Tudor

We eavesdrop on Ian Dawson as he interrogates the sources and wonders whether the first Tudor was really so mysterious.

Monarchs could do anything – or could they? Steven Ellis examines what happened when commands from the centre had to he executed in practice in the remoter parts of the kingdom.

Has our image of Henry VIII's elder daughter as 'Bloody Mary', burning Protestants and unhappily married to Philip of Spain, clouded our assessment of how close she came to restoring the old religion? 

Glenn Richardson profiles the French king's relationship with Henry VIII and the cultural PR and diplomacy that went with it.

With a hey nonny-no - but the courtship of Elizabethan lads and lasses was not quite as buccolic as the madrigals suggest, as Eric Carlson explains.

Michael Leech on a Tudor revival in the East End

The early Renaissance royal palace on the Thames

Top gun? Alexander McKee assesses Henry VIII's prowess as a commander by land and sea in the light of his 1545 campaigns against the French.

Business with pleasure - Steven Gunn shows how the spectacle of the joust oiled the wheels of service and diplomacy as well as building up the court's image, not just for Henry VIII but for his dynasty-founding father as well.

Henry VIII spent astronomical amounts on military fortifications from the Scottish border to the South Coast of England. Marcus Merriman discusses the locations and architecture of these fortifications.