Henry VIII and Martin Luther: The Second Controversy, 1525-1527

✍ Scribed by Richard Rex

• Publisher: Boydell Press
• Year: 2021
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 322
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

This book presents a modern critical edition of Henry VIII's second published work against Martin Luther. This open letter to Luther, printed at the king's command in December 1526, was in reply to a private letter addressed to him by Luther the previous year. Its particular interest lies in the fact that, unlike his better known Assertion of the Seven Sacraments, published five years before, Henry's open letter was released not only in Latin but also in an official English translation, with a special English preface added by the king for the edification of his subjects. This edition thus enables modern readers to hear what Henry had to say about Luther in his own words, and how he wanted his subjects to regard the German heresiarch.

This critical edition is based on a previously unrecognised presentation manuscript which furnishes the earliest surviving text of both letters. In addition, it offers editions and new translations of a range of related texts, including Luther's reply to Henry and further contributions to the burgeoning controversy from several of the most prominent Catholic opponents of Luther in Europe. For Henry's letter, like his earlier book, became for a while a European sensation, reprinted in towns and cities from Cologne to Cracow. This fully annotated edition includes a substantial introduction which for the first time tells the full history of Henry's second controversy with Luther, and which sets that story in the broader context of the lengthy and fractious relationship between the two men from the time of Luther's emergence in 1517 until his death in 1546.

RICHARD REX is Professor of Reformation History at the University of Cambridge.

✦ Table of Contents

Contents
Preface
Editorial Conventions
Abbreviations
Introduction
Early Editions of Martin Luther’s Letter and Henry VIII’s Response
Martin Luther’s Letter to Henry VIII
Henry VIII’s Response to Luther’s Lettera
Marginalia from the Early Latin Editions
Prologue to Pynson’s Edition
Epigraph to Pynson’s Edition
Henry VIII’s Preface to the English Translation
The Archbishop of Mainz’s Letter to Henry VIII
Hieronymus Emser’s Preface to his German Translation
Martin Luther’s Response to Emser’s Edition (in Cochlaeus’s Latin Translation)
Luther’s Response to Henry VIII: Martin Luther’s Response to the Title of the Insulting Text of the King of England
Hieronymus Emser’s Confession
Peter Quentell’s Preface to his First Editiona
Leonard Cox’s Preface to the Cracow Edition (1527)
Stanislaus Hosius’s Epigraph to the Cracow Editiona
Johannes Eck’s Preface to the Ingolstadt Editiona
Duke George of Saxony’s Letter to Henry VIIIa
Ortwin Gratius’s Preface to the Second Cologne Edition
Johannes Cochlaeus’s Admonition to the Readera
Johannes Cochlaeus’s Brief Discussion ofLuther’s Response
Ortwin Gratius’s Preface to the Variant Cologne Edition
Johannes Cochlaeus’s Preface to the VariantCologne Edition
Clement VII’s Preface to the Roman Edition
Commendatory Verses in the Roman Edition
Johann Fabri’s Preface to his Answer toLuther’s Response
Juan Luis Vives’s Letter to Henry VIII
Select Bibliography
Index of Names, Places, and Topics
Index of Biblical Texts and References