CATHERINE HOWARD BORN
1523 - 1542 FEBRUARY 13
கேத்தரீன் ஹவார்டு (Catherine Howard, அண். 1523 – 13 பெப்ரவரி 1542)[1] இங்கிலாந்தின் எட்டாம் ஹென்றி மன்னரின் ஐந்தாவது மனைவியாக 1540 முதல் 1541 வரை இங்கிலாந்தின் அரசியாக இருந்தவர். இவர் எட்மண்ட் ஹவார்ட் பிரபு, ஜோயிசு கல்பெபெர் ஆகியோரின் மகளும், எட்டாம் என்றி மன்னரின் இரண்டாம் மனைவி ஆன் பொலினின் உடன்பிறவா சகோதரியும், நோர்போக் கோமகன் தோமசு ஹவார்டின் மருமகளும் ஆவார். என்றியின் அரசவையில் தோமசு ஹவார்ட் ஒரு முக்கிய அரசியல் புள்ளியாக இருந்து வந்தார். இவரது செல்வாக்கினால், என்றியின் நான்காவது மனைவியான கிளீவ்சின் ஆனின் வீட்டில் கேத்தரீன் தங்க இடம் கிடைத்தது.[2] இதன் மூலம் கேத்தரீன் மன்னரினால் ஈர்க்கப்பட்டார்.[3] ஆனுடனான மணமுறிவை அடுத்து கேத்தரீன் 1540 சூலை 28 இல் என்றியை ஓட்லண்ட்சு அரண்மனையில் மணம் புரிந்தார். மன்னருக்கு அப்போது அகவை 49 ஆகும், கேத்தரீனின் அகவை 16 அல்லது 17 ஆகும்.[4]
1541 நவம்பரில், கத்தரின் ராணி என்ற பட்டத்தில் இருந்து நீக்கப்பட்டார். மூன்று மாதங்களுக்குப் பிறகு தனது உறவினர் தாமசு கல்பெப்பருடன் தகாத உறவு கொண்டிருந்ததாக[5][6][7] தேசத் துரோகக் குற்றச்சாட்டில் மரண தண்டனை விதிக்கப்பட்டு தலை துண்டிக்கப்பட்டு கொல்லப்பட்டார்.[8]
11 facts about Catherine Howard
How much do you know about Henry VIII's fifth wife, Catherine Howard? How did she meet Henry VIII, and is she related to Anne Boleyn? How did she die, and does her ghost really haunt Hampton Court Palace? Here, we bring you the facts...
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Catherine Howard was the fifth wife of Henry VIII. They married on 28 July 1540, just three weeks after the king’s brief marriage to Anne of Cleves was annulled.
The union between Henry and Catherine ended in tragedy when Henry discovered Catherine’s sexual past – and she was charged with treason. She was executed at the Tower of London on 13 February 1542.
So how much do you know about Catherine Howard ? We bring you the facts about Henry VIII’s fifth wife – and the truth about her adultery and death…
When was Catherine Howard born?
Catherine Howard is thought to have been born sometime between 1518 and 1524, but the exact date is unknown.
Born into an aristocratic family, Catherine Howard was the daughter of a younger brother of the 3rd Duke of Norfolk and was first cousin to Anne Boleyn. Little is known about Catherine’s early life, but historian David Starkey describes it as “a scrabbled childhood, with a dominant, providing mother, and a weak debt-ridden and… hen-pecked father”.
Catherine’s mother died when she was a child, so at the age of around 10 or 12 Catherine was sent to live with her step-grandmother, Agnes, Dowager Duchess of Norfolk, in the countryside near Horsham in West Sussex. The young Catherine “had few prospects”, says historian Josephine Wilkinson.
Catherine Howard: a brief guide
When was she born? Unknown
When did she die? 13 February 1542
When did she marry Henry VIII? 28 July 1540
Why was she executed? Catherine was accused of adultery and treason
What was Catherine of Howard’s childhood like?
Historical novelist Philippa Gregory describes the Dowager Duchess’s household as being “full of her young wards and companions” and says “they received little supervision”. Catherine and her friends were allowed to entertain male admirers in their large shared dormitory – Catherine herself was “young, merry and vivacious” and “was not scholarly or devout”.
The household has been likened by David Starkey to “a slackly run boarding school”.
Was Catherine Howard sexually abused?
When Catherine was around 13 years old, she is said to have had a relationship with her music teacher, Henry Mannock (aka Manox or Mannox), who had been employed to teach her to play the virginals, a keyboard instrument. When later questioned about it (in 1541, when Catherine was charged with treason), both denied ever having had intercourse.
Catherine had a longer, sexual relationship with a young noble, Francis Dereham, who was a secretary in her grandmother’s household, between 1537 and 1539. The pair “almost certainly became lovers, addressing each other as ‘husband’ and ‘wife’; Francis even entrusted her with his money whilst he was travelling,” says Philippa Gregory. But the jealous Mannock informed the Dowager Duchess, who quickly put an end to the relationship.
Writing for BBC History Magazine in 2016, the academic historian Josephine Wilkinson claimed that Catherine Howard’s relationships with Mannock and Dereham had been non-consensual.
“While living with the duchess [of Norfolk], Catherine was sexually exploited by two men of the household,” she said. “Both men took advantage of their position of authority in the household – and Catherine had no means of defending herself.”
The historian Lucy Worsley echoed Wilkinson’s claims. Writing in The Telegraph, Worsley highlighted the “queasy fact that the girl at the centre of [this] was quite possibly still in her early teens.”
She added: “It’s all very well to describe [Catherine’s] ‘easy charm’ and her ‘abundant store of good nature’, but it is questionable to do so about a girl who, from the age of 11 or 12 onwards, had older men coming into her bedroom. Especially when Mannock was placed in a position of responsibility towards Catherine as her music teacher.”
How did Henry and Catherine meet, and why did Henry marry her?
Catherine met Henry through his wife, Anne of Cleves. The young and reportedly beautiful Catherine Howard was maid of honour to Henry’s new queen, Anne of Cleves. Henry and Anne were married for just six months, making her the shortest reigning of all his queens. Henry had only entertained the idea of a match with Anne because “he desperately needed new allies,” says Tracy Borman. “An alliance with Cleves would provide a major boost to the Reformation in England, and it was for this reason that Henry’s chief minister, Thomas Cromwell, championed it so enthusiastically.”
After the collapse of the relationship, Henry was adamant he would choose his next bride for himself. Historian Josephine Wilkinson explains: “Henry fell head over heels with [Anne’s] new maiden of honour. Within a matter of weeks – in what was a truly spectacular rise from obscurity to the seat of power – Catherine Howard had become his fifth queen.”
Did you know?
Catherine Howard might otherwise have been ‘Mrs Culpeper’
While at court Catherine Howard had a relationship with a Thomas Culpeper, a gentleman of the king’s privy chamber, and rumours abounded that the pair were to be married. But it was Henry who secured Catherine’s hand: having fallen in love with Catherine and sent her gifts and love letters, on 28 July 1540 – just three weeks after the king’s marriage to Anne of Cleves was annulled – he married Catherine at Oatlands Palace in Surrey, making her his fifth queen. For Catherine it was “a truly spectacular rise from obscurity to the seat of power,” says Josephine Wilkinson.
What was Henry VIII and Catherine Howards age gap?
Henry was nearly 50 years old when he married the teenage Catherine – at least 30 years older than her – and he was in failing health. “Incapacitated by an ulcerated jousting wound in his leg, Henry’s girth had increased at an alarming rate,” says historian Tracy Borman. “When he became king he had been a trim 32 inches around the waist; by the time he met Anne of Cleves it was closer to 52 inches.”
But, Wilkinson explains, Catherine “restored to [Henry] the youth and vitality he thought he’d lost. After an extended honeymoon they settled into married life and Catherine showed every sign of becoming a good queen.”
Did Catherine Howard have a child?
Catherine had been married to Henry for just 18 months when she was executed at the Tower of London on 13 February 1542, and in that time did not bear Henry any children.
It has been speculated that Henry, who was nearly 50 years old when he married Catherine, was impotent. Examining Henry’s marriage to his previous wife, Anne of Cleves, Tracy Borman writes: “Henry’s inability to consummate the marriage to Anne of Cleves has been traditionally assigned to his revulsion at his new bride. But it is at least equally possible that he was impotent. He was nearly twice his young bride’s age and had become increasingly immobile in recent years. There had been no talk of a mistress for some time.”
But while Catherine had no children of her own, she was, however, stepmother to Mary Tudor and the future Elizabeth I…
Did Catherine Howard have a relationship with Mary Tudor and Elizabeth I?
Catherine, who was at least two and possibly even seven years younger than Henry’s elder daughter, Mary, found the role of stepmother difficult.
According to historian Anna Whitelock, relations between the two “were initially fraught”. In her 2010 book Mary Tudor: England’s First Queen, Whitelock details how, on 5 December 1540, Eustace Chapuys [Spanish ambassador to Henry VIII’s court from 1529 to 1545] told the emperor Charles V’s sister that the young queen Catherine “had tried to remove two of Mary’s attendants because she believed that the princess was showing less respect to her than to her predecessors.”
But relations between the two women eventually began to settle down, and they treated one another cordially. In May 1541, Chapuys reported that Catherine had “countenanced… with good grace” her husband’s decision to allow Mary to reside at court. The queen later gave Mary a gold pomander bejewelled with rubies and pearls as a gift.
Meanwhile, Catherine found herself a fan in her younger stepdaughter, the Princess Elizabeth, who is thought to have been seven years old when Catherine married Henry VIII. Related by blood (Elizabeth’s mother, Anne Boleyn, was Catherine’s first cousin), the pair are said to have enjoyed one another’s company during the few occasions on which they met.
Did Catherine Howard have an affair?
Catherine Howard’s biggest mistake, many have argued, was continuing her affair with Thomas Culpeper after she had married Henry VIII. It is thought that Catherine’s maid – Jane Boleyn, Lady Rochford, (who had previously testified against her husband, George Boleyn, and her sister-in-law, Anne Boleyn) – helped Catherine to meet Culpeper in secret while the king was away from court.
But it was Catherine’s earlier liaisons that ultimately sealed her fate. In the summer of 1541, as Henry’s court embarked upon a royal progress to the north country, “rumours of Catherine’s previous indiscretions continued to haunt her and she was forced to give favours and positions in return for silence,” says Philippa Gregory.
News of Catherine’s indiscretions eventually reached Thomas Cranmer – Archbishop of Canterbury and close friend of Henry VIII. Cranmer was told that Catherine’s music teacher, Henry Mannock, had boasted that he knew Catherine’s “privates from all others by a privy mark”, while Francis Dereham was so familiar with Catherine “afore her marriage to the king that he did lie with her a hundred nights in the year in his doublet and hose abed between the sheets.”
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