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Thomas Cromwell: From Statesman to Scaffold (Part I) · Beheaded

0:04
SPEAKER_00: Hello and welcome to Beheaded.
0:06
SPEAKER_00: Welcome to season four, episode 13, part one.
0:10
SPEAKER_00: Hi Megan Moore.
0:11
SPEAKER_00: And I'm Elizabeth Black.
0:12
SPEAKER_01: Episode 13s are always special for us.
0:16
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
0:16
SPEAKER_00: We always do a two-part season finale if you're new to Beheaded, and it's usually a bigger story.
0:24
SPEAKER_00: Someone that you've heard of before.
0:25
SPEAKER_00: Yes.
0:26
SPEAKER_01: No, like some sorceress from France.
0:29
SPEAKER_00: From France.
0:31
SPEAKER_00: It's uh, you know, we love all of our stories equally, but there's just some that just have so much more meat on the bone and during very crucial times in history, and this is one of those stories which we're very excited about.
0:44
SPEAKER_01: We are.
0:45
SPEAKER_01: And this one, this season is especially important, this episode 13.
0:49
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
0:50
SPEAKER_01: Because now we're legit.
0:52
SPEAKER_01: Because now we're legit.
0:54
SPEAKER_01: Are we historians?
0:55
SPEAKER_01: I mean, amateur historians, yeah.
0:58
SPEAKER_01: Like, you know, we we dabble.
1:00
SPEAKER_01: I feel like a new person.
1:01
SPEAKER_01: I feel like we've turned a corner in our um being just a little bit more legitimate than we were before.
1:09
SPEAKER_00: I mean, we were always legitimate.
1:10
SPEAKER_00: We've just added some validation to our legitimacy, if that makes sense.
1:14
SPEAKER_01: If you live under a rock, the previous episode had such a cool guest.
1:21
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
1:21
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we had Dr.
1:22
SPEAKER_01: Owen Emerson on the show.
1:25
SPEAKER_00: It was wild.
1:26
SPEAKER_00: We've obviously teased that we were gonna have a bigger guest throughout this season, and we've had some amazing interviews this season, and not just this season, we've had some throughout the whole time, but this season specifically.
1:37
SPEAKER_00: Good ones.
1:37
SPEAKER_00: We had um James Peacock, the uh founder and head of the Queen Anne Boleyn Society.
1:43
SPEAKER_00: Also friends with Owen Emerson.
1:45
SPEAKER_01: Who was friends with Owen?
1:46
SPEAKER_01: We've had Megan Clausen, um, Tower of London resident and author of Falling Hard for the Royal Guard.
1:53
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
1:54
SPEAKER_00: But this is the one that we've been trying to kind of nail down all season, and we knew we wanted to time it with the end of our season.
2:02
SPEAKER_00: Um, and obviously he was in the middle of doing a lot of crazy recent research, so it weirdly all worked out.
2:09
SPEAKER_01: Weirdly worked out, and it's it must have been so hard because he couldn't share anything about this research.
2:16
SPEAKER_01: Right.
2:17
SPEAKER_01: And as we talk about in the interview, really big news in the world of history, and not just tutor history, but like history in general.
2:26
SPEAKER_01: Um, Dr.
2:27
SPEAKER_01: Emerson with his co-curator Kate McCaffrey and Allison Palmer from Heaver Castle, they have found and identified Thomas Cromwell's book of hours, right?
2:39
SPEAKER_01: Which is huge.
2:40
SPEAKER_00: Which, like, it's been in Hans Holbein's very famous portrait of Thomas Cromwell forever, you know, since the 1500s, and it's a very distinct-looking book.
2:51
SPEAKER_00: And we talk about this in the interview with Dr.
2:53
SPEAKER_00: Owen Emerson, but it's like, what the heck?
2:56
SPEAKER_00: It's like, how would you not find this before?
2:58
SPEAKER_00: It's such a specific book.
3:00
SPEAKER_00: There's only three in existence, and it's just shocking.
3:04
SPEAKER_00: It took them, I think, this long to find.
3:05
SPEAKER_00: And they just found it on a shelf.
3:06
SPEAKER_00: Just happenstance at Trinity College.
3:08
SPEAKER_01: Just was like, uh, that's the same book as the portrait.
3:12
SPEAKER_01: Right.
3:13
SPEAKER_01: And of all places, yeah, it was sitting on a shelf in Trinity College.
3:17
SPEAKER_01: And Tracy Borman, we've talked a lot about her.
3:20
SPEAKER_01: She is a biographer of Thomas Cromwell.
3:23
SPEAKER_01: She's um curator for the historic royal palaces.
3:27
SPEAKER_01: And it's, I think, what a not that it's just her.
3:32
SPEAKER_01: There's a lot of historians that are giving credit to Owen and Kate, but she recently came out with her latest book um on Elizabeth First and Anne Boleyn.
3:43
SPEAKER_01: And on the front page, on the dedication page, Tracy Borman says to Owen Emerson and James Peacock with heartfelt thanks.
3:53
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
3:53
SPEAKER_01: And then later, Tracy Borman is just giving extreme gratitude to Owen and the others at Heber Castle for this amazing.
4:02
SPEAKER_01: She she posts, I think this is what's known as a pinch me moment.
4:05
SPEAKER_01: Thank you so much for letting me get up and close with this newly discovered book.
4:10
SPEAKER_01: Like she's overly ecstatic.
4:11
SPEAKER_01: And it's just so such well-deserved recognition.
4:14
SPEAKER_01: And I felt like such a little person that he would take the time to come and talk to us about it when he's busy on the BBC and holding press conferences.
4:24
SPEAKER_01: But what a nice guy.
4:25
SPEAKER_01: And I, you know, we're not little people.
4:27
SPEAKER_01: It kind of makes me feel like, you know what?
4:28
SPEAKER_01: We've got a platform.
4:29
SPEAKER_00: We're bigger people now.
4:30
SPEAKER_00: We're medium-sized, we're medium people, and you know, the fact that her book is dedicated to two people that we've interviewed that we've now had on the show.
4:39
SPEAKER_01: And I just feel incredibly grateful that after just a week of this being announced and doing all these other interviews, and being there's already a documentary with Susanna Lipscomb about it that where she interviews him.
4:51
SPEAKER_00: And we were just watching it before our interview with Dr.
4:53
SPEAKER_00: Emerson, and it's great because it's literally the date that they put on um is like June 20 uh 30 or 20, what's it?
5:02
SPEAKER_01: It was like June 2023.
5:03
SPEAKER_01: It was like what year?
5:04
SPEAKER_01: It was just a few days ago.
5:06
SPEAKER_00: That's what we were saying.
5:06
SPEAKER_00: We're like, we're literally still in June 2023 right now.
5:09
SPEAKER_01: So it's very fresh.
5:11
SPEAKER_01: So I'm so grateful that we I felt like we were, you know, like we I felt like a reporter who got like the scoop and the story and got it out there.
5:21
SPEAKER_01: It's a big deal.
5:22
SPEAKER_00: It is a big deal.
5:23
SPEAKER_00: And we obviously preface with all of our guests, you know.
5:25
SPEAKER_00: We're like, hey, like we don't know how many shows you've listened to of ours, but we're goofy.
5:30
SPEAKER_00: We're just like two people.
5:31
SPEAKER_00: We're not professional historians, we just have a passion for.
5:34
SPEAKER_01: I am now.
5:35
SPEAKER_01: I'm sorry.
5:36
SPEAKER_01: I'm on a new level now.
5:37
SPEAKER_01: I'm actually putting it on my LinkedIn.
5:39
SPEAKER_01: So good.
5:40
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, a little link to beheaded on your professional LinkedIn.
5:44
SPEAKER_00: Oh jeez.
5:45
SPEAKER_00: But it is just one of those things where, again, like we always disclaimer, like, hey, we pronounce things wrong.
5:49
SPEAKER_00: Like we're goofy, we're just like here.
5:51
SPEAKER_01: Unintentionally.
5:52
SPEAKER_01: I have to say, we don't mean to pronounce things wrong.
5:55
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, but you know, we're we're just here doing what we love, and it's starting to really, I think, take a bit of flight, and it's fun.
6:01
SPEAKER_00: It's fun to see it grow.
6:03
SPEAKER_01: I've been having fun, and I yeah, I feel like we've turned a bit of a corner.
6:07
SPEAKER_01: Um, so all that said, if you haven't listened to the episode with the special edition with Dr.
6:12
SPEAKER_01: Emerson, go back and listen to it.
6:14
SPEAKER_01: He also, him and Kate McCaffrey wrote the book about their findings within a week of everything being re released.
6:24
SPEAKER_01: Um, and you can go onto the Heaver Castle shop to purchase it.
6:28
SPEAKER_01: So very cool.
6:30
SPEAKER_01: Also, I highly recommend History Hit.
6:32
SPEAKER_01: I just downloaded it because I wanted to watch this documentary.
6:36
SPEAKER_01: And an app, right?
6:37
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's it's like a platform, I guess.
6:41
SPEAKER_01: Streaming service.
6:41
SPEAKER_01: Streaming, thank you.
6:42
SPEAKER_01: That's the word streaming service.
6:44
SPEAKER_01: And it's all specific, owned by History Hit.
6:47
SPEAKER_01: A lot of like Susanna Lipscomb stuff, a lot of Dan Jones, right?
6:52
SPEAKER_01: Um, a lot of Tracy Borman, Lucy Worsley.
6:54
SPEAKER_01: Um, so I don't know.
6:57
SPEAKER_01: I might keep my subscription.
6:58
SPEAKER_01: My I might keep my subscription.
7:00
SPEAKER_00: Yes, I like it.
7:01
SPEAKER_00: I've only seen um the documentaries with you, but I feel like I'm gonna do this independently too.
7:06
SPEAKER_00: Um, you know, and and Robbie's a history fan.
7:09
SPEAKER_00: I feel like we could dig up some things to watch in the offseason.
7:11
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, for sure.
7:13
SPEAKER_01: Cool.
7:14
SPEAKER_01: Exciting.
7:14
SPEAKER_01: Um, so all this came announced with Thomas Cromwell's Book of Hours.
7:20
SPEAKER_01: Complete coincidence.
7:22
SPEAKER_01: Again, talk about just happenstance.
7:24
SPEAKER_01: I I just felt like everything fell into place.
7:26
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
7:27
SPEAKER_01: There were some rocky weeks in our season when I was like, ooh, I'm so sorry we're late again.
7:31
SPEAKER_01: But everything is falling into place.
7:33
SPEAKER_00: Does it make sense now, like the timing of everything?
7:36
SPEAKER_00: Because for our final episode, we were planning, and we've been planning this for like two seasons.
7:42
SPEAKER_00: We've been planning since like October, we knew this is what we were gonna do.
7:45
SPEAKER_00: Right.
7:45
SPEAKER_00: So our executione of today is Thomas Cromwell.
7:50
SPEAKER_00: How appropriate we again we had no idea of this research until a week ago.
7:55
SPEAKER_00: Um, so it's just we are one of those things that's like we can't believe again with the timing of it all.
8:01
SPEAKER_00: And so we're very excited.
8:02
SPEAKER_00: This is part one of two.
8:04
SPEAKER_00: Um, we always do again longer episodes uh for this uh specific, these specific stories.
8:12
SPEAKER_01: So yeah, Thomas Cromwell.
8:14
SPEAKER_01: Is he our first dude?
8:17
SPEAKER_01: That is actually funny.
8:19
SPEAKER_01: Like season one was Mary Queen of Scots, season two was Anne Boleyn, and season three was uh Jane Gray.
8:26
SPEAKER_00: Jane Gray, this is our first guy who made it to a season finale.
8:31
SPEAKER_00: So congratulations! Congratulations, Thomas Cromwell.
8:34
SPEAKER_01: It has been uh June 2023.
8:36
SPEAKER_00: Who would have known you'd have such a comeback?
8:38
SPEAKER_00: It's true.
8:39
SPEAKER_00: Who would have known we would have finally put men on the equal playing field of women?
8:42
SPEAKER_00: Such a comeback.
8:44
SPEAKER_01: Um Elizabeth is gonna start with his early life, but just as a really like high-level overview, because if you're feeling like dumb because you don't know who Thomas Cromwell is, and we're like, everyone knows who he is, our apologies.
8:58
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's fine, it's fine, don't feel dumb.
9:00
SPEAKER_01: Just as like a very high-level overview.
9:03
SPEAKER_01: Um, he was part of the privy council of King Henry VIII and participated in a lot of King Henry VIII's legal decisions, um, and unfortunately had a downfall.
9:13
SPEAKER_01: So very high level, and then Elizabeth kicked it off with his early life.
9:17
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
9:18
SPEAKER_00: Um, and before we start with that, too, just wanted to say again, like everyone who is kind of around King Henry VIII, we've seen the story time and time again where it's always a blazing rise to glory and then an awful downfall that usually ends at the blocks.
9:33
SPEAKER_01: Just like Splash Mountain.
9:35
unknown: Exactly.
9:35
SPEAKER_00: You go up and then you go down.
9:37
SPEAKER_00: So this part we're just gonna be going through the little bayou scene, the little swamp scene with all the critters singing.
9:42
SPEAKER_00: That's what this episode is.
9:44
SPEAKER_00: Next episode is when we get to the laugh and place.
9:50
SPEAKER_00: Is that an outdated reference now because they're doing away with uh yeah?
9:53
SPEAKER_00: I actually don't think we can Well, we can because it's history.
9:57
SPEAKER_01: We can.
9:58
SPEAKER_00: But we don't endorse it.
9:59
SPEAKER_01: But if this podcast lives like 10 years down the road, it'll be vintage sounding.
10:04
SPEAKER_00: We'll have one of those little disclaimers at the beginning that's like this references outdated information, just so you know.
10:09
SPEAKER_01: We have A Tiana's bayou hasn't been built yet, so I am very excited for that.
10:14
SPEAKER_00: Let's be clear.
10:15
SPEAKER_00: New chapter of our lives.
10:17
SPEAKER_01: Should we just like make this into a Disney podcast?
10:20
SPEAKER_00: Um Disney sparkle on it.
10:25
unknown: Okay.
10:25
SPEAKER_00: Alright, no more interruptions.
10:27
SPEAKER_00: Okay, real for real this time.
10:28
SPEAKER_00: We're starting.
10:29
SPEAKER_00: We're starting.
10:30
SPEAKER_01: Serious pants with our humble pie.
10:31
SPEAKER_01: Where did you get this pants right now?
10:33
SPEAKER_01: I don't know.
10:33
SPEAKER_01: I just I'm delirious.
10:35
SPEAKER_00: Ironic because we're both not wearing pants right now.
10:39
SPEAKER_00: These are pants.
10:41
SPEAKER_00: Well, yeah, but we went for a workout, so we're not in like real clothes.
10:44
SPEAKER_00: Anyway, okay.
10:45
unknown: Here we go.
10:46
SPEAKER_01: Okay, but actually not real this time.
10:48
SPEAKER_01: We ate Subway for lunch.
10:49
SPEAKER_01: Oh my god.
10:50
SPEAKER_01: Okay, I'm done.
10:50
SPEAKER_00: I'm sorry.
10:52
SPEAKER_00: Okay, so Thomas Cromwell was born in 1485 in Putney, Surrey.
11:00
SPEAKER_00: Near the Thames.
11:01
SPEAKER_00: We've come very far because we can now pronounce these things correctly.
11:04
SPEAKER_01: Season one, you were like the Thames River.
11:06
SPEAKER_01: I was like, I think it's the Thames.
11:07
SPEAKER_01: I've never been to England, Megan.
11:09
SPEAKER_01: At that point, neither had I.
11:11
SPEAKER_01: I was just well-rounded.
11:12
SPEAKER_01: That's fine.
11:13
SPEAKER_00: Um, but he was the son of uh a guy named Walter Cromwell, who was actually a cloth merchant and who was the owner of an inn/slash brewery.
11:23
SPEAKER_00: So kind of dabbled with a few different trades.
11:26
SPEAKER_00: There are some rumors that he was a blacksmith too, but that's kind of been debunked recently.
11:30
SPEAKER_00: They're not really sure if he was a blacksmith or if his last name was just associated with the word smith.
11:36
SPEAKER_00: So, but it is clear that he kind of had a few different trades to make money.
11:40
SPEAKER_00: And uh Thomas' mother was a woman named Catherine Meverell.
11:45
SPEAKER_00: Um, but there's not a lot of information on her.
11:48
SPEAKER_00: Most of his early life kind of centers around his relationship with his father.
11:51
SPEAKER_00: So Thomas's father was kind of known to be a bit violent, perhaps a bit of a drunk, perhaps a shady businessman.
12:00
SPEAKER_01: Um allegedly, all of this.
12:02
SPEAKER_00: Allegedly, we're not entirely sure because a lot of historians are coming out, re-looking at his early life and saying, well, I think we're just misinterpreting some court records at this time because it was fairly common for people who were merchants or in his trade to have like certain allegations against them.
12:19
SPEAKER_00: So it might have just been more of a like, I guess, occupational um hazard.
12:25
SPEAKER_00: Not hazard, but you know, it's like like something that comes with your occupation, but just like you have to just deal with it if you're gonna be an owner of another.
12:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, a person who does um who runs a bridge.
12:35
SPEAKER_01: But supposedly he was violent with his kids too.
12:38
SPEAKER_00: Apparently.
12:38
SPEAKER_00: Allegedly.
12:39
SPEAKER_00: Allegedly.
12:39
SPEAKER_00: Allegedly.
12:40
SPEAKER_00: We're not entirely sure.
12:41
SPEAKER_00: Um, but he did have quite a few uh people come at him for his quality of ale that he was brewing.
12:48
SPEAKER_00: People were upset saying that his ale was either watered down or substandard.
12:52
SPEAKER_00: So that part was very clear, whether it was intentionally or in not intentionally.
12:57
SPEAKER_01: It's kind of funny.
12:58
SPEAKER_01: I would be mad too.
12:59
SPEAKER_01: He had a total of 48 court fines just for that.
13:03
SPEAKER_01: Just for having watered down beer.
13:05
SPEAKER_01: Right.
13:07
SPEAKER_01: No wonder they were broke.
13:09
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, so that's that's Walter in a nutshell.
13:12
SPEAKER_00: Um, but uh Cromwell also kind of claimed that when he was young, he was a bit of a ruffian.
13:18
SPEAKER_00: So again, a little bit of a tougher upbringing, you know.
13:21
SPEAKER_00: They they weren't necessarily like poverty stricken, but they were just like, you know, they weren't a noble family.
13:26
SPEAKER_00: They were just trying to kind of get by and try different trades to see what worked for them.
13:30
SPEAKER_00: So I think Cromwell learned a lot about maybe just being resourceful and perhaps like making decisions that are good for him in these young years, and not necessarily about like morals or duty or anything like that.
13:43
SPEAKER_00: I think it was more so just like, you know, do what you can and what you have to do to get by.
13:49
SPEAKER_01: I want to know what they mean by a ruffian.
13:51
SPEAKER_01: Like he started fights and I feel like yeah.
13:55
SPEAKER_00: I was gonna say, I feel like when you say ruffian, especially when you're younger, it implies like you like to get into trouble.
14:00
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, like you stay out late, like you know, maybe you get into fights at the bars or you drink under age.
14:06
SPEAKER_00: Or speedy under the tower bridge.
14:08
SPEAKER_00: Sure.
14:08
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, they'll they take all their spray cans in the in the 1400s under the bridges.
14:14
SPEAKER_01: Sure.
14:14
SPEAKER_01: He did try to get his axe straight though.
14:16
SPEAKER_01: Uh in 1503, he marched out with the French army as a mercenary.
14:21
SPEAKER_01: Right.
14:22
SPEAKER_01: Recently learned this word, which I don't know if I should be embarrassed.
14:26
SPEAKER_00: I like that you're embarrassed that I don't know how to pronounce the Thames River, but you don't know what a mercenary is.
14:30
SPEAKER_01: For those who were in my boat just a few weeks ago, uh, that is someone who gets it's like a paid soldier.
14:37
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
14:37
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
14:37
SPEAKER_00: You're like, you don't believe in your cause or your country.
14:40
SPEAKER_01: Like you don't really want to be there.
14:41
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
14:41
SPEAKER_00: You're just getting paid your soldier for hire.
14:43
SPEAKER_00: Contract.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
14:44
SPEAKER_00: Contract work.
14:45
SPEAKER_00: I like when Megan asked me that.
14:46
SPEAKER_00: We were like prepping for um an episode, and she's like, What's a mercenary?
14:50
SPEAKER_00: And I was like, Oh, okay.
14:52
SPEAKER_00: But that's okay because that's what we're we're all here to learn.
14:55
SPEAKER_00: We're all here to learn.
14:56
SPEAKER_01: There's all certain things that maybe we've heard and don't know what they mean.
14:59
SPEAKER_01: We know the British spelling of jail is G-A-O-L.
15:02
SPEAKER_01: It's not a gowl.
15:03
SPEAKER_01: We've come a long way.
15:04
SPEAKER_01: We've come a long way.
15:06
SPEAKER_01: Um, so he's marching with the French army, goes all the way to Italy to go fight in the Battle of Garliano.
15:13
SPEAKER_01: Perfect.
15:14
SPEAKER_01: It's Italian.
15:16
SPEAKER_01: The French um were their allies, obviously.
15:19
SPEAKER_01: We're all gonna go and fight the Italians.
15:21
SPEAKER_01: He actually kind of stays over there in Italy, though.
15:24
SPEAKER_01: Um, and sorry, really quick to kind of describe his level.
15:28
SPEAKER_01: He was he was a bottom level.
15:30
SPEAKER_01: He wasn't really quite, he wasn't even a soldier with a gun.
15:33
SPEAKER_01: He was just the guy with like a pike, like a a pike, a spike?
15:37
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, sure.
15:37
SPEAKER_01: A pole, a pole pike, um, yeah, with a a pike and a helmet, and again, like not really his heart wasn't in it, but yeah, I mean obviously he survived, so that's great.
15:48
SPEAKER_00: What kind of mercenary doesn't have a weapon?
15:50
SPEAKER_00: He had a pike, a pike, I guess.
15:52
SPEAKER_00: Okay, but wasn't elevated to the status of gunman.
15:55
SPEAKER_00: But in like a baseball bat he went in with.
15:57
SPEAKER_00: Stupid question.
15:58
SPEAKER_00: Do they have guns in this era?
16:01
SPEAKER_01: That might be a stupid question, but I'm I don't hear the answer.
16:07
SPEAKER_01: Well, hold on.
16:08
SPEAKER_01: Let's think.
16:08
SPEAKER_01: This is 1503.
16:11
SPEAKER_01: We know that they had guns.
16:13
SPEAKER_01: Did they?
16:14
SPEAKER_01: Like the pirates.
16:15
SPEAKER_01: The pirates of the Caribbean had pistols.
16:18
SPEAKER_01: That's your reference.
16:20
SPEAKER_01: No, they had gun.
16:22
SPEAKER_01: No, okay, let's be educated here.
16:23
SPEAKER_01: Do you want to just Google?
16:24
SPEAKER_01: Sir Walter Raleigh had didn't they get gunpowder?
16:27
SPEAKER_01: Wasn't that one of and that was in the 1600s?
16:30
SPEAKER_01: Okay, that's a six point.
16:32
SPEAKER_01: I'm sure someone is out there rolling their eyes right now.
16:35
SPEAKER_01: Like, this is why why do I fucking listen to these girls?
16:38
SPEAKER_01: Everything else is out the window, right?
16:40
SPEAKER_01: Hey, we talked to Dr.
16:41
SPEAKER_01: Owen Emerson.
16:42
SPEAKER_01: Give us a damn break.
16:44
SPEAKER_01: I like that.
16:45
SPEAKER_00: When literally started this episode, we started this episode by saying, Oh, we've come a long way.
16:51
SPEAKER_00: We know everything now.
16:52
SPEAKER_00: 1364 was when the gun was invented.
16:57
SPEAKER_01: When was the actual first okay, around AD 1000?
17:01
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
17:02
SPEAKER_01: Um They're saying 1364.
17:05
SPEAKER_01: Is when like a pinch.
17:06
SPEAKER_01: The Chinese first invented the gunpowder.
17:08
SPEAKER_01: Interesting.
17:09
SPEAKER_01: I'm gonna say they had did they have guns, they, in 1500 England.
17:18
SPEAKER_01: They did have gunpowder.
17:19
SPEAKER_01: Oh duh, the gunpowder plot.
17:21
SPEAKER_01: No, I know.
17:22
SPEAKER_01: I know, okay, but that was 1600.
17:24
SPEAKER_01: That was early 1600s.
17:26
SPEAKER_00: But I'm saying like the invention of a pistol because they obviously use gunpowder for other things.
17:31
SPEAKER_01: Firearms appeared during the 14th century.
17:33
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
17:34
SPEAKER_01: The English started using guns.
17:37
SPEAKER_01: They had cannons in 1473.
17:39
SPEAKER_00: Well, that's what I was gonna say.
17:40
SPEAKER_00: Like cannons was the kind of initial use, and then they had to get them smaller, like how technology gets smaller and smaller all the time.
17:48
SPEAKER_00: It's like a cannon, but it's a gun.
17:50
SPEAKER_01: The Spanish had rifles and the Italian shut up.
17:55
SPEAKER_01: The Italian wars started in 1494.
17:59
SPEAKER_01: You know what?
18:01
SPEAKER_01: Anybody knows more about gun history?
18:04
SPEAKER_00: I think that's more than we knew when we started.
18:06
SPEAKER_01: So that's what you know, we're all here to learn.
18:08
SPEAKER_00: Okay.
18:08
SPEAKER_00: Um, mercenary, no gun, just a pike.
18:12
SPEAKER_00: Just a pike.
18:13
SPEAKER_00: We don't know if the others have guns.
18:16
SPEAKER_01: Um, and he so this is 1503.
18:19
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
18:20
SPEAKER_01: And altogether he actually ended up staying in Italy until 1514.
18:25
SPEAKER_01: He worked as an agent for the Archbishop of York.
18:29
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
18:29
SPEAKER_01: And sounded like kind of a prestigious title, but he basically dealt with any um any issues between English and Rome.
18:38
SPEAKER_01: What was it called?
18:39
SPEAKER_01: The the ecclesi what's the word ecclesial?
18:42
SPEAKER_00: Uh I know what word you're thinking of, I just don't know how to pronounce it.
18:46
SPEAKER_01: Like Ecclesiastes.
18:50
SPEAKER_01: Can I just say it's also this is weird for us?
18:52
SPEAKER_01: It's the afternoon, and we've had zero alcohol.
18:55
SPEAKER_01: This is just using the water.
18:56
SPEAKER_01: We're so much better after a bottle of wine.
18:58
SPEAKER_01: We're better with wine.
19:00
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
19:00
SPEAKER_01: This isn't going well.
19:02
SPEAKER_01: It's going just fine.
19:04
SPEAKER_01: We're just um loopy.
19:06
SPEAKER_01: He did go back to England for a short period where he met his wife and they were married in 1515.
19:12
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
19:12
SPEAKER_01: Her name was Elizabeth Wicks.
19:14
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
19:15
SPEAKER_01: She was a widow of a yeoman guard.
19:17
SPEAKER_00: Mm-hmm.
19:18
SPEAKER_01: Um and the daughter of Henry Wicks, who served as gentleman usher to King Henry the Seventh.
19:23
SPEAKER_01: So she did have some ties with royalty.
19:25
SPEAKER_01: And I felt like this is kind of one of his first examples of getting into with important people.
19:31
SPEAKER_01: I think marrying her in itself was showing he's he's moving up.
19:37
SPEAKER_00: It's showing his level of ambition, too.
19:38
SPEAKER_00: It's like he selected a wife with specific ties.
19:41
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
19:42
SPEAKER_01: Um, but he did return back to Rome, and again, he stayed there for a few more years.
19:46
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, a few more years.
19:47
SPEAKER_01: He was there for a 26-week trip.
19:50
SPEAKER_01: And in this trip, he learned a lot about the newest editions of the Gospels, and he actually started doubting what he's been practicing all along as a Catholic.
19:58
SPEAKER_01: As a Catholic.
19:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
19:59
SPEAKER_01: So they go back to England, and he has three kids: Gregory, Anne, also known as Alice.
20:07
SPEAKER_01: Did you see that?
20:08
SPEAKER_01: Oh, I didn't.
20:08
SPEAKER_01: I thought it was just Ann.
20:09
SPEAKER_01: Some said Anne, some said Alice, some said Anne in parentheses or Alice.
20:15
SPEAKER_00: So So we don't know her name.
20:17
SPEAKER_01: Doesn't matter.
20:18
SPEAKER_01: It was a girl and it started with an A.
20:20
SPEAKER_01: Okay.
20:21
SPEAKER_01: Um, and Grace was the third one.
20:23
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
20:24
SPEAKER_01: Uh kind of jumping ahead a little bit in the timeline, but just because it's related to his family life, really sad.
20:31
SPEAKER_01: In 15 between 1528 and 1529, both his wife and his two daughters all died within the year.
20:40
SPEAKER_01: So they didn't even, it wasn't even like they were all sick at once and died, but they they believe it was the sweating sickness.
20:46
SPEAKER_01: And as we've talked about in previous episodes, the sweating sickness, you could catch something before breakfast and be dead by dinner because you could show symptoms and die all within 24 hours.
20:59
SPEAKER_01: Right.
20:59
SPEAKER_01: And it was actually a disease that was attacking the higher no like the higher nobility too, which was really bizarre.
21:06
SPEAKER_01: And to me, that entire like, thank God we don't have that anymore.
21:11
SPEAKER_00: Where who knows what it was?
21:12
SPEAKER_00: I know there's what it was.
21:14
SPEAKER_00: Sure, but who knows what it actually was too?
21:17
SPEAKER_00: Because it's like there's so many things, obviously, that happen, like you know, pandemics, epidemics, whatever.
21:22
SPEAKER_00: But it's like you have the Black Death, you have the plague, you have um, you know, you have the sweating sickness.
21:27
SPEAKER_00: It's like I don't know how much of that transfers to modern modern time, or if we found a way to evolve against it, if it is what we just know is the flu now, but it because it was so severe, it could kill.
21:40
SPEAKER_01: If it's coronavirus.
21:42
SPEAKER_01: You know when you get like a tickle in your throat and you're like, oh gosh, I hope it's not a cold, I hope it's not COVID.
21:46
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
21:46
SPEAKER_01: And then back then it's like you start off, you get a fever, you're like, Well, uh, this could either be just like a minor little flu, or this could be the end of my life within my dinner.
21:56
SPEAKER_00: Cool.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: It's true.
21:57
SPEAKER_00: Talk about stressful.
21:58
SPEAKER_00: I always think about uh Pride and Prejudice, though, when like Jane uh Bennett like goes over to um the estate next door and she gets sick and she has to stay there.
22:09
SPEAKER_00: And then the mom just goes, People do not die of colds.
22:13
SPEAKER_00: And I'm like, I guess maybe by then they beat the cold.
22:15
SPEAKER_01: Probably not.
22:17
SPEAKER_01: Um he also had an illegitimate daughter named Jane.
22:21
SPEAKER_01: Uh I'm not gonna really harp too much on her.
22:24
SPEAKER_01: We don't really care how much, not just kidding.
22:26
SPEAKER_01: But no, but she did live with her with his family until she was nine and then um went off and did her own thing.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: Right.
22:33
SPEAKER_00: It was believed that um the woman who who had Jane was like a house servant, but they kept everything very under wraps because um it was very common for a lot of men to have mistresses at this time, but he obviously was a bit more pious and was determined to make more of himself, so he didn't really want to be known for his indiscretions.
22:54
SPEAKER_00: So they, even though this daughter was just kind of around, this like bastard daughter, they tried to keep as much like under wraps as they could about her and her mother and all of that.
23:02
SPEAKER_00: Hmm.
23:03
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
23:04
SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
23:04
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, so that's kind of his family life, and he's back in London.
23:08
SPEAKER_00: Right.
23:09
SPEAKER_00: Um, so he um eventually obtains a seat in the House of Commons, which is very exciting because he's finally getting what he wants.
23:17
SPEAKER_00: He's like moving up in the world and he becomes an advisor to Thomas Gray.
23:22
SPEAKER_00: Um, and he also maintained like a private legal practice on the side, which I was curious, like all of a sudden he's a lawyer.
23:30
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he kind of went through a lot of different careers.
23:33
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, there was never anything in our research that said, like, and now he like studied law.
23:38
SPEAKER_00: It's all of a sudden he's just a lawyer and he's in like public service.
23:42
SPEAKER_00: Well, he got into being nowhere.
23:43
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, he he worked as a mercantile for a little bit and was in the cloth trade.
23:47
SPEAKER_01: Like his dad.
23:48
SPEAKER_01: Like his dad.
23:49
SPEAKER_01: Right.
23:50
SPEAKER_01: And he was kind of making a name for himself in that industry, but then I think discovered he was actually pretty smart and could do more, and then he got into being a lawyer and legal work.
24:01
SPEAKER_01: Right.
24:01
SPEAKER_01: That is I guess you could just choose that path and go.
24:04
SPEAKER_01: You know, I might be a doctor tomorrow.
24:06
SPEAKER_01: Could be.
24:07
unknown: Could be.
24:07
SPEAKER_01: I mean, you are a historian today, so I am currently still a historian who knows what mercenaries are.
24:13
SPEAKER_01: And now I know about guns.
24:14
SPEAKER_01: And now we know all about the gun.
24:17
SPEAKER_00: Um, brilliant.
24:18
SPEAKER_00: Well, uh, in 1524, he then became uh a member of the household of Lord Chancellor Cardinal Wolsey, who we know.
24:27
SPEAKER_00: So this is when the story starts to get a bit more juicy and he gets further and further into the inner circle.
24:33
SPEAKER_00: Um, so Wolsey had this goal of essentially like getting rid of some of the monasteries.
24:41
SPEAKER_00: And they were doing this apparently to like fund Wolsey's other ventures, which is strange because like Wolsey was Catholic, so it's like interesting that they decided to prey on like Catholic monasteries.
24:52
SPEAKER_01: Well, the guy, I mean, how religious and pious was he really?
24:56
SPEAKER_01: Woolsey had nothing but like money signs in his eyes, I feel like.
25:01
SPEAKER_01: And it was all to benefit um, yeah, his two colleges.
25:06
SPEAKER_01: So it was going towards education, I suppose, but also in a way for him to profit.
25:11
SPEAKER_01: Um, they were raising funds by shutting down these monasteries for the King's School and Cardinal College.
25:19
SPEAKER_00: Interesting.
25:19
SPEAKER_00: So yeah, a little hard to justify, but apparently they were able to do that back then.
25:24
SPEAKER_00: Um, but by 1529, Wolsey then appoints Cromwell uh to his council as a senior advisor.
25:30
SPEAKER_00: So he kind of goes from being like an assistant to now he's like an esteemed advisor for Wolsey.
25:36
SPEAKER_00: So again, he at this point, how old is he?
25:38
SPEAKER_01: He's probably like That was 1529.
25:41
SPEAKER_01: So his wife just died and his kids died.
25:44
SPEAKER_00: Um so he's like early 40s, I want to say.
25:47
SPEAKER_00: But they both got along fairly well, and I think a big reason for that was because their backgrounds were were quite similar.
25:54
SPEAKER_00: Um, Wolsey was a son of a butcher, so again, similar to cr uh to Cromwell, just like not really born into nobility or with a ton of expectations of like what they're gonna do in their futures.
26:04
SPEAKER_00: And here they are, like very powerful men in the Tudor court, you know, very close to the king and quickly getting into the king's inner circle.
26:13
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, I was that that I guess that was for a long time not normal for someone to raise to rise through the ranks coming from working class.
26:26
SPEAKER_01: And this was kind of the start of that.
26:28
SPEAKER_01: And I I think the rest of the people in the court weren't used to that, they didn't really appreciate that or respect somebody like Woolsey or or Cromwell.
26:36
SPEAKER_01: All of a sudden you're like, dude, you're the son of a butcher, and now all of a sudden you're telling me what to do, and you're making these big decisions and you're shutting down monasteries, and which by the way, they shut down at that time 30,000 monasteries.
26:49
SPEAKER_01: Like, we're not just talking about a couple here, a couple there.
26:52
SPEAKER_01: Right.
26:52
SPEAKER_00: It was pretty massive widespread.
26:55
SPEAKER_00: Um, but of course, and again, we're like there's a lot that goes into this, but we're escalating the timeline a bit because there's a lot more information to cover.
27:03
SPEAKER_00: But by October 1529, uh Wolsey starts to kind of fall from his power.
27:09
SPEAKER_00: Um, he starts to kind of develop some friction with the king.
27:13
SPEAKER_00: Um I know, and now Cromwell, because he's so close with Wolsey, is starting to have enemies as well.
27:20
SPEAKER_00: But he was really determined not to like fall with his master.
27:23
SPEAKER_00: Uh he he successfully overcame Wolsey's shadow.
27:26
SPEAKER_00: And ironically, it wasn't because he really distanced himself from Wolsey.
27:30
SPEAKER_00: It wasn't like he was like, Oh, I don't know what that guy's doing, and I don't believe anything he believes.
27:34
SPEAKER_00: Sorry for that monastery thing.
27:36
SPEAKER_00: He actually gained trust back from people because he still kind of remained loyal to Wolsey a bit, saying, like, well, you know, I'm still loyal to him.
27:44
SPEAKER_00: He's my friend, he's my advisor, but I understand like where he went wrong.
27:49
SPEAKER_00: So people kind of respected that he didn't just abandon his friend in the time where his friend started to slip.
27:54
SPEAKER_00: He was like, Well, I I you know, I still kind of you know, like like value him as a person, and you know, we still had a great time together, type of thing.
28:02
SPEAKER_00: And people really like respected that, I think.
28:06
SPEAKER_01: And the king respected that too.
28:07
SPEAKER_01: And like, look at that loyalty.
28:09
SPEAKER_01: Wow.
28:09
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and and Woolsey was losing faith, um, or was losing the king's faith because he couldn't figure out the annulment between him and Catherine between King Henry the Eighth and Catherine of Aragon.
28:22
SPEAKER_01: Exactly.
28:23
SPEAKER_01: Amongst other things.
28:24
SPEAKER_01: Right.
28:25
SPEAKER_01: But I think King Henry the Eighth was getting incredibly frustrated by the lack of progress with the King's Great Matter.
28:32
SPEAKER_01: Um, again, like just to recap very high overview, yeah, high level.
28:38
SPEAKER_01: King Henry VIII has been married to Catherine of Aragon almost 20 years.
28:43
SPEAKER_01: And now that he has eyes for Anne Boleyn, he's determined to make her his second wife.
28:49
SPEAKER_01: And he's counting on his legal counsel and Woolsey and his privy counsel to figure out how are you gonna do this.
28:56
SPEAKER_01: Right.
28:56
SPEAKER_01: And they were trying to take different angles and eventually landed on, well, the the marriage was always illegitimate because Catherine supposedly um consummated her marriage with King Henry VIII's brother, Arthur, who died shortly after they were married, and then Catherine went on to marry Henry.
29:17
SPEAKER_01: But Catherine always stood firm saying, No, I never consummated it.
29:21
SPEAKER_01: We weren't married that long, we were so young, and he was sick.
29:24
SPEAKER_00: Right.
29:24
SPEAKER_01: Um so it's still like the age-old question.
29:28
SPEAKER_00: We don't we don't know exactly.
29:31
SPEAKER_00: Um, so by the end of 1530, uh Thomas Cromwell became a clear favorite of the king.
29:36
SPEAKER_00: You know, Wolsey goes down.
29:38
SPEAKER_00: I think the king's kind of looking for like who's gonna fill this void in terms of people he can trust.
29:43
SPEAKER_00: So he um so Cromwell was appointed to the Privy Council, and he just got like a slew of titles.
29:49
SPEAKER_00: Like all of a sudden he's very well known.
29:51
SPEAKER_00: Um, one of his biggest titles was he became the master of the king's jewel house.
29:56
SPEAKER_01: Hmm.
29:57
SPEAKER_00: That sounds like fun.
29:58
SPEAKER_00: I know.
29:58
SPEAKER_01: And he did get to go to the crown jewels hour at the still to this day at the Tower of London, right?
30:03
SPEAKER_01: Which is cool.
30:04
SPEAKER_01: Which Megan Clausen's father was protecting during the last um coronation.
30:08
SPEAKER_01: So cool.
30:09
SPEAKER_01: I know.
30:10
SPEAKER_01: Hey, you know what, really quick, sorry, not to interrupt too much, but I was just thinking, you know what kind of I guess it's I shouldn't be so grim, but what's kind of unfortunate?
30:18
SPEAKER_01: What Woolsey never turned into an execution story for us.
30:23
SPEAKER_00: Bummer.
30:24
SPEAKER_01: I think he could have been because he was arrested.
30:26
SPEAKER_00: He was arrested and then he got sick.
30:28
SPEAKER_01: He got sick, and he never made it through to like a trial and execution.
30:32
SPEAKER_01: He died of natural causes before anything else.
30:34
SPEAKER_01: Don't refer to the Showtime's The Tutors because they make him take himself out with the knife.
30:39
SPEAKER_01: Remember?
30:40
SPEAKER_00: I was gonna say it didn't happen.
30:41
SPEAKER_00: And it's it's it is unfortunate though, because in whenever we do research in this specific period, I always think of like, oh, I can't wait to do a Wolsey episode.
30:49
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and we just nope, can't have one.
30:51
SPEAKER_00: I mean, maybe we can take a different direction someday or inform you guys of his story in another way, which we're kind of doing in this episode.
30:57
SPEAKER_00: We kinda are, yeah.
30:58
SPEAKER_01: We can do an alternate universe, like if Wolsey didn't get sick.
31:00
SPEAKER_01: Oh my gosh.
31:01
SPEAKER_01: But in case you yeah, but in case you were wondering, like, well, you keep saying downfall, was he executed?
31:05
SPEAKER_01: No.
31:06
SPEAKER_01: No, he actually wasn't.
31:07
SPEAKER_01: Probably would have been, right?
31:08
SPEAKER_01: Coulda, shoulda, woulda.
31:10
SPEAKER_00: Megan's really disappointed he wasn't taken to the block.
31:13
SPEAKER_00: That's okay.
31:14
SPEAKER_00: Tudors did it, you know, did a dramatic dramatic reenactment.
31:18
SPEAKER_01: Speaking of executions, let's talk about Anne Boleyn.
31:21
SPEAKER_00: Oh, perfect.
31:22
SPEAKER_00: Um, well, by uh, and again, I know we're kind of going in and out of timeline a little bit, but we trying to keep it, we're trying to keep it kind of uh thematic, I suppose, rather than exact timeline.
31:33
SPEAKER_00: But by 1527, Henry was trying to divorce Catherine of Aragon to get rid of her and essentially restart his life with Anne Boleyn.
31:41
SPEAKER_00: So um once Cromwell is kind of in power and he's in the House of Commons, he has these titles, he starts to persuade the House of Commons to make Henry the only head, sovereign lord, protector, and defender of the crown.
31:56
SPEAKER_00: So basically, he's like, we have to make this whole head of the church of England thing come about.
32:01
SPEAKER_00: It was a bit of a domino effect.
32:03
SPEAKER_01: You get him to be the head of the church, you get him to make his own decisions, remove England from the Catholic Church of Rome.
32:11
SPEAKER_01: They now are the Church of England.
32:13
SPEAKER_01: Oh, cool, Henry, you are all powerful, go get your divorce, yeah.
32:17
SPEAKER_01: Do whatever you want.
32:18
SPEAKER_00: Annul your marriage.
32:19
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
32:20
SPEAKER_01: And Thomas Cromwell really impressed King Henry VIII during this entire uh what that era was called the King's Great Matter.
32:30
SPEAKER_01: Uh Thomas More, my relative and my buddy, I know, my great, great, great, great, great, great, great grandfather, so many, probably 15 great, 16 greats.
32:42
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
32:42
SPEAKER_01: Um he was a big enemy of Thomas Cromwell naturally, because Thomas More never betrayed his Catholic roots.
32:52
SPEAKER_01: And at this point, Thomas Cromwell is forcing everybody to sign the oath of succession, which is just formalizing that, hey, you all agree with this new plan, right?
33:07
SPEAKER_01: And Thomas More as well as Bishop Fisher both refused to do this.
33:12
SPEAKER_01: Right.
33:12
SPEAKER_01: And Cromwell saw it as a huge success and a huge win on his side when he got Thomas More to step down, remove his title, and then eventually was arrested and executed for not going along with all of these rules that really Cromwell's putting in place.
33:29
SPEAKER_01: Right.
33:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it's King Henry VIII, but Cromwell's his voice.
33:32
SPEAKER_01: Cromwell is his counsel, he's giving in the legal advice, and he's got he has Henry in his ear.
33:38
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
33:39
SPEAKER_01: It's like, whose decisions are this?
33:41
SPEAKER_01: And I think this is where, like, in a way, they have to make Henry feel powerful and fluff, fluff up his feathers and make him believe that the ideas are his.
33:50
SPEAKER_01: Right.
33:51
SPEAKER_01: But Anne Boleyn did the same thing.
33:53
SPEAKER_01: She was also doing the, you know, you stroke the ego.
33:55
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
33:56
SPEAKER_01: You're like, hey, but these ideas in his head.
33:58
SPEAKER_01: Put this book here, maybe you read that.
34:00
SPEAKER_01: Oh, that's a great idea.
34:02
SPEAKER_01: And I'm like, oh, whoa.
34:03
SPEAKER_00: Um the woman is the next.
34:05
SPEAKER_01: Right.
34:06
SPEAKER_01: So Thomas Cromwell, yes, had enemies.
34:08
SPEAKER_00: Right.
34:09
SPEAKER_01: Anne Boleyn would have been considered an ally right now because he's helping her get onto the throne.
34:15
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
34:15
SPEAKER_00: So initially they were very close, like Cromwell and Anne, uh, because again, they had the same goal of like getting rid of Catherine of Aragon, uh, getting Anne Boleyn on the throne, and again, converting once Catholic England into more Protestant England, into a reformist England.
34:32
SPEAKER_00: Um, so there's a lot of moving pieces here, and this is again around like the early 1530s.
34:37
SPEAKER_00: Um, and so Parliament is interrupted.
34:40
SPEAKER_00: Again, Thomas More leaves, uh, and then all of a sudden Cromwell actually as like a thank you from Henry.
34:47
SPEAKER_00: I thought this was so funny.
34:48
SPEAKER_00: Well, thank you, Cardinal.
34:49
SPEAKER_00: As a thank you, yeah.
34:50
SPEAKER_00: Henry actually gives Cromwell um Edward Stafford's manor.
34:55
SPEAKER_00: And if you remember from season four, episode five.
34:59
SPEAKER_00: Oh, you know the episode.
35:00
SPEAKER_00: I did, I wrote it down.
35:02
SPEAKER_00: Um we did a whole episode just on Edward Stafford and his execution.
35:06
SPEAKER_00: The third book book, the third Duke of Buckingham.
35:10
SPEAKER_00: Buckingham.
35:11
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
35:11
SPEAKER_00: So it like it's so strange to me when they do things like that.
35:14
SPEAKER_00: They're like, oh, I just executed this guy who was my friend.
35:17
SPEAKER_00: Do you want his house?
35:18
SPEAKER_00: And it's always like, I guess, don't you feel a little bit like a concurrent like you feel a little bit like you're inherited.
35:24
SPEAKER_00: Walking in dead man's shoes.
35:25
SPEAKER_00: You're literally, yeah.
35:26
SPEAKER_01: Well, the same with Woolsey.
35:28
SPEAKER_01: Not necessarily, but yeah, not because he was executed.
35:33
SPEAKER_01: Hampton Court Palace was Wolsey's very nice.
35:38
SPEAKER_01: Do we even call it a house?
35:39
SPEAKER_01: His palace.
35:40
SPEAKER_01: His palace.
35:41
SPEAKER_01: Why the cardinal had his own palace, you know.
35:45
SPEAKER_00: All the all the monastery money.
35:46
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and Henry kind of moves in, like, oh, this is nice.
35:49
SPEAKER_00: I think I'll make this my palace.
35:51
SPEAKER_00: Right.
35:51
SPEAKER_00: It's such an interesting time in history when you could just like confiscate manners and give them to other people and remove titles and give pyro shame.
35:59
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
35:59
SPEAKER_01: That's what would happen at work when somebody, yeah, when someone gets let go and then you like get their desk, you're like, oh, I mean, it's a nice desk.
36:09
SPEAKER_01: I've got the good view now.
36:10
SPEAKER_01: Like I've got a good office space.
36:12
SPEAKER_01: But then you're like, again, walking in dead man's shoes, you're just like, this feels a little bit like I'm walking on someone's exactly space here on the ghosts in that area.
36:21
SPEAKER_00: It's not like you're the first one to ever be here.
36:23
SPEAKER_00: Um but you know, we're all humans and we all get excited for stuff like that.
36:27
SPEAKER_00: So Cromwell's like, sweet, like I'm at the peak of my power now.
36:31
SPEAKER_00: Um so he finally gets again Anne Boleyn on the throne.
36:35
SPEAKER_00: Henry and Anne are married on January 25th, 1533, and like all's good in the world.
36:40
SPEAKER_00: Cromwell's feeling good, Anne's feeling good, Henry's feeling good.
36:44
SPEAKER_00: Uh, they're this new reformist England, the Church of England.
36:48
SPEAKER_00: Um, and uh he gets another new title.
36:50
SPEAKER_00: Again, he just gets thrown titles at them constantly.
36:53
SPEAKER_00: Um, but his new title is a principal secretary and chief minister.
36:57
SPEAKER_00: Um and they even enact more formal legislation to break ties with Rome officially, like in all capacities, because I feel like it was always just steps, and you see a lot of that like throughout um the late 1520s, early 1530s, where it's like, okay, Rome, we're warning you, okay.
37:13
SPEAKER_00: This is like, you know, this is it.
37:15
SPEAKER_00: No, this is really it.
37:16
SPEAKER_00: No, now we're actually not gonna do anything with you.
37:18
SPEAKER_00: So it's always this like like moving further and further away.
37:22
SPEAKER_00: But uh apparently that was kind of the official end of it.
37:24
SPEAKER_00: Ties are broken with Rome.
37:26
SPEAKER_01: With this new title as chief minister, he is making bank.
37:33
SPEAKER_01: At the peak of his power, 1537, it was estimated that he was making about 12,000 pounds per year, which in today's money that would have been about 3.5 million dollars salary a year in pounds, sure, which is pretty similar to USD.
37:53
SPEAKER_01: But he was a millionaire in those times.
37:56
SPEAKER_01: Oh, yeah, and the equivalence of.
37:58
SPEAKER_01: So, I mean, he's yeah, he's riding a good ride right now.
38:02
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
38:02
SPEAKER_00: Um, and at this point, again, poor Anne Boleyn, we've already covered her in many different stories, but things start to not go her way.
38:12
SPEAKER_00: Like, once she's on the crown, or excuse me, on the throne, things start to happen that like within a couple years, she starts to not do so hot either.
38:21
SPEAKER_00: So at this point, Anne, who once considered Cromwell an ally who helped her get on the throne, is now clashing with him.
38:28
SPEAKER_00: So it kind of the I think the initial feud was over um, again, more money that was being taken from the churches.
38:35
SPEAKER_00: And Anne said, Well, if we're taking this money, like we should be reinvesting this money into charity and to education, and like, why is all this money just going into the king's coffers?
38:44
SPEAKER_00: Like, we're just taking all this money to like fatten our wallets.
38:47
SPEAKER_00: And Cromwell's like, Well, yeah.
38:49
SPEAKER_01: You want that$3.5 million annual salary?
38:52
SPEAKER_00: So do I.
38:53
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
38:53
SPEAKER_00: So so Cromwell, you know, has no problem with this, but Anne starts to kind of speak up and say, No, no, no, if we're taking this money, you know, we said we would reform England, like, not make it worse, we're not greedy, like this needs to go somewhere else.
39:05
SPEAKER_00: And that's where initially the tensions start to rise between Anne and Cromwell.
39:09
SPEAKER_00: And then separately, Anne also is starting to have tensions with Henry because she's not producing the son she promised him.
39:16
SPEAKER_00: She said, if you break up with Catherine Varagon, who's been your wife forever, for decades, like, and you get with me, like I'm younger, I'm fitter, like I'm going to like have many sons for you.
39:28
SPEAKER_00: So he falls for this, marries her, and then nothing.
39:31
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
39:32
SPEAKER_00: Miscarriages.
39:33
SPEAKER_00: Like he's clearly starting to see other women on the side once again, because he's always has a wandering eye.
39:39
SPEAKER_00: And then the straw that broke the camel's back, and we think it's probably Cromwell.
39:44
SPEAKER_00: Cromwell goes to King Henry VIII and says, Hey, I think she's actually cheating on you.
39:49
SPEAKER_00: I think she's having her own affairs.
39:52
SPEAKER_00: And quickly, Henry, who's super paranoid and only wants a son, and is starting to look at Miss Jane Seymour, says, Okay, these might just be rumors, but you, Cromwell, are gonna be the one that moves forward with the proceedings against Anne Boleyn.
40:08
SPEAKER_01: Just going back a moment, I love this concept of Anne being of the two of them the charitable, the sympathetic, the empathetic individual that she really was.
40:22
SPEAKER_01: And I know we've talked about this before, but just the terrible reputation that she's had throughout history that really I'm a strong believer that Cromwell contributed to.
40:32
SPEAKER_01: Yes.
40:33
SPEAKER_01: She wasn't, I mean, yeah, she had a temper.
40:36
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, she was a forward-thinking strong woman ahead of her time.
40:39
SPEAKER_00: She's not sure she had her own opinions and spoke about her.
40:41
SPEAKER_01: She had her own opinions.
40:43
SPEAKER_01: But it's so overlooked that, yes, Anne was really a huge advocate for charities and for especially for Protestant causes, but education, she had scholarships, she wanted to see people also rise up and make something of themselves.
41:02
SPEAKER_01: And I just again, like I I see Anne as that person who's trying to do good in the world, right?
41:09
SPEAKER_01: Despite the reputation that she has of being, you know, the the evil concubine of the throne.
41:17
SPEAKER_01: And then there's Cromwell who's just I Scrooge McDuck, money signs in his eyes.
41:22
SPEAKER_01: And and it is interesting too because I think I I I also I also have to check myself.
41:28
SPEAKER_01: Is that just the the version of history that they're feeding us that Cromwell's this evil person because he had so many enemies?
41:35
SPEAKER_01: Um for anyone who's read Hillary Mantle's trilogy Wolfall, which was also turned into the show.
41:42
SPEAKER_01: Hillary Mantle has the amazing trilogy all through the perspective of Thomas Cromwell.
41:48
SPEAKER_01: I have to say Bring Up the Bodies, the second one, which is kind of Bring Up the Bodies is this era that we're talking about right now of An Boleyn's rise and downfall.
41:59
SPEAKER_01: The best, in my opinion, like the best written execution description, like execution scene of An Boleyn.
42:07
SPEAKER_01: But what where I'm getting at with all of this is Hillary Mantle painted him in a very different picture.
42:12
SPEAKER_01: She uh made him soft and caring and understanding.
42:15
SPEAKER_01: And I mean, he's the protagonist in it.
42:18
SPEAKER_01: And Anne, in that in her version, is the evil one that everybody claims that you know she was.
42:24
SPEAKER_01: So I don't know.
42:25
SPEAKER_01: I have to check myself because was that a possibility?
42:29
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, we weren't there, but I don't know.
42:31
SPEAKER_01: I just envision him as the as the antagonist in this whole story.
42:35
SPEAKER_00: Right.
42:36
SPEAKER_00: And I think we talked about this in the Ambolyn episode too, but it's like, you know, well, this is history.
42:41
SPEAKER_00: This isn't, you know, a movie.
42:42
SPEAKER_00: So it's like one of those things where characters are a bit undefined in real life.
42:47
SPEAKER_00: Like all of us have, you know, shades of light and dark and like good thoughts and good intentions and bad thoughts and bad intentions.
42:54
SPEAKER_00: So it's like, you know, everyone in these stories and these times are they're so much more complex than just like, oh, are they innately good or innately bad?
43:01
SPEAKER_00: Like that they just want power and money, or are they actually like, you know, charitable and and looking to do something good in the world?
43:08
SPEAKER_00: Like maybe it's a bit of both.
43:09
SPEAKER_00: Maybe it's different at different times depending on how comfortable they feel in their personal situation.
43:14
SPEAKER_01: Are you a good witch or a bad witch?
43:16
SPEAKER_01: Well, maybe or a little bit more than uh one or the other.
43:20
SPEAKER_01: Right.
43:20
SPEAKER_01: Um, and as we all know, Anne Boleyn met her downfall with her execution on May 19th, 1536.
43:27
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
43:27
SPEAKER_01: I don't think anyone can really deny Cromwell orchestrated so much of that.
43:32
SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
43:32
SPEAKER_01: And I the the fact that he went from being allies with Anne Boleyn to not to taking her out.
43:40
SPEAKER_01: He's out for himself.
43:41
SPEAKER_01: He's going to do whatever King Henry VIII wants or whatever's gonna make him look good.
43:46
SPEAKER_01: Absolutely.
43:47
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, and it it's funny because even just talking to Dr.
43:49
SPEAKER_00: Owen Emerson about it, our buddy, um, you know, we we brought that up of like, you know, no one I think intended for Anne to die right away.
43:58
SPEAKER_00: I think it was more like we just need to get there and Divorce, like get her out of the state.
44:02
SPEAKER_00: You know, and who knows who would like when push came to shove and when it was officially like, oh no, she's gonna be executed.
44:08
SPEAKER_00: But again, I think Crom Cromwell is largely responsible for all of this going down as it did.
44:13
SPEAKER_00: And uh, you know.
44:15
SPEAKER_01: I love it when Dr.
44:16
SPEAKER_01: Emerson's like, that was kind of like the oh shit moment.
44:20
SPEAKER_01: Like, oh, we didn't mean for it to go this far.
44:23
SPEAKER_01: Right.
44:23
SPEAKER_00: Can we just put her in like a convent somewhere?
44:26
SPEAKER_00: I know you just sent Catherine Barragon off to a convent to like die alone.
44:30
SPEAKER_00: It's like, but poor Anne, it's like, oh man, did that really have to come to all that?
44:34
SPEAKER_00: Um, so it definitely sent a shockwave throughout um throughout all of England, and nobody was safe at that point.
44:40
SPEAKER_00: Um, not that anyone was before.
44:42
SPEAKER_00: There was plenty of executions of people of nobility before this.
44:45
SPEAKER_00: First Queen of England, though, for it to touch her.
44:48
SPEAKER_00: That's true.
44:49
SPEAKER_00: Um, and then immediately after, who replaces Anne's father, Thomas Boleyn, as Lord Privy Seal?
44:55
unknown: Thomas.
44:56
SPEAKER_01: Thomas Cromwell, July 1536.
44:59
SPEAKER_01: Not even three major yeah, three months later from Anne's death to now.
45:04
SPEAKER_01: He's a Baron.
45:06
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
45:06
SPEAKER_01: Yep.
45:09
SPEAKER_01: The most British title.
45:10
SPEAKER_01: Baron Cromwell of Wimbledon.
45:13
SPEAKER_00: The most British title I've ever heard of.
45:15
SPEAKER_00: Exactly.
45:16
SPEAKER_00: So this is his official peak because he's he's given Henry everything Henry wants.
45:21
SPEAKER_00: You know, Henry wanted his divorce with um uh with Catherine, he got that.
45:26
SPEAKER_00: Then he wanted, you know, Anne Boleyn to be out of the picture, he got that.
45:29
SPEAKER_00: Like he wants to be head of the Church of England, like he got that.
45:32
SPEAKER_00: Like basically, um, I'm trying to think of the word for it.
45:37
SPEAKER_00: Uh, I feel like Cromwell was like the fixer.
45:39
SPEAKER_00: Yeah.
45:40
SPEAKER_00: You know what I mean?
45:41
SPEAKER_00: Like, if you've seen in like a show like uh, what is it, Scandal or whatever?
45:45
SPEAKER_00: They have like people that are professional fixers.
45:47
SPEAKER_00: Like you come to them with your problems if you're make this happen.
45:49
SPEAKER_01: Yeah, like a powerful politician.
45:50
SPEAKER_01: I don't care how you do it, just do it.
45:52
SPEAKER_01: Just like I don't want to care how messy it gets, I don't care what you have to do, but like make this happen.
45:56
SPEAKER_01: I just picture Henry as this giant fat toddler going around making a mess everywhere he goes, and Cromwell's like a cigar picking up after him and trying to make things right.
46:05
SPEAKER_01: Right.
46:05
SPEAKER_00: He's just like, I want that woman, I want that thing.
46:08
SPEAKER_00: You can have this man here if you do it.
46:10
SPEAKER_00: And uh Cromwell was just his very loyal servant, just so eager to please and get you money.
46:15
SPEAKER_01: Whatever you need, master.
46:16
SPEAKER_00: Yeah, he's like the snake from Robin Hood.
46:19
SPEAKER_01: I love that.
46:19
SPEAKER_01: Sir Hiss.
46:20
SPEAKER_01: Sir His name.
46:22
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know that.
46:22
SPEAKER_01: I didn't know his name was Sir Hiss.
46:24
SPEAKER_01: Sir Hiss is a cute name.
46:25
SPEAKER_01: It is a cute name.
46:27
SPEAKER_01: Um yeah, so Cromwell then, after getting Anne out of the castle, quite literally.
46:34
SPEAKER_01: Right.
46:35
SPEAKER_01: Um, you know, then Jane Seymour is there and he's done all that.
46:39
SPEAKER_01: And very sadly, you know, had a had things have just worked out, had Jane have survived the birth of Edward, who knows what would have happened.
46:48
SPEAKER_01: I mean, so many what ifs, so many different, you know, what if Anne Boleyn had a son?
46:52
SPEAKER_01: What if anybody had a son?
46:53
SPEAKER_01: Like it's just always interesting to think of what an alternate reality could have looked like.
46:59
SPEAKER_01: But um, sadly, Jane Seymour dies from childbirth in 1537.
47:04
SPEAKER_01: And I think this is a good place to end it because Cromwell has just hit the peak of his power.
47:12
SPEAKER_01: Right.
47:13
SPEAKER_01: And what comes up must come down.
47:15
SPEAKER_00: Must come down.
47:16
SPEAKER_00: Yep.
47:16
SPEAKER_00: And uh we'll continue next time with what that downfall looks like, how it starts.
47:22
SPEAKER_00: Again, he's done everything for Henry that he possibly could.
47:25
SPEAKER_00: So it's like, what does he try to do next for Henry that ultimately fails?
47:29
SPEAKER_01: It's like a nice cliffhanger to leave you for next time.
47:32
SPEAKER_00: Oh dang.
47:33
SPEAKER_00: And next time we'll have you know, half a bottle of wine first, and maybe we'll do an evening recording.
47:39
SPEAKER_00: Oh, Elizabeth, any final words?
47:42
SPEAKER_01: Not until next time.