Thomas Cranmer
Archbishop of Canterbury under Henry VIII and Edward VI. He pronounced against Henry’s first marriage in 1533, and the Act of Uniformity of 1549 names the archbishop as head of the group that drew up the Book of Common Prayer.
In a letter of June 1533 Cranmer describes how, as archbishop, he held a court at Dunstable, gave sentence that the pope could not license the marriage of Henry VIII and Katherine of Aragon, and afterwards set the crown on Anne Boleyn’s head at Westminster (Cranmer, Letters, letter 14, to Nicholas Hawkyns, 17 June 1533). William Roper names him first among the commissioners before whom Thomas More was called at Lambeth to take the oath (Roper, Life of More the oath at Lambeth). See England Breaks with Rome.
The Act of Uniformity of 1549 says that the king appointed the archbishop of Canterbury, with other bishops and learned men, to draw up one order of common prayer for the realm (Statutes of the Realm, 2 & 3 Edw. VI c. 1); see the Book of Common Prayer. Under Mary I he was deprived of his orders and, as a London chronicler records, burned at Oxford on 21 March 1556 (Wriothesley, Chronicle vol. 2, p. 134); see the Burning of Protestants under Mary I.
In the timeline
- 1534, firm dateEngland Breaks with Rome
Parliament forbids appeals to Rome and in 1534 declares Henry VIII the only supreme head on earth of the Church of England. John Fisher and Thomas More, who deny the title, are beheaded in 1535.
- 1549 to 1552, firm dateThe Book of Common Prayer
Parliament orders one English service book, drawn up under the archbishop of Canterbury, to be used in every church in England from Pentecost 1549. A revised book, which no longer calls the communion the Mass, follows in 1552.
- 1555 to 1558, firm dateThe Burning of Protestants under Mary I
Under Mary I, Parliament returns England to obedience to Rome and revives the medieval heresy laws. From 1555 to 1558 Protestants who will not recant are burned, among them the bishops Latimer, Ridley and Cranmer. John Foxe’s book records them as martyrs.
Primary sources
The Life of Sir Thomas More
- Roper, Life of More the oath at Lambethsourcebooks.fordham.edu