Cranmer, Thomas

Thomas (1489-1556), the first Protestant archbishop of Canterbury. A scion of an old Norman family. As a boy he was fond of hunting and riding. At Cambridge University Cranmer was skilled in the learned languages and in the Scripture. In 1523 he was appointed a lecturer on theology. In 1528 Henry VIII desired a divorce from Catherine, the first of his six wives. Hearing that Cranmer had suggested that the case be tried, not before the Pope, but be "tried according to the word of God," Henry was so delighted that he asked, "Who is this Dr. Cranmer? Marry, I trow he hath the right sow by the ear." From this time on, Cranmer was Henry's right hand adviser. He was made a royal chaplain, and was sent on a mission to Rome and to the emperor. He married Henry to Anne Boleyn, and helped him get rid of both her and his third wife. Cranmer was active in furthering the English reformation and in pulling down the monasteries. An edition of the Scriptures is known as Cranmer's Bible. Whenever the English people showed signs of going back to Catholicism, Cranmer stood for the new church. Under his influence pictures and images were ordered out of the churches. Communion was made to take the place of mass. An English book of common prayer took the place of the missal and breviary in use. When Henry's death and the short reign of Edward brought Mary, the Catholic daughter of Catherine to the throne, and Cranmer into the power of his old foes, it is small wonder that he was arrested and tried on charge of heresy. In hope of saving his life Cranmer signed six recantations, that is, took back all he had ever said or done against Catholicism; but his enemies could not be appeased so easily. March 21, 1556, Cranmer was haled from the gaol of Oxford, taken to church to hear his own funeral sermon, and was burned alive at the stake in front of one of the university buildings.