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Hello, and welcome to the Queens of England podcast. Episode 38, Catherine of Aragon, Henry's Spanish Queen.

Okay. Catherine of Aragon is probably best known for three things, being Henry's brother's widow, only giving birth to a daughter, and being divorced. While all this was,

of course, true, there is so much more to Catherine than that. There is for me a myth of exceptionalism when it comes to the Tudors, and Henry VIII in particular. He is responsible for a great many

firsts, mostly to do with his family and the church.

But in many ways, he really was not all that much different from what had come before.

Historians love to draw lines and say,

X era starts on this state and ends on this.

Therefore, we see Henry portrayed as to England's first early modern king,

a break from the medieval past,

but really, was he all that different? How did he, in terms of domestic and foreign policy,

really differ from the policies of his father and of Edward VIII? I would argue not all that much.

He wants to be king of France, and fall for it. No change there.

He struggled against a political system where he could never get enough money to fight foreign wars.

Tell me something medieval kings did not know. The same thing is true of his first marriage.

Because of the sheer number of marriages that Henry had, more than three times more than

any other English king since the conquest.

...