Note [459] page 276. Henry, Prince of Wales, afterwards Henry VIII, (born 1491; died 1547), was the younger son of Henry VII and Elizabeth of York, and was educated for the church. Having succeeded his father in 1509, he married (in accordance with his parents’ wish) his elder brother Arthur’s widow, Catherine, the youngest child of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic. His accession was hailed with enthusiasm. Left rich through his father’s avarice, he was generous, frank, handsome, exceptionally robust, and an accomplished athlete and scholar. Good men were delighted with the purity of his life, his gaiety pleased the courtiers, and sober statesmen found in him a singular capacity for business. Besides being a musician, he spoke Latin, French and Spanish, and was very devout,—usually attending mass five times daily. Even as late as 1521 he dedicated to the pope an anti-Lutheran tract on the Seven Sacraments, and in return received the title of Defender of the Faith. As an offset to the enormities of his later life, it is only just to remember that he raised England to the rank of a great European power, and that for twenty years he did nothing to mar the harmony of his reign.
HENRY VII OF ENGLAND
1457-1509
Reduced from Walker and Boutall’s photograph of an anonymous portrait (no. 416) in the National Portrait Gallery at London. Painted on an oak panel for one Herman Rinck in October 1505, the picture was once owned by M. Julien at Le Mans, by M. Émile Barre at Paris, and by Mr. E. J. Muller, from whom it was acquired by the Gallery in 1876.
Note [460] page 276. ‘His great father,’ i.e., Henry VII, (born 1457; died 1509), was the son of Edmund Tudor, Earl of Richmond, (a son of Henry V’s widow Catherine), and Margaret Beaufort, whose paternal grandfather was an illegitimate half-brother of Henry IV. After the downfall of the House of Lancaster and the death of the young York princes, Henry succeeded in gathering a strong party, landed in England and wrested the crown from Richard III, 1485. Soon afterwards, by his marriage to Edward IV’s daughter Elizabeth of York, he united the hostile factions that had so long harassed the kingdom. As a ruler he was avaricious, calculating, and far from popular. He is said to have left a treasure of £2,000,000 sterling. The marriage of his daughter Margaret to James IV of Scotland finally led (on the failure of his son’s issue) to the accession of the Stuarts in the person of her grandson, James I.
Note [461] page 276. This is consistent with the earlier passage (see page [8]) where Castiglione pretends to have been absent in England at the date of the Courtier dialogues. An earlier MS. version here reads: “as we are told by our friend Castiglione, who has just returned from England,” which accords with what we have seen (note 23) to be the fact.
Note [462] page 276. Don Carlos, afterwards the Emperor Charles V, (born 1500; died 1558), was the son of the Emperor Maximilian’s son Philip of Austria, and of Juana, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella the Catholic. Born and bred in the Low Countries, and educated at least partly under the care of the future pope Adrian VI, he is said to have shown less taste for study than for military exercises, and on his accession to the Spanish throne in 1516, he was ignorant of the Spanish language. By right of his grandmother Mary of Burgundy, he already held the Netherlands. As representative of the house of Aragon, he was king of Naples and Sicily. On the death of his grandfather Maximilian in 1519, he inherited Austria, and (in spite of the rivalry of Francis I and the intrigues of Leo X) was elected Emperor;—thus achieving, without a blow, a dominion vaster than any in Europe since the time of Charlemagne.
In an earlier MS. version the text here reads: “Then messer Bernardo Bibbiena said: ‘I do not think that any of those present, except myself, have seen the prince Don Carlos, who, having recently lost such a father as the king Don Philip was, has shown such courage and wisdom in this great bereavement, that although he has not reached the tenth year of his age, we may nevertheless regard him as competent to rule over all his hereditary possessions, vast though they be,—and that the Empire of Christendom (which men think will be in his hands) must grow not a little in power and dignity.’”
Note [463] page 279. Federico Gonzaga, the first Duke of Mantua, (born 1500; died 1540), was the son of the Marquess Gianfrancesco Gonzaga and Isabella d’Este. At the age of ten he spent some time as the hostage-guest of Julius II at Rome, where he seems to have been generally caressed. Raphael is known to have introduced the boy’s face into one of the Vatican frescoes, and a little later to have painted his portrait. Having succeeded his father as marquess in 1519, he waged war for Leo X against the French. In 1527 he joined the league of Italian princes against Charles V, but went over to the Emperor’s side two years later, and was created Duke of Mantua. In 1531 he married Margarita Paleologus. Both Giulio Romano and Benvenuto Cellini were in his employ.
Note [464] page 280. These lines were written after Ottaviano Fregoso’s election as Doge of Genoa; see note [11].