Katherine appeals to the Pope to halt Scottish incursions

Katherine of Aragon’s appeal to the Pope is a carefully routed act of diplomacy: she turns the threat to England’s northern border into a reason for papal pressure on James IV of Scotland, while keeping Henry VIII’s alliance with her father’s coalition in view. The intervention succeeds, and Katherine ensures that James understands he cannot attack England without consequence.

The threat at home

Katherine frames the Scottish incursions as more than a dispute over borders. James’s hostility, his authorization of attacks on English shipping, and his repeated incursions into England’s northern lands threaten the security Henry needs in order to support the Pope against France. The alliance with Katherine’s father and the emperor depends on England being able to act abroad; without safety at home, Katherine argues, Henry cannot reliably come to the Pope’s aid.

This reasoning gives her appeal its diplomatic leverage. Katherine presents the danger to England as a danger to the wider Christian alliance, rather than simply a quarrel between neighboring rulers. Her stated concern is that Henry may be forced to defend his northern lands and so be unable to assist the Pope. The border dispute thus becomes relevant to the Pope’s own vulnerability as France advances.

A letter designed to travel

Katherine writes to Richard Bainbridge, Cardinal Archbishop of York, who is in Rome and is a friend of hers. She begins in the register of an ordinary letter between acquaintances far from home, sharing news from London, the weather, the harvest prospects, and the price of wool. She then turns to James’s conduct and to her fear that the northern threat will prevent England from supporting the Pope.

The letter is not merely a private account of anxiety. Katherine reasons that Bainbridge can take it to the Pope and explain that the Scottish threat endangers the alliance intended to defend him. By making her concern available through a trusted churchman, she creates a route for intervention without presenting Henry as the person who has formally complained. Her appeal joins personal access, religious relationship, and political calculation.

Papal intervention and its effects

The Pope understands the letter as Katherine intends. He writes to James and threatens excommunication unless James respects the peace and the agreed borders of another Christian king. The Pope treats the incursions as a disturbance of Christendom’s peace, and the threat of serious penalties compels James to accede, apologize for his incursions, and write an angry letter to Henry.

James objects that Henry had no right to approach the Pope alone about what he considered a quarrel between the two kings. Henry, however, tells Katherine that he never appealed to the Pope or reported James. When Katherine explains that she may have mentioned her concerns to Bainbridge, who may have passed them on, Henry accepts that she can speak anxiously to her spiritual adviser. She also makes clear that Bainbridge’s intervention was intentional, while maintaining the distinction that it was not Henry who complained.

Political agency through indirection

Katherine’s success lies both in the Pope’s ruling and in how she obtains it. She cannot simply command the English king or the Pope; instead, she arranges for her letter to carry the border crisis into the papal sphere and ties England’s security to the Pope’s need for allies. The result gives James a warning that attacks will not go unanswered, while allowing Henry to deny direct responsibility for the appeal.

The episode presents Katherine’s political agency as deliberate but constrained. Her own account casts her as a woman anxious for the safety of a defenseless border, yet the sequence reveals a purposeful diplomatic design behind that posture. By using Bainbridge as the intermediary, she brings papal authority to bear on James without openly making the intervention Henry’s act. The final assurance that James knows he cannot attack with impunity marks the practical outcome of her maneuver.