I got this fun press release from the British Library in conjunction with the opening of the Henry VIII – Man and Monarch exhibition
They’ve also started a Henry VIII exhibition blog and a podcast!
And here is my previous post about the exhibition catalogue. I ordered mine yesterday and it has already shipped. Can’t wait to see it!
THE CREDIT CRUNCH KING
HOW HENRY VIII DIED IN DEBT AND OTHER THINGS YOU DIDN
If you’ve ever wondered what goes in to researching portrait identification, head on over to Stephan Edwards’ (a.k.a PhD Historian) website to see some fascinating work that he recently did.
Here’s the abstract:
In mid February 2009, I was contacted by a private collector in regard to a painting he had recently purchased from an estate. The painting, seen above, bears the label Princess Elizabeth (afterwards Queen) , “The Harington Portrait” and has been attributed in the past to the artist Antonio Mor (d. ca. 1578). The collector questioned the identification and requested my opinion on it. I was able to determine at first glance that it was not, in fact, an authentic portrait of Elizabeth Tudor, so the owner asked for my assistance in determining who the sitter may have actually been. Thus began a two-month period of intensive research, and the results of that investigation are now presented here for the first time.
Armor for man and horse of Henry VIII from about 1515, on display at the White Tower in the Tower of London. Photo May 2003.
In celebration of the 500th anniversary of Henry VIII’s accession to the throne this week, I went with this picture of armor from early in Henry’s reign. The gold-colored (it’s actually brass) border of the skirt on the human armor are the letters H and K (for Henry and Katherine). This armor is currently part of the Dressed to Kill exhibition at the Tower of London.
From a press release found via Google news:
The Historic Royal Palaces, the independent charity that cares for Hampton Court Palace and the Tower of London, will send its followers updates on the events in the run-up to Henry VIII’s coronation at Westminster Abbey on June 24 – exactly 500 years after they happened.
It is believed to be the first time the website has been able to engage users in historical events from the first person perspective, and in real time over the actual period they took place, a spokesman for the charity said.
And here is the Twitter profile page for Henry/HRP
And some of you may have already seen over in the sidebar that I’m on Twitter too, although I’ll warn people now that I mostly post about science, tech and everyday life stuff, not much Tudor history. But if you’re interested – here’s my profile.
Just a quick audio announcement since I wasn’t able to get the new episode finished in time for the actual 500th anniversary date. And it was a test run on my new software – which might take some getting used to!
[Comments are closed on older posts. If you wish to make a comment, please contact Lara via the link in the sidebar.]
Just in case there are folks here who haven’t been over the The Raucous Royals blog lately, I wanted to post something here about Carlyn’s great analysis of this season’s episodes of “The Tudors”.
Here’s a link to the write-up for Episode 3 and the entries for previous episodes can be found at the bottom of that post.
The Independent ran an interesting article about the jousting fall in 1536 that will be in an upcoming documentary:
The jousting accident that turned Henry VIII into a tyrant
Medical study uncovers turning point in king’s life. Michael McCarthy reports
Henry VIII became the tyrannical monster remembered by history because of a personality change following a serious jousting accident, according to a new historical documentary.
After the accident
From The Telegraph:
The year 1536 changed Henry VIII from a handsome, popular and athletic king to a corpulent tyrant who thought little of dispatching his many wives, a historian has claimed.
A new look at the life of one of England’s most famous monarchs argues that a series of calamitous events within the space of 12 months had an irreversible effect on his life.
Suzannah Lipscomb, a research curator at Hampton Court Palace and Oxford scholar, said the apparent betrayal by his wife, a dangerous fall from a horse and a religious rebellion all played their part in transforming Henry.
She said: “He did move from being the much f
King Henry VIII’s astrolabe at the British Museum. May 1998.
From the British Museum website:
This small astrolabe, signed by Bastien Le Seney from Normandy, clockmaker to Henry VIII, is inscribed with the King’s motto and arms but surprisingly the quartering is mixed up and lions in the top left quarter face in the wrong direction.
Dimensions
Diameter: 85.5 millimetres
Thickness: 4.5 millimetres
Length: 124 millimetres (Overall length including suspension loop.)Curator’s comments
For the reversed quartering (namely England appearing in the first and fourth quarters rather than the second and third) cf. Philip Lankaster, ‘A note on some partizans with the Tudor royal arms in the Royal Armouries’, in: Royal Armouries Yearbook, 7, 2002, pp. 40-45 (Copy on file).The quality of the markings and the execution of the intrument as well as the lions in the first quarter facing sinister raise serious doubts about its authenticity as an instrument made for Henry himself.
This popped up all at once through various news sources, so I’ll just pick one:
From Broadcasting & Cable:
Jonathan Rhys-Meyers reign as King Henry VIII will end in 2010. Showtime has picked up a fourth and final season of drama The Tudors.
The series will return to the network for its final bow in Spring 2010, with production slated to begin this June in Dublin, Ireland.
Head on over to the Lady Jane Grey Reference Site blog and submit them! The deadline is April 15.
[Please submit the questions at the link above, not at this site]
From The New York Times:
Just a King for His Time: Executions, Wives, Divorces and Bad Diets
THE Henry VIII whom Dickens called
The UK National Archives has an on-line exhibition for the 500th anniversary of Henry VIII’s accession to the throne: Henry VIII – Power, Passion, Parchment. The exhibition features some documents that you can zoom in on and examine up close.
And here is an article from the Telegraph on the exhibition – Salacious claims of Anne Boleyn’s incest in Henry VIII documents placed online
AP photo
This is pretty cool… I can have both a history and tech geek-out!
From The Telegraph:
Scientists have managed to “virtually restore” the faded hues of his 28ft long tapestry using coloured light beams.
The Manchester University researchers looked at the back of the heavy wool and silk tapestry, which has been less affected by sunlight, to gauge what the original colours might have been.
They then measured the colour of every yarn on the front and used computer software to calculate how much of the original pigments of woad (blue), weld (yellow) and madder (red) had been lost.
High-definition projectors have now been used to beam two million pixels of different coloured light on to the tapestry.
Also check out the BBC story, with videos
The book for Henry VIII: Man and Monarch at the British Library will be released next week in the UK.
Here are the Amazon.co.uk order links (paperback and hardcover):
And the US order link (I think they will just be sending it from the UK, since it doesn’t look like there is specifically a US edition at this time):
The Queens Garden, one of the many lovely gardens at Sudeley Castle. May 1998.
The Banqueting Hall ruins can be seen to the right.
Hampton Court Palace‘s 500th anniversary events will start this Friday, and there is a lot going on!
Here are some highlights:
The Henry VIII talks at Hampton Court Palace
And of course, I have to link to the shopping. Here’s the web store for the Historic Royal Palaces – I love the “Divorced, Beheaded, Survived” charm bracelet. There is also a neat one with each of the wives’ badges.
This just goes to show you how many things may still be hiding in archives, libraries, attics, etc.
From The Guardian:
A drawing of Henry VIII’s famous victory over the French at the “Siege of Boulogne” in 1544 is to go on public display for the first time in more than 400 years after lying undiscovered and mislabelled in the British Library archives.
The image, drawn by a “war artist” commissioned to record the Tudor king’s military achievements, dates to 1545 and is one of four “views” documenting Henry’s second invasion of France.
For centuries art historians have pondered why there was never a final picture showing the surrender of the city. Just three drawings survived, one showing Henry landing in Calais, another of him on the way to Boulogne, and a third of the siege in progress.
“Everybody just assumed that the end of the siege had not been done,” Peter Barber, head of map collections at the British Library, told the Observer. But due to a cataloguing error the existence of a fourth drawing had gone unnoticed. It only came to light when Barber began re-cataloguing the manuscripts of Sir Robert Cotton, which had been left to the nation by his grandson, Sir John Cotton, in 1702 and passed to the British Museum on its founding in 1753.
The drawing will be on display at the British Library’s “Henry VIII: Man and Monarch” exhibition
Showtime has created a fun, tongue-in-cheek blog for “The Tudors” – Pop Tudors – History, recapped. No spoilers.
I particularly like the flowchart for 16th century marital dispute resolution. 🙂
Newly-discovered portrait by Matt Groening the Elder
[Yes, I know it’s lame to use something that I did a long time ago, but I didn’t have a chance to Photoshop something new for April Fools’ Day!]
