 . In 1501 he married Catherine of Aragon . He was the great hope of the new Tudor dynasty, but died surprisingly at the age of only 15.

His younger brother married Arthur's widow and succeeded his father as Henry VIII on the throne. When this marriage did not produce a male heir to the throne, Arthur's previous marriage to Katharina became the hook for Heinrich to request the annulment of the marriage. This had far-reaching consequences for England .

Life

birth

The Tudor rose, union of the white rose of York and the red rose of Lancaster

“On the morning before the first hour after midnight, Prince Arthur was born in Winchester,” wrote his grandmother Margaret Beaufort on September 20, 1486 in her book of hours. His birth was of great significance and was greeted with cheers and bonfires in the streets. Arthur was the hope of peace for all of England, the heir to the throne of the new Tudor dynasty . He united in himself the blood of the warring noble houses of Lancaster and York , which had previously fought for the throne in the Wars of the Roses for decades .

Arthur's father, Henry VII, heir to the House of Lancaster, had only won the crown on the battlefield the previous year and married the heiress of the House of York, Elizabeth of York. Arthur was the living symbol of this union of the two houses, whose symbols of the white and red rose merged into the white and red Tudor rose. The new dynasty had been crowned with an heir to the throne just eight months after their marriage, who was enthusiastically welcomed by court poets as the future king of peace in a golden age.

Place of birth and choice of name

The alchemists believed that the union of the red king and the white queen, from which Arthur was born, was prophesied by Merlin . In his day, not only was the Arthurian legend believed to be true, but Winchester was also believed to be the historical Camelot . It is therefore not by chance that the little prince was born and baptized in Winchester. His parents had purposely traveled to Winchester from London three weeks earlier to await his birth.

Because Arthur was born there surprisingly early, the baptism had to be postponed for a few days in order to give one of his godparents, the Earl of Oxford , the necessary time to travel. His other godfather was the Earl of Derby and his godmother was his maternal grandmother, Elizabeth Woodville .

On September 24, the prince was baptized Arthur in a spectacular ceremony in Winchester Cathedral , after the mythical King Arthur . He was to go down in history as King Arthur II and, like his famous namesake, ushered in a new golden age. In order to emphasize the choice of name and to place Arthur in the context of a long line of English kings, his father traced his ancestry back to the times of King Arthur and at the baptism a tapestry was shown which bore the coat of arms of Arthur's maternal ancestor, Belinus , showed.

Throughout his entire future life, contemporaries made comparisons between Arthur and King Arthur and placed high expectations on him to follow in the footsteps of his great namesake.

childhood

Arthur, around his eleventh year, "tall, of extraordinary beauty and charm, very willing to speak Latin"

Just four weeks after his birth, Arthur and his nurse Catherine Gibbs were taken to Farnham Castle , where, under the guidance of Lady Dacre, a nursery was set up for him outside his parents' court, as was the custom for royal princes. The Queen did not visit her son again until January and March. Lady Dacre had already been in charge of the house of the last Crown Prince Edward , and Arthur's father was almost scrupulously following the pattern of his upbringing in other ways too.

In 1489 a larger household was set up for the three-year-old, this time also with male servants. He was made Knight of the Bath on November 28, the day his younger sister Margaret was born , and Margaret was baptized in a double ceremony the day after, and Arthur was officially made Prince of Wales and Earl of Chester .

Arthur's education was up to date and began when he was four or five years old with the basics of reading, writing, and arithmetic, which he learned very quickly. Then around 1491 John Rede , Rector of Winchester College , was appointed as tutor for his further studies, and in 1496 for the third part of his training the blind poet Bernard André . He later named an impressive list of Latin works by 25 ancient authors, which the prince "either memorized or read with his own eyes and leafed through with his own fingers" before he reached his sixteenth year, including Cicero , Homer , Caesar , Ovid , Tacitus and Virgil . In preparation for his reign as king, André also wrote a series of speeches for Arthur in which fictional ambassadors from ancient Athens and Sparta addressed the prince.

According to popular belief, however, the best preparation for a prince was to gain experience in governing. Arthur had been made Warden general of the Marches against Scotland at the age of two and was the official regent of England at the age of six, while his father was at war in France , but of course only as a figurehead . So Arthur was sent to Ludlow Castle in Wales in 1493 , along with his household and council, to learn how to govern as a regional ruler.

Marriage to Catherine of Aragón

Flemish tapestry depicting Catherine and Arthur at their wedding, ca.1500

When Arthur was less than a year old, his father was already trying to arrange a prestigious marriage for him, and a marriage to the youngest Spanish Princess Catherine of Aragon , who was only nine months older than Arthur, was sought. For the young Tudor dynasty in politically insignificant England, an alliance with Spain , the greatest power in Europe, was an extremely desirable goal. The little prince was presented to Spanish ambassadors in 1488, first naked and then asleep, so that they could see for themselves his health, and finally, on March 27, 1489, it was contractually agreed that the marriage should take place shortly after Arthur's 14th birthday. In the following years Arthur and Katharina wrote each other letters in Latin, addressing each other as husband and wife and expressing their mutual affection. "I can hardly express what a serious desire I feel to see your Highness", Arthur once wrote to his "beloved wife" and thanked her for her "lovely letters". In order to affirm the intention to marry in the constantly changing political landscape of the time, a proxy engagement was carried out in Woodstock in 1497, and a proxy marriage in 1499 and 1500 , at which the Spanish ambassador swore the marriage vow instead of Katharina.

After several postponements, Katharina finally traveled to England at the end of 1501, where she was eagerly awaited. Contrary to the court protocol, the King and Arthur met her before they moved to London to see her, and Arthur later wrote to his parents-in-law that he was never as happy as when he saw the "lovely face of my wife". He went on to say that no woman in the world could be more pleasant to him and promised them that he would be a good husband. Arthur and Catherine were married in a pompous ceremony, dressed in white and gold, on November 14, 1501 in St Paul's Cathedral , on a raised platform specially built for the occasion, which ran through the entire central aisle of the cathedral and with a red one Carpet was covered. There was such a rush of onlookers that, according to an eyewitness, you could see nothing but faces. The newlyweds turned hand in hand, first to one side, then to the other, to show themselves to the audience, and enthusiastic shouts of "King Henry" and "Prince Arthur" rang out from the crowd.

After the feast that followed, the newlyweds were ceremonially put to bed in the evening by a large entourage, including the Earl of Oxford and Marquess of Dorset, in order to consummate the marriage. "And so these honorable persons decided and carried out the action and completion of the marriage covenant," wrote the official Herald. According to witnesses questioned almost 30 years later, Arthur ordered his servant Anthony Willoughby to bring him a mug of ale the next morning , “for I was in the middle of Spain that night.” Later the prince is said to have said frankly: “Gentlemen , it's a good pastime to have a wife. "

Over the next few days, lavish processions, banquets, masked balls, tournaments and dance balls followed, and 67 men were made Knights of the Order of Bath in celebration of the event , more than ever before.

The adults first considered for a while whether the two young people should actually be allowed to live together as men and women. Then the young couple finally moved to Ludlow on the English-Welsh border, where Arthur resided, on December 21 , and celebrated Christmas together as a couple at the head of their own farm.

death

The marriage lasted only four more months. On Easter Day 1502, March 27th, Arthur suddenly fell seriously ill.

"It was the most pathetic illness and suffering that fought with such painful and great violence and drove into him ... so that the cruel and fiery enemy of nature, the deadly decay, completely overwhelmed and conquered the pure and friendly blood"

Less than a week later, on April 2nd, “his spirits finally died out”. The cause of his death can no longer be traced back to the sparse sources and the underdeveloped medical knowledge of the time. The long-held theory that he died of tuberculosis is considered outdated, other possible causes of death are the then dreaded sweat sickness and the plague , both of which raged in the Ludlow area in the spring of 1502. However, according to a theory by historian David Starkey, Arthur died of testicular cancer , the most common type of cancer in 15–19 year old boys.

His sudden death came as a great shock to his parents, not only personally but also dynastically. Elizabeth of York, in an attempt to comfort her husband, told him that they were both young enough to have more children and that God had given them a "fine prince" - Arthur's brother Henry - before they did burst into tears alone in her chamber.

Arthur's body was eviscerated and preserved according to customary custom and was then laid out in his chamber for three weeks before he was brought to Worcester in a day-long procession and buried there appropriately. His younger brother Heinrich inherited Arthur's title and later ascended the English throne as Henry VIII .

Consequences of marriage for Henry VIII's divorce.

Catherine of Aragon as a young widow

The question of whether the marriage between Arthur and Katharina was consummated or not is still controversial today. It had immense consequences for the history of England, and it can be argued that it significantly influenced the course of the English Reformation and ultimately led to the separation of the Church of England from Rome with the establishment of the Anglican Church .

Arthur's death not only made Catherine a widow at the age of 16, it also destroyed the alliance between Spain and England. In order to get it anyway, both sides agreed that Katharina should marry Arthur's ten-year-old brother Heinrich, who was now the heir to the throne. Katharina married Heinrich in 1509. Despite many pregnancies, the connection did not result in the hoped-for heir to the throne, only one daughter, Maria , survived, and Heinrich began to believe that this was God's punishment for being the widow of his brother against biblical orders had married.

“If someone takes his brother's wife, it is a shameful act; they should be without children, because he has exposed his brother's nakedness. "

- 3 Mos 20,21  LUT

This hindrance had already been recognized in 1502, and in order to make the marriage between Katharina and Heinrich possible anyway, a papal dispensation had been obtained. The sentence from the Bible and the need for a dispensation only applied if the marriage between Arthur and Katharina had been a marriage in the full sense, that is, had been consummated. Shortly after Arthur's death, there was disagreement as to whether this had happened. The English firmly assumed that the marriage would be enforced and, after Arthur's death, had initially believed that Katharina could be pregnant with an heir to the throne. This turned out to be wrong, and Katharina's governess Doña Elvira swore that the princess was still a virgin. The papal dispensation was therefore deliberately vague to allow for both interpretations that the marriage “may have been consummated,” it said and had been approved.

When Heinrich made efforts to have his marriage to Katharina annulled in 1527, already with the intention of subsequently marrying his beloved Anne Boleyn , the question of whether he was married to Arthur took on new significance. Katharina stubbornly resisted a divorce and now said for the first time herself that she had married Heinrich as a virgin. In the ensuing battle between Katharina and Heinrich, which lasted almost seven years, u. a. Unearthed details and witnesses about her first marriage to Arthur. Even supposedly real bloody sheets from the wedding night were shown in court. Katharina claimed that Arthur only slept in bed with her seven times, but without sexual contact. On the other hand, Heinrich held the testimony of Arthur's chamberlain, William Thomas, who said that he had accompanied Arthur "many different times, dressed in his nightgown to the princess's bed chamber". The report was also heard from Anthony Willoughby, whom Arthur had said after their wedding night that he had been in the middle of Spain. Whether it was bought testimony, the truth, or just juvenile bragging on the part of Arthur is difficult to say. Katharina also had good reason to lie so as not to lose her status as queen after twenty years of marriage and for fear that a divorce could turn her daughter Maria into a bastard (which ultimately happened).

Neither side could provide definitive evidence for or against, and the Pope was reluctant to make a decision for political reasons. After years of postponement, Heinrich took the radical step of separating England from the authority of the Pope and establishing the Anglican Church by declaring himself head of the Church of England and having his Archbishop Thomas Cranmer declare his marriage to Catherine null and void . As a result, England followed a separate denominational path in the centuries that followed and to this day.

The weakling myth

During the century before last, it was believed that Arthur was a frail and sickly child from birth, small and underdeveloped for his age. This idea became so exaggerated over time that some modern authors like Antonia Fraser even falsely claim that Arthur was half a head shorter than his bride at his wedding, who in turn was of downright tiny stature. However, there is no evidence that Arthur was considered small and sickly during his lifetime. On the contrary, the Milanese ambassador in 1497 described the eleven-year-old Arthur as "taller than his age would warrant, of extraordinary beauty and charm".

The first description of Arthur as sick and frail appeared in the Dictionary of National Biography in the 19th century and was probably based on a misinterpretation of a letter Arthur's father wrote to his son's in-laws. In it the king says that, contrary to the objections of his councilor, he wanted Arthur and Katharina to live together as husband and wife, despite the "tender age of our son" and "even at his own risk". Since Arthur died shortly afterwards and was also a premature baby, this was interpreted as a general comment on Arthur's health. However, the king was referring to the then common view that early sexual contact was a health risk for a boy of Arthur's age. By contrast, Katharina, nine months older than her, was considered ready for marriage and motherhood at 16.

In fact, Arthur was believed to be in good health until his sudden death.

Pedigree

literature

Web links

Commons : Arthur Tudor  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. David Starkey: Henry, Virtuous Prince . Harper Perennial, London 2009, p. 42.
  2. Steven Gunn: Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales. Woodbridge, 2009, pp. 1f.
  3. Starkey: Virtuous Prince, pp. 122-124.
  4. ^ Gunn: Arthur, p. 30.
  5. James GairdnerArthur (1486-1502) . In: Leslie Stephen (Ed.): Dictionary of National Biography . Volume 2:  Annesley - Baird. , MacMillan & Co, Smith, Elder & Co., New York City / London 1885, p. 131 (English).
  6. ^ Rosemary Horrox: Arthur, prince of Wales (1486-1502). In: Henry Colin Gray Matthew, Brian Harrison (Eds.): Oxford Dictionary of National Biography , from the earliest times to the year 2000 (ODNB). Volume 2: Amos-Avory. Oxford University Press, Oxford 2004, ISBN 0-19-861352-0 , p. 545, ( oxforddnb.com license required ), as of 2004
  7. Starkey: Six Wives, p. 62.
  8. ^ Lucy Wooding: Henry VIII, Routledge Historical Biographies, London New York 2009, p. 141.
  9. David Starkey: Henry, Virtuous Prince. Harper Perennial, London 2009, pp. 79-86.
  10. Steven Gunn: Arthur Tudor, Prince of Wales. Woodbridge, 2009, pp. 38f.
predecessor Office successor
New title created Duke of Cornwall
1486–1502
Henry VIII
New title created Prince of Wales
Earl of Chester
1489-1502
Henry VIII