Behavior to his wives
Henry VIII was also famous for his cruel behavior towards his 6 wives. He married and divorced so many times because he wanted a son. His first wife, Catherine of Aragon did not successfully give birth to a wife so he divorced with her. This lead to the Act of Supremacy because he asked the pope for permission to divorce with her but the church didn't agree to so his relationship with the church began to get bad. But after one of his wives, Jane Seymour, gave birth to a boy (Edward VI), he started looking for a good wife to be with. All of this resulted to him marrying all 6 wives.
Act of Supremacy
The Act of Supremacy (1536) was about the time when Henry VIII took over the church and became the head of the churches. This lead to the Dissolution of the Monasteries. Henry closed down all the catholic monasteries because he wanted to get rid of catholic power and earn the power and finance of the churches.
Henry VIII: Dissolution of the Monasteries
<- Rievaulx Abbey The dissolution of the monasteries started in 1536 and ended in 1540. It was the time when Henry decided to get rid of catholic power and was a big part of the English Reformation. And to do that, the best way was to close down all the monasteries. But Henry didn’t have any reason to close down the monasteries. So he sent one of his most trusted chief ministers, Thomas Cromwell, to go to the monasteries and write a report about any thing that he can find that’s reasonable enough in order to close down the monasteries.
Thomas Cromwell came back with lots of fake reasons about things that happened in the monasteries. And in 1536, the dissolution started. Churches, from poor to rich, got closed down one by one. The last church was closed in 1540. Nowadays in England, some ruins of the churches still remain.
Still Catholic
Even though Henry VIII took over the church and changed the way that churches were supposed to be like, the religion belief was still the same.
My Opinion on Henry VIII
There are lots of different perspectives from people of whether Henry VIII is a good king of a bad king. Some say he’s a good king, and some do not agree. I personally think that Henry is a good king and a bad king in many ways. But he has done more good as a king than bad, so I reckon he’s a pretty average king. Even though he shouldn’t have just killed all his wives for unimportant reasons, he still managed his kingdom well and successfully achieved many great accomplishments. For example, he increased the English navy’s power from 5 to 60 ships.
But Henry VIII is a little deceitful at times. He always wants his own ways and can do anything in order to get/achieve it. For example, he sent down Thomas Cromwell to make a report of anything that’s reasonable enough to close down the monasteries. And Thomas Cromwell made up a lot of reasons that weren’t true. And even though Henry knew that they were fake, he didn’t care about the monks in the monasteries and still just closed them down. But he also gave them a pretty fair amount of money and a good living and many monks lived pretty happily after that and there wasn’t much violence either.
So you could also say that Henry VIII is a good king even though he’s not caring, but he still made most of his people happy, including some of his wives. He did everything that he thought was best for his kingdom. So altogether, I think Henry VIII is a good king, even though in his heart, he doesn’t really care much, but despite that, a lot of his people still lived very happily.
