Henry VIII on Tour

About Henry VIII on Tour

Henry VIII on Tour is a major three-year project funded by the Arts and Humanities Research Council (AHRC) which began in November 2022 and runs until October 2025. Led by Professor Anthony Musson (HRP), the project brings together a cross-disciplinary team to reconceptualise Henry VIII's progresses through studying archival sources, architecture, music, and material culture.

By mapping all known progress venues and identifying changes throughout Henry’s reign, the project will establish the first full itinerary for Henry VIII, significantly enhancing historians' understanding of royal progresses and their impact on 16th century political and religious culture.

Part of this project also involves reassessing the role and agency of Henry’s queens on royal journeys and recreating their own itineraries wherever possible. Overall, the project explores the hidden histories of understudied groups and communities and demonstrates how progresses themselves fostered the circulation of ideas, news, skills, architectural styles, and music across England.

Project website

Find out more on our dedicated project website.

Research questions

1. How did visibility function in Henry VIII’s reign: where was he at any given moment, and how can we use different kinds of evidence to reconstruct his progress itinerary?
2. What were the main logistical factors in implementing royal progresses?
3. How was the performance of kingship and queenship shaped by progresses, and to what extent were Henry VIII’s queens independent actors when the royal court was on tour?
4. How were the environment and local communities impacted by Henry VIII’s progresses?
5. How can heritage organisations use the Tudor legacy to engage with 21st-century audiences?

Community engagement

The project combines physical archaeological digs and musical experiments to engage specific communities with the heritage sites. This will involve:

• Opportunities for volunteers (individuals and families) to participate in in a three-week community archaeology dig at Petworth House in July 2024 with the aim of ascertaining the dimensions of the former North-Wing and locate Henry’s grandstand/banqueting house.
• Engaging with local choirs in performances of Tudor music in their original settings, including a liturgical enactment at Christchurch Priory in Dorsetand Berkeley Castle in Gloucestershire.
• Staging a ‘Civic Welcome’ at Exeter Cathedral.
• Working with students from the Royal School of Needlework and Wimbledon College of Arts, who are reproducing clothing and textiles for an installation at Powderham Castle and West Horsley Place.
• Ensemble Pro Victoria will perform concerts at Christchurch Priory, West Horsely Place, Berkeley Castle and New College, Oxford and produce a recording of music for Henry VIII’s progresses for Delphian Records, some pieces of which will be world premieres.
• The choir of HM Chapel Royal, Hampton Court will also stage a service of Vespers for St Nicholastide in December 2024.

Presentations

In July 2023, the team gave tours around the King’s Manor and presentations to the cast, crew, and audience members of a theatrical adaptation of CJ Sansom’s Sovereign (a detective story based on Henry VIII’s 1541 progress to York) performed at the King’s Manor.