{"id":11233,"date":"2024-10-08T08:34:38","date_gmt":"2024-10-08T12:34:38","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=11233"},"modified":"2026-01-04T13:20:19","modified_gmt":"2026-01-04T18:20:19","slug":"the-dynasty-that-keeps-on-giving","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/?p=11233","title":{"rendered":"The Dynasty That Keeps on Giving"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Last week, American Ancestors hosted a Zoom presentation about potential?? English ancestors\u2014those lusty, murderous Tudors. I\u2019ve been a fan of stage, screen, and tv interpretations of Tudorabilia starting with the BBCs The Six Wives of Henry VIII<\/em>, now more than 50 years ago! and still memorable, on to Elizabeth<\/em> (Cate Blanchett), up to the salacious (and highly inaccurate) The Tudors<\/em> in 2007-2010, and the three volumes of the late Hilary Mantel\u2019s prize-winning novels, which started with Wolf Hall<\/em>, through their stage and television versions<\/a> (Mark Rylance at his very best). So, of course I couldn\u2019t miss this latest program, led by Curt Di Camillo, curator of Special Collections for the New England Historic Genealogical Society. Here are some tidbits.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Di Camillo started with a little background on what paved the way for the Tudors, and that was the War of the Roses, the Plantagenets\u2014the longest running royal house in Britain\u2014symbolized by the White Rose and the Lancasters (red rose). When Henry VII seized the throne from the reviled Richard III, he created the \u201cTudor Rose,\u201d red and<\/em> white a bit of transparent pandering.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(As an aside, if you missed last year\u2019s film, The Lost King<\/a><\/em>, the true story of a persistent English woman who went on a hunt for Richard III\u2019s body, which scholars searched for fruitlessly for centuries, rent it!.)<\/p>\n\n\n

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But what I learned about the first Tudor, Henry VII, was less well known (to me at least). He was reviled as well, considered a usurper, and, possibly worst of all, he was Welch. He was under such threat he created a special bodyguard and designed their uniforms. You recognize them as the Beefeaters, who still wear Henry\u2019s design today. For Britain, at least, Di Camillo says, Henry Tudor\u2019s accession to the crown in 1485 represented the end of the Middle Ages.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

He undertook a number of acts to establish his legitimacy. He introduced a gold coin, called a sovereign, that bore his image with the trappings of the monarchy, he married Elizabeth of York (who passed on her red-hair genes to her son and grandchildren). And he added the Henry VII Lady Chapel to Westminster Abbey, which now holds the remains of many English kings and queens. But it was up to his granddaughter, Queen Elizabeth I, daughter of Anne Boleyn, to employ England\u2019s first spymaster, Sir Francis Walsingham, setting the stage for many great spy novels to come.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

More information:<\/strong>
American Ancestors\/New England Historic Genealogical Society<\/a>
Wolf Hall<\/a><\/em> by Hilary Mantel
The Lost King<\/a><\/em>
Elizabeth\u2019s Spy Master: Francis Walsingham and the Secret War that Saved England<\/a> <\/em>(have not read this one)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Last week, American Ancestors hosted a Zoom presentation about potential?? English ancestors\u2014those lusty, murderous Tudors. I\u2019ve been a fan of stage, screen, and tv interpretations of Tudorabilia starting with the BBCs The Six Wives of Henry VIII, now more than … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"Exploring 15th c. political shenanigans with the Tudors. The times were full of juicy tidbits, not counting the ones you know about.","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[366,266,35,104],"tags":[519,2245,2244],"class_list":["post-11233","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-drama","category-history","category-real-life","category-the-morgue","tag-england","tag-henry-viii","tag-tudors"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p2NkiT-2Vb","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11233","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11233"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11233\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":11236,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11233\/revisions\/11236"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11233"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11233"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/vweisfeld.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11233"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}