David Scott - Leviathan - The Rise of Britain as a World Power

Untying the knot with Katherine would present as great a diplomatic challenge for Henry as any of his ‘enterprises abroade’. Matrimonial law relating to princes came under the pope’s jurisdiction, and obtaining a papal annulment for a royal marriage could sometimes turn into a power struggle between the princely relations and allies of the parties involved. Katherine’s predicament could not be expected to sit well with her nephew (and Henry’s enemy by 1526), Emperor Charles V. Yet Henry too had a formidable champion in any contest for papal favour, and that was Wolsey. The great trust reposed in him by Henry, and the almost complete control that he had established over the administration of the Church in England, gave the cardinal considerable influence at Rome. Papal authority in England – the Vatican’s power of levying taxes on the English clergy, for example – was exercised, very largely, through Wolsey, and he used that authority in the king’s interest. Whether the cardinal’s cunning and diplomacy could prevail against the emperor’s vast resources was open to question. But Henry had seen his hopes of becoming Christendom’s greatest warrior-king dashed. He would not bear lightly the frustration of his other great ambition, that of securing the Tudor dynasty.

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