7 The 100 Most Influential World Leaders of All Time 7

Henry VIII

(b. June 28, 1491, Greenwich, near London, Eng.—d. Jan. 28,
1547, London)

A

s king of England from 1509 to 1547, Henry VIII pre-
sided over the beginnings of the English Renaissance
and the English Reformation. He is remembered for tak-
ing six wives in his quest for a male heir.
Henry was the second son of Henry VII, first of the
Tudor line, and Elizabeth, daughter of Edward IV, first
king of the short-lived line of York. When his elder brother,
Arthur, died in 1502, Henry became the heir to the throne.
Soon after his accession in 1509, Henry married his broth-
er’s widow, Catherine of Aragon.
Henry was determined to engage in military adven-
ture. Europe was consumed by rivalries between the
French and Spanish kingdoms, mostly over Italian claims.
Against the advice of his older councillors, in 1512 Henry
joined his father-in-law, Ferdinand II of Aragon, against
France and ostensibly in support of a threatened pope, to
whom the devout king for a long time paid almost slavish
respect. Henry himself displayed no military talent, but a
real victory was won by the earl of Surrey at Flodden (1513)
against a Scottish invasion. Despite the pointlessness of
the fighting, the appearance of success was popular.
Henry’s first chief minister, Thomas Cardinal Wolsey,
exercised nearly complete control over policy in 1515–27.
By 1515 Wolsey was archbishop of York, lord chancellor of
England, and a cardinal of the church. More important, he
was the king’s good friend, to whom was gladly left the
active conduct of affairs.
In 1527 Henry pursued a divorce from Catherine, who
had not provided a male heir to the throne—after several
stillbirths and early deaths, only their daughter Mary (born