Catherine of Aragon (Spanish:
Catalina de Aragón) (16 December 1485 – 7 January 1536), also known as
Katherine or
Katharine, was
Queen of England as the
first wife of King
Henry VIII of England and
Princess of Wales as the wife to
Arthur, Prince of Wales. On 18 February 1516, Catherine delivered a healthy girl. She was named
Mary and christened three days later with great ceremony at the Church of Observant Friars. In 1518, Catherine became pregnant for the last time. She gave birth to a daughter on 10 November, but the child was weak and lived only a few hours. Catherine was pregnant six times altogether.
In 1525, Henry VIII became enamoured of
Anne Boleyn, a maid-of-honour to Queen Catherine who was between 10 and 17 years younger than Henry (Anne's exact year of birth is unknown). Henry began pursuing her.
[19] By this time Catherine was no longer able to bear children. Henry began to believe that his marriage was cursed and sought confirmation from the Bible, which he interpreted to say that if a man marries his brother's wife, the couple will be childless.
[20] Even if her marriage to Arthur had not been consummated (and Catherine would insist, to her dying day, that she had come to Henry's bed a virgin), Henry's interpretation of that Biblical passage meant that their marriage had been wrong in the eyes of God. Whether the Pope at the time of Henry and Catherine's marriage had had the right to overrule Henry's claimed scriptural impediment would become a hot point in Henry's campaign to wrest an annulment from the present Pope. It is possible that the idea of annulment had been suggested to Henry much earlier than this, and is highly probable that it was motivated by his desire for a son.
“
My tribulations are so great, my life so disturbed by the plans daily invented to further the King's wicked intention, the surprises which the King gives me, with certain persons of his council, are so mortal, and my treatment is what God knows, that it is enough to shorten ten lives, much more mine.”
It soon became the one absorbing object of Henry's desires to secure an annulment.
[22] Catherine was defiant when it was suggested that she quietly retire to a nunnery, saying "God never called me to a nunnery, I am the King's true and legitimate wife . . . .
