Prodigy house said to be Henry VII's Richmond Palace, completed in 1501 but now destroyed. But as a royal palace it does not strictly fit the definition. Hampton Court Palace, built by Cardinal Wolsey but taken over by the king on his fall, is certainly an example. The trend continued through the reigns of Henry VIII, Elizabeth, and into the reign of James I, when it reached its height. Henry was a prolific builder himself, though little of his work survives, but the prudent Elizabeth (like her siblings) built nothing herself, instead encouraging her courtiers to "...build on a scale which in
Henry VIII (opera) Henry VIII (opera) Henry VIII is an opera in four acts by Camille Saint-Saëns, from a libretto by Léonce Détroyat and Armand Silvestre, based on "El cisma en Inglaterra" "(The schism in England)" by Pedro Calderón de la Barca. The action covers the period in Henry VIII's life when the king was attempting to divorce Queen Catherine of Aragon in favour of marrying Anne Boleyn, a move rejected by the Church. In an effort to evoke the historical context, Saint-Saëns researched English music from the period and incorporated several English, Scottish, and Irish folk melodies into his score, as well