Editing House of Lancaster (section)

===Succession===

Lancastrian [[Cognatic kinship|cognatic descent]] from John of Gaunt and Blanche's daughter Phillipa continued in the royal houses of Spain and Portugal.<ref name=Phillipa>{{harvnb|Weir|2008|p=100}}</ref> The remnants of the Lancastrian court party coalesced support around [[Henry VII of England|Henry Tudor]]{{mdash}}a relatively unknown scion of the [[Beaufort family|Beauforts]]. They had been amongst the most ardent supporters of the House of Lancaster and were descended illegitimately from John of Gaunt by his mistress [[Katherine Swynford]]. However John of Gaunt and Katherine subsequently married and their children were legitimated by the Pope and by Parliament during the reign of Richard II. Henry IV had tried to debar them from the succession by use of his royal prerogative to avoid competition with the House of Lancaster's claims to the throne but this was of limited effect. By some calculations of primogeniture, there were as many as 18 people{{mdash}}including both his mother and future wife{{mdash}}with what some might claim a better right to the throne. By 1510, this figure had increased with the birth of an additional 16 possible Yorkist claimants.<ref name=Tudor148>{{harvnb|Weir|2008|p=148}}</ref>

With the House of Lancaster extinct, Henry claimed to be the Lancastrian heir through his mother [[Lady Margaret Beaufort]]. His father, [[Edmund Tudor, 1st Earl of Richmond|Edmund Tudor]], was Henry VI's maternal half-brother. In 1485, Henry Tudor united increasing opposition within England to the reign of [[Richard III of England|Richard III]] with the Lancastrian cause to take the throne. To further legitimise his claim, Henry married [[Elizabeth of York]]{{mdash}}Edward IV's daughter{{mdash}}and promoted the [[House of Tudor]] as a dynasty of dual Lancastrian and Yorkist descent.<ref name=Tudor>{{harvnb|Weir|2008|pp=146–149}}</ref>