Francis Bigod

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Sir Francis Bigod (* 1508 ; † June 2, 1537 in Tyburn ) was an English nobleman who rose against King Henry VIII and was executed for it.

Origin and family environment

Francis Bigod came from an old Anglo-Norman family who had come to England with William I (England) and who had five Earls of Norfolk since 1140/41 , until the childless 5th Earl returned his title to the crown in 1302, although he still had a living brother with male offspring (see also Bigod (noble family) ). From this brother was Francis Bigod in a straight line. He was the grandson and heir of Sir Ralph Bigod, died 1515, and son of John Bigod , who died in the Anglo-Scottish War in 1513. With the death of his grandfather he inherited his estates Settringham and Mulgrave Castle.

Life

Francis Bigod was born in 1508 and received his inheritance from Henry VIII when he came of age in 1529. In the same year he was knighted. He studied at Oxford for some time , but without graduating with a degree. From 1527 he was in the service of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey , after his overthrow in the service of his successor Thomas Cromwell , later the Earl of Essex, who was executed in 1540. Like Cromwell, he was involved in the church reforms of Henry VIII in the following years, but, more or less forced by the rebels from the county of Yorkshire , allegedly inadvertently took part in the Pilgrimage of Grace under the leadership of Robert Aske , with which the rebels who Wanted to achieve restoration of the Catholic Church, participated. After the bloody suppression of this rebellion, for whose participation he was not prosecuted, he nevertheless rose up in Beverley in January 1537 as the leader of a renewed uprising (the so-called Bigod uprising) against the king, as he did not keep his promises, including a general amnesty . He was captured, sentenced to death, and hanged in Tyburn on June 2, 1537.

Sir Francis Bigod was also active in literature: he translated several Latin writings into English and wrote treatises on religious-political issues, including a pamphlet against royal supremacy. He was married to Katherine, daughter of Lord Conyers, with whom he had a son who, under Edward VI. was restituted, and a daughter.

literature

• Dictionary of Nationa Biography, Volumes V and XVIII, Smith, Elder and Co, London, 1889.
• RW Hoyle: The Pilgrimmage of Grace and the Politics in the 1530s, Oxford Press, 2003.

Individual evidence

1. ^ Dictionary of National Biography , Volume V, Smith, Elder and Co, London, 1889, p. 21.
2. ^ RW Hoyle: The Pilgrimmage of Grace and the Politics in the 1530s , Oxford Press, 2003, p. 378.
3. ^ ^{A b} Dictionary of National Biography , Volume V, Smith, Elder and Co, London, 1889, p. 22.