Henry Tudor, later Henry VII, was the first person from the House of Tudor to become King of England.
Biography[]
In 1485, he defeated King Richard III of the York family in the Battle of Bosworth, thus bringing an end to the Wars of the Roses. (PROSE: Sometime Never..., AUDIO: The Kingmaker) According to one account, it was actually an injured William Shakespeare who was killed in Richard's place but this made little difference to the progression of history since he matched Richard's description and everyone believed it was him. (AUDIO: The Kingmaker)
Soon afterwards, he was crowned King. He later married Elizabeth of York which united the previously warring families. They had four children together, namely Henry VIII, Arthur Tudor, Margaret Tudor and Mary Tudor. His reign ended in 1509. (TV: The Coach with the Dragon Tattoo)
Henry featured as a character in Shakespeare's play Richard III. While Peri Brown summarised the second half of the play to Erimem, she stated that Richard killed "just about everyone on his bloody rise to power" before Tudor arrived to stake his "flimsly claim" to the throne and Richard was subsequently "hacked to pieces on Bosworth Field". Shakespeare's interpretation of Richard was particularly unfavourable because the play served to please his beloved Queen Elizabeth I, whose position derived directly from her grandfather Henry Tudor's defeat and delegitimisation of the titular monarch. (AUDIO: The Kingmaker)
Behind the scenes[]
- He was played by John Woodnutt in the BBC series The Six Wives of Henry VIII, Peter Benson in The Black Adder and Andrew Tiernan in the 2005 version of Richard III.
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