Famous Redheads in History: 131) Catherine of Aragon

Wednesday 20 June 2018

131) Catherine of Aragon

Catherine of Aragon (1485 - 1536). Queen of England as the first wife of Henry VIII. Daughter of Isabella I of Castile and Ferdinand II of Aragon. She was previously Princess of Wales as the wife of Henry's elder brother, Arthur, Prince of Wales.

Catherine was three years old when she was betrothed to Prince Arthur, heir apparent to the English throne. They married in 1501, but Arthur died five months later. Catherine held the position of ambassador of the Aragonese crown to England in 1507, the first known female ambassador in European history. She married Arthur's younger brother, the recently ascended Henry VIII, in 1509. For six months in 1513, she served as regent of England while Henry VIII was in France.

By 1525, Henry VIII was infatuated with Anne Boleyn and dissatisfied that his marriage to Catherine had produced no surviving sons, leaving their daughter Mary as heir presumptive at a time when there was no established precedent for a woman on the throne. He sought to have their marriage annulled, setting in motion a chain of events that led to England's schism with the Catholic Church. When Pope Clement VII refused to annul the marriage, Henry defied him by assuming supremacy over religious matters. In 1533 their marriage was consequently declared invalid and Henry married Anne on the judgement of clergy in England, without reference to the pope. Catherine refused to accept Henry as supreme head of the Church in England and considered herself the king's rightful wife and queen, attracting much popular sympathy. Despite this, Henry acknowledged her only as dowager princess of Wales. After being banished from court by Henry, Catherine lived out the remainder of her life at Kimbolton Castle, dying there in January 1536 of cancer. The English people held Catherine in high esteem, and her death set off tremendous mourning. Her daughter Mary would become the first undisputed English queen regnant in 1553.