Tudor Controversies That STILL Spark Debate: Jane Grey, Seymour, and Mary, Queen of Scots

Tudor controversies continue to captivate historians and enthusiasts alike, sparking debate centuries after the events unfolded. From the legitimacy of Lady Jane Grey’s brief reign to the execution of Mary, Queen of Scots, these pivotal moments raise questions about power, politics, and personal conviction.

Let’s dive into four of the most hotly debated Tudor controversies: Should Katherine of Aragon have stepped aside? Was Elizabeth I right to sign Mary’s death warrant? Did Thomas Seymour truly deserve execution? And was Henry VIII’s will ultimately meaningless? These enduring disputes offer more than just historical drama—they reflect timeless dilemmas that still resonate today.

Transcript of Tudor Controversies That STILL Spark Debate: Jane Grey, Seymour, and Mary, Queen of Scots

Should Lady Jane Grey have actually been called Jane I? This is one of the many, many topics that Tudor enthusiasts still debate centuries later. I put a poll up last week to ask people what they thought, and the results were pretty mixed. It’s clearly something we still have thoughts and opinions about, so thank you to everybody who filled that out.

There are so many moments like that in Tudor history—these kinds of sliding glass doors, what-ifs, and decisions that were made that we can still argue about. Reasonable people can still disagree, and it’s really fun to get into those debates, to look at those big controversies like: Was Elizabeth I right to have Mary, Queen of Scots, executed? Did Henry VII’s will actually matter? Should Thomas Seymour really have been executed? Should Katherine of Aragon have stepped aside?

These are big questions that actually change the arc of Tudor history, and there are still people on both sides who disagree, who argue for one side or the other. So today, we’re going to talk about four of the biggest controversies of Tudor England. I’ll tell you my opinion on them at the end—I’m not going to get into it while I’m reporting, but I will tell you at the end.

The first one we’re going to start with is: Should Katherine of Aragon have stepped aside? Katherine of Aragon was no stranger to sacrifice. She had been a Spanish infanta, raised to believe that her destiny was to be queen. She was the daughter of a warrior queen—Queen Isabella—and she held onto that belief. She was forceful about that belief.

But what if she had let go? What if, instead of digging in her heels during Henry’s Great Matter, she had actually just stepped aside? And there was, in fact, a precedent for this. A few decades earlier, Joan of France, Duchess of Berry, had been the wife of Louis XII. Their marriage was annulled, and she retired to a convent in Bourges.

Now, Joan had married Louis XII in an arranged marriage, but he annulled it so that he could marry Anne of Brittany. Joan went on to found the Order of the Annunciation and was later canonized as a saint. So that’s an example of what Katherine of Aragon’s path might have been, had she stepped aside.

Katherine had already given Henry a daughter. It was clear she wasn’t going to have any more living children, and she could probably understand that Henry needed a male heir. She knew what England had gone through with the Wars of the Roses. So if she had gracefully exited the stage—perhaps claiming a religious calling—Henry might have remarried without launching a full-scale rebellion against Rome.

So I think it’s one of those big ironies: Katherine was fighting so hard to keep England Catholic, to keep herself as queen, to keep England loyal to the Pope, that she actually kind of forced Henry into this rebellion. If she had let go, it’s very possible that England would have stayed Catholic. There wouldn’t have been a Thomas Cromwell. There wouldn’t have been a Cranmer. There wouldn’t have been a dissolution. No break from the Pope.

It’s an irony that’s kind of too big to ignore: in fighting to remain queen, Katherine may have set into motion the destruction of everything she was trying to protect. Stepping aside was never really going to be an option for her. She wasn’t just a wife—she was a princess of Spain, the daughter of Isabella and Ferdinand. Stepping aside would have meant branding Mary a bastard, and that was never going to happen.

So what do you think? Was Katherine right to have fought for her rights—for Mary’s rights? Or should she maybe have just stepped aside? Let me know.

All right, the second one: Should Elizabeth have actually executed Mary, Queen of Scots? This is one of the biggest controversies of Elizabeth I’s reign. This one’s really tricky because we know how it ends. Elizabeth reluctantly, finally, signs Mary’s death warrant in 1587—and Mary, Queen of Scots, loses her head and gains martyrdom. It took Elizabeth 19 years to get to that point, and for almost every one of those years, people were telling her that execution was the smart move.

The argument for execution was really straightforward: Mary had a legitimate claim to Elizabeth’s throne. We first have to look back at what Catholics believed about the marriage of Anne Boleyn to Henry VIII. Katherine of Aragon was still alive when Elizabeth was born, which meant that the marriage of Henry and Anne—in the eyes of Catholics, who did not think the marriage to Katherine had been dissolved—was bigamy.

The marriage between Henry and Anne was an illegitimate marriage, and so that meant Elizabeth was an illegitimate child. So if you believed that, you looked to the next person in line for the succession—and it just happened to be a Catholic like yourself: Mary, Queen of Scots.

Mary, Queen of Scots, was also the center of every major Catholic plot for two decades, especially the Babington Plot, which finally sealed her fate. As long as Mary lived, Catholic Europe had hope. But Elizabeth hesitated again and again. Killing a fellow monarch was unthinkable. Can you imagine if the roles had been reversed—if she were kept prisoner somewhere and someone killed her?

It wasn’t just about guilt—it was about precedent. It set the example that a fellow monarch could be executed for being a threat. And then how would that ever stop someone from potentially turning that logic on her? Even when she finally relented, Elizabeth still performed this great pantomime of outrage when the warrant was carried out, claiming she never meant for it to happen. Was she being sincere, or clever, or cowardly?

Either way, the execution did remove a threat. And though it created a martyr, it solved a problem. But it didn’t do it quietly. It actually directly led to the Armada. It ramped up the war with Spain, which cost thousands of other lives. So I don’t know—should she have executed Mary, Queen of Scots? What do you think?

Next: Should Thomas Seymour have been executed? Thomas Seymour was equal parts ambitious, charming, and really reckless. The brother of Jane Seymour and uncle to Edward VI, Thomas managed to marry the dowager queen, Katherine Parr, only a couple of months after Henry VIII’s death—which scandalized Princess Mary, for example. And if that wasn’t bold enough, he started getting a little too friendly with the teenage Princess Elizabeth while living under the same roof. But was that enough to get him executed?

The real issue wasn’t just Elizabeth—it was his attempt to break into the king’s chambers at Hampton Court, supposedly to check on the boy in the middle of the night. He also tried to manipulate his way into the regency. It was messy. It was desperate. It was not the least bit subtle.

His brother, Edward Seymour—the Lord Protector—used this as an excuse to get rid of him. There’s also the idea that he quite possibly shot the dog—Edward’s dog. And anybody who comes to Tudorcon or watches Tudorcon online, whether in person or virtually, will remember that we have this ongoing debate about whether or not Tom actually shot the dog. Every year, Janet Whitman brings her little stuffed dog, and it’s become one of those bits of Tudorcon lore.

Anyway, Edward said that Tom was committing treason. Tom was found guilty, and Thomas lost his head. Poor Edward VI—first having to execute one uncle, Tom Seymour, and then later having to execute Edward Seymour. That kind of trauma would’ve been enough to give Edward a headache—if not worse.

Of course, Thomas lost his head—but was it necessary? Some argue that he was more fool than traitor. He was dangerous, sure, but perhaps only to himself. Others say he was just one lucky break away from taking over the kingdom. Either way, he didn’t live long enough for any of us to find out. What do you think—should Tom Seymour have been executed?

And finally, the last question we’re going to look at today: was Henry VIII’s will meaningless? This comes back to whether or not Jane Grey should have been called Jane I. Henry VIII’s will was meant to be the final word on everything. He even had it signed with a dry stamp so that no one could claim he hadn’t approved it.

It laid out a clear succession: Edward, then Mary, then Elizabeth. After them, the heirs of his younger sister, Mary Tudor—not the Scottish line descended from Margaret. But here’s the thing—Parliament never ratified any of the sections beyond Elizabeth. That means the succession order had no legal force once Elizabeth died.

Edward tried to override it with his “Device for the Succession,” naming Lady Jane Grey—something Henry’s will did not allow. And then, when Elizabeth died in 1603, no one even glanced at the document. It was nearly 60 years old by that point. James VI of Scotland was crowned without any reference to it, despite being from the line of Margaret Tudor, whom Henry had explicitly left out. So was the whole thing performative? A way for Henry to feel like he was in control—even from beyond the grave?

It turns out that once the king dies, paper doesn’t matter as much as power. And Henry’s carefully written future actually never came to pass. So what do you think about any of these? I’ll tell you my opinion.

I’m an Episcopalian, so I’m actually quite happy that Katherine fought as hard as she did and that the Reformation came to pass in England—and came to pass the way it did. I still go to a church that uses the Book of Common Prayer, which came from Cranmer, so I’m a fan of that.

But I think that from Katherine’s perspective—if you were fighting to keep Catholicism and to keep England loyal to the Pope—she actually really failed at that. And it kind of reminds me of the Zen Buddhist idea that “what you resist persists,” and the concept of detachment.

She was so attached to her rights, so attached to England being loyal to the Pope and to her own role as queen, that she lost sight of what was actually happening: Henry was moving further and further away from Rome. And the whole thing just backfired spectacularly on her.

I think things could have been so different for her. Also, not having seen her daughter for years… If she had just stepped aside and said, “You know what? My bad—you’re right, it was consummated, I was married to Arthur, we probably shouldn’t do this,” and had tried to understand Henry’s position—that he really needed a male heir—and also that he was falling for Anne Boleyn (and he’s the king, so he can kind of do that)… things might have gone very differently. Plus, there was precedent—Claude of France had stepped aside just a few decades earlier.

Had Katherine done the same, she probably would have been given a very generous settlement. Look at what happened with Anne of Cleves—she got an amazing settlement. Katherine would likely have been sent to the convent of her choice. She was very religious anyway, so that might actually have suited her.

She would have been able to continue seeing her daughter. And she probably could have negotiated a really strong marriage for Mary. Instead, Mary never married until she was too old to have children.

It’s one of the great tragedies about Mary Tudor—that all she wanted for so long was a child. There were so many times when she was betrothed and it didn’t work out. My heart really goes out to Mary because she truly wanted to be a mother.

The way she took care of Elizabeth—even though she had every reason to hate her—yet they were very close, and she looked at Elizabeth the way a mother would look at her child. I really feel for Mary that she never had that experience herself.

I think Katherine actually wound up hurting Mary more—and hurting her own cause more—because then Mary had this whole vendetta to bring England back to Catholicism. And look at how poor Mary is remembered now—as “Bloody Mary.” The whole thing, I think, just backfired spectacularly on Katherine.

So from Katherine’s perspective, I see it as a failure. She probably should have stepped aside, and I think things might have worked out a lot better for her. But I also understand—she was the Spanish infanta. She was the daughter of Isabella and Ferdinand. She was not going to give up. And I get it.

But again, I come back to that idea: “What you resist persists.” She resisted so much, and it persisted—and it didn’t work out for her. But then again, I am an Episcopalian, so I’m a fan of the Book of Common Prayer, and it all worked out for me. And really—I am the center of the universe. So of course, my opinion is what matters most.

Everybody is the center of their own little universe, right? I’m the center of mine, and you are the center of yours. At least I’m open and honest about it. All right—my opinions on the other controversies aren’t as strong, I will say that.

Should Elizabeth have executed Mary Queen of Scots? I think it set a really bad precedent. I also think Elizabeth was too wishy-washy about it. I’m not a fan of the way she handled it. But again, I see her perspective.

Mary, Queen of Scots was not particularly smart in how she involved herself in some of these plots. She wasn’t especially politically savvy. Scotland was a mess, and honestly, I don’t know that there could have been any other way for her.

But it also seems like she brought some of this on herself by being involved in these plots and by supporting them. But again, if I were in her shoes, I don’t think I would’ve done anything differently. That’s the thing—when you walk in someone else’s shoes, of course they did what they did, because they did it. It all makes sense when you look at it like that.

I’m not a fan of the way Elizabeth handled it, but I’m also not a fan of how Mary, Queen of Scots handled it. So… I’m not a fan of either. I don’t think either party comes out looking particularly good in that scenario.

Tom Seymour—again, I don’t know what else you do. What do you do when someone is threatening the throne? If someone’s being treasonous, it kind of puts you in a corner. But was he actually treasonous? I don’t know. I don’t really have a strong opinion on that one, but I know a lot of people do. So I’d love to hear what your opinion is.

And was Henry VIII’s will meaningless? I mean, everyone’s will is ultimately kind of meaningless, because… you’re gone. You can’t enforce it. You just have to trust that the people around you are going to carry out your wishes. Hopefully, they do. But in Henry’s case, it was generations later. I don’t think the people determining the succession were still going back and consulting Henry VIII’s will.

And Henry VII certainly didn’t look back at the will of, I don’t know, William Rufus, or try to figure out what Edward III wanted. So, you know—you pass away, and things change. That’s what happens. That’s life. So yeah, I think Henry VIII’s will probably was meaningless. And honestly, I don’t know that it really matters that much.

You guys, I get kind of Zen about this stuff. I don’t get worked up about most of it. I do get worked up about how people treat Lady Margaret Beaufort—that one really gets me—but that’s pretty much the only thing in Tudor history I get fired up about.

I know—if you go on Facebook groups, people are arguing about this and that: “Well, if you believe this,” or, “If you believe that…” Ugh. I don’t know. Life is short, man. Go smell the flowers. These people have been dead for 400 years. Are we really getting that worked up about it?

What I do think, though, is that the reason we’re so fascinated by this history is because it reflects the times we live in now. I see so many parallels and similarities with what’s going on in our world today.

Things like, for example, the idea of the printing press making information available that wasn’t necessarily authorized—that didn’t come through the proper channels—was happening for the first time. And look at what that opened up for people. We see something very similar in the past 30 years with the internet and with social media.

And also, like, what can you trust, right? If somebody has a printing press in their basement and they’re putting out pamphlets—can you trust that? And if somebody posts something on Twitter, can you trust that? (I refuse to call it X. I just… I can’t do it. I got my first Twitter account in 2005, and you still had to use one of those flip phones and text updates to 40404. That was how you tweeted. I refuse to call it X after that.)

Anyway—if somebody posts something on X, does that make it true? If someone prints a pamphlet in their basement, does that make it true? How do you know what is truth? And I feel like that’s something people in the 16th century were grappling with—and it’s something we’re grappling with now, too. It’s really important.

Also, the class differences in the 16th century—there was a rise in the merchant class, the emergence of a real middle class. Classes were realigning. Political affiliations were shifting. And I see so much of that today too, with the rise of this whole new techno-class that we’ve never seen before. And the political realignment happening now—it’s fascinating. It so closely parallels what people back then were experiencing.

There were also major questions about the role of government. Think about the poor laws passed under Elizabeth, or the dissolution of the monasteries. When you dissolve the monasteries—which had been providing hospitals, schools, support for the poor—you didn’t replace it with anything. Not until the poor laws, which came about 40 years later.

So what is our role to each other? What obligations do we have? What is the social contract? Do we even have one? I think people today are grappling with those questions in new ways—ways they haven’t necessarily grappled with before.

And people were thinking about this back then as well—this shift away from serfdom, the end of serfdom. Moving from a system where the lord was responsible for the serfs and the serfs were tied to the land, to a new world with more mobility, a little bit more freedom. But with that freedom—what responsibilities do you have? What responsibility does the king have? What responsibility does the government have?

If people are now free to make their own way, does that mean there’s still a social contract? I don’t know. And this—this is the stuff I really nerd out on. So if you want to nerd out on that stuff with me too, leave me a comment and let me know, and we can nerd out on it together.

Either way, I’d love to know your thoughts on some of these controversies—and any other controversies you’d like to voice your opinion on. I’d be very interested! If there’s something new, we could even put up a poll and see what people think.

I think it’s really important to be able to practice having these kinds of debates, and to realize that reasonable people can disagree. I’ve said this before—probably many times—but I think it’s good practice for us to learn empathy. If we can have these arguments and walk in someone else’s shoes from 500 years ago, maybe we can bring some of that empathy back into the present. If we get really good at understanding people from the past, maybe we can start to understand where people who think differently from us today are coming from. So—that’s my spiel on that.

Heather Teysko is the creator, writer, and producer of The Renaissance English History Podcast, the original Tudor history podcast, started in 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. In 2019 she created Tudorcon, which is now a yearly event, in addition to writing books, and running TudorFair.com - a whimsical Tudor Merch shop.

She has been passionate about Tudor England since she first read Alison Weir's The Six Wives of Henry VIII 30 years ago, and subsequently moved to London after college to spend her time immersed in Tudor history (how exciting when she got to interview Alison for the first time!). In addition to history, she is passionate about travel, and has lived in 3 countries and 4 states (not counting her perpetual state of confusion), and her family (who help her host her YouTube channel occasionally).

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