Renaissance English History Podcast: A Show About the Tudors

Henry VIII didn't dismantle the Church in England. He took it over, one step at a time, and the plan looks an awful lot like a hostile corporate takeover. Squeeze the leadership, take the board, cut off Rome, audit everything, find some dirt, close the small houses first, and then come for the big ones.

In this episode I walk through the whole playbook, from the 1531 fine on the clergy to the abbot of Glastonbury being dragged up the Tor in 1539. And I make the case for the people it was run on, the monks, nuns and friars who lost their homes, and the towns that lost their hospital, almshouse and biggest employer. (Full disclosure, I'm an Episcopalian, so this is me looking hard at the other side.)

TudorCon is October 23 to 25, and you can join from anywhere with TudorCon From Home. The main room is livestreamed and every talk is recorded: https://tudorcon.englandcast.com/tudorcon-from-home/

Get my weekly newsletter, with Tudor news, a vocab word and the stuff that doesn't fit in videos: https://www.englandcast.com/newsletter-sign-up/

What happened to the monks and nuns afterwards: https://www.englandcast.com/2025/04/dissolution-of-the-monasteries-2/

#HenryVIII #Tudors #DissolutionOfTheMonasteries #TudorHistory #ThomasCromwell
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By All Saints' Day in Tudor London, the sun was down by quarter past four. In the final episode of our autumn series, we find out how the Tudors got ready for the long dark, in their bodies, in their homes, and in their hearts.

We start with the health books. Sir Thomas Elyot warned that autumn was "dangerous to all ages, all natures, and all countries," and Andrew Boorde had a whole diet for melancholy people (no red wine, sorry!). Then we light the mutton-fat candles with Thomas Tusser, find out why one doctor thought the smell of apples was dangerous, and hang out the lanterns with London's mayor. And then we come to Hallowtide, when church bells rang all night for the souls of the dead. Henry VIII nearly banned it, Elizabeth's bishops tried for years to stop it, and ordinary people in places like Sandbach and Weaverham kept climbing the tower to ring for the people they'd lost.

This is episode 4 of 4 in our series on how the Tudors got ready for autumn. Thank you so much for watching!

🎟 TudorCon From Home, October 23 to 25. We livestream the main room all weekend, and every talk is recorded with audio and slides so you can listen afterward. Every ticket comes with a digital swag bag worth over $100:
https://tudorcon.englandcast.com/tudorcon-from-home/

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https://www.englandcast.com/newsletter-sign-up/

IMAGE CREDITS
Most images are public domain, via Wikimedia Commons and the Internet Archive. The following are used under Creative Commons licenses:
Wellcome Collection (CC BY 4.0): Castel of Helth title page; physician with urine flask; Andrew Boorde portraits; Breviary of Helthe title page and woodcut
St Mary's, Weaverham: Sue Adair (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Church tower at night: Ben Harris (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Bellringers' board, Fowey: Rob Farrow (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Sunset over fields: Susanne Nilsson (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Tallow Chandlers' crest: D M Wilmot (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Tallow Chandlers' Hall: Dun.can (CC BY 2.0)
Medieval candlestick: Museum of Antiquities, Newcastle (CC BY-SA 4.0)
John Stow's monument: Michael Coppins (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Office of the Dead: Chester Beatty Library, Dublin (CC BY-SA 4.0)
Sanctus bell, Berkswell: Michael Garlick (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Bassingbourn church: John Salmon (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Sandbach Crosses: Mike Faherty (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Bell tower, Pembridge: Sandy Gerrard (CC BY-SA 2.0)
Licenses: creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0 | /by/4.0 | /by-sa/2.0 | /by-sa/4.0

#Tudor #TudorHistory #Halloween #AllSaints #ElizabethI #HenryVIII #EnglishHistory #History

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Every September, all of Tudor England was on the move. In episode 3 of our autumn series, we climb the social ladder one rung at a time, from a seventeen-year-old farm servant looking for next year's job all the way up to Queen Elizabeth watching sea gods row across a lake that was dug just for her.

On the way, we find out why quitting your job without a written testimonial could land you in prison in 1563, wander through Stourbridge Fair (one of the biggest fairs in Europe, right outside Cambridge), peek into Sir William Petre's household accounts at Ingatestone, and follow the court to Elvetham in 1591, where the Earl of Hertford built a crescent-shaped lake with a ship-shaped island for a four-day visit. Plus the staggering cost of hosting Elizabeth on progress, and the nobles who tried very hard to get out of it, including one earl who simply wasn't home when she knocked.

This is episode 3 of 4 in our series on how the Tudors got ready for autumn.

🎟 TudorCon From Home, October 23 to 25. We livestream the main room all weekend, and every talk is recorded with audio and slides so you can listen afterward. Every ticket comes with a digital swag bag worth over $100:
https://tudorcon.englandcast.com/tudorcon-from-home/

📬 Get the newsletter:
https://www.englandcast.com/newsletter-sign-up/

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The harvest is in. Now what? In episode 2 of our autumn series, we head out into the Tudor village with the best guide I could possibly have found: Thomas Tusser, a former choirboy and court musician who walked away from court, became a Suffolk farmer, and wrote an entire farming manual in rhyme.

We crash a harvest home celebration spotted near Windsor by a German traveller in 1598, follow the gleaners into the stubble and the pigs into the woods, and find out why "mast fats up swine, mast kills up kine." Then we spend time with the Tudor farmer's wife, who was winnowing corn, making malt, driving the plough, selling geese at market, and keeping the accounts. And there's a 1523 farming manual that tells husbands and wives to show each other their receipts!

This is episode 2 of 4 in our series on how the Tudors got ready for autumn. If you missed Michaelmas, start there. There's a goose in it.

🎟 TudorCon From Home, October 23 to 25. We livestream the main room all weekend, and every talk is recorded with audio and slides so you can listen afterward. Every ticket comes with a digital swag bag worth over $100. Sign up by September 30th to join the Privy Council and get the bonuses, including the Spooky Halloween Walk through London: https://tudorcon.englandcast.com/tudorcon-from-home/

📬 Get the newsletter: https://www.englandcast.com/newsletter-sign-up/
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September 29th was one of the biggest days of the Tudor year, and most of us have never heard of it. Michaelmas, the feast of St Michael and All Angels, was when rent came due, farm servants' contracts ran out, London chose its Lord Mayor, and the lawyers and students all headed back to town. It was also goose day, and the reason tenants turned up at the landlord's door with a goose under their arm is funnier (and a little sadder) than you'd think. This is episode 1 of a four-part series on how the Tudors got ready for autumn. In this one: 🪽 Who St Michael was, and why he's weighing souls in English church doom paintings🌧 The Wenhaston Doom, hidden under whitewash for 300 years until a rainstorm in 1892 🪿 George Gascoigne's poem about tenants buttering up their landlords "for fear their lease fly loose" 🏴‍☠️ Busting the myth that Elizabeth I started the Michaelmas goose after the Armada 📜 Why the British tax year still starts on April 6th, thanks to an old quarter day 🎟 TudorCon From Home, October 23 to 25. We livestream the main room all weekend, and every talk is recorded with audio and slides so you can catch up afterward. Every ticket comes with a digital swag bag worth over $100. Sign up by September 30th to join the Privy Council and get the bonuses, including the Spooky Halloween Walk through London: https://tudorcon.englandcast.com/tudorcon-from-home
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