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Tudors
1491 – 1547
Henry VIII
“If anyone is found speaking ill of me, off with their head.”
Blimey fact: His jousting accident knocked him out for two hours and may have rewired his personality.
School left you with a portrait and three dates. We give you the rumours, the bad decisions and the temper tantrums. Six showstoppers who shaped Britain, and the bits your textbook was too polite to mention.
“If anyone is found speaking ill of me, off with their head.”
Blimey fact: His jousting accident knocked him out for two hours and may have rewired his personality.
“I'm fighting for my freedom, my bruised body and my outraged daughters.”
Blimey fact: She torched Roman London so thoroughly there's still a layer of ash 4 metres down.
“All the world's a stage. (And I want top billing.)”
Blimey fact: He invented over 1,700 words we still use, including 'eyeball' and 'gossip'.
“A desperate disease requires a dangerous remedy.”
Blimey fact: He was caught with 36 barrels of gunpowder, enough to flatten Westminster Abbey.
“How very little can be done under the spirit of fear.”
Blimey fact: She invented a pie chart so terrifying it forced the British Army to wash its hands.
“We shall fight on the beaches…”
Blimey fact: He drank champagne at breakfast, painted 500 paintings, and won the Nobel Prize for Literature.