Hello, I'm Lucy Worsley, chief curator at Historic Royal Palaces.

You're listening to our podcast that explores the history and stories of our six palaces.

These talks are a collection of some of our best live events.

I really hope you enjoy listening.

In this series of talks by renowned Tudor historians, we closely examine the monarch and man

himself, Henry D. 8th. These talks were recorded live in collaboration with history today

to mark the 500th anniversary of the coronation of Henry D. 8th. In this episode, historian Eric

Ives argues for the good versus the bad Henry

and questions if he deserves his reputation as a tyrant king. Let me start tonight with a truism,

which is, of course, that the historian's first loyalty is to evidence. He can't distort it, he can't replace it, he can't get rid of it.

But if all he does is recapitulate evidence,

then he's just a factmonger, as Voltaire said he was.

If you're going to make any sense of history at all,

you've got to bring your own understanding

of life and your own experience. You make the past come alive by donating your own life.

And that's where I come from with regard to Henry, because I've been fortunate enough on a number of occasions

to be involved fairly high up in the running of big institutions. And I look at that, I look at

Henry, from that experience. Because what you find is that anyone who has to exercise independent power, be he Henry the 8th,

or be he Stalin, or to a lesser extent the chairman of RBS, or indeed a university vice-chancellor,

doesn't do so in isolation. And to that extent, a course which is about Henry

gives it an unfortunate tilt

because the ruler, whoever he is,

...