Bishop Gilbert Burnet: "History of the Reformation of the Church of Engl...

13 Feb 1547. King Henry is buried. The story is told of the funeral procession/cortege to Syon on the way to Windsor, to wit, seepage of blood or fat from the deceased King, being fat, through the broken/disturbed lead in the coffin whereat dogs licked the seepage. A Friar Peto, later a Cardinal, “had threatened him [Henry] in a sermon at Greenwich that the dogs should lick his blood” (52). That must have gone over well at Greenwich and with the King, if true. Henry was is interred in St. George’s Chapel at Windsor. He endowed two chantry priests to say mass at his tomb daily, four obits yearly and a sermon at every obit. This, from the man who shut down monasteries where propitiatory masses were said for the living and dead. Henry covered himself and his own personal base; questions were raised along with eyebrows. What about prayers for our forbears and yet he shut those down? Now, he has prayers for himself? Inquired minds were asking.