Our Lady of Ipswich was a popular English Marian shrine before the English Reformation. Among Marian shrines, only the shrine at Walsingham attracted more visitors.
Tudor English pilgrim badge with "M" for Mary
St. Mary at the Elms church
A modern replica of Our Lady of Ipswich at Saint Pancras Church, Ipswich
The English Reformation took place in 16th-century England when the Church of England was forced by its monarchs and elites to break away from the authority of the pope and the Catholic Church. These events were part of the wider European Reformation, a religious and political movement that affected the practice of Christianity in Western and Central Europe.
King Henry VIII initiated the separation of the Church of England from the Roman Catholic Church. Portrait by Hans Holbein the Younger. Thyssen-Bornemisza Museum, Madrid.
The Tyndale Bible was the basis for later English translations.
Catherine of Aragon, Henry VIII's first wife. Attributed to Joannes Corvus, National Portrait Gallery, London.
Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII's second wife, by an unknown artist. National Portrait Gallery, London.