Who were Henry VIII’s parents?
Henry was the 2nd son of King Henry VII and Queen Elizabeth of York. Henry VIII’s father, King Henry VII (or Henry Tudor), was born in 1457. He won the crown of England at the Battle of Bosworth in 1485 where he defeated and killed King Richard III. This battle ended ‘the Wars of the Roses’. Henry VII was 28 when he became king and ruled for 24 years until his death on 21st April 1509, at the age of 52. Although he won the throne in battle, he became quite a ‘bureaucratic king’. Henry VIII’s mother was a princess, Elizabeth of York (or Elizabeth Plantagenet). She was born in 1465. Elizabeth was the eldest daughter of an earlier king, Edward IV, the niece of Richard III, and the sister of ‘the Princes in the Tower’. Elizabeth married Henry VII in 1486. Their marriage created a union between the two warring houses of Lancaster (Red Rose) and York (White Rose). The Tudor Rose, which is red and white, symbolises this union. Elizabeth died in childbirth at the Tower of London in 1503 on her
