ARTHUR II
King of England and Lord/King of Ireland
1528-1565
PART I
Born: January 17, 1504 in London, England
Reign Began: August 18, 1528 (age 24)
Died: April 9, 1565 in London, England (age 61)
Royal House: House of Tudor
Parents:
Arthur I of England
Catherine of Aragon
Spouse:
Isabella of Portugal (1520-1549, her death)
Mary Howard (1551-1565, his death)
Children:
by Isabella of Portugal
Arthur (b. 1523)
Catherine (b. 1525)
Stephen (b. 1527)
Elizabeth (b. 1530)
John (b. 1531)
Edward (b. 1533)
by Mary Howard
Mary (b. 1552)
Margaret (b. 1554)
Edmund (b. 1557)
only those who survived infancy are shown
Religion: Roman Catholicism
The eldest son of King Arthur I, Arthur II was groomed to be the king of England since his birth. The younger Arthur was born during the reign of his grandfather Henry VII. Henry was thrilled at the birth of his first grandson as it marked the continuation of the Tudor Dynasty which he brought to the throne when he defeated and killed King Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field less than twenty years before the birth of the future Arthur II. Henry VII also spent much effort preserving the posterity of the Tudors such as fighting off pretenders such as Lambert Simnel and Perkin Warbeck and marrying his son and heir Arthur to Catherine of Aragon who was indisputably and legitimately descended from Edward III. However, with the birth of the prince, the aging king could take a more relaxed approach to governing as he now had three legitimate male heirs.
Arthur was christened shortly after birth and granted the Dukedom of Lancaster as a courtesy by his grandfather.
Arthur's parents were both teenagers at the time of his birth and both still receiving their education. Arthur's father and namesake, the then-Prince of Wales, spent very little time with him when he was a young child. The elder Arthur instead was forced to devote much time to assist his father with his kingly duties in turn learning how to be a king himself. Arthur's mother Princess Catherine tried her best to be a devoted mother to her newborn son but her motherhood was compromised as she was learning to be a Queen-consort herself. Also, Catherine lost her own mother, Isabella I of Castille, just a few months after the birth of her son which sent her into a period of deep grief for much time also compromising her ability to be a good mother to Arthur. Therefore, young Arthur was mainly raised by his paternal grandmother Elizabeth of York the Queen Consort, and his paternal great-grandmother Margaret Beaufort. Elizabeth for one viewed Arthur as her own son, and Arthur developed an exceptionally close relationship with his grandmother growing up to the extent that authors found letters the then-prince wrote to her in his teenage years addressed "mother" instead of "grandmother."
At age nine, Arthur became the heir to the throne when his grandfather passed away and his father ascended to the kingship as Arthur I. He was subsequently made the Prince of Wales and an honorary Knight of the Garter. At the ceremony where Arthur received these titles, his father famously announced that he will not under any circumstances send his young son to live at Ludlow Castle, the traditional residence of the Prince of Wales, where he was once sent to live and almost died, or any far-off castle for that matter.
As the Prince of Wales, Arthur was described as intelligently precocious and religiously pious like his father. However unlike the elder Arthur who was more reserved and kept his feelings to himself, young Arthur was described as "having a short temper" at times, an attribute that certainly followed him into the kingship.
1520 was a bittersweet year for the Prince of Wales. On one note, his beloved grandmother whom he often called "mother," Elizabeth of York suddenly passed away at the age of 54. However on another note, a different woman entered the 16-year-old Arthur's life that year. In a lavish ceremony paid by the King of Portugal's generous dowry, Arthur married the beautiful 17-year-old Princess Isabella of Portugal, King Manuel's oldest daughter whom he had been betrothed to since childhood. The marriage greatly pleased Arthur I who sought to make Portugal a great ally of England.
The king pushed his son and new daughter-in-law to have children right after their marriage as he wanted to quickly displace his rambunctious second son, Henry Ferdinand, Duke of Clarence (who was commonly known as "Prince Harry") on the line of succession. It would be three years before Isabella gave birth to the king's first grandchild who was named Arthur in honor of his father and grandfather. With consent from the Prince of Wales, Arthur I transferred the title of Duke of Lancaster which had belonged to his son onto his grandson upon his christening therefore creating the precedent of giving the title of Duke of Lancaster to the eldest son of the Prince of Wales. Duke Arthur would be followed by five more surviving children from Prince Arthur's marriage to Isabella, three male and two female.
The Prince of Wales became King Arthur II when his father suddenly died on a hot summer day in 1528. However as people would soon realize, the two kings did not share anything aside from their name.
Arthur I during his reign had built the reputation as a benevolent "peace monarch," but as soon as his son took the reins, the time of peace in England would abruptly end. From a young age, Arthur II had a visceral hatred toward France and this was further cemented by his friendship with his cousin and brother-in-law Charles V, the Holy Roman Emperor and King of Spain. In a letter written by Arthur to his cousin the Emperor shortly before he became king of England, he wrote, "just as my grandfather liberated England from the tyranny of King Richard, with your help, I will liberate former English lands from the tyranny of King Francis."
And this is exactly what Arthur did shortly after ascending to the throne. In 1530 with the assistance of his cousin and brother-in-law Emperor Charles and his other brother-in-law John III of Portugal, Arthur launched a full-scale of France with his late father's best friend and former Lord Chancellor Charles Brandon serving as the leading English general. After much fighting, the invasion proved to be a success and as a result the French had surrendered much land in the north such as the city of Boulogne giving England a generous foothold in continental Europe in addition to the already-English city of Calais.
However, even this did not completely please Arthur who wanted all of France to be under his reign. Following the success of his first invasion, he met with Charles V and John III who with him had formed a "triple alliance" to launch another invasion of France, this time possibly taking more if not all land. However, such an invasion was to be delayed by events at home.
By the 1530's many people were fed up with the corruption of the Roman Catholic Church, the dominant religion of Western Europe, and wanted it to be reformed. At the forefront of these reforms was Alfred Hennessy, a young Irish priest. Hennessy petitioned the Catholic Church to change some of their doctrine such as to discontinue the sale of indulgences, preach a more literal interpretation of the Bible, recognize the Eucharist as a merely a symbolic representation of Jesus's body and blood and allow clergy to marry. However, the pope refused to listen to any of Hennessy's reforms and in 1536 promptly excommunicated him.
This therefore began what became to be known as the "Protestant Reformation." Hennessianism (also known as "Protestantism" because the members of Hennessian churches were
protesting practices of the Catholic Church) spread like wildfire throughout Ireland and into northern Scotland, Wales, Brittany and as far south into Gascony. It also later started to spread eastward into Norway and to a lesser extent into Sweden though Denmark remained for the most part staunchly Catholic.
Ireland known as the "birthplace of the Reformation" was under the control of King Arthur II at the time of the Reformation. Upon his ascension to the English throne, Arthur also gained the title “Lord of Ireland” passed down from his father. Being an extremely devout Catholic and the leader of the nation from where Hennessy hailed, Arthur was predictably an early foe of the Reformation. In 1535 when Father Hennessy’s famous pamphlet “A Concise Thesis of Grievances of the Most Holy Catholic Church” (commonly referred to as “Hennessey’s List”) was published, King Arthur penned a scathing letter to the Pope telling him to excommunicate Hennessy and his followers explaining that the reformers would only go away if the Pope worked with him to take action. The Pope complied with the king’s request and publicly denounced the pamphlet and just a few months later excommunicated Hennessey and many of his followers.
However, the excommunication of the Hennessians only gave them grounds to form into their own churches, and thus proved to be a bad idea for the Catholics. Arthur seeing that the Reformation started in his own country thought it was his job to stop it in its tracks. In 1537, he took his first step toward fighting the Reformation though this was only merely symbolic in nature. By act of parliament, he changed his title from Lord of Ireland to King of Ireland. This was done to show the Irish that while they were at the forefront of the reformation, they were subjects of a Catholic King. Arthur then proceeded to punish many of the reformers...
Fun Fact:
- Unlike his father who showed little interest in sports, Arthur II loved tennis and even credited with creating his own variant of the game known as "kingball."
