Essay
Do you agree that the main reason for Wolsey's fall from power was his failure to secure an annulment?
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A* response to a 25 mark essay question on Henry's ministers, namely Wolsey.
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Do you agree with the view that the main reason for Wolsey's fall from power was his failure tosecure an annulment of the King's marriage to Catherine of Aragon?
As Wolsey was elevated to a position of great influence by his diligence and charisma, he would
be forever vulnerable to falling out of the King’s favour. His success was to always depend upon
his ability to satisfy a volatile monarch. This was epitomised in his failure to resolve the King’s
Great Matter, the decisive blow to his power. That is not to say that he made only one mistake,
but rather that this error caused the loss of the one thing his power relied upon, the King’s
protection. With this, all hope of recovery was lost. The nobility, by this point gathered into
vicious factions, were poised to attack him, reminding the King of Wolsey’s previous domestic
and foreign policy failings. Thus Wolsey’s fall was chiefly the result of his inability to secure an
annulment for Henry VIII.
The fall of Cardinal Wosley was principally caused by the unsuccess in settling the King’s Great
Matter. Between 1521-1525, Henry had become determined to annul his marriage with
Catherine, who was yet to produce the male heir that Henry needed to secure the throne. In
1525, Henry had become infatuated with Anne Bolyne. Anne was insistent that she should
become Queen, not a mistress. Wolsey was entrusted with this issue and assured the King he
would succeed. From the beginning both the gravity of this problem, which had built up for 8
years by 1529, and the personal and egoistic motivations of this despotic leader were clear. It
was a great matter both in its longevity and personal effect on the King and would have
profoundly negative consequences on the party to blame, if unsuccessfully carried out. Due to
the Sack of Rome in 1527, Wolsey’s attempts to secure the annulment became futile, and so did
his attempts to stay in power. Accused of delaying proceedings, he accused of Praemunire
(acting in the interests of someone other than the King- in this case the Pope). This spectacular
catastrophe was so detrimental in his downfall due to its complexity. Wolsey had always
suffered through Henry’s fallacy that England was an important player in European politics.
However, Charles V’s grip over the Pope after the Sack of Rome, and therefore his influence
over Henry’s ability to secure the throne and to pursue his infatuation, conveyed England’s
insignificance on the European stage. This time Wolsey failed to act as a successful negotiator
and could not maintain Henry’s delusion. Wolsey had already been proved not to be an
invincible statesman in the alliance with France having put England on the losing side in
Habsburg-Valois struggle, but this conveyed him as a poor one. Moreover, Charles’ diminished
the Cardinal’s significance as papal legate, a role awarded to Wolsey in 1518. If Wolsey could
not persuade the Pope, as the Pope’s representative in England, then that title, at least to
Henry, lost its advantage, with any prestige already lost through foreign insignificance. Finally, it
must be reiterated that the personal nature of this issue is what distinguishes it from other
foreign and domestic failures under Wolsey. Under Henry, Wolsey had frequently had to work
with irrational leadership, such as the refusal to formally join the League of Cognac simply
because it was not to be signed in England. Nevertheless Wolsey had always found a way to
work around the chaos. In 1529, however, he had run out of options. The King’s Great Matter
lost Wolsey the esteem of the King, through illustrating England’s weak international position,
and essentially revealing the King’s own misbelief. It was the last and greatest of a series of
mistakes made by Wolsey. Wolsey’s power, rooted in his ability to please the King, was lost.
Without the King, Wolsey was defenceless to the scheming nobles he had provoked by his
reformed legal system, modest background and power.
However, prior to the culmination of the King’s Great Matter, Wolsey had made significant
foreign policy mistakes. After 1520, Wolsey failed to produce any foreign policy successes.
Perhaps the most catastrophic failure, the Amicable Grant of 1525, illustrated the issue with
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