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If looking for some isolation entertainment there was what I thought an excellent series "The Tudors" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tudors https://en.wikip

If looking for some isolation entertainment there was what I thought an excellent series "The Tudors" (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tudors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Tudors) which is a fictionalised, but still fairly accurate in the big picture, retelling of Henry VIII's life, probably available on streaming services (Stan in Australia). I watched it in parallel with looking up most people who appeared on my phone to get more, and more accurate, details and found it all fascinating. Hans Holbein plays a part as Henry's favourite painter and this is how I learnt about him.

hinkley 6y ago
I've been watching a BBC series that does historical re-enactments, and in particular the series on building a castle, and the one on monastic farming in the early days of the Tudor Kings: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01k3b96 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01k3b96 The historian keeps mentioning in a very jovial way that at the beginning of the Tudor era The Church was the second biggest land owner in England. That doesn't sound jovial to me. Further, the burgeoning middle class was developing in part as sharecroppers on church land, half of England's exports were sheep wool, the Church is responsible for a large fraction of the social safety net, owned many of the mills (and enforced a monopoly with the sharecroppers) and was selling booze at festivals. It paints for me a much more complex picture of Henry VIII's motivations for breaking with the Church. There's this sort of notion that it was a frivolous thing for him to do and now I'm examining that assertion a bit more skeptically, as spin. There were so many subtle and not-so-subtle ways in which it objectively represented a threat to sovereignty, one that was growing larger by the decade. I'd nearly convinced myself to watch The Tudors and now I think I probably will.
- gilleain 6y ago
  His break with The Church is usually considered frivolous because the focus is often put on his desire to divorce. The real goal was to have _legitimate_ male heirs. It was never much of a problem for kings to have affairs, even out of wedlock children. For example, Henry FitzRoy - a son from an affair. However, as you mention, the church had a lot of wealth including land. Conveniently, once Henry was 'pope' of his own religion he could go about stripping the monasteries of their wealth. Actually I don't know what was done with that money. Presumably it was part of the motivation, but who knows.
  - hinkley 6y ago
    Someone, it seems, has spent quite a lot of time and effort on a wiki page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_Monasteries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_Monasteries
    - gilleain 6y ago
      Yeah, I started to try and skim that, then realised I was not going to do it justice to summarise it! For example, discussion of 'spiritual income streams' and advowsons, and other obscure topics. I wonder how many people have knowledge in medieval ecclesiastical accounting...
      - hinkley 6y ago
        I still haven't gotten through it all. There's enough stuff here to fill a college mid-term exam.
RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago
That series also provides some perspective. We complain of "cancel culture" now, but in Tudor England, being "cancelled" meant having all your possessions confiscated, being confined to the Tower of London, undergoing torture to get a confession, and then having your head chopped off in public.
- nickff 6y ago
  That type of punishment still exists in many places around the world (North Korea is actually harsher), just not in England anymore.

hinkley 6y ago

I've been watching a BBC series that does historical re-enactments, and in particular the series on building a castle, and the one on monastic farming in the early days of the Tudor Kings: https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01k3b96 https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p01k3b96 The historian keeps mentioning in a very jovial way that at the beginning of the Tudor era The Church was the second biggest land owner in England. That doesn't sound jovial to me. Further, the burgeoning middle class was developing in part as sharecroppers on church land, half of England's exports were sheep wool, the Church is responsible for a large fraction of the social safety net, owned many of the mills (and enforced a monopoly with the sharecroppers) and was selling booze at festivals. It paints for me a much more complex picture of Henry VIII's motivations for breaking with the Church. There's this sort of notion that it was a frivolous thing for him to do and now I'm examining that assertion a bit more skeptically, as spin. There were so many subtle and not-so-subtle ways in which it objectively represented a threat to sovereignty, one that was growing larger by the decade. I'd nearly convinced myself to watch The Tudors and now I think I probably will.

gilleain 6y ago
His break with The Church is usually considered frivolous because the focus is often put on his desire to divorce. The real goal was to have _legitimate_ male heirs. It was never much of a problem for kings to have affairs, even out of wedlock children. For example, Henry FitzRoy - a son from an affair. However, as you mention, the church had a lot of wealth including land. Conveniently, once Henry was 'pope' of his own religion he could go about stripping the monasteries of their wealth. Actually I don't know what was done with that money. Presumably it was part of the motivation, but who knows.
- hinkley 6y ago
  Someone, it seems, has spent quite a lot of time and effort on a wiki page: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_Monasteries https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dissolution_of_the_Monasteries
  - gilleain 6y ago
    Yeah, I started to try and skim that, then realised I was not going to do it justice to summarise it! For example, discussion of 'spiritual income streams' and advowsons, and other obscure topics. I wonder how many people have knowledge in medieval ecclesiastical accounting...
    - hinkley 6y ago
      I still haven't gotten through it all. There's enough stuff here to fill a college mid-term exam.

RcouF1uZ4gsC 6y ago

That series also provides some perspective. We complain of "cancel culture" now, but in Tudor England, being "cancelled" meant having all your possessions confiscated, being confined to the Tower of London, undergoing torture to get a confession, and then having your head chopped off in public.

nickff 6y ago
That type of punishment still exists in many places around the world (North Korea is actually harsher), just not in England anymore.