Read The King's Cardinal: The Rise and Fall of Thomas Wolsey (Pimlico) Online
Authors: Peter Gwyn
What of Wolsey’s overall contribution to the common weal? The very diversity of the subjects that come under such a label, few of which are easily quantifiable in terms of success or failure, makes such an assessment difficult. What does emerge, though, despite the many gaps in the evidence, is Wolsey’s enormous concern to achieve something: the enclosure and corn commissions alone are proof of this. Add to these his reforms of the royal household and of taxation, his massive
intervention in all areas of the English Church and his concern for ‘indifferent’ justice, and the final result in terms just of energy expended is remarkable, but especially so in one who, if he is not being portrayed as the gifted and self-indulgent amateur, usually emerges as more anxious to adorn a Field of Cloth of Gold than to master the complexities of the exchange rates, or to counter the effects of bad harvests. But if there is a seriousness about Wolsey’s concern for the common weal that cannot be gainsaid, this does not go very far to explaining his motivation. Because of the lack of direct evidence for his personal views they will probably always remain uncertain. Certainly, the things he was attempting show no striking new departures, neither do they suggest that he was driven by any deep ideological commitment such as might have been provided by Christian humanism. All the same, the possible effect on him of that admittedly rather nebulous concept, the climate of opinion, should not be underestimated, for after all, when in 1519 Erasmus had announced the dawn of a golden age, he had the court of Henry
VIII
much in his mind. And at the very least, Wolsey’s efforts suggest an enormous confidence in the efficacy of government intervention and more specifically in the usefulness of detailed information. Nevertheless, as always with Wolsey, it is his temperament that most catches the eye, and in particular that boundless energy and determination which he brought to bear on any problem. In December 1527, the duke of Norfolk, having ventured to give Wolsey some advice on the current problems, was so moved by the cardinal’s thanks that he promised that ‘from time to time I shall be so bold, as long as I shall know your grace content with the same, not only with my tongue and pen to give your grace my best poor advice to do that thing that may best and most sound to your honour, but also with my words and reports advance the same to the best of my little wit and power’. And why should he do this? Because he knew Wolsey ‘to be so firmly determined to do all things that may sound to the king’s high honour and the universal wealth of this realm’.
245
Not a bad verdict from one who was supposedly his arch-enemy.
1
Thomas Smith, p.53.
2
But see Hoskins,
Age of Plunder
, in which Henry is presented as the ‘Stalin of Tudor of England’.
3
There is a large literature but Ramsey still provides an excellent starting point. See also Coleman; Elton,
Studies
, i, pp.285-93.
4
LP
, ii, 3297.
5
Leadam,
Domesday
, i, pp.9-10.
6
A.J. Pollard, pp.85-7.
7
Elton,
Reform and Reformation
, p.69.
8
Scarisbrick, ‘Cardinal Wolsey’. Not only does this essay provide the starting point for what follows, but I owe an enormous debt to its author not only for much fruitful discussion and a visit to Wormleighton, but also for making available his detailed notes.
9
4 Hen
VIIC
. 19; 6 Hen.
VIIIC
. 5; 7 Hen.
VIIIC
. 1.
10
Scarisbrick, ‘Cardinal Wolsey’, p.63 for his ‘nine peers, three bishops, thirty-two knights and fifty-one heads of religious houses’. My own list of peers numbers eleven together with two aristocratic ladies: dukes of Norfolk and Suffolk, marquess of Dorset, earls of Derby, Devon and lords Cobham, Ferrers, Fitzwarren, Mountjoy and Zouche; also the countesses of Devon and Oxford.
11
For the bishop of Lincoln being cited see PRO E 159/298, ro.xviii, the date Michaelmas 1519, two years before Longland became bishop. The subsequent history of the case is unknown, but if others are anything to go by, it could well have dragged on into Longland’s time.
12
LP
, iv, 1525; also Scarisbrick, ‘Cardinal Wolsey’.
13
Here I am taking issue not only with Elton but also Scarisbrick, ‘Cardinal Wolsey’, pp.65-6.
14
See p.110 above.
15
Scarisbrick, ‘Cardinal Wolsey’, pp.51-4.
16
Kerridge,
EHR
, lxx, pp.214-15;
SR
, iii, p.244.
17
TRP
, no.110.
18
PRO SP l/50/fo.151 (
LP
, iv, 4796).
19
TRP
, nos. 113-44.
20
Ibid, no. 119.
21
Ibid, no.123.
22
Ibid.
23
Select Cases in Star Chamber
, pp.36 ff. For Wolsey’s over-zealousness see p.439.
24
CWM
, 4, pp.65 ff; Hexter, pp.146-55 for interesting comments on the relationship between the two men, and its relevance to More’s decision to accept a career in royal service.
25
‘Your sheep … which are usually so tame and so cheaply fed, begin now according to report to be so greedy and wild that they devour human beings and devastate and depopulate fields, houses and towns.’ (
CWM
, 4, pp.65-7).
26
Blanchard; Thirsk,
Rural Economy
, pp.73-5; Thirsk (ed.),
Agrarian History
, pp.238-9.
27
CWM
, 4, pp.65-9.
28
Tudor Economic Documents
, iii, pp.20 ff. for extracts from A. Fitzherbert’s
The Book of Husbandry
, Thomas Lever’s St Pauls Cross sermon and C. Armstrong’s ‘A treatise concerning the Staple and Commodities of this Realme’ and ‘Howe to Reforme the Realme in settyng them to work and to restore Tillage’; Lamond; Thomas Starkey, pp.95-7, 155-6.
29
CWM
, 4, pp.67-9.
30
A good way into these is through the preamble to the 1517 instructions, for which see
English Historical Documents
, pp.929-30.
31
Ibid, p.930.
32
CWM
, 4, p.67. See also
SR
, ii, p.542; iii, pp.127, 176;
TRP
, nos.75, 110.
33
Thirsk (ed.),
Agrarian History
, pp.1-112 for a detailed survey of the different farming regions.
34
TRP
, no.155.
35
The four were Sir Edward Belknap, Thomas Haselrig, Thomas Purfrey and John Spencer.
36
CWM
, 4, p.67: Thorpe.
37
Blanchard; C. Dyer,
Lords and Peasants
, pp.218 ff;
EcHR
, 2 ser., 35. Dyer’s work underlies much of what follows; and I must also thank him for taking the trouble to comment on it.
38
C. Dyer,
Lords and Peasants
, pp.244 ff.
39
C. Dyer, Dugdale Society, 27, pp.25 ff.
40
Thorpe, pp.55-6; also C. Dyer, Dugdale Society, 27, p.18.
41
In the enclosure findings the people affected are usually said to have departed in tears, or rather, since they were written in Latin, ‘
lacrimando’, ‘lamentando
’, or adverbially ‘
lacrimose
’ or ‘
dolorose
’; see Leadam,
Domesday
.
42
Wordie, pp.491-4, where he modifies Gay’s much used findings; see Gay,
TRHS
, new ser, xiv;
Quarterly Journal of Economics
, xvii,
43
C. Dyer, Dugdale Society, 27, pp.10-42.
44
Ibid, pp.18 ff; C. Dyer, Dugdale Society, 27, pp.18 ff;
Lords and Peasants
, pp.244 ff;
EcHR
, 2 ser., 35, p.30.
45
Parker, ‘Enclosure’, pp.30 ff.
46
Magdalen College Muniments, Quinton, 56, 60.
47
Alcock,
Records of Social and Economic History
, new ser., iv, p.35, this a revision of his earlier views in
Warwickshire History
, 3.
48
PRO SP l/57/fo.151v (
LP
, iv, 4796).
49
Blanchard, p.438 comments on this, but mostly it has been ignored.
50
C. Dyer,
EcHR
, 2 ser., 35, p.31; B.M.S. Campbell.
51
Skillington, pp.95-8; Hoskins,
Leicestershire History
, p.85.
52
Inter alia
C. Dyer,
EcHR
, 2 ser., 35; Ramsey, pp.26 ff.
53
The view is particularly associated with Thirsk and popularized in her
Tudor Enclosures
, but see also Thirsk (ed.),
Agrarian History
, pp.200-55.
54
Thirsk (ed.),
Agrarian History
, pp.412-17.
55
Ibid, pp.200-12.
56
M. Dormer Harris, pp.169-211; Phythian-Adams, pp.254; see also p.449 below.
57
Pam, p.4.
58
Ramsey, p.22; Thirsk (ed),
Agrarian History
, p.204.
59
Hoskins,
Age of Plunder
, pp.219-20; Palliser,
Age of Elizabeth
, pp.29-38.
60
In writing thus I may be too much under the influence of C. Dyer,
Lords and Peasants
, pp.218 ff., but see also Blanchard, pp.436-45; B.M.S. Campbell, pp.145-54. Campbell produces a figure of 1,843, 568 for the population of early Tudor England, significantly lower than other estimates.
61
Hoskins,
Age of Plunder
, p.87.
62
Ibid, p.247.
63
Ibid, p.116; see also Thirsk (ed.),
Agrarian History
, pp.275-7.
64
Hoskins,
Age of Plunder
, pp.218-19.
65
Palliser,
Age of Elizabeth
, p.35.