Tudor Times is the online repository for all things Tudor and Stewart (1485–1625)

On 23rd April 1506, with much ceremony, Philip, Duke of Burgundy and titular King of Castile, was installed as a Knight of the Garter at the Chapel of St George, Windsor (pictured). Philip, and his wife, Queen Juana of Castile, had been shipwrecked en route between Burgundy and Castile, and had been obliged to enjoy Henry VII’s hospitality for an extended period whilst Henry turned their visit to his advantage. Philip was a keen participant in tourneys and other chivalric displays, and was no doubt delighted to receive the Garter.

On this day, 22nd April 1451, Juan II of Castile’s second wife, Isabella of Portugal, gave birth to a daughter, named for her mother. There was no thought that the young Isabella of Castile, with an older half-brother, and later, a brother, would ever be more than some prince or King’s wife, but from an early age she had her eyes on a throne for herself. On the death of Enrique IV, her half-brother, she claimed the throne of Castile in her own right, being crowned in Segovia in 1474. The action led to a civil war, in which she eventually triumphed. Her marriage to Ferdinand II of Aragon enabled them to conquer the last Moorish kingdom in Europe and united Spain more or less into its current boundaries. Their dynastic alliances took their grandchildren to almost every throne in Europe. Not content with Spain, Isabella funded Christopher Columbus’ exploration which brought the riches of the New World to her kingdom.

On 21st April 1509 Henry VII died, at his favourite palace of Richmond. The King had been ailing for several years with throat and lung infections. During the first eighteen years of his reign, Henry had made great strides in turning a war-torn kingdom into a coherent whole. Although he had twice commanded an army – at Bosworth, and in France - he was no seeker of military glory, preferring to concentrate on trade and the application of the law. In the period 1501-1503 his wife and her new-born baby, an eighteen-month old son and his fifteen year old heir all died and he lost his thirteen-year-old daughter to marriage in a foreign land. He never really recovered from these blows and spent the last six years of his reign in an increasing atmosphere of oppression.

On the death of his father, Henry VIII, aged seventeen, ascended the throne, to the delight of everyone. Technically still under age, the Council and his grandmother, Margaret Beaufort, were in control until June, but Henry was soon making himself felt.