Next topic to look at

I have now finished my work on the medieval times and have been asked by Ruth Lee to look at the reigns of both Mary Tudor and Edward VI and to determine if there was a mid-Tudor crisis by reading the following books: The Tudors by John Guy and Access to History: Change and protest 1536-88: Mid-Tudor Crises? by Roger Turvey and Nigel Heard.

Before I look at these two historical figures and their reigns in detail. I am going to give a brief description of each of them which I found on http://www.historylearningsite.co.uk/

Edward VI

Edward became king after his father Henry VIII died in 1547 and although Mary (his sister) was the oldest of Henry's children, Edward became king first because he was a boy. He ruled in England from 1547 to 1553. He was however only 9 years old when he came to power and therefore had to have an advisor to rule the country for him. During his power of rule he had two advisors. His first advisor was his uncle, Edward Seymour, the Duke of Somerset who became the Lord Protector and advised and guided the king for the first two and half years of his reign. Following the defeat and arrest of the Duke of Somerset, the Duke of Northumberland (John Dudley) became his second advisor in 1549. As a result of the advice of his two advisors, Seymour and Dudley and Edward's religious beliefs, Edward's reign is mainly remembered for the major changes he made to religion while he was king (changes which had been started off by Henry Viii during his reign when he changed the church of England from catholicism to protestantism during the reformation.)

Main changes of Edward:

• Laws passed to make churches more plain: stained glass windows and pictures were removed from churches and the furniture within churches became much more plain and basic
• The actual church services were a lot more simpler than before and services were held in English so that everyone could understand what was going on
• A prayer book in english was introduced
• Priests did not have to dress in bright coloured clothes like they did in catholic churches and they were allowed to marry
• The King remained the head of the church

As a result of these changes, England made a break with the catholic church in Rome and hence became a protestant country.

Edward had never been a healthy boy throughout his life and on 6th July 1553 aged only 15 years old, he died from tuberculosis and after nine days of interruptions when Lady Jane Grey came to power (to stop a threat coming from Mary Tudor who it was believed would change the main religion of England to catcholicism) Mary Tudor [his half sister] came to the throne.

Mary I

Mary I is also often referred to as Mary tudor or 'Bloody' Mary and reigned from 1553 to 1558. When she initially became queen she was very popular with the people of England, however this popularity was quickly taken away from her because of of her religious changes and her marriage. Mary was a devout catholic and therefore was horrified with the changes her half-brother, Edward had made. Thus she quickly restored England as a catholic country: restoring the catholic mass and banning holy communion, all priests had to be catholic, the basic furniture of protestant churches was replaced with colourful furniture and paintings of the catholic church, services were held in latin and the English prayer book was banned and the pope became the head of the church once again. The majority of people accepted these changes, however others were reluctant to do so and were therefore burnt at the stake for heresy (nearly 300 people died in this way) and this is hence why she earnt the nickname 'Bloody Mary'.

Furthermore English people at this time, feared the power of Spain and thus in order to bring the two countries closer togehter Mary decided to accept the marriage proposal of Philip II (the king of Spain). He was also a strong catholic. As a result of this marriage, the people of England feared that Philip would take control of England and thus as a consequence Mary became very unpopular with the English people. The marriage turned out however to be a huge failure for Mary as Philip spent most of his time in Spain and therefore neither of them saw very much of each other and also had no children.

Mary died in 1558 as a very unhappy person due to her failed marriage and the resentment from English people towards her and Elizabeth I (her half-sister) became the next queen following her death.

Next time I will use the two books I have brought on this topic to give more detailed notes on the reigns of Edward and Mary before looking at some ways in which I would teach these topics.