Throughout his reign of 1487 to 1509, Henry VII looked to dynastic marriage to establish England as a significant power broker in Europe in and seal the future of the Tudor dynasty. The results were mixed
Regarding Henry VII’s relations with Spain the dynastic marriage between his son Prince Arthur and Catherine of Aragon, a Spanish princess in 1501, worked well in Henry’s favour. This dynastic marriage, which was established by the Treaty of Medina del Campo, provided Henry VII with recognition on the international stage and valuable security. Such a union meant that the king of Spain Ferdinand and Henry VII agreed on mutual support to defend their countries against any enemy, assurance that neither king would make any peace, alliance or treaty with France without the other’s agreement and that neither country would assist or harbour rebels or pretenders. All these terms gave Henry a source of significant foreign power. The means to Henry VII’s power with Spain was cemented by the dynastic marriage between Prince Arthur and Princess Catherine – the fact that the two countries were conjoined by marriage made it less likely that the terms of the treaty would be broken.
In 1497 Anglo-Scottish harmony was established as it suited both King James IV of Scotland and Henry VII to make peace. By 1501 Henry further strengthened this peace by making an agreement for his daughter Princess Margaret to marry James IV. By 1502 this matured into a formal peace treaty, the dynastic marriage was to be held accountable for this newfound harmony between Scotland and England. The dynastic marriage between James IV and Princess Margaret stopped the frequent border warfare between Scotland and England it also eradicated the persistent danger of a Franco-Scottish alliance. Due to the peace treaty being solely based upon the Anglo-Scottish