Norfolk is a ceremonial county in the East of England and East Anglia. It borders Lincolnshire and The Wash to the north-west, the North Sea to the north and east, Cambridgeshire to the west, and Suffolk to the south. The largest settlement is the city of Norwich.
Kett's Rebellion was a revolt in Norfolk, England during the reign of Edward VI, largely in response to the enclosure of land. It began at Wymondham on 8 July 1549 with a group of rebels destroying fences that had been put up by wealthy landowners. One of their targets was yeoman Robert Kett who, instead of resisting the rebels, agreed to their demands and offered to lead them. Kett and his forces, joined by recruits from Norwich and the surrounding countryside and numbering some 16,000, set up camp on Mousehold Heath to the north-east of the city on 12 July. The rebels stormed Norwich on 29 July and took the city. On 1 August the rebels defeated a Royal Army led by the Marquess of Northampton who had been sent by the government to suppress the uprising. Kett's rebellion ended on 27 August when the rebels were defeated by an army under the leadership of the Earl of Warwick at the Battle of Dussindale. Kett was captured, held in the Tower of London, tried for treason, and hanged from the walls of Norwich Castle on 7 December 1549.
Wymondham is a market town and civil parish in the South Norfolk district of Norfolk, England, 12 miles (19 km) south-west of Norwich off the A11 road to London. The River Tiffey runs through. The parish, one of Norfolk's largest, includes rural areas to the north and south, with hamlets of Suton, Silfield, Spooner Row and Wattlefield. It had a population of 14,405 in 2011, of whom 13,587 lived in the town itself.
Norwich is a cathedral city and district of the county of Norfolk, England of which it is the county town. Norwich is by the River Wensum, about 100 mi (160 km) north-east of London, 40 mi (64 km) north of Ipswich and 65 mi (105 km) east of Peterborough. As the seat of the See of Norwich, with one of the country's largest medieval cathedrals, it is the largest settlement and has the largest urban area in East Anglia. The population of the Norwich City Council local authority area was estimated to be 144,000 in 2021, which was an increase from 143,135 in 2019. The wider built-up area had a population of 213,166 in 2019.
Norwich Castle is a medieval royal fortification in the city of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk. William the Conqueror (1066–1087) ordered its construction in the aftermath of the Norman Conquest of England. The castle was used as a gaol from 1220 to 1887. In 1894 the Norwich Museum moved to Norwich Castle. The museum and art gallery holds significant objects from the region, especially works of art, archaeological finds and natural history specimens.
Christopher John Sansom is a British writer of historical crime novels, best known for his Matthew Shardlake series. He was born in Edinburgh and attended George Watson's College in that city, but left the school with no qualifications. Sansom has written about the bullying he suffered there. Subsequently he was educated at the University of Birmingham, where he took a BA and then a PhD in history. After working in a variety of jobs, he decided to retrain as a solicitor. He practised in Sussex as a lawyer for the disadvantaged, before leaving the legal profession to become a full-time writer. He lives in Sussex.
Mousehold Heath is a freely accessible area of heathland and woodland which lies to the north-east of the medieval city boundary of Norwich, in the English county of Norfolk.
Norfolk is a rural county in the East of England. Knowledge of prehistoric Norfolk is limited by a lack of evidence — although the earliest finds are from the end of the Lower Paleolithic period. Communities have existed in Norfolk since the last Ice Age and tools, coins and hoards such as those found at Snettisham indicate the presence of an extensive and industrious population.
Dame Hilary Mary Mantel was a British writer whose work includes historical fiction, personal memoirs and short stories. Her first published novel, Every Day Is Mother's Day, was released in 1985. She went on to write 12 novels, two collections of short stories, a personal memoir, and numerous articles and opinion pieces.
Stephanie Jane Merritt is an English literary critic and writer who has contributed to publications including The Times, The Daily Telegraph, the New Statesman, New Humanist and Die Welt. She was Deputy Literary Editor of The Observer from 1998 to 2005 and currently writes for The Observer and The Guardian, in addition to writing novels — under her own name as well as the pseudonym S. J. Parris.
Dissolution (2003) is a historical mystery novel by British author C. J. Sansom. It is Sansom's first published novel, and the first in the Matthew Shardlake Series. It was dramatised by BBC Radio 4 in 2012.
Dark Fire is a historical mystery novel by British author C. J. Sansom. It is Sansom's second novel, released in 2004, and also the second in the Matthew Shardlake Series. Set in the 16th century during the reign of Tudor King Henry VIII, it follows hunchbacked lawyer Shardlake's search to recover the long-lost formula for Greek fire.
Sovereign, published in 2006, is a historical mystery novel by British author C. J. Sansom. It is Sansom's fourth novel and the third in the Matthew Shardlake Series. Set in the 16th century during the reign of King Henry VIII, it follows hunchbacked lawyer Matthew Shardlake and his assistant, Jack Barak as they investigate a series of murders and a plot to question the legitimacy of the line of succession to the English throne.
Revelation is a historical mystery novel by British author C. J. Sansom. It is Sansom's fifth novel, and the fourth in the Matthew Shardlake Series. Set in 1543 during the reign of King Henry VIII, it follows hunchbacked lawyer Shardlake and his assistant, Jack Barak as they hunt the killer of a fellow lawyer - who turns out to be a religiously fanatic serial killer, insane but highly intelligent and capable.
Ian Edward Sansom is the author of the Mobile Library Mystery Series. As of 2016, he had written four books in a series that will comprise a projected forty-four novels.
Heartstone is a historical mystery novel by British author C. J. Sansom. It is Sansom's sixth novel, and the fifth in the Matthew Shardlake Series. Set in the 16th century during the reign of King Henry VIII, the events of the novel take place in the summer of 1545. Shardlake and his assistant Barak travel to Portsmouth on a legal case given to them by an old servant of Queen Catherine Parr. The book also concerns preparations for the Battle of the Solent and the King's warship, the Mary Rose.
The Optimists is the fourth novel by English author, Andrew Miller, released on 21 March 2005 through Sceptre.
The Shardlake series is a series of historical mystery novels by C. J. Sansom, set in 16th century Tudor England. The series features barrister Matthew Shardlake, who, while navigating the religious reforms of Henry VIII, solves crime and tries to avoid getting caught up in political intrigue.
Lamentation is a historical mystery novel by British author C. J. Sansom. It is his eighth novel and the sixth entry in the Matthew Shardlake Series, following 2010's Heartstone. Set in the summer of 1546, King Henry VIII is dying while the Catholic and Protestant factions of his court are battling for power over his successor, Prince Edward. Matthew Shardlake is deep in work and still feeling the shock of the events of the previous year when Queen Catherine Parr, caught in the throes of the power struggle, again seeks his aid when a potentially controversial manuscript, Lamentation of a Sinner, is stolen from her chambers.
Shardlake is an upcoming streaming television series made for Disney+, based on the Shardlake series of historical mystery novels by C. J. Sansom, set in the reign of Henry VIII in the 16th century. The series is adapted by Stephen Butchard and directed by Justin Chadwick and produced by The Forge. Arthur Hughes stars as the eponymous Matthew Shardlake, alongside Sean Bean as Thomas Cromwell.
