King Henry VII

Henry VII was crowned on the battlefield with Richard's crown. He then marched into Leicester and then, slowly, onwards to London. On 3rd September he entered the capital in triumph. Elizabeth of York was placed in the London household of his mother, Margaret Beaufort. The parliament which met on 7th November asserted the legitimacy of Henry's title and annulled the instrument embodying Richard III's title to the throne. On 10th December 1485, the House of Commons, through their speaker Thomas Lovell, urged the king to act on his promise to marry "that illustrious lady Elizabeth, daughter of King Edward IV" and so render possible "the propagation of offspring from the stock of kings". (13)

Henry married Elizabeth of York and on 19th September 1486 she gave birth to a son, Prince Arthur. He was baptized on 24th September in Winchester Cathedral and named after the famous British hero whose fabulous exploits fill the pages of Geoffrey of Monmouth. Initially he was put into the care of women and his nursery at Farnham. This was headed by Dame Elizabeth Darcy. (14)

Francis Bacon has suggested that Henry's "aversion toward the house of York was so predominant in him as it found place not only in his wars and councils, but in his chamber and bed". However, Elizabeth's biographer, Rosemary Horrox, disagrees with this assessment. She quotes from several different sources that indicate that they had a happy marriage. (15)

Henry VII inherited a kingdom that was smaller than it had been for over 400 years. For the first time since the 11th century the realm did not include one French province. The only part of France still held by the English was the Marches of Calais, a strip of territory around the town of Calais. He held the title of "Lord of Ireland" since the 12th century, but effectively governed only an area that was roughly a semi-circle forty miles deep around Dublin.

It is estimated that Henry VII had three million subjects. Nearly every summer they were hit by epidemics of the Plague or Sweating Sickness which killed many of the population and improved the standard of living of the survivors, as the shortage of tenants and agricultural labourers kept rents low and wahes high. Fifty thousand people lived in the capital city, London. The second largest city in England, Norwich, had 13,000 inhabitants; but Bristol and Newcastle were the only other towns with more than 10,000. Ninety per cent of the population lived in villages and on the farms in the countryside.

According to Jasper Ridley the English were famous throughout Europe for their hearty appetite. "It was said the English vice was overeating, as the German vice was drunkenness and the French vice lechery." (16) Bishop Stephen Gardiner commented: "Every country hath his peculiar inclination to naughtiness. England and Germany to the belly, the one in liquor, the other in meat; France a little beneath the belly; Italy to vanity and pleasures devised; and let an English belly have a further advancement, and nothing can stay it." (17)