The Tudor State

Published: Oct. 26, 2000, 8 a.m.

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Melvyn Bragg and guests discusses the Tudor State. In 1485 Henry Tudor slew Richard III and routed his army at The Battle of Bosworth Field. It was a decisive victory which founded a bold new dynasty; and this date like 1789 and 1066 has been taken by historians to be one of the great \\u2018year zeros\\u2019 of history: Suddenly the muddled Medieval World with its robber barons, feudal barbarism and bloody Wars of the Roses was banished, and the modern age of centralised government and King\\u2019s Justice was ushered in. But were the Tudors as instrumental in reshaping the British state as historians have liked to make out, and did their reign throughout the 16th century really lay the political foundations of our own age? With John Guy, Professor of Modern History, University of St Andrews; Christopher Haigh, Tutor of Modern History at Christ Church College, Cambridge; Christine Carpenter, Fellow in History at New Hall, Cambridge.

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