The 1520 shipment of allegedly heretical books…
1529 CE
The 1520 shipment of allegedly heretical books from the Continent to England that so alarmed the clergy leads in to a proclamation in 1529 by Henry VIII against heretical and blasphemous books.
Henry now institutes a licensing system that requires the screening of all matter that is to be printed.
The divorce trial of Henry VIII and his queen, Catherine of Aragon, held in London in 1529, is adjourned without a decision.
In anger at the delay, Henry dismisses the heretofore-powerful Cardinal Wolsey, who has proven unable to persuade Pope Clement VII to support Henry’s position.
All Wolsey’s temporal possessions become crown property.
Thomas Cromwell, one of Wolsey's most senior and trusted advisers and a member of his household, had in the mid-1520s assisted in the dissolution of nearly thirty monasteries to raise funds for Wolsey to found The King's School, Ipswich, in 1528, and Cardinal College, in Oxford, in 1529, by which time he has had become Wolsey’s secretary.
Cromwell now enters Parliament, where he attracts the king’s attention and attaches himself directly to the royal court.
Thomas More, despite his earlier refusal to endorse Henry's divorce plan, becomes lord chancellor.