Who was Catherine Parr, and how did Henry VIII meet his final wife? The Tudors Season 4 Episode 6 shifts from scandal to politics, covering Mary and Elizabeth’s place in the succession, the rise of Catherine Parr, and religious tensions at court, but the real Tudor history behind these events is more nuanced than the show suggests.

In This Post:

• Who Was Catherine Parr?
• Were Thomas Seymour and Catherine Parr in Love?
• How Did Henry VIII Meet Catherine Parr?
• When Did Henry VIII Propose to Catherine Parr?
• Was Bishop Gardiner Really Anti-Reform?
• When Were Mary and Elizabeth Restored to the Succession?
• Minor Historical Inaccuracies

Episode 6: You Have My Permission

Who Was Catherine Parr? The Real Woman Behind Henry VIII’s Final Wife

After the beheading of Catherine Howard (covered in episode five), Henry VIII pivoted his attention to a different woman…

In this episode, we meet John Neville (Baron Latimer) and his wife, Catherine Parr. The Nevilles were one of the oldest, grandest families in the north of England, and from them came the Kingmaker, who displaced Henry VI and put Edward IV on the throne. Catherine Parr was named for Catherine of Aragon, whom her mother Maud Parr served as one of her ladies-in-waiting! She was descended from King Edward I, and after her father’s death at the tender age of five, her mother raised Catherine and her other children alone. Unlike most Tudor women, Catherine learned not only needlework, sewing, and how to run a household, but received a high standard of education, influenced by Catherine of Aragon’s standards. (Catherine believed in educating little girls as much as little boys, as her own mother did for the Princesses of Castile.)

After her first husband died, the childless Catherine married John Neville, a man twice her age, and became a mother to his two children. In 1536, Neville was sucked into the Pilgrimage of Grace as a leader. He claimed to have been taken from his house in the middle of the night at sword point and forced to swear to the cause. The Duke of Norfolk investigated and felt this was true, and Neville had been in great fear for his life. Neville decided to ride to London and appeal his case to the king in person, and in his absence, the rebels took his castle and held his wife and his children captive. He returned, convinced them to release Catherine and his heirs, and carefully stayed out of the next uprising.

For another year, the king kept his eye on him, but Neville sold one of his southern manors to bribe Thomas Cromwell. So, by this point in The Tudors, there was no more “concern” that the king might persecute him for his role in recent events, but it makes a nice introduction to his story and their lives.

The Tudors ages up Catherine Parr; Joely Richardson is 44 in the role, but the real Catherine Parr was thirty—beautiful, accomplished, appealing, charming, well-educated, and stuck in a dull marriage to a dying man. For a long time, historians thought she played nursemaid to Neville and later to the king, but in reality, that under-represents her intelligence, her enthusiasm for Reform, which escalated through her friendship with Archbishop Cranmer, and her literary skills. Most of the “nursing” that went on with these two men came from physicians and paid servants, since they were hardly poor and needed a wife to dote on them!

Catherine spoke French, Italian, Spanish, and Latin, which she sought to improve as queen. She has the distinction of being the first woman to publish a book under her own name in England.

Were Thomas Seymour and Catherine Parr in Love?

On-screen, Thomas Seymour and Catherine Parr are already in love and planning to get married when Neville kicks the bucket. Given that the series had Thomas impregnate his brother’s wife a few months ago, I can’t root for them. Besides which, Thomas comes with a lot of historical baggage that I’ll address at the end of the season. They were in love, but we don’t know when the attraction began, only that the King got into the middle of it within a few weeks of her husband dying.

The episode shows her as having a pleasant relationship with Mary Tudor, which is a historical fact; but there was only a handful of years separating them in age rather than Catherine having a “motherly” affectation toward her. I would have liked to have seen a younger Catherine Parr, since it would have continued the “ick” with Henry constantly picking young women of a childbearing age, hoping to have more sons, and that he had known Catherine Parr for her entire life. As in, when she was in the royal nursery alongside his own daughter.

How Did Henry VIII Meet Catherine Parr?

The show brings her to court to plead her husband’s case, but all of that happened earlier without her involvement. It’s more likely that after her husband’s death, Catherine Parr got a position in Princess Mary’s household and drew the king’s attention on one of his visits, or even met him when visiting Princess Mary, since they would have been friends.

In this episode, Henry sends her lavish gifts ahead of her husband’s death, which causes contention between her and Neville, who is angry about being replaced. This comes from an incident noted in the king’s papers, which says the king paid a dressmaking bill for Catherine Parr. But whether the bill was paid after Neville’s death or before is uncertain; whether the king bought the items for her, or she ordered them for Mary, or he paid the bill out of sympathy for her loss, is uncertain.

Did Henry VIII really court her before her husband’s death? Unlikely, since she may not have returned to court ahead of his burial. Which means there was no angst between the married couple over it, and he most certainly did not tell her to “go to hell” on his deathbed.

When Did Henry VII Propose to Catherine Parr?

John Neville died in early March. In April, Catherine Parr’s brother and her uncle received important promotions at court, a sign of royal favor (just like Henry promoted the Boleyns and Catherine Howard’s relatives). Henry sent Thomas Seymour to Brussels in May, and Catherine accepted his proposal in June.

On the show, he proposes within a few days of her husband’s death. That’s Henry VIII for you. Always classy.

Was Bishop Gardiner Really Anti-Reform?

The series has Bishop Gardiner being a Catholic fanatic, a wolf in sheep’s clothing, who tortures people and attempts to bribe them to give him information to incriminate the Reformist sympathizers at court, such as Edward Seymour. It’s true that he did not like Reform and wanted to reverse as much of it in English politics as possible. Henry VIII never embraced Reformist beliefs other than that the Pope ought not to tell him what to do, when he could declare himself head of the Church of England instead. After he got rid of the Boleyns, and had taken all the money he could from dissolving the abbeys and monasteries, his “passion for the cause” fizzled and the Court reverted to “Catholic-Lite.” As time went on, Henry became more and more “Catholic” again, and his Catholic bishops grew bolder at persecuting Reformist teachers, preachers, writers, and members of the court.

Earlier in his reign, the beliefs of the Church of England were outlined in a book written by Thomas Cromwell and Thomas Cranmer, two English theologians. It had a lot of pro-reformist ideas in it, but as Henry got older, he went back to his roots. The “King’s Book” of 1543 replaced it with traditionalist views. Instead of the grand Reformation envisioned in England by Cranmer and Cromwell, this new law banned anyone below the Gentry from reading the Bible for themselves in English (a lot of lower / common folk did not speak Latin, so they could not have read the Bible anyway) and said women could not read it together. (Because, you know, we talk to each other, I guess, and might misinterpret it.) Which is pretty close to the Catholic doctrine of “only priests can correctly interpret scripture.”

For a while, the Reformist faction in Henry’s cabinet was safe, because there were so many Protestant sympathizers still in power, even after Thomas Cromwell went to the block, but as soon as Henry VIII allowed the new Book, Bishop Stephen Gardiner started chipping away Reform. He spearheaded “heretic hunts,” hoping to get rid of the biggest heretic of them all, Archbishop Thomas Cranmer.

When Were Mary and Elizabeth Restored to the Succession?

This episode opens in Hunston House, 1542, when Princess Mary informs her sister, Princess Elizabeth, that they have both been restored to the succession. It’s a nice scene because it showcases their dynamic and personalities; Mary is excited about this because it reverses the Act of Succession. Elizabeth seems to care less, since she does not feel her odds are that great of ever being queen (her siblings would need to die first) and is more private in her feelings; she says this means Mary may be queen one day, and after what happened to Catherine Howard, she has decided never to get married.

Elizabeth famously had an “I am never getting married” stance from a young age that coincided with Catherine Howard’s execution. Robert Dudley said that at age eight she told him she would never marry. Elizabeth grew up under the shadow of her mother’s “adultery, witchcraft, incest, and execution.” She was raised in a household where all of her father’s marriages led to disaster and death. Even if she could turn a blind eye to him executing his wives, she saw Jane Seymour die in childbirth, which told her such things were possible. She could get married, have a miserable time, and die trying to bear a child. Her reaction to that was about the same as mine at her age; oh, hell no.

Thing is… this new “act of succession” didn’t happen until 1544, a year and a half later. It only happened because Henry was preparing an invasion of France and intended to be out of the country. He knew he could get killed in battle and wanted his affairs in order while Catherine Parr served as Regent. By doing this, he could protect both his daughters, while making the various court factions happy, and they would be less likely to stage a revolt for Mary and kill Prince Edward to put a Catholic on the throne.

Also, Mary and Elizabeth did not live together most of the time.

Minor Historical Inaccuracies:

• Henry VIII says Mary Queen of Scots was born on the day of her father’s death, but she was born eight days earlier, in December 1541. He also says the Regent Queen Marie de Guise is handling Scottish affairs, but for the first eleven years of Mary’s life, the Earl of Arran served as Regent.
• Charles Brandon and his wife now live separately, which never happened.
• Henry VIII says Catherine Parr is about to become a “very rich widow,” which is not true; she would have had a modest income.
• It’s implied that Catherine Parr’s first husband was crazy; he was not.
• Robert Testwood did not escape his arrest for heresy and run to the Seymours for help that was not given.

Curious what personality types feature in The Tudors? Check out my analysis here!

This article is part of my Historical Accuracy in Historical TV Shows & Movies series, where I break down the real history behind popular historical dramas.

About the Author: Charity Bishop writes historical fiction, historical fantasy, and suspense novels that explores the darkness in human hearts, and the light that refuses to be extinguished. Discover her books.