title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Devoid of radio-friendly pop songs, "Folklore" eschews the mainstream sound of Swift's older works. It consists of mellow, cinematic, slow-paced ballads, with a minimal, lo-fi production, and elegant melodies, together lending a modern spin on traditional songwriting. It is built around neo-classical instrumentals, such as: soft, sparse and sonorous pianos, moody, picked and burbling guitars, glitchy and fractured electronic elements, subliminal, throbbing percussions, mellow programmed drums, Mellotron, sweeping orchestrations with ethereal strings and meditative horns. The album does not fully avoid plush synths and programmed beats characteristic of Swift's pop music, but instead dials them down to a subtle texture, delivering an electro-acoustic soundscape, which highlights Swift's voice and lyrics. "Rolling Stone" stated the album's tone resembles "Safe & Sound", Swift's 2012 single for "". The Ringer noted that Antonoff confers a synth-based style to the record, while Dessner contributes a piano-leaning sound, and linked "Folklore" to two songs on "Lover"—"The Archer" and "It's Nice to Have a Friend"—as Swift's albums "usually have a couple tracks that harken back to the previous album or wind up connecting them to the next".


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Folklore" consists of songs exploring points of view that diverge from Swift's life, including third-person narratives written from perspectives of characters that interweave across the tracks. Its songwriting style combines balladeering with autobiographical experiences and character-driven storytelling, and is primarily distinguished by themes of wistfulness, escapism, nostalgia, contemplation, and empathy. Although Swift opted for a new sound, the album retains stylistic aspects of her trademark songwriting, such as mournful delivery and bildungsroman passion.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Compared to much of her older discography, "Folklore" reflected Swift's deepening self-awareness, introspection, and vivid storytelling that showed a higher degree of fictionalization and fewer self-references, culminating in an outward-looking approach. The lyricism is both personal and fictional, and a blend of both at times. The emotional and narrative range of "Folklore" is widened by expanding the focus from Swift's personal stories to imagined characters and personifications.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The narratives described in "Folklore" include a ghost finding its murderer at its funeral, a seven-year-old girl with a traumatized friend, an old widow spurned by her town, recovering alcoholics, and a love triangle between the fictional characters Betty, James, and an unnamed woman, as depicted in the tracks "Cardigan", "Betty" and "August", with each of the three songs written from each of the character's perspective in different times in their lives. NPR's Ann Powers defined "Folklore" as a "body constructed of memory, a shared sense of the world, built of myths, heard stories", based on the idea that "we each have our own folklore", with the album being Swift's folklore. Many songs on the album exude a cinematic quality in their lyrics, and reference objects and phenomena in nature, such as a solar eclipse, Saturn, auroras, purple-pink skies, salt air, weeds, and "Wisteria".


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "The 1", the opening track, is a soft rock tune driven by a bouncy arrangement of piano, minimal percussion, and electronic accents. In the perspective of Swift's friend, "The 1" describes a new-found positive approach to life and past love, wishing they could have been soulmates. The slow-burning "Cardigan" is a folk ballad driven by moody, stripped-down instrumentals consisting of drums and tender piano; Swift sings from the perspective of a fictional character named Betty, who recalls the separation and enduring optimism of a relationship with a boy named James.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "The Last Great American Dynasty" is an alternative indie pop tune with classical instruments like slide guitar, viola, violins, drums and glitchy production elements. The satirical song tells the story of Harkness, the founder of Harkness Ballet, when she resided in Swift's Rhode Island mansion. It details how Harkness married into an upper-class family, was hated by the town, and blamed for the death of her then-husband and heir to Standard Oil, William Harkness, and the fall of his family's name, and draws parallels with Swift's life. "Exile" is a gospel-influenced, indie folk duet with Bon Iver, fusing Swift's soft vocals with Vernon's growling baritone, serving as an unspoken, argumentative conversation between two former lovers. It begins with a plodding piano and reaches a dramatic climax accompanied by strings, synths and harmonies.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Sung from the perspective of a deceased lover's ghost, "My Tears Ricochet" is an icy arena-goth song that reflects on the tensions following the end of a marital relationship, using funereal imagery—a metaphor for Scott Borchetta and his sale of the masters of Swift's older catalogue. It encompasses a music box, backing choir, reverbed ad-libs in the bridge, and reaches a tumultuous climax over shuddering drums. "Mirrorball" is a folk-tinged dream pop song, driven by pedal steel and twanging guitars. Its lyrics portray Swift as a disco ball, pertaining to the reflective quality, describing her ability to entertain people with her music by making herself her vulnerable and sensitive.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: In "Seven", Swift sings in an innocent tone, reminiscing about an abused friend from her childhood in Pennsylvania, whom she cannot fully remember but still has fond memories of, over a resonant arrangement consisting of flurrying strings and piano. "August" is a gloomy dream-pop song that captures the summer affair between two young lovers—a naive girl who is seen holding on to a boy that "wasn't hers to lose"; the boy is revealed to be James, later in the album. The song depicts the girl grieve and yearn over her love, using Swift's light and breezy delivery, "yo-yoing" vocal yelps, and a grandiose production driven by acoustic guitar, glistening vocal reverb, and key changes.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The ninth track, "This Is Me Trying", is an orchestral pop song detailing the accountability and regret of an alcoholic who admits feeling inadequate. It contains Swift's "ghostly", reverberated vocals and a gradually growing, dense production. Over an acoustic arrangement of finger-plucked strings and soft horns, "Illicit Affairs" unfolds the infidelity of a disloyal narrator, and highlights the measures they carry out to keep the affair a secret. "Invisible String" is a folk song that provides a glimpse into Swift's love life with Alwyn, recounting the "invisible" connection between them that they were not aware of until they met, alluding to an East Asian folk myth called the Red Thread of Fate. It comprises an acoustic riff, thumping vocal backbeats, a distinct passive writing style, and references her older songs.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Mad Woman" tackles the taboo linked with female anger, using sarcastic remarks at sexism, as "Folklore" moment of vituperation. It metaphorically describes Swift's dispute with Borchetta and Scooter Braun, painting the story of a deviant widow getting revenge, with references to witch hunts. "Epiphany" is an ambient hymn. It depicts the devastation of the pandemic, paying homage to healthcare workers, with whom she empathizes, comparing them to traumatized military soldiers, such as her veteran grandfather, Dean, who fought at the Battle of Guadalcanal (1942). The song is carried by a glacial piano, and a howling brass


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The fourteenth track, "Betty", is a country and folk rock song with prominent harmonica. It describes the relationship narrated in "Cardigan", but in the perspective of the cheating boyfriend James, who had a summer fling with the female narrator of "August". James apologizes for his past actions but does not fully own up to them, citing excuses. Its characters (Betty, James, and Inez) are named after the daughters of Blake Lively and Ryan Reynolds. The R&B-inclining "Peace" features jazzy vocals with a complex vocal melody. over a pulse juxtaposed with three lushly harmonized basslines, complemented by minimal synths and a drizzling piano. Lyrically, "Peace" is an ode to Swift's lover, dissects the effects of hectic stardom on her relationship and warns the subject of future challenges.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The standard edition of the album closes with "Hoax", a slow piano ballad with emotionally raw lyrics that detail a flawed but everlasting relationship, ending the album on a despondent note of sadness. The deluxe bonus track, "The Lakes", is a string-laden midtempo song that introspects on Swift's semi-retirement in England's Lake District; the location is also mentioned in "Invisible String". Imagining a red rose growing out of tundra "with no one around to tweet it", Swift fantasizes about a social-media-free utopia, referencing William Wordsworth, an English poet known for his Romantic writings.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Folklore" album art, packaging, and lyric videos were created through a DIY approach. Swift collaborated with photographer Beth Garrabrant for the artworks, without a technical team due to COVID-19 concerns. The photoshoot marked a change from Swift's older shoots, where she would have "100 people on set, commanding alongside other people in a very committee fashion." She styled herself, including hair, makeup and wardrobe, and prescribed Garrabrant a specific moodboard. The photographs are characterized by a grayscale, black and white filter.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The standard cover art depicts Swift as an 18th-century pioneer sleepwalking in a nightgown. She is seen standing alone in a misty forest covered by morning fog, wearing a long, double-breasted plaid coat over a white prairie dress, gazing at the height of the trees. On the backside cover, she stands turned away from the camera, wearing a slouchy flannel-lined denim jacket slumped around her arms, and a white lace frock, with two loose braided buns low over her nape, similar to American Girl doll Kirsten Larson. The album title is written in an italicized roman font reminiscent of "a "Chronicles of Narnia" scrawl".


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: In December 2020, Jimmy Kimmel interviewed Swift about the presence of the word "Woodvale" on the cover of "Hide And Seek" edition of "Folklore", which some suspected to be the title of a new album after "Evermore;" Swift denied it and said she did not reveal "Folklore" title to anyone until just before its release and used "Woodvale" as a code name, which was included in an artwork for reference, but was accidentally printed in the final products.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Reflecting its lyrical motifs of escapism, "Folklore" sees Swift embracing a rustic, nature-focused, cottagecore aesthetic for the project, moving away from the "technicolor carnival" of its predecessor, "Lover". The music video for "Cardigan" expands on cottagecore, and starts with her sitting at a vintage piano in a cozy cabin in the woods. The video features a moss-covered forest and a waterfall-producing piano. Swift sold replicas of the "folklore cardigan"—a cream colored cable knit, with silver embroidered stars on the sleeves' chunky elbows, and navy blue piping and buttons—she wore in the video, on her website.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "W" regarded the cardigan the "pièce de résistance" of the aesthetic, and thought the eight cover artworks of "Folklore" have Swift "frolicking through the woods like a cottagecore queen". "Irish Independent" wrote that she became a "rural tunesmith communing with the birds and the trees", dressed up in a bulky "Clancy Brothers-style" Aran sweater. RTÉ thanked Swift for putting cardigans "back on the map once more". Noting that her album eras have been defined by their own color scheme, fashion and cultural motifs, "Teen Vogue" described "Folklore" as simple, neutral-toned wear, with the cardigan helping in understanding the sentimental role clothing plays. Cottagecore faced resurgence on the internet after Swift used the aesthetic, with a sales surge of hand-knitted Aran sweaters in Ireland and the US.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Comparing it with her past albums, "The Guardian" characterized "1989" as sleek and suave, "Reputation" as gothic and dangerous, and "Lover" as jovial and pastel-hued, whereas "Folklore" is the monochrome tale of a songwriter returning to folksy roots. Refinery29 dubbed the aesthetic as Swift's return to her "truest self", and compared her new look to that of a "classic English Rose". "Vogue" found Swift opting for a pastoral palette, and drew parallels to the music video of her 2012 single "Safe & Sound". "Beats Per Minute" deemed the aesthetic reminiscent of works by painters Grant Wood, Andrew Wyeth, and Lionel Walden, especially Wood's "American Gothic". "Vulture" defined "Folklore" as "an eerie black-and-white indie period horror film" that pays homage to various cult classic films, especially A24 horror films, with its songs evoking cinematic visuals. The album's aesthetic has been compared to the visuals in multiple films, including "Ivan's Childhood" (1962), "Picnic at Hanging Rock" (1975), "The Blair Witch Project" (1999), "Pan's Labyrinth" (2006), "The Babadook" (2014), "The Witch" (2015), "The Beguiled" (2017), "Woodshock" (2017), "The Lighthouse" (2019), "Midsommar" (2019) and "Little Women" (2019).


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Folklore" was a surprise album. It marked the first time Swift abandoned her traditional album rollout, opting to release suddenly due to intuition; she stated "if you make something you love, you should just put it out into the world". She unveiled the album via her social media on July 23, 2020, 16 hours prior to its release to digital music platforms at midnight. Swift informed Republic Records about the new album only a few hours before its release, and thus it was not widely and immediately available at retail, especially in its first week. Deluxe CDs and vinyl LPs with seven other alternate covers, were sold on Swift's website exclusively. The standard edition "In the Trees" CDs of "Folklore" were released to retail on August 7, 2020, while "Meet Me Behind the Mall" CDs were made exclusive to Target. The formerly physical-exclusive "Folklore" deluxe, featuring the bonus track "The Lakes", was released to digital platforms on August 18, 2020.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Starting on August 20, 2020, a limited number of autographed "Folklore" CDs were delivered to various indie record shops in the US and Scotland to support small businesses in the pandemic. Swift mailed her "Folklore" cardigans to celebrity friends and well-wishers. Four six-song compilations of "Folklore" tracks were released to streaming, based on the thematic cohesion between them; "The Escapism Chapter", "The Sleepless Nights Chapter", "The Saltbox House Chapter" and "The Yeah I Showed Up at Your Party Chapter" were released in August–September 2020. Swift's ninth studio album, "Evermore", is a sequel to "Folklore." She dubbed them "sister albums".


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Cardigan" serves as the lead single of "Folklore". It was accompanied by a music video posted to YouTube, directed by Swift and produced by Jil Hardin. Both were released on July 24, 2020, alongside the album. It was serviced to US pop and adult pop radio formats on July 27. The song debuted at number one on the "Billboard" Hot 100 chart, becoming Swift's sixth chart-topper and second number-one debut. "Billboard" noted a unique radio roll-out for "Folklore", where few of its tracks were simultaneously promoted to multiple radio formats. While "Cardigan" impacted pop and adult contemporary, "Exile" was sent to adult alternative radio on August 3, 2020, which had initially peaked at number six on the Hot 100, whereas "Betty" was sent to country radio on August 17, after arriving at number six on the Hot Country Songs chart. "The 1" was released as a promotional single in Germany on October 9, 2020; "The 1" had previously reached number four on the Hot 100. On July 24, 2021, the first anniversary of "Folklore", the original orchestral version of "The Lakes" was also released as a promotional single.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: A concert documentary, titled "Folklore: The Long Pond Studio Sessions", was released on November 25, 2020, to Disney+. It was directed and produced by Swift, seeing her perform all the tracks of "Folklore" in an intimate setting at Long Pong Studio, and sharing the stories behind the songs, with Antonoff and Dessner. Alongside the film's premiere, Swift's third live album, "", containing the acoustic versions from the film, was released to streaming platforms.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Folklore" was met with widespread acclaim from music critics, who praised its emotional weight and introspective songwriting, calling it Swift's most subdued and sophisticated body of work yet. At Metacritic, which assigns a normalized rating out of 100 to reviews from professional publications, the album received an average score of 88, based on 27 reviews, indicating "universal acclaim". "Folklore" is widely regarded as Swift's best album and a pioneering album of 2020.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Rob Sheffield of "Rolling Stone" lauded Swift's songwriting abilities that brought out her "deepest wit, compassion, and empathy", making "Folklore" her most intimate album so far. Also noting the album's vivid storytelling filled with imagination and imagery, "Pitchfork" Jillian Mapes considered "Folklore" a mature step in Swift's artistry while retaining her core as a celebrated songwriter. Mark Savage of BBC classified "Folklore" as an indie record dealing with nostalgia and mistakes that resonate with the times. Katie Moulton from "Consequence" appreciated Swift's maturity, particularly the employment of third-person perspectives that had been uncommon on her previous works. Complimenting the album's writing, "The Daily Telegraph"'s Neil McCormick, "i"s Sarah Carson, and "The Sydney Morning Herald"'s Giselle Au-Nhien Nguyen, gave the album full-score ratings. Describing "Folklore" as a bold attempt, Hannah Mylrea of "NME" praised Swift's ability to evoke vivid imagery, but said that the 16-song run can "sometimes drag slightly".


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Several critics welcomed Swift's new musical direction. Chris Willman of "Variety" considered "Folklore" to be a "first-rank album", and its change of a musical style a "serious act of sonic palette cleansing" for Swift. Laura Snapes of "The Guardian" considered it to be the most cohesive and the most experimental among Swift's releases. "Entertainment Weekly"s Maura Johnston deemed the album a bold move for a pop star like Swift to challenge its audience. Roisin O'Connor of "The Independent" praised the album's "exquisite, piano-based poetry" which she found unconventional for Swift's catalog. AllMusic's Stephen Thomas Erlewine was positive towards the album but felt its musical styles are not "precisely new tricks" for Swift. In agreement, Annie Zaleski of "The A.V. Club" deemed the album not completely experimental, but still a new aspect of Swift's artistry. In his Substack-published Consumer Guide column, Robert Christgau was most moved by the youth-themed "Seven" and "Betty" than the more adult songs, which he summarized as "melodically fetching, lyrically deft pop songs that are fine as far as they go". He singled out "The Last Great American Dynasty" as the only intolerable song for how it reminds him of "Taylor Swift the showbiz plutocrat". In a mixed review, "The New York Times" critic Jon Caramanica praised Swift's songwriting but felt the album is burdened by "desolate" and "overcomposed" indie rock.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: A multitude of publications listed "Folklore" in their lists of best albums of 2020, including number-one placements from "Billboard", "Los Angeles Times", "Rolling Stone", "Insider", NJ.com, "South China Morning Post", "Uproxx", "USA Today", "Us Weekly", "Variety", and "Walla Walla Union-Bulletin". "Folklore" placed third on Metacritic's ranking of the most mentioned albums in 2020 year-end lists. Its tracks "The 1", "Cardigan", "The Last Great American Dynasty", "Exile", "Mirrorball", "Seven", "August", "This Is Me Trying", "Invisible String" and "Betty" were also named among the best songs of 2020.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The biggest first day on Spotify for a 2020 album, "Folklore" opened with over 80.6 million global streams on the platform, and earned the Guinness World Record for the most opening-day streams for an album by a female artist, surpassing Ariana Grande's "Thank U, Next." "Cardigan" placed first on global Spotify chart with 7.742 million plays—the biggest first day for a song by a female artist in 2020. The album broke the Apple Music record for the most-streamed pop album in a day, and the Amazon Music indie/alternative record. Republic Records reported that "Folklore" sold over 1.3 million units worldwide on its first day and two million units in its first week. Swift was 2020's second most-streamed woman on Spotify, after Billie Eilish, and the year's most streamed act on Amazon Music. By the end of 2020, "Folklore" sold 2 million pure copies globally. The International Federation of the Phonographic Industry named it the year's best-selling album by a woman, and Swift the best-selling solo act of 2020.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The album's on-demand first-day streams were 72 million in the US, beating "Thank U, Next"s 55.9 million. "Folklore" sold over 500,000 units, including 400,000 sales, in its first three days, becoming the first album to do so since Swift's own "Lover". "Folklore" debuted at number one on the "Billboard" 200 and topped it for eight weeks, becoming the longest-reigning number-one album of 2020. Opening with 846,000 units, consisting of 615,000 pure sales and 289.85 million streams, it marked the largest sales and streaming weeks of 2020, surpassing Juice Wrld's "Legends Never Die". Its first-week sales alone were enough to make it the year's best-selling album, beating BTS' "". Swift became the first woman with seven "Billboard" 200 number-one debuts and tied Janet Jackson for the third-most number-ones. Eclipsing Eminem, she was the first act in Nielsen SoundScan history to have seven albums each sell 500,000 copies or more in a week, and the first woman since Barbra Streisand to have six albums spend multiple weeks at number one. "Folklore" gave Swift her first entry on Alternative Albums, with the biggest debut ever on the chart.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: It was 2020's fastest album to move a million units, the longest-running number-one album by a woman on the "Billboard" 200 since "Reputation", and the first to spend its first four weeks at the top since Adele's "25" (2015); Swift became the first 21st-century act to have six albums each spend four weeks atop, and the first solo/female artist (after the Beatles) to have five albums each top the chart for six weeks or more. "Billboard" attributed the album's success to its timing, pandemic-suited songs and Swift's ability to connect with listeners. She also surpassed Whitney Houston as the woman with the most weeks atop "Billboard" 200 (47 weeks). "Folklore" sold a million pure copies in the US by October, becoming the only 2020 album to do so and Swift's ninth project to reach the mark. When "Evermore" topped the "Billboard" 200 later that year, "Folklore" rose to number three with 133,000 units, making Swift the first woman ever to chart two simultaneous albums in the top three.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: All of its 16 tracks debuted simultaneously on the "Billboard" Hot 100, giving three top-10 and five top-20 entries. Swift became the first act to debut atop both "Billboard" 200 and Hot 100 in the same week, with the number-one debut of "Cardigan". She also was the first act to debut two songs in the top-four and three songs in the top-six simultaneously, as "The 1" entered at number four and "Exile" at number six. It increased Swift's sum of top-10 hits to 28, including 18 top-10 debuts. "Folklore" was her second consecutive album to chart all of its tracks together on the Hot 100 after "Lover". Swift extended her record for the most concurrent Hot 100 debuts ever among women (16), and eclipsed Nicki Minaj as the woman with the most Hot 100 entries (113). 11 tracks charted on Hot Rock & Alternative Songs, of which a record eight entries were in the top 10.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: On the 2020 "Billboard" Year-End charts, Swift was the top female artist for the fifth time in her career. Swift or "Folklore" ranked at number one on the year-end Top Album Sales, Tastemaker Albums, Alternative Albums, Hot Rock & Alternative Songs Artists, and "Billboard" 200 Female Artists charts. 11 tracks from "Folklore" landed on the year-end Hot Rock & Alternative Songs chart—the most for any act or album. Swift ranked as US Spotify's most streamed female artist of 2020, and the year's most consumed artist, totaling 3.5 million units (including 1.3 million sales). The best-selling album of 2020, "Folklore" earned 2.3 million units, including 1.276 million sales. It made Swift the first act to have the best-selling album of a calendar year five times, following "Fearless" (2009), "1989", "Reputation", and "Lover". "Folklore" was the eighth best-selling album of 2021 with 304,000 copies sold.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Folklore" opened at number-one on the "Billboard" Canadian Albums as Swift's seventh consecutive number-one, spending four weeks atop. All of its 16 tracks debuted on the Canadian Hot 100 chart together, with "Cardigan", "Exile", and "The 1" in the top-10. "Folklore" landed ninth on the 2020 Top Canadian Albums year-end list.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: In the UK, "Folklore" debuted atop the Official Albums Chart with 37,000 copies, besting Eminem's "Music to Be Murdered By" for the biggest digital sales week of 2020. It became Swift's fifth consecutive chart-topper, making her one of the only five women to score five number-one albums in the UK, after Madonna, Kylie Minogue, Streisand, and Celine Dion, and the first one to do so in the 21st-century. Becoming Swift's first album to spend multiple weeks atop the chart, "Folklore" remained at number one for three consecutive weeks. On the UK Singles Chart, "Cardigan", "Exile", and "The 1" opened at numbers six, eight and 10, respectively, taking the total of Swift's UK top-ten entries to 16, and made her the first woman in UK history to concurrently debut three songs in the top-10. "Folklore" is the UK's most downloaded album of 2020. It further topped the Official Vinyl Albums Chart.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The album arrived at number one on the Irish Albums Chart, scoring Ireland's biggest opening week of 2020 and outperforming the rest of the top-five combined. Swift became the first solo female act with five Irish number-one albums in the 21st-century. "Folklore" stayed atop for four weeks, yielding Swift's longest-running Irish number-one album. The tracks "Exile", "Cardigan" and "The 1" appeared at the third, fourth and seventh spots on the Irish Singles Chart, respectively, taking Swift's career top-tens to a total of 15. "Folklore" is 2020's longest-running number-one album of Ireland, and the most downloaded. It reached number one in Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, Estonia, Finland, Greece, Norway, Switzerland, and many other European countries.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: In China, the album sold more than 200,000 copies in its first six hours and around 740,000 copies in its first week, instantly becoming the best-selling and fastest-selling album of 2020 by a western act. "Folklore" was certified Diamond by QQ Music, making Swift the first western act to have four albums, with "Reputation", "1989" and "Lover", reach the milestone. It was the platform's most streamed English-language album of 2020. In Malaysia, "Folklore" spawned nine top-20 songs on the RIM Singles chart, with "Cardigan", "Exile", "The 1", "My Tears Ricochet" and "The Last Great American Dynasty" entering the top 10. In Singapore, 14 tracks from the album landed on the RIAS Singles chart, 11 of which reached the top 20 and five in the top 10. "Folklore" was the best selling foreign album of 2020 in Japan.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: In Australia, "Folklore" topped the ARIA Albums Chart as Swift's sixth album to do so, giving her more chart-toppers in the country in 2010–2020 than any other artist. Its 16 tracks entered the top 50 of the ARIA Singles Chart together, breaking the all-time record for the most debuts in one week, previously held by Post Malone and Ed Sheeran. "Cardigan" became Swift's sixth number-one song, while "Exile", "The 1", "The Last Great American Dynasty" and "My Tears Ricochet" reached top-10; Swift became the act with the most Australian top-ten hits of 2020. "Folklore" topped the chart for four consecutive weeks as Swift's longest-running Australian number-one album since "1989", the only 2020 album to top the chart for more than two weeks, and the country's best selling album by a woman in 2020. It topped New Zealand's Official Top 40 Albums chart as well, spending two weeks atop. "Cardigan", "Exile", and "The 1" charted in the top-10 of the New Zealand singles chart, and "The Last Great American Dynasty" placed 13th. "Folklore" ranked at number seven on the RMNZ 2020 year-end albums list.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Folklore" and its songs received five Grammy Award nominations at the 63rd ceremony, winning the Album of the Year. Swift became the first woman in history to win Album of the Year thrice, and the fourth artist overall, tied with Frank Sinatra, Stevie Wonder and Paul Simon. The album was also a candidate for Best Pop Vocal Album, while "Cardigan" was nominated for Best Pop Solo Performance and Song of the Year, making Swift the most nominated female artist ever in the latter category with five nods. "Exile" contended for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance. At the 2020 American Music Awards, Swift scored four nominations: Artist of the Year, Favorite Pop/Rock Female Artist, Favorite Music Video for "Cardigan" and Favorite Pop/Rock Album for "Folklore", and won the first three, extending her record as the most awarded artist in the show's history with 32 American Music Awards. It also marked the third consecutive year Swift was crowned the Artist of the Year, and sixth overall—the first and only artist to achieve it.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: "Folklore" release ignited widespread interest in the term "folklore" on the internet. In response to this mainstream attention, the American Folklore Society launched a website titled "What is Folklore?" and engaged in an online campaign to educate passersby about folklore studies. Folklorists were recruited to promote the academic field to the general public via social media. Metacritic's traffic skyrocketed by roughly half a million views upon "Folklore" release. The site's founder Marc Doyle stated, "There's nothing quite like Taylor Swift", whose albums supply "a great deal of traffic and user participation" to the site whenever they are released.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The album has been contextualized as a lockdown project by commentators, and earned a reputation as the archetypal quarantine album. "The Guardian" opined that "Folklore" was a respite from chaotic events. "The Daily Telegraph" called it "an exquisite, empathetic lockdown triumph". "NME" wrote the album will be remembered as "the quintessential lockdown album" that "felt like the perfect accompaniment for the weird loneliness" of 2020. "Insider" stated that "Folklore" would be known as "lockdown's one true masterpiece". "Rolling Stone" said the album may go down in history as "the definitive quarantine album" for providing comfort and catharsis "just when we needed it most". "Billboard" proclaimed that "Folklore" would be cherished as one of Swift's most influential albums. "Uproxx" noted how "Folklore" changed the tone of music in 2020, and its impact on the year's cultural landscape "can't be measured".


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: In a list awarding the most creative works that shaped quarantine, "Vulture" labeled "Folklore" as 2020's "Best Breakdown in Musical Form" for addressing loneliness and related thoughts. "Vogue" listed the album amongst the best moments of lockdown culture. "The Week" called it "the first great pandemic art" for setting "a high bar" for future pandemic-inspired projects. "Financial Times" called it "the first great lockdown album", while "Hot Press" termed it "the first great album of the lockdown era". Judging from its acclaim and commercial success, Tom Hull concluded that Swift "caught the spirit of the times" with "Folklore". "Billboard" named "Folklore" and "Evermore" as the best examples of innovative albums from artists who amended their creative process during the pandemic, and in a list titled "The 25 Musical Moments That Defined the First Quarter of the 2020s", called the album a "commercial smash" and "Grammy darling" that stands as "one of the quintessential quarantine full-lengths".


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: The making of and rave reception to "Folklore" encouraged Swift to release "Evermore". Swift herself has credited "Folklore" for ushering a new mindset of songwriting in her repertoire, which in turn influenced her subsequent releases. "Folklore" was the most popular album of 2020 on Genius, and Swift was the top searched act. She was also the world's highest-paid solo musician of 2020, and the highest paid in the US, solely due to her incomes from the 2020 albums.


title: Folklore (Taylor Swift album)

text: Hayley Williams of Paramore described her second solo studio album, "Flowers for Vases / Descansos", as her "Folklore". Phoebe Bridgers suggested that her next record could be inspired by "Folklore". Critics have noted influences of "Folklore" in Olivia Rodrigo's debut album, "Sour" (2021), and its lead single "Drivers License". Spanish singer-songwriter Zahara released a song titled "Taylor" in tribute to Swift, and credited "Folklore" for encouraging her to compose music again following months of isolation. Croatian singer Mia Dimšić named "Folklore" as an inspiration for "Guilty Pleasure", her song representing Croatia at the Eurovision Song Contest 2022. Christina Perri and Sabrina Carpenter credited "Folklore" with encouraging them to be emotionally honest in their songs without worrying about external expectations. Japanese-British singer-songwriter Rina Sawayama cited the poetic and fictitious traits of "Folklore" as a source of inspiration for her second studio album, "Hold the Girl" (2022). "Bridgerton" writer Abby McDonald stated the track "Illicit Affairs" inspired writing the episode "An Unthinkable Fate" of the series' second season. American singer-songwriter and actress Maya Hawke was inspired by "Folklore" compositions for her second studio album, "Moss" (2022). After "Folklore", artists such as Hawke, Gracie Abrams, Ed Sheeran, King Princess, and Girl in Red chose to collaborate with Dessner and record songs at his Long Pond Studio.


title: House of Tudor

text: The House of Tudor was a royal house of largely Welsh origin that held the English throne from 1485 to 1603. They descended from the Tudors of Penmynydd and Catherine of France. Tudor monarchs ruled the Kingdom of England and its realms, including their ancestral Wales and the Lordship of Ireland (later the Kingdom of Ireland) for 118 years with six monarchs: Henry VII, Henry VIII, Edward VI, Jane Grey, Mary I and Elizabeth I. The Tudors succeeded the House of Plantagenet as rulers of the Kingdom of England, and were succeeded by the House of Stuart. The first Tudor monarch, Henry VII of England, descended through his mother from a legitimised branch of the English royal House of Lancaster, a cadet house of the Plantagenets. The Tudor family rose to power and started the Tudor period in the wake of the Wars of the Roses (1455–1487), which left the main House of Lancaster (with which the Tudors were aligned) extinct in the male line.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry VII succeeded in presenting himself as a candidate not only for traditional Lancastrian supporters, but also for discontented supporters of their rival Plantagenet cadet House of York, and he took the throne by right of conquest. Following his victory at the Battle of Bosworth Field (22 August 1485), he reinforced his position in 1486 by fulfilling his 1483 vow to marry Elizabeth of York, daughter of Edward IV, thus symbolically uniting the former warring factions of Lancaster and York under the new dynasty. The Tudors extended their power beyond modern England, achieving the full union of England and the Principality of Wales in 1542 (Laws in Wales Acts 1535 and 1542), and successfully asserting English authority over the Kingdom of Ireland (proclaimed by the Crown of Ireland Act 1542). They also maintained the nominal English claim to the Kingdom of France; although none of them made substance of it, Henry VIII fought wars with France trying to reclaim that title. After him, his daughter Mary I lost control of all territory in France permanently with the fall of Calais in 1558.


title: House of Tudor

text: In total, the Tudor monarchs ruled their domains for just over a century. Henry VIII () was the only son of Henry VII to live to the age of maturity. Issues around royal succession (including marriage and the succession rights of women) became major political themes during the Tudor era, as did the English Reformation in religion, impacting the future of the Crown. When Elizabeth I died childless, the Scottish House of Stuart succeeded as England's royal family through the Union of the Crowns of 24 March 1603. The first Stuart to become King of England (), James VI and I, descended from Henry VII's daughter Margaret Tudor, who in 1503 had married King James IV of Scotland in accordance with the 1502 Treaty of Perpetual Peace.


title: House of Tudor

text: The Tudors descended from King Edward III on Henry VII's mother's side from John Beaufort, 1st Earl of Somerset, one of the children of the 14th century English prince John of Gaunt, the third surviving son of Edward III. Beaufort's mother was Gaunt's long-term mistress Katherine Swynford.


title: House of Tudor

text: The descendants of an illegitimate child of English royalty would normally have no claim on the throne, although Gaunt and Swynford eventually married in 1396, when John Beaufort was 25. The church then retroactively declared the Beauforts legitimate by way of a papal bull the same year, confirmed by an Act of Parliament in 1397. A subsequent proclamation by John of Gaunt's son by his earlier wife Blanche of Lancaster, King Henry IV, also recognised the Beauforts' legitimacy but declared the line ineligible for the throne.


title: House of Tudor

text: Nevertheless, the Beauforts remained closely allied with Gaunt's descendants from his first marriage, the House of Lancaster, during the civil wars known as the Wars of the Roses. However the descent from the Beauforts, did not necessarily render Henry Tudor (Henry VII) heir to the throne, nor did the fact that his father's mother, Catherine of Valois, had been a Queen of England (although, this did make Henry VII the son of King Henry VI's half-brother).


title: House of Tudor

text: The legitimate claim was that of Henry Tudor's wife, Elizabeth of York, as daughter to Edward IV, and descendant of the second son of Edward III, Lionel, Duke of Clarence, and also his fourth son, Edmund, Duke of York. As she had no surviving brothers, Elizabeth had the strongest claim to the crown, but while she became queen consort, she did not rule as queen regnant; for the last attempt a female made at ruling in her own right had resulted in disaster when Henry II's mother, Empress Matilda, and Henry II's uncle, Stephen, King of England, fought bitterly for the throne in the 12th century.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry Tudor had, however, something that the others did not. He had an army which defeated the last Yorkist king, Richard III, in the field of battle and the support of powerful nobles to take the crown by right of conquest. How Richard III had come to the throne proved controversial, even among powerful Yorkists.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry Tudor, as Henry VII, and his son by Elizabeth of York, Henry VIII, eliminated other claimants to the throne, including his first cousin once removed, Margaret Pole, Countess of Salisbury, and her family. Only Reginald Pole survived, but he was a cardinal in the Catholic Church, with no heirs. He later became Archbishop of Canterbury under Henry VIII's Catholic daughter, Mary I.


title: House of Tudor

text: On 1 November 1455, John Beaufort's granddaughter, Margaret Beaufort, Countess of Richmond and Derby, married Henry VI's maternal half-brother Edmund Tudor, 1st Earl of Richmond. It was his father, Owen Tudor (), who abandoned the Welsh patronymic naming practice and adopted a fixed surname. When he did, he did not choose, as was generally the custom, his father's name, Maredudd, but chose that of his grandfather, Tudur ap Goronwy, instead.


title: House of Tudor

text: This name is sometimes given as "Tewdwr", the Welsh form of Theodore, but Modern Welsh "Tudur", Old Welsh "Tutir" is originally not a variant but a different and completely unrelated name, etymologically identical with Gaulish "Toutorix", from Proto-Celtic "*toutā" "people, tribe" and "*rīxs" "king" (compare Modern Welsh "tud" "territory" and "rhi" "king" respectively), corresponding to Germanic Theodoric.


title: House of Tudor

text: Owen Tudor was one of the bodyguards for the queen dowager Catherine of Valois, whose husband, Henry V, had died in 1422. Evidence suggests that the two were secretly married in 1429. The two sons born of the marriage, Edmund and Jasper, were among the most loyal supporters of the House of Lancaster in its struggle against the House of York.


title: House of Tudor

text: and was married to Lady Margaret Beaufort, the great-granddaughter of John of Gaunt, the progenitor of the house of Lancaster; Jasper became Earl of Pembroke on 23 November 1452. Edmund died on 3 November 1456. On 28 January 1457, his widow Margaret, who had just attained her fourteenth birthday, gave birth to a son, Henry Tudor, at her brother-in-law's Pembroke Castle.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry Tudor, the future Henry VII, spent his childhood at Raglan Castle, the home of William Herbert, Earl of Pembroke, a leading Yorkist. Following the murder of Henry VI and death of his son, Edward, in 1471, Henry became the person upon whom the Lancastrian cause rested. Concerned for his young nephew's life, Jasper Tudor took Henry to Brittany for safety.


title: House of Tudor

text: Lady Margaret remained in England and remarried, living quietly while advancing the Lancastrian (and her son's) cause. Capitalizing on the growing unpopularity of Richard III (King of England from 1483), she was able to forge an alliance with discontented Yorkists in support of her son. Two years after Richard III was crowned, Henry and Jasper sailed from the mouth of the Seine to the Milford Haven Waterway and defeated Richard III at the Battle of Bosworth Field (22 August 1485). Upon this victory, Henry Tudor proclaimed himself King Henry VII.


title: House of Tudor

text: Upon becoming king in 1485, Henry VII moved rapidly to secure his hold on the throne. On 18 January 1486 at Westminster, he honoured a pledge made three years earlier and married Elizabeth of York (daughter of King Edward IV). They were third cousins, as both were great-great-grandchildren of John of Gaunt. The marriage unified the warring houses of Lancaster and York and gave the couple's children a strong claim to the throne. The unification of the two houses through this marriage is symbolized by the heraldic emblem of the Tudor rose, a combination of the white rose of York and the red rose of Lancaster.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry VII's foreign policy had an objective of dynastic security: witness the alliance forged with the marriage in 1503 of his daughter Margaret to James IV of Scotland and through the marriage of his eldest son. In 1501 Henry VII married his son Arthur to Catherine of Aragon, cementing an alliance with the Spanish monarchs, Ferdinand II of Aragon and Isabella I of Castile. The newlyweds spent their honeymoon at Ludlow Castle, the traditional seat of the Prince of Wales. However, four months after the marriage, Arthur died, leaving his younger brother Henry as heir apparent. Henry VII acquired a papal dispensation allowing Prince Henry to marry Arthur's widow; however, Henry VII delayed the marriage.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry VII limited his involvement in European politics. He went to war only twice: once in 1489 during the Breton crisis and the invasion of Brittany, and in 1496–1497 in revenge for Scottish support of Perkin Warbeck and for the Scottish invasion of northern England. Henry VII made peace with France in 1492 and the war against Scotland was abandoned because of the Western Rebellion of 1497. Henry VII came to peace with James IV in 1502, paving the way for the marriage of his daughter Margaret.


title: House of Tudor

text: One of the main concerns of Henry VII during his reign was the re-accumulation of the funds in the royal treasury. England had never been one of the wealthier European countries, and after the War of the Roses this was even more true. Through his strict monetary strategy, he was able to leave a considerable amount of money in the Treasury for his son and successor, Henry VIII. Although it is debated whether Henry VII was a great king, he certainly was a successful one if only because he restored the nation's finances, strengthened the judicial system and successfully denied all other claimants to the throne, thus further securing it for his heir.


title: House of Tudor

text: The new King Henry VIII succeeded to the throne on 22 April 1509. He married Catherine of Aragon on 11 June 1509; they were crowned at Westminster Abbey on 24 June the same year. Catherine had been the wife of Henry's older brother Arthur (died 1502); this fact made the course of their marriage a rocky one from the start. A papal dispensation had to be granted for Henry to be able to marry Catherine, and the negotiations took some time. Despite the fact that Henry's father died before he was married to Catherine, he was determined to marry her anyway and to make sure that everyone knew he intended on being his own master.


title: House of Tudor

text: When Henry first came to the throne, he had very little interest in actually ruling; rather, he preferred to indulge in luxuries and to partake in sports. He let others control the kingdom for the first two years of his reign, and then when he became more interested in military strategy, he took more interest in ruling his own realm. In his younger years, Henry was described as a man of gentle friendliness, gentle in debate, and who acted as more of a companion than a king. He was tall, handsome and cultured and generous in his gifts and affection and was said to be easy to get along with. The Henry that many people picture when they hear his name is the Henry of his later years, when he became obese, volatile, and was known for his great cruelty.


title: House of Tudor

text: Catherine did not bear Henry the sons he was desperate for; her first child, a daughter, was stillborn, and her second child, a son named Henry, Duke of Cornwall, died 52 days after birth. A further set of stillborn children followed, until a daughter, Mary, was born in 1516. When it became clear to Henry that the Tudor line was at risk, he consulted his chief minister Cardinal Thomas Wolsey about the possibility of annulling his marriage to Catherine. Along with Henry's concern that he would not have an heir, it was also obvious to his court that he was becoming tired of his aging wife, who was six years older than he was. Wolsey visited Rome, where he hoped to get the Pope's consent for an annulment. However, the Holy See was reluctant to rescind the earlier papal dispensation and felt heavy pressure from Catherine's nephew, Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor, in support of his aunt. Catherine contested the proceedings, and a protracted legal battle followed. Wolsey fell from favour in 1529 as a result of his failure to procure the annulment, and Henry appointed Thomas Cromwell in his place as chief minister .


title: House of Tudor

text: Despite his failure to produce the results that Henry wanted, Wolsey actively pursued the annulment (divorce was synonymous with annulment at that time). However, Wolsey never planned that Henry would marry Anne Boleyn, with whom the king had become enamoured while she served as a lady-in-waiting in Queen Catherine's household. It is unclear how far Wolsey was actually responsible for the English Reformation, but it is very clear that Henry's desire to marry Anne Boleyn precipitated the schism with Rome. Henry's concern about having an heir to secure his family line and to increase his security while alive would have prompted him to ask for a divorce sooner or later, whether Anne had precipitated it or not. Only Wolsey's sudden death at Leicester


title: House of Tudor

text: on 29 November 1530 on his journey to the Tower of London saved him from the public humiliation and inevitable execution he would have suffered upon his arrival at the Tower.


title: House of Tudor

text: In order to allow Henry to divorce his wife and marry Anne Boleyn, the English parliament enacted laws breaking ties with Rome, and declaring the king Supreme Head of the Church of England (from Elizabeth I the monarch is known as the Supreme Governor of the Church of England), thus severing the ecclesiastical structure of England from the Catholic Church and the Pope. The newly appointed Archbishop of Canterbury, Thomas Cranmer, was then able to declare Henry's marriage to Catherine annulled. Catherine was removed from Court, and she spent the last three years of her life in various English houses under "protectorship", similar to house arrest. This allowed Henry to marry one of his courtiers: Anne Boleyn, the daughter of a minor diplomat Sir Thomas Boleyn. Anne had become pregnant by the end of 1532 and gave birth on 7 September 1533 to Elizabeth, named in honour of Henry's mother. Anne may have had later pregnancies which ended in miscarriage or stillbirth. In May 1536, Anne was arrested, along with six courtiers. Thomas Cromwell stepped in again, claiming that Anne had taken lovers during her marriage to Henry, and she was tried for high treason and incest; these charges were most likely fabricated, but she was found guilty and executed in May 1536.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry married again, for the third time, to Jane Seymour, the daughter of a Wiltshire knight, and with whom he had become enamoured while she was still a lady-in-waiting to Queen Anne. Jane became pregnant, and in 1537 produced a son, who became King Edward VI following Henry's death in 1547. Jane died of puerperal fever only a few days after the birth, leaving Henry devastated. Cromwell continued to gain the king's favour when he designed and pushed through the Laws in Wales Acts, uniting England and Wales.


title: House of Tudor

text: In 1540, Henry married for the fourth time to the daughter of a Protestant German duke, Anne of Cleves, thus forming an alliance with the Protestant German states. Henry was reluctant to marry again, especially to a Protestant, but he was persuaded when the court painter Hans Holbein the Younger showed him a flattering portrait of her. She arrived in England in December 1539, and Henry rode to Rochester to meet her on 1 January 1540. Although the historian Gilbert Burnet claimed that Henry called her a "Flanders Mare", there is no evidence that he said this; in truth, court ambassadors negotiating the marriage praised her beauty. Whatever the circumstances were, the marriage failed, and Anne agreed to a peaceful annulment, assumed the title "My Lady, the King's Sister", and received a massive divorce settlement, which included Richmond Palace, Hever Castle, and numerous other estates across the country. Although the marriage made sense in terms of foreign policy, Henry was still enraged and offended by the match. Henry chose to blame Cromwell for the failed marriage, and ordered him beheaded on 28 July 1540. Henry kept his word and took care of Anne in his last years alive; however, after his death Anne suffered from extreme financial hardship because Edward VI's councillors refused to give her any funds and confiscated the homes she had been given. She pleaded to her brother to let her return home, but he only sent a few agents who tried to assist in helping her situation and refused to let her return home. Anne died on 16 July 1557 in Chelsea Manor.


title: House of Tudor

text: The fifth marriage was to the Catholic Catherine Howard, the niece of Thomas Howard, the third Duke of Norfolk. Catherine was promoted by Norfolk in the hope that she would persuade Henry to restore the Catholic religion in England. Henry called her his "rose without a thorn", but the marriage ended in failure. Henry's fancy with Catherine started before the end of his marriage with Anne when she was still a member of Anne's court. Catherine was young and vivacious, but Henry's age made him less inclined to use Catherine in the bedroom; rather, he preferred to admire her, which Catherine soon grew tired of. Catherine, forced into a marriage to an unattractive, obese man over 30 years her senior, had never wanted to marry Henry, and conducted an affair with the King's favourite, Thomas Culpeper, while Henry and she were married. During her questioning, Catherine first denied everything but eventually she was broken down and told of her infidelity and her pre-nuptial relations with other men. Henry, first enraged, threatened to torture her to death but later became overcome with grief and self-pity. She was accused of treason and was executed on 13 February 1542, destroying the English Catholic holdouts' hopes of a national reconciliation with the Catholic Church. Her execution also marked the end of the Howard family's power within the court.


title: House of Tudor

text: By the time Henry conducted another Protestant marriage with his final wife Catherine Parr in 1543, the old Roman Catholic advisers, including the powerful third Duke of Norfolk, had lost all their power and influence. The duke himself was still a committed Catholic, and he was nearly persuaded to arrest Catherine for preaching Lutheran doctrines to Henry while she attended his ill health. However, she managed to reconcile with the King after vowing that she had only argued about religion with him to take his mind off the suffering caused by his ulcerous leg. Her peacemaking also helped reconcile Henry with his daughters Mary and Elizabeth and fostered a good relationship between her and the crown prince.


title: House of Tudor

text: Henry died on 28 January 1547. His will had reinstated his daughters by his annulled marriages to Catherine of Aragon and Anne Boleyn to the line of succession. Edward, his nine-year-old son by Jane Seymour, succeeded as Edward VI of England. Unfortunately, the young King's kingdom was usually in turmoil between nobles who were trying to strengthen their own positions in the kingdom by using the Regency in their favour.


title: House of Tudor

text: Although Henry had specified a group of men to act as regents during Edward's minority, Edward Seymour, Edward's uncle, quickly seized complete control and created himself Duke of Somerset on 15 February 1547. His domination of the Privy Council, the king's most senior body of advisers, was unchallenged. Somerset aimed to unite England and Scotland by marrying Edward to the young Mary, Queen of Scots, and aimed to forcibly impose the English Reformation on the Church of Scotland. Somerset led a large and well equipped army to Scotland, where he and the Scottish regent James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran, commanded their armies at the Battle of Pinkie Cleugh on 10 September 1547. The English won the battle, and after this Queen Mary of Scotland was smuggled to France, where she was betrothed to the Dauphin, the future King Francis II of France. Despite Somerset's disappointment that no Scottish marriage would take place, his victory at Pinkie Cleugh made his position appear unassailable.


title: House of Tudor

text: Edward VI was taught that he had to lead religious reform. In 1549, the Crown ordered the publication of the Book of Common Prayer, containing the forms of worship for daily and Sunday church services. The controversial new book was not welcomed by either reformers or Catholic conservatives; it was especially condemned in Devon and Cornwall, where traditional Catholic loyalty was at its strongest. In Cornwall at the time, many of the people could only speak the Cornish language, so the uniform English Bibles and church services were not understood by many. This caused the Prayer Book Rebellion, in which groups of Cornish non-conformists gathered round the mayor. The rebellion worried Somerset, now Lord Protector, and he sent an army to impose a military solution to the rebellion. The rebellion hardened the Crown against Catholics. Fear of Catholicism focused on Edward's elder sister, Mary, who was a pious and devout Catholic. Although called before the Privy Council several times to renounce her faith and stop hearing the Catholic Mass, she refused. Edward had a good relationship with his sister Elizabeth, who was a Protestant, albeit a moderate one, but this was strained when Elizabeth was accused of having an affair with the Duke of Somerset's brother, Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley, the husband of Henry's last wife Catherine Parr. Elizabeth was interviewed by one of Edward's advisers, and she was eventually found not to be guilty, despite forced confessions from her servants Catherine Ashley and Thomas Parry. Thomas Seymour was arrested and beheaded on 20 March 1549.


title: House of Tudor

text: Lord Protector Somerset was also losing favour. After forcibly removing Edward VI to Windsor Castle, with the intention of keeping him hostage, Somerset was removed from power by members of the council, led by his chief rival, John Dudley, the first Earl of Warwick, who created himself Duke of Northumberland shortly after his rise. Northumberland effectively became Lord Protector, but he did not use this title, learning from the mistakes his predecessor made. Northumberland was furiously ambitious, and aimed to secure Protestant uniformity while making himself rich with land and money in the process. He ordered churches to be stripped of all traditional Catholic symbolism, resulting in the simplicity often seen in Church of England churches today. A revision of the Book of Common Prayer was published in 1552. When Edward VI became ill in 1553, his advisers looked to the possible imminent accession of the Catholic Lady Mary, and feared that she would overturn all the reforms made during Edward's reign. Perhaps surprisingly, it was the dying Edward himself who feared a return to Catholicism, and wrote a new will repudiating the 1544 will of Henry VIII. This gave the throne to his cousin Lady Jane Grey, the granddaughter of Henry VIII's sister Mary Tudor, who, after the death of Louis XII of France in 1515 had married Henry VIII's favourite Charles Brandon, the first Duke of Suffolk.


title: House of Tudor

text: The dying Edward VI, under the pressure of John Dudley, the Duke of Northumberland, named his cousin Lady Jane Grey his successor due to her fervent Protestant beliefs. Edward's reluctance to follow the line of succession, which named his half-sister Mary as next in line, stemmed from his knowledge that Mary, firmly Catholic, would restore England to a Catholic nation. Lady Jane Grey was consistently at court after her father was made Duke of Suffolk in October 1551. Her mother, Lady Frances Brandon, was the daughter of Mary Tudor, Queen of France, youngest sister of Henry VIII. On 21 May 1553, Jane was married to John Dudley's son, Lord Guildford Dudley. This was a political move organised by the Duke to ensure that Protestantism stayed the national religion if Jane were to become queen. Edward died on 6 July 1553 and fifteen-year-old Jane, who fainted when she heard the news, was made queen on 10 July. However, despite the efforts of the Duke of Northumberland and Jane's father, the Duke of Suffolk, the public's support was with Princess Mary, the rightful heir according to Henry VIII's will. On 19 July Suffolk persuaded his daughter to relinquish the throne, which she had never wanted, to Mary. Mary's supporters joined her in a triumphal procession to London, accompanied by her younger sister Elizabeth. Lady Jane and her father were arrested for high treason and imprisoned in the Tower of London. Her father was pardoned, but his participation in Wyatt's rebellion led to his death shortly after. Jane and her husband Lord Guildford were sentenced to death and beheaded on 12 February 1554. Jane was only sixteen years old, and the cruel way in which her life had been lost for a throne she never desired aroused much sympathy among the public.


title: House of Tudor

text: Mary soon announced her intention to marry the Spanish prince Philip, son of her mother's nephew Charles V, Holy Roman Emperor. The prospect of a marriage alliance with Spain proved unpopular with the English people, who were worried that Spain would use England as a satellite, involving England in wars without the popular support of the people. Popular discontent grew; a Protestant courtier, Thomas Wyatt the younger, led a rebellion against Mary aiming to depose and replace her with her half-sister Elizabeth. The plot was discovered, and Wyatt's supporters were hunted down and killed. Wyatt himself was tortured, in the hope that he would give evidence that Elizabeth was involved so that Mary could have her executed for treason. Wyatt never implicated Elizabeth, and he was beheaded. Elizabeth spent her time between different prisons, including the Tower of London.


title: House of Tudor

text: Mary married Philip at Winchester Cathedral, on 25 July 1554, and he thereby became king "jure uxoris" until her death. Philip found her unattractive, and only spent a minimal amount of time with her. Despite Mary believing she was pregnant numerous times during her five-year reign, she never bore children. Devastated that she rarely saw her husband, and anxious that she was not bearing an heir to Catholic England, Mary became bitter. In her determination to restore England to the Catholic faith and to secure her throne from Protestant threats, she had 200–300 Protestants burnt at the stake in the Marian Persecutions between 1555 and 1558. Protestants came to hate her as "Bloody Mary." Charles Dickens stated that "as bloody Queen Mary this woman has become famous, and as Bloody Queen Mary she will ever be remembered with horror and detestation"


title: House of Tudor

text: Mary's dream of a new, Catholic Habsburg line was finished, and her popularity further declined when she lost Calais — the last English area on French soil — to Francis, Duke of Guise, on 7 January 1558. Mary's reign, however, introduced a new coining system that would be used until the 18th century, and her marriage to Philip II created new trade routes for England. Mary's government took a number of steps towards reversing the inflation, budgetary deficits, poverty, and trade crisis of her kingdom. She explored the commercial potential of Russian, African, and Baltic markets, revised the customs system, worked to counter the currency debasements of her predecessors, amalgamated several revenue courts, and strengthened the governing authority of the middling and larger towns. Mary also welcomed the first Russian ambassador to England, creating relations between England and Russia for the first time. Had she lived a little longer, Catholicism, which she worked so hard to restore into the realm might have taken deeper roots than it did. However, her actions in pursuit of this goal arguably spurred on the Protestant cause, through the many people she killed. Mary died on 17 November 1558 at the relatively young age of 42.


title: House of Tudor

text: Elizabeth I, who was staying at Hatfield House at the time of her accession, rode to London to the cheers of both the ruling class and the common people.


title: House of Tudor

text: When Elizabeth came to the throne, there was much apprehension among members of the council appointed by Mary, because many of them (as noted by the Spanish ambassador) had participated in several plots against Elizabeth, such as her imprisonment in the Tower, trying to force her to marry a foreign prince and thereby sending her out of the realm, and even pushing for her death. In response to their fear, she chose as her chief minister Sir William Cecil, a Protestant, and former secretary to Lord Protector the Duke of Somerset and then to the Duke of Northumberland. Under Mary, he had been spared, and often visited Elizabeth, ostensibly to review her accounts and expenditure. Elizabeth also appointed her personal favourite, the son of the Duke of Northumberland Lord Robert Dudley, her Master of the Horse, giving him constant personal access to the queen.


title: House of Tudor

text: Elizabeth had a long, turbulent path to the throne. She had a number of problems during her childhood, one of the main ones being after the execution of her mother, Anne Boleyn. When Anne was beheaded, Henry declared Elizabeth an illegitimate child and she would, therefore, not be able to inherit the throne. After the death of her father, she was raised by his widow, Catherine Parr and her husband Thomas Seymour, 1st Baron Seymour of Sudeley. A scandal arose with her and the Lord Admiral to which she stood trial. During the examinations, she answered truthfully and boldly and all charges were dropped. She was an excellent student, well-schooled in Latin, French, Italian, and somewhat in Greek, and was a talented writer. She was supposedly a very skilled musician as well, in both singing and playing the lute. After the rebellion of Thomas Wyatt the younger, Elizabeth was imprisoned in the Tower of London. No proof could be found that Elizabeth was involved and she was released and retired to the countryside until the death of her sister, Mary I of England.


title: House of Tudor

text: Elizabeth was a moderate Protestant; she was the daughter of Anne Boleyn, who played a key role in the English Reformation in the 1520s. She had been brought up by Blanche Herbert Lady Troy. At her coronation in January 1559, many of the bishops – Catholic, appointed by Mary, who had expelled many of the Protestant clergymen when she became queen in 1553 – refused to perform the service in English. Eventually, the relatively minor Bishop of Carlisle, Owen Oglethorpe, performed the ceremony; but when Oglethorpe attempted to perform traditional Catholic parts of the Coronation, Elizabeth got up and left. Following the Coronation, two important Acts were passed through parliament: the Act of Uniformity and the Act of Supremacy, establishing the Protestant Church of England and creating Elizabeth Supreme Governor of the Church of England ("Supreme Head", the title used by her father and brother, was seen as inappropriate for a woman ruler). These acts, known collectively as the Elizabethan Religious Settlement, made it compulsory to attend church services every Sunday; and imposed an oath on clergymen and statesmen to recognise the Church of England, the independence of the Church of England from the Catholic Church, and the authority of Elizabeth as Supreme Governor. Elizabeth made it clear that if they refused the oath the first time, they would have a second opportunity, after which, if the oath was not sworn, the offenders would be deprived of their offices and estates.


title: House of Tudor

text: Even though Elizabeth was only twenty-five when she came to the throne, she was absolutely sure of her God-given place to be the queen and of her responsibilities as the 'handmaiden of the Lord'. She never let anyone challenge her authority as queen, even though many people, who felt she was weak and should be married, tried to do so. The popularity of Elizabeth was extremely high, but her Privy Council, her Parliament and her subjects thought that the unmarried queen should take a husband; it was generally accepted that, once a queen regnant was married, the husband would relieve the woman of the burdens of head of state. Also, without an heir, the Tudor line would end; the risk of civil war between rival claimants was a possibility if Elizabeth died childless. Numerous suitors from nearly all European nations sent ambassadors to English court to put forward their suit. Risk of death came dangerously close in 1564 when Elizabeth caught smallpox; when she was most at risk, she named Robert Dudley as Lord Protector in the event of her death. After her recovery, she appointed Dudley to the Privy Council and created him Earl of Leicester, in the hope that he would marry Mary, Queen of Scots. Mary rejected him, and instead married Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley, a descendant of Henry VII, giving Mary a stronger claim to the English throne. Although many Catholics were loyal to Elizabeth, many also believed that, because Elizabeth was declared illegitimate after her parents' marriage was annulled, Mary was the strongest legitimate claimant. Despite this, Elizabeth would not name Mary her heir; as she had experienced during the reign of her predecessor Mary I, the opposition could flock around the heir if they were disheartened with Elizabeth's rule.


title: House of Tudor

text: Numerous threats to the Tudor line occurred during Elizabeth's reign. In 1569, a group of Earls led by Charles Neville, the sixth Earl of Westmorland, and Thomas Percy, the seventh Earl of Northumberland attempted to depose Elizabeth and replace her with Mary, Queen of Scots. In 1571, the Protestant-turned-Catholic Thomas Howard, the fourth Duke of Norfolk, had plans to marry Mary, Queen of Scots, and then replace Elizabeth with Mary. The plot, masterminded by Roberto di Ridolfi, was discovered and Norfolk was beheaded. The next major uprising was in 1601, when Robert Devereux, the second Earl of Essex, attempted to raise the city of London against Elizabeth's government. The city of London proved unwilling to rebel; Essex and most of his co-rebels were executed. Threats also came from abroad. In 1570, Pope Pius V issued a Papal bull, "Regnans in Excelsis", excommunicating Elizabeth, and releasing her subjects from their allegiance to her. Elizabeth came under pressure from Parliament to execute Mary, Queen of Scots, to prevent any further attempts to replace her; though faced with several official requests, she vacillated over the decision to execute an anointed queen. Finally, she was persuaded of Mary's (treasonous) complicity in the plotting against her, and she signed the death warrant in 1586. Mary was executed at Fotheringhay Castle on 8 February 1587, to the outrage of Catholic Europe.


title: House of Tudor

text: There are many reasons debated as to why Elizabeth never married. It was rumoured that she was in love with Robert Dudley, 1st Earl of Leicester, and that on one of her summer progresses she had birthed his illegitimate child. This rumour was just one of many that swirled around the two's long-standing friendship. However, more important to focus on were the disasters that many women, such as her mother Anne Boleyn, suffered due to being married into the royal family. Her sister Mary's marriage to Philip brought great contempt to the country, for many of her subjects despised Spain and Philip and feared that he would try to take complete control. Recalling her father's disdain for Anne of Cleves, Elizabeth also refused to enter into a foreign match with a man that she had never seen before, so that also eliminated a large number of suitors.


title: House of Tudor

text: Despite the uncertainty of Elizabeth's – and therefore the Tudors' – hold on England, she never married. The closest she came to marriage was between 1579 and 1581, when she was courted by Francis, Duke of Anjou, the son of Henry II of France and Catherine de' Medici. Despite Elizabeth's government constantly begging her to marry in the early years of her reign, it was now persuading Elizabeth not to marry the French prince, for his mother, Catherine de' Medici, was suspected of ordering the St Bartholomew's Day massacre of tens of thousands of French Protestant Huguenots in 1572. Elizabeth bowed to public feeling against the marriage, learning from the mistake her sister, Mary I, made when she married Philip II of Spain, and sent the Duke of Anjou away. Elizabeth knew that the continuation of the Tudor line was now impossible; she was forty-eight in 1581, and too old to bear children.


title: House of Tudor

text: By far the most dangerous threat to the Tudor line during Elizabeth's reign was the Spanish Armada of 1588, launched by Elizabeth's old suitor Philip II of Spain and commanded by Alonso de Guzmán El Bueno, the seventh Duke of Medina Sidonia. The Spanish invasion fleet outnumbered the English fleet's 22 galleons and 108 armed merchant ships. The Spanish lost, however, as a result of bad weather on the English Channel, poor planning and logistics, and the skills of Sir Francis Drake and Charles Howard, the second Baron Howard of Effingham (later first Earl of Nottingham).


title: House of Tudor

text: While Elizabeth declined physically with age, her running of the country continued to benefit her people. In response to famine across England due to bad harvests in the 1590s, Elizabeth introduced the poor law, allowing peasants who were too ill to work a certain amount of money from the state. All the money Elizabeth had borrowed from Parliament in 12 of the 13 parliamentary sessions was paid back; by the time of her death, Elizabeth not only had no debts, but was in credit. Elizabeth died childless at Richmond Palace on 24 March 1603. She left behind a legacy and monarchy worth noting. She had pursued her goals of being well endowed with every aspect of ruling her kingdom, and of knowing everything necessary to be an effective monarch. She took part in law, economics, politics and governmental issues both domestic and abroad. Realms that had once been strictly forbidden to the female gender had now been ruled by one.


title: House of Tudor

text: Elizabeth never named a successor. However, her chief minister Sir Robert Cecil had corresponded with the Protestant King James VI of Scotland, great-grandson of Margaret Tudor, and James's succession to the English throne was unopposed. There has been discussion over the selected heir. It has been argued that Elizabeth would have selected James because she felt guilty about what happened to his mother, her cousin. Whether this is true is unknown for certain, for Elizabeth did her best to never show emotion nor give in to claims. Elizabeth was strong and hard-headed and kept her primary goal in sight: providing the best for her people and proving those wrong who doubted her while maintaining a straight composure.


title: House of Tudor

text: The House of Tudor survives through the female line, first with the House of Stuart, which occupied the English throne for most of the following century, and then the House of Hanover, via James' granddaughter Sophia. King Charles III, a member of the House of Windsor, is a direct descendant of Henry VII.


title: House of Tudor

text: Public interference regarding the Roses dynasties was always a threat until the 17th century Stuart/Bourbon re-alignment occasioned by a series of events such as the execution of Lady Jane Grey, despite her brother-in-law, Leicester's reputation in Holland, the Rising of the North (in which the old Percy-Neville feud and even anti-Scottish sentiment was discarded on account of religion; Northern England shared the same Avignonese bias as the Scottish court, on par with Valois France and Castile, which became the backbone of the Counter-Reformation, with Protestants being solidly anti-Avignonese) and death of Elizabeth I of England without children.


title: House of Tudor

text: The Tudors made no substantial changes in their foreign policy from either Lancaster or York, whether the alliance was with Aragon or Cleves, the chief foreign enemies continuing as the Auld Alliance, but the Tudors resurrected old ecclesiastic arguments once pursued by Henry II of England and his son John of England. Yorkists were tied so much to the old order that Catholic rebellions (such as the Pilgrimage of Grace) and aspirations (exemplified by William Allen) were seen as continuing in their reactionary footsteps, when in opposition to the Tudors' reformation policies, although the Tudors were not uniformly Protestant according to Continental definition—instead were true to their Lancastrian Beaufort allegiance, in the appointment of Reginald Pole.


title: House of Tudor

text: The essential difference between the Tudors and their predecessors, is the nationalization and integration of John Wycliffe's ideas to the Church of England, holding onto the alignment of Richard II of England and Anne of Bohemia, in which Anne's Hussite brethren were in alliance to her husband's Wycliffite countrymen against the Avignon Papacy. The Tudors otherwise rejected or suppressed other religious notions, whether for the Pope's award of "Fidei Defensor" or to prevent them from being in the hands of the common laity, who might be swayed by cells of foreign Protestants, with whom they had conversation as Marian exiles, pursuing a strategy of containment which the Lancastrians had done (after being vilified by Wat Tyler), even though the phenomenon of "Lollard knights" (like John Oldcastle) had become almost a national sensation all on its own.


title: House of Tudor

text: In essence, the Tudors followed a composite of Lancastrian (the court party) and Yorkist (the church party) policies. Henry VIII tried to extend his father's balancing act between the dynasties for opportunistic interventionism in the Italian Wars, which had unfortunate consequences for his own marriages and the Papal States; the King furthermore tried to use similar tactics for the "via media" concept of Anglicanism. A further parallelism was effected by turning Ireland into a kingdom and sharing the same episcopal establishment as England, whilst enlarging England by the annexation of Wales. The progress to Northern/Roses government would thenceforth pass across the border into Scotland, in 1603, due not only to the civil warring, but also because the Tudors' own line was fragile and insecure, trying to reconcile the mortal enemies who had weakened England to the point of having to bow to new pressures, rather than dictate diplomacy on English terms.


title: House of Tudor

text: The Welsh Dragon supporter honoured the Tudors' Welsh origins. The most popular symbol of the house of Tudor was the Tudor rose (see top of page). When Henry Tudor took the crown of England from Richard III in battle, he brought about the end of the Wars of the Roses between the House of Lancaster (whose badge was a red rose) and the House of York (whose badge was a white rose). He married Elizabeth of York to bring all factions together.


title: House of Tudor

text: On his marriage, Henry adopted the Tudor Rose badge conjoining the White Rose of York and the Red Rose of Lancaster. It symbolized the Tudor's right to rule as well the uniting of the kingdom after the Wars of the Roses. It has been used by every English, then British, monarch since Henry VII as a royal badge.


title: House of Tudor

text: As noted above Tewdur or Tudor is derived from the words tud "territory" and rhi "king". Owen Tudor took it as a surname on being knighted. It is doubtful whether the Tudor kings used the name on the throne. Kings and princes were not seen as needing a name, and a " 'Tudor' name for the royal family was hardly known in the sixteenth century. The royal surname was never used in official publications, and hardly in 'histories' of various sorts before 1584. ... Monarchs were not anxious to publicize their descent in the paternal line from a Welsh adventurer, stressing instead continuity with the historic English and French royal families. Their subjects did not think of them as 'Tudors', or of themselves as 'Tudor people'". Princes and Princesses would have been known as "of England". The medieval practice of colloquially calling princes after their place birth (e.g. Henry of Bolingbroke for Henry IV or Henry of Monmouth for Henry V) was not followed. Henry VII was likely known as "Henry of Richmond" before his taking of the throne. When Richard III called him "Henry Tudor" it was to stress his Welshness and his unfitness for the throne as opposed to himself, "Richard Plantagenet", a "true" descendant of the royal line.


title: House of Tudor

text: The Tudors' claim to the throne combined the Lancastrian claim in their descent from the Beauforts and the Yorkist claim by the marriage of Henry VII to the heiress of Edward IV.


title: House of Tudor

text: Numerous feature films are based on Tudor history. Queen Elizabeth has been in special favorite for filmmakers for generations. According to Elizabeth A. Ford and Deborah C. Mitchell, images of Elizabeth I move: "fast-forward across film history, unforgettable, iconic images: the stately bearing; the red wigs; the high forehead; the long, aristocratic nose; the alabaster makeup; the pearl-drop earrings; the stiff, ornate ruffs; the fingers dripping with jewels; and the gowns, with yards and yards of white satin, purple velvet, gold, and silver ornamented and sparkling with rubies, diamonds, and more pearls. Even a schoolchild would be hard-pressed to mistake her for any other monarch."


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Harald was the third child and only son of King Olav V of Norway and Princess Märtha of Sweden. He was second in the line of succession at the time of his birth, behind his father. In 1940, as a result of the German occupation during World War II, the royal family went into exile. Harald spent part of his childhood in Sweden and the United States. He returned to Norway in 1945, and subsequently studied for periods at the University of Oslo, the Norwegian Military Academy, and Balliol College, Oxford.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Following the death of his grandfather Haakon VII in 1957, Harald became crown prince as his father became king. A keen sportsman, he represented Norway in sailing at the 1964, 1968, and 1972 Olympic Games, and later became patron of World Sailing. Harald married Sonja Haraldsen in 1968, their relationship having initially been controversial due to her status as a commoner. They have two children, Märtha Louise and Haakon. Harald became king following his father's death in 1991, with Haakon becoming his heir apparent.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Prince Harald was born at the Skaugum estate during the reign of his grandfather King Haakon VII and was baptised in the Royal Chapel of the Royal Palace in Oslo on 31 March 1937 by Bishop Johan Lunde. His godparents were: his paternal grandparents King Haakon VII and Queen Maud of Norway; his maternal grandparents Prince Carl and Princess Ingeborg of Sweden; King Leopold III of Belgium; Queen Mary and King George VI of the United Kingdom; and Crown Princess Ingrid of Denmark. His parents already had two daughters, Princess Ragnhild and Princess Astrid.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: At the time of Harald's birth, he was 2nd in line of succession to the Norwegian throne following his father, Crown Prince Olav. He is also in the line of succession to the British throne, being a descendant of Edward VII of the United Kingdom.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In 1940 the entire royal family had to flee Oslo because of the German invasion. It was deemed safer for the family to split up. The King and Crown Prince Olav would remain in Norway and the Crown Princess was to make her way to Sweden with the three children. The latter party reached Sweden on the night of 10 April, but although Crown Princess Märtha was Swedish-born, they encountered problems at the border station. According to Princess Astrid and others who were present, they were admitted only after the driver threatened to ram the border gate. Another account does not describe the escape so dramatically. However, when the King and Crown Prince inquired of Swedish foreign minister Christian Günther whether they could sleep one night in Sweden without being interned, their request was refused.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Harald spent the following days in Sälen before moving to Prince Carl Bernadotte's home in Frötuna on 16 April. On 26 April the group moved to Drottningholm in Stockholm. King Gustaf V has been accounted to have had an amicable relationship with his Norwegian guests, but the topic of the war in Norway was not to be raised. However, influential Swedish politicians, including Minister of Justice Westman, wanted the Crown Princess and Prince Harald to be sent back to Norway so he could be proclaimed King by the Germans. After the King and Crown Prince had to leave Norway on 7 June they felt Sweden might not be the best place for the rest of the family, and started planning for them to go to the United States. On 17 August the Crown Princess and her children left for the United States from Petsamo, Finland, aboard the United States Army transport ship .


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Harald, his mother, and his sisters lived in Washington, D.C. during the war, while his father, Crown Prince Olav, and his grandfather, King Haakon, stayed in London with the Norwegian government-in-exile. One of the notable events he remembers from that time is standing behind Franklin D. Roosevelt when he was sworn in for his fourth term on the South Portico of the White House in 1945. Such childhood experiences are reflected in a trace of an American accent when he speaks English. The Doris Kearns Goodwin book "No Ordinary Time: Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt and the Home Front in World War II" contains a picture of the King (then Prince) playing with FDR's dog, Fala, on the North Lawn of the White House in 1944.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Harald visited Norwegian servicemen training in the United States. The prince also made visits outside America, travelling north to visit Norwegian personnel at the training base "Little Norway" in Ontario, Canada. He attended The White Hall Country School from 1943. Prince Harald returned to Norway with his family at the war's end in 1945.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In the autumn of 1945 he was enrolled in third grade of Smestad skole as the first member of the royal family to attend a public (state) school. Amidst this when he was only 17 years old in 1954, his mother died of cancer. The Crown Princess's death was a tremendous loss for him and his family as well as for Norway, and he named his daughter Märtha to honour her memory. Four years later in 1958 he would lose his maternal grandmother Princess Ingeborg of Denmark.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In 1955 he graduated from Oslo katedralskole and in the autumn of that year, Harald began studies at the University of Oslo. He later attended the Cavalry Officers' Candidate School at Trandum, followed by enrollment at the Norwegian Military Academy, from which he graduated in 1959. On 21 September 1957 at the death of his grandfather, Harald became crown prince at the age of 20 and he attended the Council of State for the first time six days later and took the oath to the Constitution of Norway on 21 February 1958. In the same year, he also served as regent in the King's absence for the first time.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In 1960, Harald entered Balliol College, Oxford where he studied history, economics and politics. He was a keen rower during his student days at Oxford and was taught to row by fellow student and friend Nick Bevan, later a leading British school rowing coach. In 1960, he also made his first official journey abroad, visiting the United States in connection with the fiftieth anniversary of the American Scandinavian Foundation. An avid sailor, Harald represented Norway in the yachting events of the Summer Olympics in Tokyo in 1964, Mexico City in 1968, and Munich in 1972. The Crown Prince carried the Norwegian flag at the opening parade of the 1964 Summer Olympics. Harald is an honorary president of the International Soling Association.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Harald married Sonja Haraldsen at Oslo Domkirke in Oslo on 29 August 1968. The pair had dated for nine years, but Olav was reluctant to allow his son to marry a commoner. Olav only relented when Harald told his father that if he was not allowed to marry Sonja he would not marry at all. This would have ended the reign of his family and the Norwegian monarchy, as Harald was the sole heir to the throne. The couple have two children, Princess Märtha Louise and Crown Prince Haakon, heir apparent to the Norwegian throne.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: On the death of his father on 17 January 1991, Harald succeeded to the Norwegian throne. He became the first Norwegian-born monarch since Olav IV died in 1387, a gap of 604 years. Harald is the sixth King of Norway to bear that name, and the first in 855 years. The five other kings who have borne the name are Harald Fairhair, Harald Greycloak, Harald Bluetooth, Harald Hardrada, and Harald Gille. Harald Bluetooth is usually not given a number in the Norwegian list of kings, therefore Harald is 'only' numbered as "Harald V". King Harald made the decision to use his grandfather's royal motto, "Alt for Norge". The King also chose to continue the tradition of royal benediction, a tradition that had been introduced with his father, and was consecrated together with Queen Sonja in the Nidaros Cathedral on 23 June 1991.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: The reign of King Harald has been marked by modernization and reform for the Norwegian Royal family. The King has cooperated closely with Queen Sonja and the Crown Prince in making the royal household more open to the Norwegian public and the Norwegian media. King Harald's decision to accept two more commoners into the royal family, Crown Princess Mette-Marit and Ari Behn, has been interpreted as a sign of modernization and adjustment. Under King Harald and Queen Sonja's leadership, comprehensive renovation projects on the Bygdøy Royal Estate, the Royal Palace, the royal stables and Oscarshall have also taken place. The latter three have also been opened to the public and tourists. Together with Queen Sonja, the king has also for decades attempted to establish a palace museum in Oslo.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: While the Constitution vests the King with executive power, he is not politically responsible for exercising it. This is in accordance not only with provisions of the Constitution, but with conventions established since the definitive establishment of parliamentary rule in Norway in 1884. His acts are not valid without the countersignature of a member of the Council of State (cabinet)–usually the Prime Minister–and proceedings of the Council of State are signed by all of its members. Although he nominally has the power of veto, no Norwegian king has exercised it since the dissolution of the union with Sweden in 1905. Even then, the King's veto power is suspensive, not absolute as is the case with British monarchs. A royal veto can be overridden if the Storting passes the same bill following a general election.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: While the Constitution nominally vests the King with the power to appoint the government, in practice the government must maintain the confidence of Parliament. The King appoints the leader of the parliamentary bloc with the majority as prime minister. When the parliamentary situation is unclear, the King relies on the advice of the President of Parliament and the sitting prime minister. Unlike some monarchs, Harald does not have the power to dissolve Parliament; the Constitution does not allow snap elections.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: The King meets with the Council of State at the Royal Palace every Friday. He also has weekly meetings with the Prime Minister and the Minister of Foreign Affairs. He receives foreign envoys, and formally opens parliament every October delivering a speech from the throne during each opening. He travels extensively throughout Norway and makes official state visits to other countries, as well as receiving and hosting guests.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Until 2012, the King of Norway was, according to the constitution, the formal head of the Church of Norway. The constitutional amendment of 21 May 2012 made the King no longer the formal head, but he is still required to be of the Evangelical Lutheran religion.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: On 8 May 2018, the King's constitutional status as holy was dissolved, while leaving his sovereign immunity intact.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In 1994, both the King and Crown Prince Haakon played roles during the opening ceremony of the Lillehammer Olympics. The King opened the games, while the Crown Prince lit the cauldron, paying tribute to both the King and his grandfather as Olympians. The King has also represented Norway at opening ceremonies of Olympic Games, among them Torino and Beijing. However, he wasn't present in Vancouver; the Crown Prince attended instead, with the King and Queen attending later in the games.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: With his sailing crew he won World Championship bronze, silver and gold medals, in 1988, 1982 and 1987, respectively. In July 2005, the King and his crew aboard the royal sailboat "Fram XV" won the gold medal at the European Championships in Sweden. In the 2007 World Championship the King came in sixth place.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: King Harald's leadership during Norwegian national crises, such as the New Year's Day Storm, the landslide in Gjerdum and particularly the 2011 attacks, has been met with both national and international acclaim.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In 2015, he became the world's first reigning monarch to visit Antarctica, specifically the Norwegian dependency Queen Maud Land. In 2016, King Harald V competed with a team for the sailing World Championships on Lake Ontario, Toronto. The king came second in the classic fleet category. He was dubbed "Sailor-King" by Canada's "National Post" as he slept on board his yacht "Sira".


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In 2016 Harald, in a speech marking 25 years on the throne, sought to unify Norwegians coming from Afghanistan and Pakistan as well as "girls who love girls, boys who love boys and girls and boys who love each other."


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Since the start of the twenty-first century King Harald has been unable to perform his duties as sovereign due to ill health on a few occasions: from December 2003 to mid-April 2004 due to urinary bladder cancer, from April to early June 2005 due to aortic stenosis, and in 2020 he was in hospital for cardiac surgery (replacement of a heart valve). Crown Prince Haakon served as the country's regent on these occasions, including giving the King's Speech at the State opening of parliament in 2020.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: When the King and Queen turned 80 years old in 2017, the King decided to open the former royal stables to the public as a gift to his wife, the Queen. The new venue was named The Queen Sonja Art Stable and is the first institution owned by the royal family which is permanently open to the public. King Harald was made Name of the Year by the newspaper "VG" in 2017.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: On 17 January 2021, King Harald celebrated 30 years on the throne of Norway. On 11 September 2022, King Harald visited Denmark to celebrate the Golden Jubilee of Queen Margrethe II of Denmark.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: The King is a four-star general, an admiral, and formally the Supreme Commander of the Norwegian Armed Forces. The infantry battalion His Majesty the King's Guard are considered the King's and the Royal Family's bodyguards. They guard the Royal residences, including the Royal Palace, the Crown Prince Residence at Skaugum, and the Royal Mausoleum at Akershus Castle.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: The King is Grand Master of the Royal Norwegian Order of St. Olav and the Royal Norwegian Order of Merit.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: In the British Army, Harald V was the final Colonel-in-Chief of the Green Howards. He is also an honorary Colonel in the British Royal Marines. He is patron of the Anglo-Norse Society in London, formerly together with Queen Elizabeth II, his second cousin. Harald is in the line of succession to the British throne, because of his descent from King Edward VII of the United Kingdom. He is a Stranger Knight of the Garter, an Honorary Knight Grand Cross of the Royal Victorian Order, and a Recipient of the Royal Victorian Chain, as well as numerous other orders of chivalry.


title: Harald V of Norway

text: Harald V received an honorary degree of Doctor of Civil Law from Oxford University in 2006 (as did his father, King Olav, in 1937, and his grandfather, King Haakon, in 1943). The King also received honorary doctorates from Heriot-Watt University in Scotland in 1994, the University of Strathclyde in Scotland in 1985, Waseda University in Japan in 2001, and Pacific Lutheran University in Tacoma, Washington, in 2015. He is also an honorary fellow at Balliol College, Oxford.