The Tudors: Fact or Fiction?

Miles Feuerstein

The Tudors was a popular show on Showtime that lasted for four seasons. The show was rich and had many interesting and dramatic storylines, not all of the events depicted in the show are historically accurate. This blog will go through some of the major inaccuracies throughout the four seasons.

In season 1, Cardinal Wolsey commits suicide rather than face the King’s justice but, in reality, he died from a sickness on his way to his trial for being accused of treason (Cohen). King Henry VIII is shown in the show to have only one sister that eventually marries his friend Brandon Charles. Part of this is true, the King did have a sister, Mary, who married his friend Brandon but the King actually had two sisters. The other sister, Margaret, has major historical significance because she married a Scottish king and their descendants would eventually take the English throne. One of those descendants being King James I of England and the “Glorious Revolution” would have been quite different, if it occurred at all had it not been for Margaret (Matthews).  The show focused on Mary Tudor but named her Margaret, I assume they were trying to combine the two sisters into one.

In season 2 George Boleyn is portrayed as a homosexual and very violent towards his wife, these two reasons are why they have an unhappy marriage. In reality George was known for being a non-violent person and there is no evidence suggesting he was homosexual (Cohen). Many historians think that their marriage was unhappy due to the fact that George was protestant and his wife, Jane, was catholic (Cohen). These problems could be why Jane Boleyn testified against George resulting in his death.

Another historical inaccuracy is the way the King is depicted in the show. In the show he is a dark haired, athletic man who is skinny throughout the show and goes grey, in actuality the King had red hair and while he was very active in his youth he later on became quite obese in his later years (Matthews). There are many other historical inaccuracies I am sure but those are a few of the major ones that I felt should be addressed.

Bibliography

Cohen, Alex. NPR. Accessed August 29, 2015. http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=89182466.

Matthews, David. Historyextra. Accessed August 29, 2015. http://www.historyextra.com/feature/truth-behind-%E2%80%98-tudors%E2%80%99#top-of-page.