Staying with the subject of King Henry VIII the Historic Royal Palaces website for Hampton Court recently had a piece about the medicines and ointments made for the King in his later years. Some indeed he devised himself - the ultimate treat perhaps for the privileged invalid or hypochondriac. It is based on research into a British Library manuscript - MS Sloan 1047 - which contains a wide range of these potions amounting to almost 200 recipes.
The article can be read at The Weird and Wonderful Medicines of Henry VIII
There is a longer article about the King and his use and patronage of “physik” and medicine in an academic paper ‘King Henry VIII’s Medical World’ which can be read at elizabethhurrenfinal
Recent studies of the later years of his reign have discussed and speculated about the King’s ailments, their cause and the impact they had on his ability to exercise authority and indeed his judgment in that period of shifting political, religious and diplomatic patterns. The health of rulers could then, and sometimes still, have a very considerable impact on the lives of those they ruled.
I have myself posted previously, in 2020, about MS Sloan 1047 in The medicinal interests of King Henry VIII
Similar material survives from the records of the royal apothecary to King Henry’s maternal grandfather King Edward IV, a man whom he resembled in many ways - most of them unattractive. That manuscript evidence also includes cosmetics used by courtiers such as the Duke of Buckingham. It is cited and discussed in Thomas Penn’s very readable book The Brothers York: An English Tragedy
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