Being an excellent horseman and an expert in the martial arts, Henry was also passionately fond of that other great medieval sport, the jousting tournament, which was almost a weekly event during the early years of his reign. He was a fine jouster who was conspicuous in the combats, both on horseback and on foot, excelling everyone else ‘as much in agility at breaking spears as in nobleness of stature’. At one tournament in 1518, Henry performed ‘supernatural feats’, causing his magnificent charger to ‘jump and execute other acts of horsemanship’. Then, changing mounts, he made his fresh steed
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