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TIME: Almanac 1990
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1990 Time Magazine Compact Almanac, The (1991)(Time).iso
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091189
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09118900.029
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1990-09-17
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WORLD, Page 51World NotesGASTRONOMYHenry VIII -- Malnourished?
His appetite for women and food is legendary, but despite his
royal girth, Henry VIII may have died from malnutrition. According
to historian Susan Maclean Kybett, it was not syphilis, as once
commonly believed, but a chronic lack of vitamin C that killed the
King in 1547 at age 55. Or, as the London Guardian so delicately
put it, "Henry was a scurvy knave."
In the current issue of the British monthly History Today,
Kybett writes that Henry's frequent colds, constipation, bloated
body, collapsed nose, bad breath, ulcerated legs and wild mood
swings are all symptoms of scurvy. The affliction was common in
Tudor England, where fruits and vegetables were not only scarce but
also shunned by the upper classes as unfit to eat. Kybett, who is
writing a book about scurvy down through the ages, contends that
the deficiency also affected Henry's personality. If so, it could
conceivably have influenced his decision to marry six times --
having two of his wives beheaded -- and break with Rome to found
the Church of England. Which raises the question, Might a few
bottles of vitamin C on the King's table have changed the course
of history?