After Dark: Myths, Misdeeds & the Paranormal - Final Days of Sir Walter Raleigh

Episode Date: June 9, 2025

'Strike, man, strike!' were the last words of Sir Walter Raleigh as his neck lay on the block. After thirteen years in the Tower of London, (multiple) expeditions to find a city of gold, and a plot to kill the king, Walter Raleigh finally met his end. Maddy Pelling tells Anthony Delaney the story of how it all played out.Edited by Tomos Delargy. Research by Phoebe Joyce. Produced by Freddy Chick. Senior Producer is Charlotte Long.You can now watch After Dark on Youtube: www.youtube.com/@afterdarkhistoryhitSign up to History Hit for hundreds of hours of original documentaries, with a new release every week and ad-free podcasts. Sign up at https://www.historyhit.com/subscribe.  You can take part in our listener survey here.All music from Epidemic Sounds.

Hi, we're your hosts, Anthony Delaney and Maddie Pelling. And if you would like After Dark myths, misdeeds and the paranormal ad free and get early access, sign up to History Hit. With a History Hit subscription, you can also watch hundreds of hours of original documentaries with top history presenters and enjoy a new release every week. Sign up now by visiting historyhit.com forward slash subscribe. Hello and welcome to After Dark. I'm Anthony. And I'm Maddie. And today we are talking about one of the icons of Tudor and then Stuart England. And he's somebody who is a lot of things to a lot

of different people. Is he a spymaster? Is he the lover of a queen? Is he the man who invented potatoes and did some weird cloak thing to attract the attention of Elizabeth I? In this episode, we are, of course, talking about Sir Walter Raleigh, and more to the point, how he met his end. We begin many years after the end has been and gone, after the axe had fallen, Bess Raleigh, nay Throckmorton, is in her sixties now. She's asleep in her grand bedchamber dreaming of him again. They're sailing up the river through a wild jungle in search of a golden city, with him reeling off poems as he goes, that twinkle in his

eye. Then comes the pain of waking, remembering. Time to get ready for the day. But before she calls her attendants, she goes to the cupboard beside her bed, where she keeps her most precious things. She pulls out a large red bag. She feels its familiar weight and opens it. This part is hard to understand, but it is true. Inside is the embalmed head of her late husband Sir Walter Raleigh. It's a wizened thing now, but for Bess, it still resembles her life's love. This is the story of that head in a bag, how it was separated from the shoulders that carried it, how its lips spoke poetry, how its eyes looked on queens, how its ears heard the sounds of Venezuelan jungles, how its nostrils billowed

out tobacco smoke, how its ears lent themselves so faithfully to a treasonous plot against the King. Welcome to After Dark. This is the final days of Sir Walter Raleigh. Hello, and welcome to After Dark. I'm Anthony. And I am Maddie. And we are in Final Days territory once more. We have had a lot of Final Days now. I love this series so much. I do. Yeah, I like it. Who have we had? We had George III.

One of my faves. We've had Lady Jane Grey. Anne Boleyn. Anne Boleyn. Thomas Cromwell. We've done them all. We've done Queen Victoria. We did a funeral. Have we done the final days? Does that count? Sure.

Unclear. I mean, there's still so many to go. And I will say- Everybody died. Everybody in history is dead, funnily enough. If you have suggestions for the final days series, do write in because we do love to hear the people in history that you are obsessed with that you want to know more about, whose deaths are particularly interesting, unusual, or that you just want to know a bit more information about them. We love to hear from you, so do write in at afterdarkethistoryhit.com. No, what is it?

Afterdarkethistoryhit.com. It is? Yes. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I'm extremely tired in the final days of writing a book and the brain's not braining. Well, talk about the final days of Sir Walter Raleigh then, because we have somebody who, I'm just going to like pick out some of the things that I think I know of him. So we have diplomat, we have courtier, we have potential love interest, I think. There's some rumors,

I'm sure probably not true around that of Queen Elizabeth I. Potato bringer to Europe, something with tobacco, I guess, bringer of tobacco as well. That cloak thing that you did for Elizabeth. Mother of Dragons. Bringer of Tobacco. And Spice Girl. Spy Spice is what he is. Because he was supposedly a potential spy as well, right?

He's a bill of bloody everything. And I just wonder how much... And then you're talking about this incredible imagery that you were just talking about there, about this wizened head in a bag. And so we're getting, I know we're into myth-making territory here because there's a head in a goddamn bag. So like, before we go to Raleigh himself, let's do the usual thing where we set up the time period. So give us an idea of the time into which Raleigh is born into. This is his world. Yeah. So he has a really interesting life that spans a lot of English history.

So he's born around about 1553. We aren't exactly sure, but that's under the reign of Mary the First. And he dies age 65 in 1618 under the reign of James the First and Sixth. So quite a life. And obviously there's Elizabeth in between that. Events, themes, big things happening during his lifetime. 1588, we've got the Spanish Armada defeated. He is very much present and involved for that. We've got the Elizabethan Golden Age off theatre. We've got Shakespeare, we've got Kit Marlowe,

we've got Johnson, we've got the play houses absolutely ruling the roost in terms of the London landscape, entertainment, politics, all of that going on. We've got Sir Francis Drake who circumnavigates the globe. So there's lots of global travel that going on. We've got Sir Francis Drake, who circumnavigates the globe. So there's lots of global travel. With that, we've got colonialism. We've got the beginning of the transatlantic slave trade, which has expanded first in Africa. And then enslaved human beings are brought to the Americas to aid European, not just English, but European exploits there as well. Across Europe, we've got the Renaissance in full swing. We've got art, we've got poetry, we've got music. This is a time of huge change. And within

that, Sir Walter Raleigh, like I say, he is a different thing to different people. He is a villain, he's a hero, he's a character, as well as an actual person. For some, he's a head in a bag. Let's get into it. I want you to describe him, please. Have a painting in front of me. And let's just start with the physical presence, the man himself, and then we can expand into some of the storytelling and the myth that surrounds him. Okay. So if you imagine what you imagine Shakespeare to be in your head, that's very much what we are working with here.

He's like a fancy Shakespeare. Yeah, he is. He's very much what we are working with here. We have- He's like a fancy Shakespeare. Yeah, he is. He's like a fancy Shakespeare. Literally. He's got a lovely pointy beard. He's got a slightly receding hairline in this image. He's young in this.

I would say he's in his twenties or thirties. And he's got a lovely pearl earring in one of his ears. He's looking directly at us. Looks quite handsome actually. He's really handsome. Mm-hmm. Lovely white silk clothing. And then a cape to go with that, which is quite detailed and has some fur on there too. So this is showing his wealth, his status, his influence. He

is a striking person. He's got the delicate hands of a courtier in there as well. There's the hint under his cloak as well of the hilt of a dagger or a sword. Very much the mark of an elite gentleman to carry such a weapon. So he is quite a striking figure. He is somebody who you would take notice of, I think. Yeah, definitely. And you know, this is a painting, not a photograph, so it comes with its own mythologies and meanings applied over the top of the man himself.

But I think it gives us a good impression of who he was. As you mentioned, a courtier. He's very important. He's quite glitzy and glamorous. He had a bit of a polymath career. He started as a soldier, as a teenager. He fought with the Huguenots in France against Catholic oppression there by his early 20s. He's working for Elizabeth I and he helps defend against the Spanish in 1588 with the Armada and he continues to fight the Spanish at sea throughout the 1590s. And he rises up in her reign and she takes a lot of notice of him. She becomes potentially romantically interested in him. What I think

is really interesting is that he is a very sort of self-aware, performative person. He knows how to craft his own image and how to garner favour. And at the court of Elizabeth, he performs courtly love. He writes her poetry. He is seen as being quite close to her. So he's introduced to her by his great aunt called Cat Ashley. Sounds like a very modern name, Auntie Cat, who is Elizabeth's governess and a very close companion in her own right. And so he gets to be close to the Queen, the personage of the Queen, which of course is a very sort of privileged thing. He compares her in writing to the goddess Diana when the colony of Virginia is founded. He of course names it after the queen herself, the Virgin Queen.

He is keen to be noticed by her to rise up, to put himself in her path. Literally in some cases, and is this true or not? Of course, one of the big stories that we have about him is that he takes his cloak off on a rainy day and he puts it over a puddle so that the queen doesn't have to tread in the water. First of all, how would that work? Because surely the puddle would just be absorbed by the cloak, it would have to be a very thick cloak. There is no contemporary evidence to suggest this is true, but one of his biographers, Anna Beer, does say that it really fits with his sort of flamboyant,

self-conscious image. He's very much kind of performing all of the time. So I don't think he didn't do it, but... Yeah, I know what you mean. It fits the picture that we want to communicate, basically, whether he did or he didn't. Exactly. So that's one side of him. The other side is Sir Walter Raleigh, the colonist. This is how I would know him best, I think. Okay. So he, whilst he never sets foot in North America himself, he spends a lot of time in South America. We're going to hear more about his exploits there. He spends a

lot of time in Ireland as well. He puts down the Desmond rebellions. That's a rebellion of Irish nobles helped by the Italians and Spanish, including, by the way, sanctioning the execution of 600 of those people. So he's not well liked in Ireland. He's not one of those names. No, he's really not. He is gifted land there and is a landlord for, I think, about 20 years, a bit of land called the Munster Plantation. So he's a very different thing to the people living under his rule and the consequences of his actions there.

He is often credited with bringing the potato to Ireland, although it's more likely it's Ireland's trade with Spain that introduces them. But that's one of the things that he is most associated with. Quickfire quiz. Oh God. What is the other product that he's most- I do know. Okay.

Tobacco. Tobacco, yes. So it is thought that he brings tobacco back during his time in South America. Love this story and story absolutely underlined here again, is this true, is this not true? That at one point, one of his servants sees him lighting up the tobacco pipe and the servant thinks that Sir Walter Raleigh is setting fire to himself and he throws water over him, which I just love. But he brings it back to the Elizabethan court and it becomes this incredibly popular thing. So he does do that. So he is, he does introduce that.

Maybe didn't bring potatoes to Ireland, but he does bring tobacco to England. The other thing, and the thing that's important for our story here, is that he goes after the lost city of gold, El Dorado. Did you ever see that film? No. El Dorado, El Dorado. Was it a Disney? It was a cartoon.

It was so good. Lots of inappropriately sexy characters in that. Take a look at yourself, whoever made that. But great. This has gone on a tangent. Yeah. It was one of my favourite films growing up. It was great. It's like an adventure.

Two Spanish men go searching for gold. And come a cropper and learn the moral of life along the way, of course. Anyway. Is this what happened to Walter Ali? Sadly, not so much. Oh. It would not work out like that for him. He leads the expedition set in 1595 and then again, under James, importantly,

spoiler alert, he does not find the city of gold either of those two times. Funny that. Yeah, funny, but it will prove part of his downfall. So he has this extraordinary career. He has these big highs, these moments of climbing to the top, being close to the queen, being potentially romantically involved with her, at least on a performative level, if not a physical level. But he is eventually sent to the tower, first of all under Elizabeth and then again later under James. So I want to talk about both of these times. The first time he makes a wrong move. So he's got all this strategizing and this he's very sort of PR conscious.

And this is in Elizabeth's reign first. It is. But he makes a catastrophic error that really rocks that relationship with the Queen and that is that in 1591, he gets secretly married to Bess, who we heard about at the beginning. This is Beth Throckmorton, who is a lady in waiting to the Queen. And of course, anyone in the Royal Court needs the Queen's permission to marry, especially a lady-in-waiting. And yeah, it's not good. The Queen's kind of pissed off about it. Both Sir Walter and Bess are sent to the Tower.

Tragically. So they have a newborn son at this point. So boring. I mean, I don't mean what you're saying, what you're saying is interesting. Oh yeah, sorry. Well, sorry, no. I'll just goodbye. It's just so boring of Elizabeth. I'm just like, cop on to yourself. You have so much to be getting on with. Don't just be jealous. And it suggests as well that she was kind of romantically involved with him, right? That she does feel betrayed. Or he's interested. Yeah. I mean, hell hath no fury, as Shakespeare said, like a woman scorned.

Copy that von, Lizzie. And the consequences are that, so they've just had a newborn baby when they go to the tower, and the baby dies of plague. So I hope Elizabeth felt bad about that. I bet she didn't. Bet she didn't care. Well, she did, potentially, because they were released after the baby died. And then she's like, right, you can go, but, prime city of gold. So, this is the first expedition, and he goes to what is now Venezuela. And this is where the mythology really starts

to build on him. And it's very much his own work, the mythology at the beginning. So he goes, of course he does not find the city of gold. It's a failure. He's like, that's not good. This has not gone well. I want to show you a picture though of, this is an engraving, an illustration from a book that Sir Walter Raleigh penned himself about this first expedition to El Dorado. And I think it's fair to say in this version of the story, it wasn't a failure. So please describe what is going on in what is a completely wild image. This part of my eyesight is absolutely abysmal, more to the point. Right. So in the bottom left-hand

corner of the image, we have, who I presume upfront is Raleigh with a troop of men behind him. And they are in a kind of a river. And by kind of a river, I mean literally a river. And just in front of them, a sea serpent type thing, quite a large beast of a thing, is eating a naked man. There's an arse out of the water there. And then there are other sea beasts all within that water. There's another, oh, there's loads of people in little boats following them down as well. I see some monkeys on the, like it's very much we're in a foreign land, the sun is shining. Actually, that sun is like blazing up there in the sky. Presumably that's like the route to El Dorado.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. The golden sun. Guys, it's so much warmer here than it is in England. But either way, the sun is blazing up there. It's actually quite an interesting image, there's a lot going on, hence the need for glasses. Yeah, there's sea serpents, or river serpents I suppose. Yeah, there's parrots.

There's a stag. What is that behind? Is that a... Like a dodo or something. Like a turkeyag. What is that behind? Is that a... Like a dodo or something. Like a turkey or a peacock or something? A dodo. Yeah, it's completely wild. You know, this is a depiction of like a far off, mystical land. The only year he's been to look at all the wonders he did discover. Don't look over there at the fact that I didn't find the City

of Gold. Look over here at the sea surface. Obsessed. Land a Viking longship on island shores. Scramble over the dunes of ancient Egypt and avoid the Poisoners' Cup in Renaissance Florence. Each week on Echoes of History, we uncover the epic stories that inspire Assassin's Creed. We're stepping into feudal Japan in our special series, Chasing Shadows,

where samurai warlords and shinobi spies teach us the tactics and skills needed, not only to survive, but to conquer. Whether you're preparing for Assassin's Creed Shadows, or fascinated by history and great stories, listen to Echoes of History, a Ubisoft podcast brought to you by History But, Kameer, is the fact that he was put in the tower for, well, getting married essentially, and then El Dorado, did she punish him when he came back and hadn't found it, or no? No. So he writes her a poem called Cynthia, and this is, you know, a sort of love letter to her,

I suppose. It's a way of trying to regain favour and be like, Oh, mighty queen, you know, big fan. And she sort of lets him off, but their relationship is irrevocably damaged. There's not really a way back from that, but he's escaped the tower. He's been to El Dorado. He tried his best and he gets to live the rest of his life for now. However, Elizabeth dies. James the sixth and first comes to the throne in 1603 and Raleigh is not a fan. He's not a fan and also James is not a fan of him. So James

already has his favorites. He has his court that he brings down to London with him and Raleigh's not invited to be part of that. There is a plot called the main plot. The main, yeah, as in side plot, main plot. In 1603, when James comes to the throne, which is intended to remove James and to put someone called Arabella Stuart on the throne, which I know very little about her. I want to know more. That's another episode. Let's do that. This is a plot that's backed by Spain to get rid of the King. So Raleigh is implicated. He is sent to the tower, but it's not clear if he's guilty or not. A death sentence is passed on him, but then it's reduced to imprisonment.

So it's kind of, the tower becomes almost like a holding pen for James. He's like, just stick that guy in there until I can work out if he's safe or not, if he was actually involved. They did peak too soon though, calling the main plot the main plot, because two years later the gunpowder plot happened. So there was what is now, you know, possibly considered the main plot. And what's amazing is that while Raleigh is in the tower, he very likely, based on the geography of that site, saw Guy Fawkes being brought in for torture to the tower. He very likely, based on the geography of that site, saw Guy Fawkes being

brought in for torture to the tower. Which just feels like an amazing crossover moment because I associate Raleigh with Elizabeth I and that slightly earlier period. And yet here are two men, very different ages, in this same crossing over dramatic moment of history. Yeah, I feel like we need, that'd be like such a great opening to a TV show, wouldn't it? That moment. And then you don't see Raleigh ever again, it's just that one scene he gets. But tell me this, how long is he in there for, then? Because he doesn't die until later into the 17th century. Yeah, so he's in the tower, because James can't work out what to do with him. He's in the tower for 13 years. Oh my. During which time, obviously, Guy Fawkes is long.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. It's not quite what you'd expect though, he's not in a cell with straw on the floor shackled to the wall. He gets to live a reasonably comfortable life. Which is not unusual. By the standards of being imprisoned in the Tower of London. It's not unusual. So, by the way, he has to pay for living there as well. So, it's not great. But he gets two floors of the garden

tower there and he is allowed three servants with him. He's also allowed his wife, Bess, who I'm sure was not thrilled about having to go and live in the Tower of London. He gets up to all kinds of activities when he's there, not least of which is procreating. They have another son called Karoo. So that happens. So, you know, it's not all misery. Life is going on basically in some aspects. Yeah, exactly. The other thing that he does, so two things which so speak to his personality. One is that he comes up with something called the great cordial, which is a cure all remedy, which has 40 ingredients in. And he says it's from his time in South America, and is it?

Question mark. And he just announces that he's made this cordial. He's a quack doctor all of a sudden now. I guess he's got a lot of time in his hands. These are like lockdown activities, aren't they? It was either that or sourdough. He was like, oh, I need to find something to do. The other thing he does, and I love this, is he writes a text called The History of

the World, and it's really anti-monarchist and James obviously gets angry about it. Now this is just a little sidebar, but in the 17th century, well, we're into the 17th century now, but in the later 17th century, Oliver Cromwell gives Raleigh's History of the World to his son to read. Yeah, we don't like him either. Cromwell, I mean. So that makes sense. Yeah, not a great track record in Ireland.

But fascinating. Yeah, yeah. That there's that legacy. Yeah, yeah. So he's in the tower for 13 years, but he is going to get executed. So why is he executed is the question. Why can't he go on happily living with his wife, his little son, and his three servants in the garden tower?

He's not causing any problems to anyone apart from proclaiming that he's made medical advancements and writing a history of the world. I guess he needs an income, right? So like, he has to pay for his upkeep in the tower. So he's going to need some form of income, right? A book, fine. So James finally decides what to do with him. And I think this is a really canny move by James because I think really he wants to get rid of him. And so, he says, you can go out of the tower, but once again, you have to go and find Eldorado. Stop. Stop going on about Eldorado.

Why doesn't he just go away and not come back then? Why does he come back? Oh my god. Idiot. He is not pardoned from being involved in the main plot, that turned out not to be the main plot. But he does, he goes again. And of course, does he find El Dorado? No, he doesn't. But not only this, when James is saying you've got to go, James is like, but when you go, do not pick a fight with the Spanish who are there. It's very important to me that we maintain peace with the Spanish.

You will not aggravate. Why would he pick a fight with the Spanish? That feels loaded. Raleigh's like, guys, on the ship over, he's like, gather him. We are not picking a fight with the Spanish, okay? Cut to, they get there, his men, against his orders, pick a fight with the Spanish. So, he has to come back to Britain, to England. So I wouldn't come back. That'd be me done there. I'd be like, I live here now. Absolutely. Why doesn't he just sail somewhere else? Just live a nice little life in Venezuela.

No. But he comes back. He's like, didn't find the city, picked a fight with Spanish. James is like, there's only one thing to do here. Yeah. You're getting evicted. Yeah. You're getting evicted and your head is getting severed from your body. So that's that. He is executed on the 29th of October, 1618 in Old Palace Yard in the Palace of Westminster. Do you know anything about his execution? Because there's a famous line that he supposedly said. Do I know anything? Something about like, oh, like strike quick man or something like

that, right? Yeah. So he's supposed to have shouted strike man, strike to the executioner holding an axe. We actually have some of his execution speech and I'm going to read it to you because I think, and again, we're taking this with a giant pinch of Venezuelan salt, but I think this tells us so much about who he was perceived to be and who he tried to project to the world. So this is what he's supposed to have said. I thank God of his infinite goodness that he has vouchsafed me to die in the light and

not in darkness. One thing I desire to be resolved of, let my accuser come face to face and be deposed. Were these but true laws, they would be satisfied. But this is the law. The king will have it so, and the law is not to dispute with the king. I forgive all men of the world who have wronged me, even my greatest enemies. I desire you to pray for me, and I forgive the world. This," and he points to the axe, "'is a sharp medicine, but it is a physician for all diseases.' He asks to see the axe, and he runs his finger along the edge and supposedly smiles and says, it is a sharp medicine. Then kneels down to the block, puts

his head on it, raises his head slightly to turn to the executioner, and supposedly says, strike man, strike. Jamie Mack is a drama queen. Yeah, absolutely drama queen. But then you did say he always had that sense of self-fashioning and whatever else. But you know what's striking about that? Usually when people come to their final, we've heard so many in these final days episodes or whatever.

Well I'm always haunted by Anne Boleyn looking up to see at the last minute if Henry's going to grant her a reprieve and the desperation of that and really believing to your very last that it's okay, he'll save me, it's going to be fine. And he doesn't. No, he doesn't. But there's also this thing, usually they're going, oh, and the king is very good. And the king's a great fellow altogether. And the king, the king, the king.

This is some shade. He's like, what the hell is this? Like, okay, it's the law, but the law is wrong, essentially, is what he's kind of going. I think also, there's a line in here for me when he says, he's thanking God, and he says, God has vouchsafed me to die in the light and not in the darkness. And I think that tells us something about why he's come back to England actually, that it's perceived as this Christian place. It's where he belongs.

It's where he's made his fame and he wants to come back and to live out his fate, whatever it is. He doesn't want to die far from home in a land that's considered lesser than England itself, even if he's found the city of gold, which of course he doesn't. So it's absolutely fascinating, but I think he's found the city of gold, which of course he doesn't. So, he's absolutely fascinating, but I think he's such an interesting figure and there are so many layers of myth and reality. Has it changed your perception of him to hear this?

No, because I'm Irish. But what it has done, it's focused in on a very unusual, you know, this is the Final Days series, and what it's done is it's highlighted a very unusual pattern in one's final days, even for the Stuart period as we are in now. Where we are at once in Venezuela and we're exploring the world, and we are part of this expansion of empire, or the attempted expanding empire. And just having come from the tower, and then on the scaffold.

It's a very unusual sequence of events, because usually what we get is, there's a crime being committed, that person's being held for X amount of time, and then they're executed. Or this person has a great life, they start to fall ill, they're ill for quite some time, and then they die. And it could be quite remarkable the ways in which they die, gruesome or whatever. Firstly, there was a way out, like we keep saying, he didn't have to come back. Although that's a really good point, I think, that you made about ah yes, this is God's land. It gives us such insight into that mindset of the late 16th and early 17th century,

and how Raleigh saw his place in the world. That he's so full of his sense of self-importance, and the role that he's played in England's history in expanding its empire, in putting down its enemies, that of course he goes back to the center of things. He's not going to live out his days on a little desert island somewhere. ALICE The other thing that's really interesting, I think, is that he voices these ideas of a lack of trust and support and dedication and loyalty to the new Stuart monarch. And that is something that never really leaves, despite the fact that obviously then we go into Charles I, who loses his head, we have the restoration. Okay, things are not so bad. Then we come to James again.

This is a tumultuous royal house that comes into being after Elizabeth's death. And there are so many plots to try and kill James. Not just the gunpowder plot and the quote unquote main plot. There are so many attempts. I think Raleigh for me is that fascinating thing of someone who lives over these multiple reigns, these different eras. He feels almost anachronistic coming within the same spaces as Guy Fawkes, but his life really, if you zoom out and look at it in its entirety, it tells you so much about the changing attitudes to the empire, what the ambitions were, how the court operated

and didn't operate, how you could garner enormous favor, but you could equally self-sabotage or you could just fall out of favor, you could make a mistake. The strategizing and the careful manipulation of that and how it works so well with one monarch because of the dynamic between the two of them, right? Because there's this potential romantic spark or some affection or attraction or something, and then that doesn't work with James, even though we know that James has male lovers. Yeah, absolutely. So that's, you know, but there's not a meeting of minds or personalities there.

There's nothing. James is like, I don't need you. I'm not interested. You represent the old world that I'm trying to get rid of. Raleigh for James is Elizabeth. He's Elizabeth Reign, Elizabeth's right hand, the guy who battered away the Spanish armada, et cetera. He wants to get rid of him. Raleigh weathers all of these storms and becomes these different things to different people. In some ways, he's kind of an empty vessel. He's just someone who puts on lots of different masks himself, but equally, people dress him up in their own minds as different things.

AC And here's the thing. I've thought before when we're talking about Tom's Cromwell, for instance, that the Tudor period, unlike, say, from the Georgian period onwards, so the Tudor and Stuart period, gives people an opportunity often to rise socially. That is not necessarily available after the kind of 1750s, let's say. But it also gives people the chance to fall dramatically. If it's going to happen at one side, it can happen at the other side. And this, if Cromwell's a good example of, okay, Cromwell falls too, but if Cromwell's a good example of how the rise can happen, this is a really good example of that fall. Yeah. And the fact that the people living in this moment operating within it, they understand that.

They know that there is a fall that follows the rise, most likely, and that it can happen like that. That's the world they live in. Well, if you enjoyed this episode, you can go back and watch or listen to other final days. As we say, we've got George III on there, we've got Anne Boleyn, we've got Thomas Cromwell. We might have Queen Victoria. So if you've enjoyed, do follow us wherever you get your podcasts, subscribe if you're watching on YouTube and leave us a review that will bring other people to the After

Dark family because we very much enjoy doing this for you guys and we know that you guys love it too. So thank you so much for bearing with us all of these episodes that we've done at this point. We must be heading for 200, Maddie, right? Bearing with us. Is it a chore to listen? Not a chore, but you know, contributing. Thank you for coming on the journey is what Anthony means.

That's what I mean. Until next time, happy listening. you