All language subtitles for A Merry Tudor Christmas with Lucy Worsley

We think of Christmas as a time
for tradition,

that's full of age-old customs
and symbols.

And yet, if you wind back the clock
500 years to when Henry VIII

was on the throne, a lot of
the things that seem essential

to Christmas, just disappear.

The Tudors didn't have
Christmas trees, or crackers,

or stockings and Santa Claus...

..didn't exist.

Don't worry, kids, he'd just gone
off to the North Pole for bit.

So if you strip away all the customs
that have been invented since then,

what would a genuinely olden-times
Christmas have looked like?

To find out,
I'm going to recreate Christmas

as Henry VIII knew it.

Whoa! What a crazy-looking thing.

When our ancestors partied hard
for 12 whole days.

I'm in charge of Christmas.

I'm getting into Tudor clothes
and inside Tudor minds.

This is from the lady, Anne Boleyn.

This is a very well-judged present.

To discover what our festive
heritage tasted like...

Oh!

I don't like it.

..smelt like...
Hm!

..and felt like.

I am getting drunk on sugar
this stage.

Oh, oh, oh, oh.

I'll get new insights into an age
when Britain changed forever.

Henry's spending 7,000 just
at Christmas...

Just on Christmas? Yes. Wow!

And discover the roots of today's
seasonal customs.

It is, as you can smell,
the precursor

to the modern Christmas cake.

Greyhounds were incredibly
popular as a gift to Henry,

who was a real dog lover.

It's a Christmas wilder...

It's blown my head off.

..and weirder...

..than anything you've seen before.

With a Hey Nonny Nonny.

And a ho, ho, ho.

When Henry VII came to the throne
in 1509,

over 90% of his subjects lived
outside towns and cities.

So I'm starting by getting a taste
of what December the 24th

would have been like in
the countryside.

Even on Christmas Eve, Tudor people
were probably still hard at work,

doing something unpleasant and cold
and miserable.

For Tudor people, the first 24 days
of December

definitely weren't about partying.

Whereas in the 21st century,

Christmas seems to start
in November, doesn't it?

Especially the shopping.

At a time when practically everyone
in the British Isles

was still a practising Catholic,

the whole of Advent was a period
of strict abstinence,

enforced by the church.

If this really were Tudor Christmas
Eve, I'd have been fasting now,

for four weeks.

No, meat, no dairy,
that's the rules during Advent.

Pretty grim.

But tomorrow,
everything's going to change.

Tomorrow, a holiday begins
that's been enshrined by law

for centuries.

According to the church calendar,
it begins with the birth of Jesus

and ends with the coming
of the three wise men.

And those are the 12 days
of Christmas.

To prepare for them,

one festivity was allowed on
Christmas Eve...decorating.

According to a Tudor writer,
every man's house

as also their parish churches,
were decked with green.

I want to know what that
would have looked like.

So I'm meeting a historian
of rural life.

How would you recommend that
I would decorate

a Tudor farmhouse for Christmas?

Definitely holly and ivy.

We've got good contemporary
references for that.

The other thing that gets mentioned
very commonly is bay.

Maybe an even stranger one
is rosemary.

It's nothing to do with cooking,
this is just a decoration?

No, just as a decoration.

Let's deck our halls. Yes.

Now, John, we're not going to do
any Christmas tree stuff, are we?

No, not known at this time.

Too early for Christmas trees? Yes.

But having said that, this is
a very ancient-seeming thing to do,

to bring the leaves into the house
at mid-winter?

And at the darkest time of year,
they're a sort of promise

of the trees and the plants coming
out again in spring.

If it were the 21st century, I'd be
doing exactly the same thing... Yes.

..on Christmas Eve, but I'd be
doing it with tinsel.

And there's something in common,
there's a long, windy

decorative thing that you put
around the house. Yes.

What should we decorate next, then?

I think we'll decorate
the spinning wheel.

Weave it round the spokes.

So why are we making the spinning
wheel unusable?

Well, there should be no work done
over the 12 days of Christmas.

The spinning wheel's the symbol
of the farmer's wife's work,

so we render it inoperable.

Do you think that women
really needed this sort of thing

to stop them from working?

Well, I think they would probably
have been quite busy over

the Christmas period anyway.

Now that we've done that,
that's not going anywhere.

Once the decorating was done,
people headed for Midnight Mass,

which heralded the birth of Christ,
and the official start

of the 12-day holiday.

For December the 25th,

I want to discover how
the king celebrated.

Henry owned more than 50 grand
properties where he might choose

to spend his Christmas Day,
but over time his favourite palace

became Hampton Court.

I'm arriving, not through
the grand visitor entrance,

but via the service yards,
which have barely been altered

since they were built in
the 16th century.

With the four weeks of fasting
for Advent over,

it would be time for the feasting
to begin.

And this was the courtyard
where all the constituent parts

would arrive for Henry's
Christmas dinner,

including the centrepiece
at the royal feast, a boar.

This was an animal that Henry
himself liked to hunt, using one

of his special boar spears.

I'm going to find out for myself
what boar's head tastes like,

by recreating the kind of feast
the king would have sat down to

on the first day of Christmas.

Oh, what's going on, what's
going on, what's going on here?

Hampton Court's kitchens are still
in use 500 years later.

So I've enlisted some of the palace
cooks, together with food historian,

Annie Grey, to make some
Tudor recipes.

Pies are prominent on the menu,
including mince pies.

Back then, they weren't sweet
little snacks,

they were the stars of
the savoury course.

Hey, what's going on here
at the chopping board?

Mincing up some suet.

Mincing? Is that more extreme
than chopping?

It's where mince pies get their
name from, the act of mincing.

So everything that goes
into this needs to be minced

very, very finely or shredded, they
were also known as shred pies.

And what's this white stuff
that you're mincing?

This is suet, it's the kidney
fat, in this case, from sheep.

You would not want to eat that
in its raw state, would you?

Are you sure, do you want to try?

Unlike the stuff that you can
get today, you've got to strip

all the veins and the membranes
out and mince it yourself.

And then we've got our spices.

Ingredients from as far afield
as China and India were shipped

to England during Henry's reign,
at great expense.

The royal kitchens routinely
turned to exotic spices,

like these peppery seeds
from West Africa.

You've got grains of paradise here.

Then you've got cubeb pepper,
another type of pepper, very fruity.

Where does it come from? Java.

Mm.

Today they always have fruit in
and the same is true

in the Tudor period, so we've got
raisins, we've got currants,

we've got dried prunes, all things
you can get during the winter.

And we've also got the crucial
ingredient here, which is beef.

The period before that demarcation
that we've got

between sweet and savoury and meat
and dessert

is really fully developed.

Yes.

Squidge. Squidge.

Look at that, squidging through
them fingers.

Whoa, that's disgusting.

It's meat, I'm squeezing meat.

But if you eat meat
normally, then...

I don't squeeze it, though,
I eat it.

I don't squeeze it.

The wealthier you were, the more
meat would feature on your table.

So the King's Christmas dinner must
also include a choice of roasts.

You can see that there are three
lumps of gorgeous beef on the fire

already being turned. Yes.

Beef was another real Christmas
favourite and in fact

was THE Christmas meat for much
of history.

So we're going to have this venison
join it.

It's a really big haunch and it's
perfect for King Henry VIII's feast,

because he had the deer herd,
as did most aristocrats.

This is all about showing off
wealth.

Mm, look at that.

The sweaty job of hand turning
the spit

was usually given to young boys.

Think I've got the hang of it.

Keep turning, keep turning.

We know how the kitchens worked
from surviving household accounts.

But for evidence of how the king
himself spent Christmas,

I need to consult an amazing
source from his reign

at the National Archives.

What is in this truly enormous book?

So this is the public and private
expenditure of the king.

His eyes have scanned down
this page.

This is Henry's first Christmas.

Yes. 1509, we are here.

What's special about that Christmas?

So perhaps most interesting
entry is here.

So it says, "Item to John Shirley,
Coffer of the King's household."

So he's the person in charge
of the cash.

"For the advancement of goods
and provision to be had,"

effective at Christmas, "£7,000."

That's an awful lot of money.

That's a huge amount of money,
just to put that into context,

Henry's father Henry VII
in his last few years,

was spending £12,000 a year for the
provision of his household.

Henry's spending 7,000 just...
Just on Christmas.

Yes! Wow!

This is what happens when you put an
18-year-old in charge at Christmas,
isn't it?

Yes. He's gone completely over the
top.

Henry likes to be generous,
to make a splash, to show off.

But he's also, I think, making
a political point here.

His father wasn't a terribly popular
king, reputation for avarice.

I think Henry's trying to show with
this Christmas he's turning a page.

It's a new dawn.

He's buying a bit of popularity.

Yes, I think that's probably right.

Having seen the historical evidence,
I'm now ready to experience

what Christmas dinner would
have been like for the virile,

and exceptionally handsome,
young king.

Henry often ate away from the
prying eyes of the court,

and he sat alone in his
private dining chamber,

with just a few favoured attendants.

Your Grace.

I am your royal carver today.

I would be picking
for you the choicest morsels.

What are the choicest morsels
that we've got out here?

Well, roast meat was a very, very
important part of the Christmas

feast, especially spectacle birds,

so, things like the peacock,
and, of course, the swan.

Very much royal creatures.

Everything here has to scream bling.

Is that the giant mince pie
that we made? It is.

Oh, let's eat it! Very well.

As you can see, the lid
that we prepared has been removed,

and this very beautiful, ornate lid
has been put on it instead.

This can be reused for another pie.

So, we're just going to lift it off,
and move it to one side.

Mmm!

Mmm! Good?

There's something a bit
Middle Eastern

about the meat and the fruit.

It taste more grown up than a modern
mince pie.

I think what we have today
is a pale shadow of the glories

of the Tudor era.

But, really, you've seen nothing
yet,

because the real star of the Tudor
Christmas feast is yet to arrive.

# The boar's head in hand bear I

# Bedeck'd with bays and rosemary

# And I pray you sing merrily

# Quot estis in convivio. #

It's a dish so special,

it comes with its own solemn
ceremony.

This carol was sung at court,
and other grand locations,

to herald its arrival.

# The boar's head, as I understand

# Is the rarest dish in all the land

# To cheer you all this Christmas

# The boar's head with mustard. #

And the song was included in the
very first book

of Christmas carols, printed in
England, which dates

from the early years of
Henry VIII's reign.

Wow!

What a crazy looking thing!

It's monstrous.

Of course, the red eyes are showing
you how angry it is,

how macho it is to have killed a
wild boar.

You cannot get more Christmassy,
and more feast-like,

than a boar's head upon your table.

Let's taste him then. I can't wait
any longer.

The snout is definitely the best
bit.

You get all this beautiful,
gelatinous flesh
across the end of it.

Oh, it looks like spam!

It's very, very nice spam.

This has been brined, for two weeks,
in red wine and herbs and spices.

Then it's been stuffed, as you can
see, and then it's been boiled

for seven hours, in more red wine,
than finally decorated up.

Even the tusks are gilded
with real gold leaf.

Oh, I just saw the nostrils.

I think I might go for the ear.

It's a bit less "alive" looking.

I would recommend a little mustard
dressing.

Bottoms up!

How's it taste?

It's fine, as long as you don't
think about what it is.

The texture of ear can be a little
challenging.

Urgh!

I don't like it!

Now, I've had quite a lot to eat
already.

Do you think portion control was
a problem for Henry VIII,

getting all this food?

Behaving like a king means

having all of this largesse on the
table,

but really, only to pick and choose
the choicest morsels.

So really you would stay slender,
thin and gorgeous,

as Henry was in 1509, and yet have
all of this in front of you.

By royal decree, any leftovers from
the royal table,

known as "broken meate",

would be taken to the palace gates
and distributed

"unto the poore folkes, by way of
almes."

Phew!

And this is only the first day of
Christmas!

There's lots more feasts to come.

My goodness.

For Tudors, the climax wasn't going
to be Christmas Day,

or even New Year's Eve.

For them, it was going to be Twelfth
Night, right into January.

I've got a feeling I'm going to need
some bigger breeches.

In the Tudor era, December 26th
wasn't yet known as Boxing Day.

It was the Feast of Stephen.

Yes, that's the one who gets a name
check in Good King Wenceslas.

St Stephen was venerated
for his charity,

and many of Henry VIII's subjects
would have been in much need
of that.

I've got hold of some of
the leftovers

from yesterday's royal feast.

The courtiers have eaten
the nice meaty bits,

but they've left me with the pastry.

Now, the Tudors had a special word
for a charitable gift

of food or money like this.

They called it dole.

Of course, centuries later,
some people are still "on the dole".

It's estimated that a third
of the Tudor population

lived in poverty.

Dole could be the only thing that
made their Christmas a merry one.

Now, this is a super common
type of Tudor document.

This particular one is from
a village in Somerset, and it says

that on the day following Christmas,
natalis domini,

the local landowner, Mr de Knapp,
is going to give presents

to his tenants.

These are going to be two loaves
of bread,

ale, and two chunks of meat.

And what's more, it is to be served

- and I love the fact that this is
actually in the contract -

with sinapio, which is Latin
for mustard.

Tenants were also invited to an
annual St Stephen's Day feast.

The Tudor poet took pride in this
custom.

At Christmas we banquet

The rich with the poor

Who then, but the miser not openeth
his door?

This may sound very harmonious,

very unlike the consumerist
Christmases of the 21st century.

But - this isn't charity,
as I understand it,

because there are strings attached.

The contract says that in return
for their feast, the tenants

have to give Mr de Knapp a present.

They're even told what it has to be!

A hen.

Everyone was meant to stick to their
place in the pecking order.

But at Christmas, the rules do
seem to have been relaxed a little.

That's even more apparent from
accounts of Tudor entertainment.

I want to experience how people
amused themselves, before the days

of Christmas telly -
even before pantomime.

LIVELY MEDIEVAL MUSIC

So, historic performance specialist,
Charlotte Ewart, has recreated

the kind of party you'd find at
Henry's court.

This sort of mayhem is what the
Tudors called misrule.

You could say that the 12 days
of Christmas were the high point

of Tudor entertainment.

They played games, and they danced
dances.

There were plays that were staged.

And they are disguised.

You see, this is a disguising,
which is a sort of a general term,

which should cover many things
from theatrical entertainment,

right the way to just dressing up
for fun.

I think I like Tudor misrule!

But of course, all of this revelry
needed a ringleader.

BLOWS HORN

Aha! I am the Lord of Misrule!

I am appointed to make
sport in the court!

LAUGHTER

And this my band of lusty guts.

CHEERS

So, are you sort of like
a jester or a fool? No!

This is my fool!

TOOTS HORN

My lords, gentlemen and ladies,

absolutely nothing's about
to happen!

Ha!

Now, despite appearances
and behaviour,

the Lord of Misrule was actually
appointed from among the courtiers.

He was quite high status.
So, he's a toff. Yes.

The Lord of Misrule was in charge
of all of these revelries,

so he was a producer, a director,
he had to organise all of this

spectacle across the whole
of the 12 days.

I'm in charge of Christmas!

There's more to him
than meets the eye. Yes.

And what was the point of all this?

It's sort of like
court ordered chaos.

It was a parody of what would
happen in the court for the rest

of the year. How did they know not
to go too far? Well, exactly. Oh!

I think he's gone too far!

Where are you going?! Fool,
I command you to bring her back!

Give her to me! I'm so sorry!

LAUGHTER
There you go.

See, order is then restored.
Sort of!

Oof!
So, is this just a court thing? No.

We do have records in aristocratic
houses of the period,

in towns and villages,
in the inns of court,

but it was certainly a time
where the strict hierarchy of Tudor

England was challenged and things
were somewhat turned upside down.

I mean, in some cases,

we even have records of
where servants were made

Lord of Misrule, which
for the Tudors would, I'm sure,

have been thrillingly subversive.

Enough talking!
It's time for some drinking!

CHEERS

Strike up, players!
Let's have some revel!

MUSIC STARTS

In the 16th century,

the Lord of Misrule was sometimes
referred to as Lord Christmas,

the Christmas Prince,
or even the King of Christmas,

which has led some historians
to argue that

he might be a forerunner
of our Father Christmas.

Ho-ho-ho-ho-ho!

Merry Christmas!

Hm, it's all getting a bit much
for me, to be honest.

We do have accounts that the
festivities occasionally got

a little out of control.

We have records in London where
they rioted and in 1523,

we know that a Lord of Misrule
accidentally killed someone.

I think
it might be time to go home. Mm.

But the 12 days were not just
a non-stop party.

There's evidence of
the more spiritual

side of Tudor Christmas in another
carol, dating from Henry's reign.

The Fourth was one of the
most significant of the 12 days

for the Tudors.

This was the feast
of the Holy Innocence,

sometimes called
Childermass, Children's Mass.

There was nothing
childish about this day.

It was a religious
commemoration of an ancient mass

murder of babies by King Herod.

The words of the carol are just
everyday spoken Tudor English.

They actually come from
a folk play that was

performed on the
streets of Coventry.

# Bye, bye, lully, lullay... #

And that word "lullay"
basically means "baby, go to sleep".

# Bye, bye, lully, lullay. #

Whoever composed this carol,
we don't know who they were,

got straight to the heart
of the feelings of mothers who've

lost their children.

# Bye, bye, lully, lullay. #

Oh! That's heartbreaking!

What for you, Tamsin, is
the power of that really sad song?

In Tudor times, of course,
infant mortality was very high.

So many children died before
they reached adulthood and you can

tell from something like that song
how much people would have cared.

So that's like a little window right
into the feelings of Tudor people.

It is. Carols give us an insight
into people's lives, really.

Today, you think about Christmas as
being about celebration, but because

it was more of a religious festival
then, it had these solemn depths.

It has solemn depths,

but even on a sombre day, like
Innocence Day, people would feast.

We know this from the carol books.

Although now, we associate carols
with religious subjects,

they were also about what you
were going to drink, how much

the master is going to feed you,
and that you're going to dance

and make merry.

With those themes, it's perhaps
not surprising the church was

the last place you'd expect
to hear carols.

Instead, Tudors sang them
in taverns, markets, in homes,

humble and great, and also at court.

We know the musically talented
king loved carols

because he composed his own.

He wrote one that isn't
particularly religious,

but is nonetheless wintery
and Christmasy.

It's a song about the holly
and the ivy.

And you can see on it, it says,
"The King". The King!

"H VIII",
less anyone should have any doubt.

It's quite surprising to
think of the king himself writing

a pop song,
which this effectively is, isn't it?

It is. This is a sort of love song.

Do you want to join us
in doing this one? Yes, yes.

Which parts am I going to sing?
Let's try you on the top one.

# Green groweth the holly,
so doth the ivy

# Though winter blasts blow
never so high

# Green groweth the holly

# As the holly groweth green

# And never changeth hue

# So I am, and ever hath been... #

Well, Tamsin did say this carol
was also a love song.

As things seem to be hotting up,
I think it might be time to move on.

During the Christmas holidays,
then, as now,

people made time to play games.

The 12 Days were a favourite time
for ordinary people to play sports.

That's partly
because they weren't working,

but also because outside Christmas,
a whole range of games were illegal.

That's according to a set of laws
passed under Henry VIII.

So, for the rest of the year,
you would be fined

if you were caught, for example,
playing tennis.

Or quoits.

Yes!

Or bowls.

In 1526, the authorities even went

so far as to seize people's
sets of bowls and burn them.

Even at Christmas,
playing bowls was only permitted

when your master was present.

Why did the Tudor state think that
playing sport was so awful?

Well, it might lead young men
to gather together,

there might be drinking, there might
be gambling, but worse than that,

if they were playing games,

they weren't practising
their archery and they really

needed to be doing that, in case
we got invaded by the French.

There's another series of laws
I find very intriguing.

One specified
that during this holy time

of Christmas, no-one should be
out at night in painted visors or

masks, or...

So, what exactly was this custom
that had the authorities so worried?

For my next night of
Tudor Christmas, I'm going to find

out for myself, with the help
of someone who's unearthed rare

historical accounts of this once
popular pastime.

KNOCKS ON DOOR

Oh!

Mm!

Who are these funny,
freakish-looking people? Hm!

Why can't you talk? Hm-mm!

They're not allowed to speak.
All they can say is... Mm!

That is mumming
and that is where we get the phrase

"mum's the word" from. Oh,
cos they can't say actual words?

They can only say "mum". They can't
say actual words. They can only say
"mum". Mum-mm-mum-mm-mum.

Yeah. And why do they look so weird?
What are they wearing? Well, they're
wearing whatever comes to hand.

He appears to be wearing his wife's
skirt and probably her stays

and for some strange reason, this is
particularly recorded in Scotland.

And that one is wearing
a false face.

What are we supposed to do
with them?

We have to invite them in. Really?

Everybody in Tudor England
would know about it.

It happened all over the country

and it's an essential
part of a Tudor Christmas.

I suppose you'd better come on in,
then.

The freaky folk who'd come into your
home were hopefully your friends

and neighbours, who'd put on fancy
dress for the night.

Guessing who was actually underneath
the mask was all part of the fun.

But first, there was
a game to be played.

Oh! Now, this is quite intimidating.
What's going to happen next, Meg?

They're challenging you
to a game of dice.

You need to get out your money
and put on the table.

OK, here's my stake.
I'm in the game.

Mm!

A six and a three, that makes nine.
What's going to happen next?

They have to repeat it.
They have to get nine again? Yes.

Oh, that's impossible!
They'll never do that.

Mm!

What?! A three and a six again!
So, I'm afraid they've won.

Why am I insanely
suspicious of this?

I think you were perfectly right
to be suspicious.

They are probably weighted.

You've weighted your dice.
Mm, mm, mm.

They've just come into my house
and under false pretences,

they've taken all of my money.
That's the game!

That's the game!

What else are they getting
out of this evening?

Kicks, possibly, if they're lads.

They will get the chance to squeeze
the maidens of the household

without any comeback
because nobody knows who they are.

And they get the fun
out of frightening you.

Am I supposed to enjoy being
frightened in the way that

perhaps I would be at a horror film?
Yes, they are meant to be menacing.

In the 16th century to
be in disguise meant you could be

anything you like
and do anything you like

because you're not yourself.
And there's a lot of rules
in the Tudor world, aren't there?

Everyone knows exactly
where they fit in,
exactly what they're allowed to do.

Absolutely and this is 12 days
in which it doesn't operate.

Why did it eventually die out?

Well, it probably
drifts across to Halloween.

So it's possibly at some point,

our mummers turned into Halloween
trick or treaters... It is possible.

..which is something we're still
familiar with today.
Yes, it is possible.

In the 21st century,
most people think that the

height of Christmas craziness
is putting on a kitsch jumper.

Personally, I think it's a shame
that we no longer have

the edgy anarchy of mumming.

On the other hand,

we're definitely having more fun
than the Tudors on December

the 31st, which for many people
today is the finale of the season.

But in the Tudor calendar,
New Year's Eve was just the Seventh

Day of Christmas,
not a particularly significant one.

They didn't get together and have
a great big countdown to New Year.

And as for parties, they were saving
themselves for their big bash,

that was only five days later.
It was on 12th Night.

At court, that took the form of
a spectacular entertainment

with the best performers
in the kingdom and I'll be attending

a recreation of this when my
Tudor Christmas reaches its climax.

But first,
there's a remarkable account

of New Year's Day I want to look at
back in the National Archives.

January the 1st was when the Tudors
did something that we think

is essential on December the 25th,
gift giving.

At this point in history, though,
exchanging presents was a highly

political ritual, exclusively
for the rich and powerful.

And it was the king who kept
a list of who'd been naughty

and who'd been nice.

This is a compilation of the gifts
the king has received

and given for the New Year
celebrations in 1532.

And it all happens on New Year's
Day, not on Christmas Day.

That's right. It says, "New Year's
gifts given by the king's

"grace on the 1st of January"
in Latin.

I might keep a list of Christmas
cards I've sent, so I know
who to give them to next year,

but he's kept a list of all
the presents he's given. Exactly.

And Henry is giving out
lots of gilt,

lots of gold and silver plate, cups,
bowls, jars, and these

are listed by their weight,
by ounces and quarters of ounces.

So this is a list of everybody who's
had presents from the king

this New Year. Top of the list,
as you'd expect, is the queen,
that's Catherine of Aragon.

And the blank entry tells you
everything about that

relationship really because this is
the winter that Catherine

of Aragon was banished from court,
so she doesn't come back after this.

So we have the whole
psychodrama of their fading,

failing relationship here.
I find this both sad

and sinister that she's been
sort of institutionally disappeared.

And then who are all these
people here?

So, these are the bishops.

Archbishops first, Canterbury
and then York. Oh, yes.

And they're getting gilt cups with
covers and it goes down the

ranks of bishops and the weight
declines as you go down the list.

So, the lesser bishops are getting
a slightly smaller pot or cup.

Do you think this list of gifts
shows a lack of imagination,

if you like? It's like Henry's
gone out and he's bought a job lot
of gold and silver items.

But I think this is not Henry
attempting to

think about what the best gift
is for his particular favourites.

It's really almost like bribing
people to remember their loyalty

because Henry still relies on these
people to lead his armies

and to pay his taxes and he knows
he has to offer them a gift,

just as they're offering him a gift.
So that must be really stressful,

what to give the king in return
for your 12 ounce goblet.

Definitely.

The nobility gave presents to
the king during an elaborate

ceremony,
held at one of his palaces.

To better understand the man
at the centre of this ritual,

it's being restaged, just for me.

I've been looking at the 1532 gift
roll. So I've come as 1532 Henry.

Let's go and see what I've got.
Absolutely.

So, Maria,
how did Henry VIII get his pressies?

He would have received his presents
in the full face of the court,

so everybody would have seen what
everybody else was giving.

Let's see how this guy does, then.
First gift, please.

So, everyone's going to be
staring at them

and judging them
as they come forwards. Absolutely.

You are on display, your clothes,
and most importantly,

the gift that you've
brought for the king.

Of course, dependent on how
well you receive them,

that instantly gives people a sense
of how important they are at court.

Their place in the pecking order.

That's a glove. But only one glove.

Where's the other one?

It would be normal to give a gift
of money in expensive packaging.

Ooh! And so in this case,
it's one opulent glove.

That's a nice chinking
sound in there. Absolutely.

And we know that the Earl of Oxford
gave you a gift of ten

sovereigns in a glove. Ooh!
This is great!

So instead of a Christmas stocking,
I've got a Christmas glove

and it's full of hard cash!

Money was the most popular gift
given to Henry in 1532.

It accounted for over a fifth
of the presents that he received.

That was a very good start, I like
the cash. What's the next gift?

Whoa!

Lady Sandys brought a gilt
cup with a cover.

She's commissioned one of the most
fashionable goldsmiths.

She can show off her taste
by the quality of the craftsmanship

used to make the cup.
Oh, and another goblet.

Yes, it was a popular gift in 1532.
You received 17 of them.

What have we here?

It's a beautiful shirt.

Shirts were given most
frequently by aristocratic women.

The idea being that they would have
the pleasure of seeing you wear it.

Did I like getting clothing?

You might well receive, you know,
20 or 30 shirts at Christmas.

Bearing in mind that you might
change your shirt three or

four times a day.
Getting loads of shirts,

I suppose that's a bit like getting
loads of socks today.

Although, of course,
these are considerably more
luxurious and desirable.

Well, this is great.
The gifts just keep on coming!

What's next? What's next?

What on earth is this that
the lady's brought us?

This is a Biscayan dart, it would
be used for boar hunting. Aha!

One of my favourite sports.
This is a very well judged present.

It is indeed. This is
from the Lady Anne Boleyn. Aha!

Anne Boleyn is waiting in the wings.

This is the year that she
will marry him.

Indeed, yes. You're hunting her

and she has provided you with
the means to hunt her down.

Does this have the meaning -
I want to poke you, Anne?

Good question!
LAUGHTER

There was another kind of present
guaranteed to melt Henry's heart

and for New Year 1532, he got it
from the Countess of Westmorland.

Oh, yes! Look at these fine beasts!

These are beauties!

So, here we have a lovely
brace of greyhounds.

Greyhounds were incredibly popular
as a gift to Henry,

who was a real dog lover.
They're beautiful

and I guess that Henry VIII
wasn't walking his dogs himself.

No, there was
a Keeper of the King's Greyhounds.

They had kennels at all of the key
palaces, they had a cart that

would take them from palace to
palace, so they didn't have to walk.

They were well and truly pampered.

A dog is for life
and not just for Christmas.

But in Henry's case,
a dog is for New Year.

So, I feel like I've got quite
a good haul this year,

but I suppose to Henry,
this was business as usual.

Yes, we know from the Venetian
ambassador that Henry always

essentially made a profit
on his Christmas gifts,

that he received more than he gave.
Funny that!

On January the 2nd, when many of us
are thinking about diets

and dreading the return to work,

Tudor people were still
celebrating Christmas.

Churches remain busy, marking key
events from the early life of Jesus.

There was even a feast day
for his circumcision.

And everything was building
to a climax on Epiphany,

the arrival of the Three Wise Men.

It's a reminder that for the Tudors,
partying

and praying were all mixed up
together.

The King's Revels at the end
of the 12 days would include

a sumptuous banquet, which the

palace kitchens would have spent the
first few days of January preparing.

So, what are we going to make for
the court's big 12th Night Banquet?

Well, a banquet is the sweet course,

completely separate
to the rest of dinner.

You've eaten all of the heavy stuff,
you want something that will

really make your eyes
and then your palate zing.

Mm! How are you going to
wow our senses then?

This is going to be a chess set,
modelled out of marchpane,

what we would now call marzipan.

This is a much more exciting
way of having marzipan than just

putting it on your cake in a layer,
isn't it? Oh, much more.

But then, what you have here is
similar to what you would
put on your Christmas cake.

These are figures made out of what
is effectively royal icing.

In the Tudor period,
it was known as sugar plate.

So, here, we've got
a big blob of icing.

It does stick if you're not careful.

Yes! There we are. There he is.
Beautiful!

The best thing to do first is
to actually put his face on.

Sugar is one of the most prestigious
ingredients at the Tudor court.

It's phenomenally expensive
because it's not yet grown

in the West Indies, it still has to
be imported from the Near East.

So, here, we've got half of a sugar
man, he needs to dry out a bit.

He needs to dry out a lot.
What's that gold thing over there?

The gold box is also made from
sugar. Entirely made out of sugar!

Yeah. Isn't that fantastic? Is
that real gold? It is real gold.

Today, we're impressed by the gold
and the silver,

but back in the Tudor era, the sugar
was also very, very expensive,

and the comfits, which will go
inside, were very, very expensive.

What are we making here?
We are making comfits here.

Tudor sweets, basically.

What are they made out of?

The centre of each one of these
balls is a tiny grain of aniseed.

And then we roll it in sugar,
hour after hour after hour.

We're going to put in a bit more
sugar syrup. Do we jig it about?

These balls are getting bigger
the whole time

cos the sugar is adhering to them.

It is, yes. Coating them up.

This is very time consuming. It is.

I tend to think that if you were
in the confectionery department

in Henry VIII's time as an
apprentice, this would be your job.

And to get from seed to completed
sweets will take three days,

which is all the time
we have left till Twelfth Night.

Another crucial ingredient for
any successful feast was alcohol.

I've come to taste
some typical Tudor tipples

as a tavern which welcomed drinkers
throughout Henry's reign.

Annie's brought along
two modern-day brewers,

who've recreated historic recipes
for us to try.

Hello, brewers. May I join you?

I like the way you've brought
so many drinks with you.
This is good stuff.

What have you got over here?

So I've brought along some mead,

and mead's made from honey,
that's the base of it.

What we've made today is from
an old traditional Tudor recipe.

It's what we call a metheglin.

A metheg...? Metheglin. Metheglin.

The word comes from the Welsh,

and Henry Tudor was quite keen
to emphasise his Welsh roots.

So there's a kind of vogue for it,

which is very specific
to that dynasty.

It's got a honey base and then
it's got some red sorrel,

thyme, cloves and some strawberry
leaves and lemon balm, as well.

So things you kind of forage for.

Red sorrel doesn't sound like
something that belongs in a drink,

but that's a Tudor thing, is it?

It is when it comes to
this particular drink

because it is medicinal.

Doctor's orders that you drink this.
Precisely.

So let's try your meth-e-glin.
The metheglin.

Sure.

Cheers! Happy Christmas! Cheers!

That's quite nice!
It's a bit like Pimm's.

Yeah. It's got that kind of thin,
dry perfume.

It's very refreshing.
It's a little bit lighter.

I thought mead was going to be
all sticky and sweet, like honey,
but this isn't at all.

No. So all the honey gets turned
into alcohol,

so actually, it all gets burnt off.

I like the way that you take mead
seriously as a drink.

THEY CHUCKLE

Herbs and spices were also mixed
into Tudor wine,

which was usually imported
from France,

and into the most affordable
and popular form of booze.

We'd call it beer or ale.

Though for the Tudor drinker,

those words meant
very different drinks.

I've made a gruit ale,
which is a recipe

that would probably have been made
in Tudor times.

What's the gruit mean?

A gruit is a bunch of herbs
and spices

that you would put into your ale
instead of using hops.

A-ha!
Hops did exist in the Tudor period,

but they were quite a new thing,
weren't they, Annie?

They sort of started to come in
at around the 1480s-1490s, we think.

The advantage of hopping your ale is
the beer would last a lot longer.

But hops were seen as this strange,
new-fangled additive from abroad.

Henry VIII passed
various regulations

making sure that
within his household,

ale and beer were very separate.

Because he said that adding hops
to your ale

would stop it being wholesome.

So, can we drink some of this ale,
not beer? Yeah, fantastic.

So we've got a lovely
murky-brown colour.

It does look a bit like gravy.
THEY CHUCKLE

Happy Christmas yet again! Cheers!

I like!
ANNIE LAUGHS

Can you taste a little bit
of sourness in there?

Mm. Tastes of vegetables. Yeah.
A little... Yeah.

SHE LAUGHS

Well, it does have a lot of bay leaf
and rosemary

and things that you would associate
with savoury foods.

It's not too overpowering. You could
get through quite a lot of this.

You could drink
some serious quantity.

People did drink in serious volumes.

I mean, we know that there were lots
of complaints about how Christmas

had ceased to become a time
of quiet contemplation

and was just a time when people got
rat-roaringly drunk.

So the modern idea that
at Christmas,

you can drink a lot more than usual
and it's somehow OK,

that was alive and well
in the Tudor period.

It's blown my head off!
THEY LAUGH

It's brilliant! Cheers! Cheers!

Don't be sick on my shoes.

CHORAL SINGING

Now, although I've been focusing
on revelry,

Tudor Christmas was also defined by
religion.

To an extent that's hard
for our more secular age
fully to understand.

Here in Hampton Court's
Chapel Royal,

the magnificent vaulted roof draws
the eyes towards the heavens.

It was created during the 1530s
on the orders of the King.

And it's amazing to think that
500 years ago,

Henry was in this room.

This is where he came to Mass.

But by the time he installed
his new ceiling,

Henry had unleashed
his religious revolution.

He'd decided to break away
from the Catholic Church of Rome

and to become the supreme head
of his own new Church of England.

Henry's reformation
would, in time, transform

the way Christmas was celebrated.

The new Protestant faith
had no place for the saints,

whose feasts were central
to the 12 days.

And its most zealous followers,
the Puritans,

had no time for Christmas at all.

Puritan means they're getting back
to basics.

And they didn't like the fripperies
that went on around Christmas.

They felt that Christians
should be far more serious,

far more godly, far more sober,
in all senses of the word.

It seems to me that they're clamping
down on some of the jolly bits
of Christmas,

like the Lord of Misrule
and mumming and some of the drinking
and some of the singing.

And that culminates, of course,
in the reign of Cromwell,

who abolishes Christmas
in the 17th century.

And after the civil war,
various things were restored.

The service, the feast day itself
was restored,

but other things didn't come back.

And so they did kill off some
of those old traditions forever.

It's a bit ironic, isn't it, that
Henry VIII, who loved Christmas,

by setting off the Reformation,

actually, he was going to kill
Christmas for a couple of centuries.

I'd imagine he would've
been horrified, had he known
what would've happened.

Unintended consequences. Absolutely.

But during Henry's lifetime,

the Christmas customs
he'd always enjoyed

continued to be observed
throughout the country.

And, above all, on Twelfth Night.

I've finally reached that climactic
date in the Tudor festive calendar.

Each year, the grandest in the land

would gather at one of
Henry's palaces.

So tonight, viewer,
I'm going to be my favourite

of the six wives - Anne of Cleves.

She married Henry in 1540 and
separated from him in the same year.

But, and this is the canny thing,

she stayed on good terms with him.

So we're imagining
the Twelfth Night party,

as it might have been in 1541.

And laid out in our great hall is
a banquet fit for a queen.

Some of the opulent spread,
I recognise

from my shift in the kitchen
with Annie.

Hello. Ha-ha-ha-ha!

This looks fantastic now.
Isn't it! Yes.

So this is the completed chess set.

And as you can see, it's slightly
different to the modern chess set.

That is a courier board.

It's not square. Yeah.

And we know that Henry VIII
commissioned one

to send over to the King of France.

Mm!

Well, it tastes like marzipan,
but also of soap.

Rose soap.

Rose water. Very, very popular.
Rose water!

Rose water, that's what it is.

It was a very, very popular flavour.

And, of course, as a lady,
you are floral and pure.

So this is something that you would
be expected to particularly enjoy.

Oh, I love it! And I love this
thing, too. I recognise this.

Ah, yes! But now...

Oh, it's got the little sweeties
inside it!

Your little comfits, yes.

I helped to make that one.

That's...that's like a proper sweet!

Mm. They're quite zingy,
aren't they?

There's so many beautiful things
on the table.

What are all these
orangey-looking things? Suck it.

There's no need for that kind
of language, young Annie.

These are strips of candied oranges
and candied kumquat.

The Tudors were really, really fond
of their citrus fruits.

And oranges, in particular,
became associated with Christmas

because, of course,
that is when they are in season.

WHISPERS: Nectar!
ANNIE LAUGHS

I am getting drunk on sugar
at this stage.

Oh-ho-ho-ho! Kids' party.

This is an utterly gigantic cake!

This was really the high point
of the Twelfth Night festivities.

And it became later known
as a twelfth cake,

although at this point, it's known
as a great cake, or rich cake.

There are recipes that call for,
"cake hoops a yard across".

This is slightly more than a yard.
More than a yard!

Henry VIII was somewhat more than
a yard across, so...

He's now in his 50s
and piling on the pounds.

Can I cut it now? You can
cut it now.

Gee!

Spicy! Shows your wealth.

And it is, as you can smell,

the precursor
to the modern Christmas cake.

A royal Twelfth Night would usually
conclude with a mix of dance

and drama, known as the mask.

An example of this long-lost
form of entertainment

has been choreographed
especially for us by Charlotte.

THEY LAUGH

You may rise, you may rise.

She's come to the ball tonight
as Henry's fifth queen,
Catherine Howard.

Now, weirdly, I'm the old wife,
you're the new wife,

but we're sort of friends,
aren't we?

We did spend a lot of time together,

particularly, we know,
in the early days of 1541.

During the festivities. During
the 12-day festivities, absolutely!

I can't wait! And all the joy!

Is it about to begin? It is, it is!

MUSIC PLAYS

Masks were highly stylised,

and they used classical references

to make the audience
feel all sophisticated.

Honour! Riches! Marriage blessing!

Juno, Queen on high,
you are addressing.

I, Diana, Goddess of the Moon...

So this is a bit like a play?

Yeah. Remember, we are in the times

prior to proper
professional theatre.

These are members of the court
and they are playing

for our entertainment
and their entertainment.

MUSIC PLAYS

Masks were usually symbolic,

and often took the form of a debate
between two virtues.

In this case, married love
and chastity.

So, this is basically a dance-off,
isn't it,

between the peacocks and the stags?

Essentially.
It's like a little competition.

Their skill at dancing is...
Is incredible!

But that's part of being a courtier
isn't it, that you know
how to dance well?

Absolutely. You will be trained from
a very, very young age.

Because it showed nobility
and your status.

THEY GASP

We've had play, we've had dance-off,
now we've got fighting going on.

It's a bit like
the Royal Variety Show. Well, it is.

It all started with the Tudors.
THEY LAUGH

Mock combats were a regular feature
of royal entertainment.

The ideal courtier would be
as nimble with his sword

as he was with his dancing.

So it seems like it's all come to
a happy ending.

The two goddesses, the two queens,
they've made it up.

Well, they've decided
that all love is equal.

Of course, this is not just
a po-faced entertainment.

It's also an opportunity to flirt,

and to maybe catch the eye
of someone

who maybe you,
er...like the look of.

APPLAUSE

Oh!
THEY LAUGH

That was terrific!
Now we have the revels.

And we all get to show off our own
prowess on the dance floor.

And even queens can dance?
Of course!

In fact, we have an account
from 1541,

where Queen Catherine Howard

and Anne of Cleves
did actually dance together.

But after Henry went to bed.
Yes, let's do it!

CHEERING

MUSIC PLAYS

I think that partying in the bleak
first days of January

is a lovely idea,
but it's a lost tradition,

as with so much I've encountered

during the 12 days
of Tudor Christmas.

And yet, it's been heartening

to learn that some things
have endured.

According to a Tudor carol,

Christmas was a time to make
good cheer and be right merry.

I think that's a sentiment we can
still agree on 500 years later.

CHEERING

Wassail!

# When Christmastide
comes in like a bride

# With holly and ivy clad

# Twelve days in the year
much mirth and good cheer

# In every household is had

# Where cake, bread and cheese
is brought for your fees

# To make you the longer stay

# At the fire to warm
will do you no harm

# To drive the cold winter away. #