Or, was Henry VIIIth actually the good guy and was the dissolution of the monasteries motivated by something more than simple royal greed?
The story of Henry VIII is the story of a conflict. The conflict that is occurring is the conflict between Habsburg and Tudor houses. The house of Habsburg is, as they had previously done in many other European countries, attempting to gain political control of England through marriage and through its influence over the Catholic Church.
Which is to say: The Habsburgs are trying to take over England during the reign of Henry VIII.
Henry’s actions – exiting a marriage to a Habsburg connected figure, and exiting the Catholic Church – are direct responses to Habsburg attacks on England’s sovereignty through those same two avenues. The Habsburg attack comes through marriage and the Catholic Church.However I have never seen that story recounted. Instead, I have only seen bizarre retellings where half the plot is left out, the Habsburg part. Obviously, if you omit the geopolitical motivation for Henry VIII’s actions from the story then his actions seem insane. The situation reminds me a little bit of the experience of accidentally walking into a spiderweb. Have you ever done this? It is totally jarring. You flail your hands and look like an idiot trying to get the bits of spiderweb off of your face. To an outside observer who can’t see the spiderweb you just walked into, you look spastic, manic. But there is a reason you’re acting that way. The conflict with the Habsburgs is that spiderweb for Henry VIII. You need to know it is there to understand his actions.
Is there any evidence of a Habsburg coup attempt? The evidence I have that the Habsburgs are trying to take over England during this period is that the Habsburgs do take over England in this period.
What? Yes. ‘Bloody Mary’ Tudor weds Phillip II Habsburg – the son of the Habsburg Emperor – just 5 years after the death of Henry VIII.
Phillip Habsburg becomes King of England Jure Uxoris – joint sovereign with Queen Mary. England comes under Habsburg control, along with Spain, Holland, Belgium, Luxembourg, Austria, Flanders, Bohemia, Germany, Italy, Hungary and… Did I forget any? At this point the Habsburgs are basically kings of the Universe, totally drunk with power. In England they are literally burning their enemies at the stake.
The Habsburg method for expanding their territory was fairly simple:
- Find a failing kingdom in need of aid or protection.
- Offer to use your influence in the Catholic Church to aid the Kingdom in exchange for an advantageous marriage, protection money, or both.
- Betray the Kingdom and use your influence instead to install your newly wed Habsburg as the sole sovereign.
Are you starting to understand why the story of a medieval Republican who miraculously defeats something that looks suspiciously like today’s democratic institutional oligarchy has never been properly told?
The Habsburg Coup in Henry VIII’s England
I’ve literally never, ever, heard this theory before, but at first glance, it sounds extremely persuasive. It also tends to raise an obvious question about the ethnicity of the Hapsburgs, who were both highly consanguineous and physically deformed. They certainly appear to have worked out their own method of “color revolutions” centuries before the neocons, although it may simply be that they were inspirations for the Rothschilds rather than predecessors of some kind.
And, of course, it would be yet another example of a “religious war” actually being about something other than the purported religious conflict, which tends to track with what we’ve learned about everything from the Crusades to the 30 Years War.
To think some people actually believe that history is boring… Definitely read the whole thing!