Today in 1556 Archbishop Thomas Cranmer was executed by Mary I, the most famous of the Marian Martyrs.
Mary had an especial grudge against Cranmer, as he orchestrated the divorce between Henry VIII and her mother, Catherine of Aragon. His execution was probably illegal as he had recanted, and people who recanted were meant to be forgiven, and set free. But Cranmer wasn’t.
He gave a scaffold speech – he had been ordered to make one final recantation, but he didn’t. Instead, he recanted his recantations, and he renounced the Pope as Christ’s enemy, and the antichrist.
John Foxe called his burning an act of glorious martyrdom.
That’s your Tudor Minute for today. Remember you can dive deeper into life in 16th century England through the Renaissance English History Podcast at englandcast.com.
Suggested links:
Episode 010: A Tale of Two Thomases Part 2 (Cromwell & Cranmer)
Episode 089: Edward and Mary and Religious Whiplash
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Heather Teysko is the creator, writer, and producer of The Renaissance English History Podcast, one of the longest running indie history podcasts, going since 2009. She's been writing about history online for over 25 years, since her first site on Colonial American history became number one in history on Yahoo in 1998. She writes books, created the original Tudor Planner (a yearly diary filled with Tudor history) and in 2019 created the world's first Tudorcon (you can "attend" online this year!). She has been passionate about Tudor England since she first read Alison Weir's The Six Wives of Henry VIII 20 years ago, and subsequently moved to London after college to spend her time immersed in Tudor history.