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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
by 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 agoSomeone, 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 agoYeah, 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 agoI still haven't gotten through it all. There's enough stuff here to fill a college mid-term exam.