Join or Sign In
Sign in to customize your TV listings
By joining TV Guide, you agree to our Terms of Use and acknowledge the data practices in our Privacy Policy.
Lucy Worsley's Royal Myths & Secrets Season 1 Episodes
Season 1 Episode Guide
3 Episodes 2020 - 2020
Episode 1
The Reformation
Sun, Jun 21, 202054 mins
Lucy Worsley discovers how the history of the English Reformation has been manipulated and mythologized by generations of politicians and writers. It's usually portrayed as a lusty royal soap opera but Lucy reveals that it was about far more than just a randy king in pursuit of a younger wife and a long-awaited male heir. Henry's divorce from Catherine of Aragon, a Catholic, created a religious and political schism between England and Europe that can be still be felt in Britain today. It also laid the foundations for our modern constitution and economic power as an empire. But this fundamental shift in our cultural, political and economic fortunes wasn't driven by Henry VIII's Protestant zeal. Lucy begins by demolishing one of the founding myths about the English Reformation: far from being a ready ally of Martin Luther's Protestant revolution, Henry remained a Catholic to his death. It was his wife Anne Boleyn and his fixer Thomas Cromwell who championed the Protestant cause.
Episode 2
The Spanish Armada
Sun, Jun 28, 202054 mins
The defeat of the Spanish Armada is told as the defining epic of the Elisabethan Age, staring Philip II of Spain as villain versus the virgin queen, but that's largely Tudor Pr and fake news. After Elisabeth grew up as the bastard daughter from Henry VIII's first protestant second marriage, Mary, her Catholic sister from the first, to a Spanish princess, succeeded and hated her, but Philip protected her as heiress to the English throne, fearing the alternative, Mary queen of Scotts, although Catholic, would bring the British isles under French control given her betrothal to the dauphin. Once enthroned, the ingrate rejected his protection and a later proposal, restored Anglicanism and chartered privateers like Francis Drake to rob the proceeds of the Spanish colonies. The Armada Philip mounted, to protect an invasion army from the Low Countries, was smaller than the Norman fleet and a recent French one, poorly prepared with a worthless crew, further diminished by weather and disease. It perished mainly due to the weather, half still returned to Spain via Scotland and Ireland -suffering further storm losses- and was repaired. Elisabeth had little part in the victory, only made her famous Tilbury speech nine days after the battle and failed to delivery any reward, many veterans perished miserably, and the fleet sent under Drake to destroy the rebuilt Armanda in Spain suffered a crushing defeat, which her propaganda helped getting forgotten soon, part of covering up her dwindling popularity as the economy declined with her health. Her colonial ambitions would only materialize under the succeeding Stuart dynasty as she produced no heir. Still her legend was ever embellished and 'updated', glorifying the British Empire, especially in the Victorian age.
Episode 3
Queen Anne and the Union
Sun, Jul 5, 202054 mins
Queen Anne's twelve year reign, after her sister Mary and the unpopular Dutch William III, was arguably important and successful, but almost forgotten as she was hopeless at PR, unlike the glorified, overrated poser Elisabeth I. She was shy, rarely made up and almost constantly ill, often in bed, suffering horrible cures that didn't work. It made her reputedly dependent on attending favorites, especially Sarah Churchill, who controlled access to the monarch and had her husband John, the duke of Marlborough, appointed commander in the Spanish war of succession, where he scored a rare victory against the dominant French army of Louis XIV, rewarded with Blenheim palace, named after his key battle at Blindheim. She personally played umpire in the national interest between he hostile Whig and Tory parties in Westminster parliament. Unable to produce an heir, with over fifty Catholics closer by blood then first acceptable protestant, Sophie of Hannover, Anne arranged instead for a union with Scotland into Great Britain, actually requiring cunning and bribery, and would be succeeded by Sophie's heir Georg(e). Meanwhile Sarah lost hers status as favorite to less arrogant niece Abigail, and started a smear campaign against her, which ended up tainting all three women's reputation, leaving Anne to become almost a taboo topic.
