Reginald Pole: Prince and Prophet

by Thomas F. Mayer

• ISBN13: 9780521038690
• ISBN10: 0521038693
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2007-07-30
• Publisher: Cambridge University Press

Summary

This was the first full-length biography in ninety years of Reginald Pole (1500-1558), one of the most important international figures of the sixteenth century, and the first ever to give equal attention to all phases of his career. It was based on painstaking and extensive archival research, above all in Italy and among the archives of the Inquisition. Pole spent much of his life writing, especially about himself. This book attempted to expose the tension between the 'life as lived' and the 'life as written' in order to see Pole whole rather than as a plaster saint - or devil. Pole's career is followed as prot_g_ and then harshest critic of Henry VIII, as cardinal and papal diplomat, legate of Viterbo, a nearly successful candidate for pope, and finally as legate to England, archbishop of Canterbury, architect of the English Counter-Reformation, and victim of both pope Paul IV and of himself.

Table of Contents

List of tables

List of illustrations

Acknowledgements

List of abbreviations

Introduction

A book and a life

The campaign against Henry VIII

The church of Viterbo?

The council of Trent

The war of the saints

Temporal and spiritual peace

Reconstructing the English church

Temporal and spiritual war

The making of a saint

Catalogue of images

Conclusion: 'Ein KSmpfer gegen seine Zeit'?

Index

Table of Contents provided by Publisher. All Rights Reserved.