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

On 30th January 1590, Lady Anne Clifford was born, the daughter of George Clifford, 3rd Earl of Cumberland. Lady Anne’s grandfather had once been married to Lady Eleanor Brandon, niece of Henry VIII, perhaps in recognition of his loyalty during the Pilgrimage of Grace, but Anne was the result of a second marriage. At the age of 10, she was taken to court to be presented to the Queen. Lady Anne inherited the Barony of Clifford in 1605 and became an important member of the Jacobean Court, dancing in the masques of Queen Anne and patronising literary figures. Much of what we know of this period of her life comes from her own journals.

Unable to inherit her father’s earldom, she spent a good deal of time in litigation over the estates, which were eventually restored to her in 1649. Lady Anne married twice, becoming Countess of Dorset and the Countess of Pembroke and Montgomerie. She lived to the great age of 86 carrying out the hereditary duties of the High Sheriff of Westmorland. Lady Anne was succeeded by her daughters, Lady Margaret and Lady Isabel Sackville, as co-parceners.

Picture is the life of Lady Anne Clifford, probably by Jan van Belkamp

On 29th January 1536, Katharine of Aragon was buried in Peterborough Cathedral. She had been ailing for some time, banished to Kimbolton in Huntingdonshire (now Cambridgeshire), guarded by Sir Edmund Bedingfield of Oxburgh Hall. The arrangements for her funeral were precise. Henry VIII having cast her off as a wife, was determined to make the point that she was his sister-in-law, and she was therefore buried as Dowager Princess of Wales. The chief mourner was Lady Eleanor Brandon, daughter of Mary, the French Queen, who had supported Katharine in defiance of her own brother. Other mourners included Lady Bedingfield who received a letter from the King, giving instructions as to her presence, providing black cloth for her own attendants and promising a further delivery of linen for a head-dress.

A black marble and gold monument was raised to Katharine, presumably far less grand than the one that Henry had planned to share with her when he commissioned a tomb for them at Westminster Abbey in 1518. No trace of the original remains, just a simple monument paid for by a collection from the women of England named Katharine (or any of its variants) organised by Katharine Clayton, wife of a Canon of the Abbey in the late nineteenth century. The banners with the royal arms were restored by Queen Mary (1867 – 1953), wife of King George V.

Picture is of the tomb of Katharine of Aragon, in Peterborough Cathedral © Tudor Times Ltd 2016

On 28th January 1547, Henry VIII breathed his last in his palace at Whitehall. He had been ailing for some years, as his growing corpulence and ulcerated legs gave him inordinate pain and frequent fever. During the previous December, he had felt himself to be deteriorating, and drew up a new will, replacing that of 1544, which he had written prior to taking an army into France. This new will attempted to control the succession to the Crown for generations to come, and has been a matter of controversy ever since – was it legal, or not?

In her recent book, 'The King is Dead', Dr Suzannah Lipscomb has analysed the will in detail – read our review here.