Vivat Rex!: 500th Anniversary of Henry VIII's Accession to the Throne

This article is about an exhibition about the historical figure Henry VIII. For other uses, see Henry VIII (disambiguation).

Vivat Rex!: 500th Anniversary of Henry VIII's Accession to the Throne, one part of the Exhibitions at the Folger, opened on September 24, 2010 and closed December 30, 2010 and was first seen at The Grolier Club in New York. The exhibition was curated by Arthur L. Schwarz. The catalog can be purchased from the Folger Shop.

Contents of the exhibition

Prince Henry, King Henry

The first of the Tudor monarchs, King Henry VII, gained his throne at the Battle of Bosworth, on August 22, 1485. He married Elizabeth of York, uniting the royal houses of Lancaster and York, and they had four children who survived infancy. Their elder son, Prince Arthur, married Catherine of Aragon, but he died without an heir at the age of fifteen. Henry VII himself died on April 21, 1509, and two days later his second son, not yet eighteen, was proclaimed King Henry VIII. Within two months, the new king married his brother’s widow, having received papal dispensation to do so some five years earlier. What they wanted most was a son and heir, but this was not to be: a son, named Henry for his father, was born on New Year’s Day, 1511, but he died seven weeks later.

Pictured here is Henry VIII's birthplace—Greenwich Palace (earlier named Placentia, “the palace of courtesy”). The palace was demolished in the seventeenth century, and the Old Royal Navy College now stands on the same site.

Items included

• (LOAN courtesy of The Royal Collection, Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. Photograph of Laughing child, possibly Henry VIII. Painted and gilded terracotta bust, ca. 1498, attributed to Guido Mazzoni. RCIN 73197.)
• James Basire. A view of the antient royal palace called Placentia. Print, 1767, in William Macready. Macready's Reminiscences. London: Macmillan & Co., 1875. Call number: ART Vol. a60 Vol.3 and LUNA Digital Image.

Educating a Young King

The early years of Henry’s reign were occupied with warfare against France and Scotland, worry about a possible invasion of Europe by Muslim forces, and concern for his throne, which was always vulnerable to possible usurpers. Meanwhile, Henry studied the arts of leadership and kingship, drawing inspiration from books by Thomas More, Niccolò Machiavelli, and Desiderius Erasmus.

The volume pictured here, whose title translates as “Familiar Commentary on the ‘Duties’ of Cicero,” is Henry’s own schoolboy text, inscribed “Thys Boke Is Myne Prynce Henry.” In addition to Henry’s assertive ownership claim, the volume contains numerous glosses, annotations, notes, and aphorisms in the hand of Henry and what is thought to be that of his tutor, the poet John Skelton. It is one of the earliest surviving examples of a book containing Henry’s annotations.

In a woodcut image of the Battle of Flodden Field in 1513, Scotland's James IV stands outside his tent before battle. Henry and James were rivals; the Scottish king was killed in the battle. This case also included Henry VIII as a young man from the Trevelyon Miscellany, and an image of his rival, James IV, from Henry Holland's Book of Kings.

Listen to curator Arthur L. Schwarz discuss Henry's copy of Cicero.

Items included

• Marcus Tullius Cicero. Commentú familiare in Ciceronis officia. Lyon: Etienne Gueynard, 1502. Call number: PA 6295 .A3 1502 Cage and LUNA Digital Image.
• LOAN courtesy of The Morgan Library & Museum from the collections of Frances Mary Richardson Currer and A. W. Griswold. Richard Faques. Hereafter ensue the trewe encountre or batayle lately don betwene Englande and Scotlande: in whiche batayle the Scottsshe kynge was slayne. London, 1809. Morgan call number: 006828
• Thomas Trevelyon. Trevelyon Miscellany [formerly called Commonplace book]. Manuscript, 1608. Call number: V.b.232; displayed Leaf 217, image of Henry VIII.
• LOAN courtesy of the Houghton Library of the Harvard College Library; Gift of Christian A. Zabriskie in memory of Edward Powis Jones. Henry Holland. Baziliōlogia = A Booke of kings: beeing the true and lively effigies of all our English kings from the Conquest untill this present, with their severall coats of armes, impreses and devises, and a briefe chronologie of their lives and deaths. London, 1618. Harvard call number: Houghton f STC 13581.

King at Court

Henry VIII was heavily influenced by the writings of Erasmus, More, Machiavelli, and Thomas Elyot, which provided him with advice and suggested appropriate standards of royal behavior. But Henry and his court had much more fun and pleasure than these treatises on morality may suggest. Ruler and courtiers outfitted themselves richly, according to their station, and Henry’s jester, Will Sommers, provided merriment in the court, much to the annoyance of Cardinal Thomas Wolsey, who detested him. He might well have done so, as one of Sommers’s favorite pastimes was lampooning the cardinal.

This view of Nonsuch, near Epsom, in Surrey, was engraved some thirty-five years after Henry’s death but nevertheless provides an excellent impression of one of his royal palaces that is long gone. Arguably the greatest of Henry VIII’s building projects, Nonsuch was begun in 1538 but remained incomplete at the king’s death, almost nine years later. It was built to demonstrate the grandeur and power of the Tudor monarchy and to compete with the palace of Chambord, built by Henry’s great rival, Francis I, king of France.

Pictured here is Henry's jester, Will Sommers, wearing an elaborate coat with the letters “HR”—“Henricus Rex”—embroidered on the chest and jester’s cap tucked into his belt. Sommers was Henry's jester for over twenty years. He amused the king with foolish riddles and by playing practical jokes on Cardinal Wolsey, who could never abide him.

Items included

• Franz Hogenberg after Georg Hoefnagel.Palatium regium in Angliae regno appellatum Nonciutz. Engraved by Franz Hogenberg, Hand-colored engraving from Braun and Hogenberg's Civitates Orbis Terrarum. Germany, 1582. Call number: ART Box H716 no.1 (size L) and LUNA Digital Image.
• Francis Delaram. Will Sommers, King Heneryes Jester. What though thou thinkst mee clad in strange attire... Print, ca. 1618-27. Call number: ART 256- 916 (size S) and LUNA Digital Image.

Power and Pageantry

Henry was the father of the English navy and, by the time of his death in 1547, the fleet had grown to fifty-eight ships. The extravagant ship “Great Harry” conveyed him and part of his retinue to France for his meeting with Francis I at the Field of the Cloth of Gold. In England, Henry also made a point of putting on display his vast wealth and his indulgent lifestyle. In 1546, Henry combined Cambridge’s King’s Hall and Michaelhouse Colleges to found Trinity College with the goal of producing future leaders of the Church of England. He also completed the hugely expensive construction of King’s College Chapel, Cambridge, which was begun a century earlier. Despite these grand gestures, one might conclude that his goal was less to further education than to demonstrate his wealth and power.

This image depicts The Field of the Cloth of Gold—the name given to the site of a meeting between Henry VIII and Francis I of France. Henry and Francis tried to impress and outshine each other, and neither spared any expense. Huge temporary pavilions were erected to serve as halls and chapels, and great silken tents were decorated with gems and cloth of gold. Organized jousts and tilts, other competitions of skill and strength, masked balls, and lavish banquets filled the days and evenings. Henry challenged the French king to a wrestling match. Francis won.

Two items of further shows of power and wealth are King's College and a manuscript listing the gifts given by Henry for New Years Day, 1539.

King’s College was first founded by Henry VI in 1441, but it was only under the first two Tudor kings, Henry VII and Henry VIII, that its spectacular chapel was completed. The majority of construction and glazing of the windows was completed during the reign of Henry VIII, who was also responsible for the chancel screen, which bears the carved initials of Henry and Anne Boleyn, and much of the chapel woodwork. When Henry died in 1547, King’s College Chapel was recognized as one of Europe’s finest buildings.

The New Year's gift roll is eight and one-half feet long and signed on both sides by the king. It lists the gifts given by Henry to various recipients, arranged in descending order of precedence. Listed are “the Lorde Prince (Edward),” “the Lady Mariee,” “the Lady Elizabeth,” and “the Lady Margret Doughtles,” followed by “Bisshops,” “Dukes and Erles,” and lesser “Lordes.” The value of each gift is listed in the right-hand column. On the back of the document are some of the gifts received by the king, also in descending order of precedence. In the section headed “Gentelmen,” the gifts presented to Henry include “a brase of greyhoundes” from the marquis of Dorset, “a boke covered with grene velvet” from Lord Morley, “a night cap with cheynes & buttons of golde” from the Countess of Hampton, and “a shirte of camericke wrought in silke” from Lord Richard Grey.

Learn more about the gift roll by listening to the curator's audio tour remarks.

Items included

• LOAN courtesy of The Royal Collection Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. Unknown Artist. The Field of the Cloth of Gold. Painting, ca. 1545. RCIN 405794.
• LOAN courtesy of Arthur L. Schwarz. Rudolph Ackerman. A History of the University of Cambridge. London, 1815.
• Henry VIII. New Year’s gift roll of Henry VIII, King of England. Manuscript, 1538/9 January 1. Call number: Z.d.11 and LUNA Digital Image.

Supplemental materials

Related Programs

Talks and Screenings at the Folger

• Folger Friday: Henry VIII Discussion, October 15, 2010
• Henry VIII: Art and Magnificence, November 5, 2010
• A Reading by Margaret George, author of The Autobiography of Henry VIII, November 29, 2010

Folger Theatre

• William Shakespeare's Henry VIII, October 12 – November 28, 2010

Folger Consort

• Pastime with Good Company: Music from the Court of Henry VIII, October 1–3, 2010
• A Renaissance Christmas, December 10–12, 2010

Folger Institute

• Reassessing Henry VIII, Workshop, November 5–6, 2010.