History Spotlight, 1/7

On this day in 1536, King Henry VIII of England's first wife, Catherine of Aragon dies of natural causes. Cathy was actually Henry's brother Arthur's wife in a political marriage meant to solidify relations with Spain (Cathy was Ferdinand and Isabella's youngest child) and annoy the French. When Arthur died of a "mysterious sweating sickness" the marriage was still necessary, so Henry married her when he ascended to the throne. This was to cause lots of problems in the future.

Catherine of Aragon

Henry's big wish was to have a son to carry on his line. Cathy gave birth to five sons and a daughter. All five sons died. Modern thinking has it that the children were sickly because Henry was crawling with sexually transmitted diseases, which he then passed to his wife who gave them to her fetal children. At the time, of course, nobody had any idea about that sort of thing and Henry alternately blamed himself (for marrying his brother's wife - he found an obscure Biblical tract that I can't remember to back it up) or he blamed Cathy for being a woman and having dirty, dirty womanly parts.

Henry VIII

As noted, Henry was desperate to have a son. England didn't have a tradition of having female rulers (the last female monarch, Empress Matilda, ruled for less than a year almost 400 years previously).
The problem with not having a male heir lay in the fact that the Tudor line rested on very preciarious foundations. Henry VII came to power at the end of the Wars of the Roses when the Lancastrian team beat the Yorkists in double overtime. Henry VII wisely united both sides with a political marriage, but there were still several pretenders to the throne out there and he never could quite shake the notion that he had come to power by breaking the Great Chain of Being and overthrowing Richard III.
At this point, Henry VIII is absolutely paranoid to 1) Not have Wars of the Roses II (with him possibly on the losing side) and 2) Solidify his reign by having a strapping young lad to carry on his line. Either directly or indirectly, he places the blame squarely on his marriage to Cathy. About this time he makes the acquaintance of a toothsome wench named Anne Boleyn who is everything that Cathy isn't. Anne is fun and vivacious, young and pretty. Cathy is prim and pious and "never on Sunday" if you take my meaning. It's The Patty Duke Show in Tudor England. The big similarity between them is that Anne wasn't about to put out for the king unless there was a ring on her finger. If she had wanted a dalliance, she could have gotten all she wanted from any number of muscley, non-syphilitic stable boys and farm hands.

Anne Boleyn - not easy

Henry decides to ditch Cathy in favor of Anne, but it's not a simple as filing papers down at the courthouse. England, at the time, was a staunch Catholic country. Henry himself had been named "Defender of the Faith" by the pope for writing (or having ghost-written) some book about how awesome the Church was. While divorce is forbidden in the Church, pass some coin to the right people and you can get an annulment which is just as good. The problem lay in the fact that Pope Clement VII was being held virtual prisoner by Emperor Charles V of the Holy Roman Empire, who was Cathy's nephew and he wasn't about to let Henry treat his aunt like some common scullery maid.
Henry gets it into his head (with help from Anne) to break off from the Roman Catholic Church and start the Church of England with himself as the head. As head, he can divorce who he wants and set whatever rules he wants. He sends Cathy off to the Continent (not cutting off wives heads just yet) and marries Anne. When Cathy finally dies, Anne wears yellow in celebration. Little did she know she would be joining her in the hereafter less than six months later and not from natural causes.
Henry did manage to have one son, Edward, from his third wife, Jane Seymour, but he was a sickly lad (there's that syph from Daddy again). While he did ascend the throne on Henry's death, he only ruled for six years before dying at the age of 16. Then came "Bloody" Mary, Cathy's daughter and Elizabeth I, Anne's daughter.