by S B Chrimes
It was the commons who prayed for the recital and due execution of 25 Edward III, St. 5, c. 12, and 5 Richard II, St. 1, c. 2, forbidding the establishment of any money exchange without the king’s licence and forbidding any unlawful chevisaunce and usury.7 But later they also called attention to the obscurity of this act and to the difficulty of understanding its intent, procured its repeal and some clarification thereof, reserving the rights of spiritual jurisdiction.8
But it was the Crown that initiated measures regarding alien and other merchants, the coinage, wages, ‘enclosures’, and vagabonds.
It was to the king’s interest to enact that aliens made denizens (i.e. citizens) should continue to pay customs at the alien’s rate and should not allow aliens to operate in their names.1 No doubt an abuse was obviated by providing that scavage or shewage was to be paid only by aliens, not denizens, except denizens in London.2 It was policy to declare that no acts relating to merchants or merchandise should prejudice the merchants of the Hanse.3 The important but customary financial agreement between the king and the merchants of the Staple in 1504 was a fit subject for statutory declaration,4 as similar agreements had been in the past.
Naturally it was the king who wanted to create a new statutory treason by declaring the counterfeiting of foreign coins to be such,5 and difficulties arising as to the value of the important new coinage introduced earlier in the reign received definition in 1504.6
An attempt to revive the scale of wages for ‘servants in husbandry’ laid down by statute 23 Henry VI, c. 12, was abandoned by repeal a year later.7
The earliest act seeking to curb the growing practice of enclosure, or more precisely engrossing, came in 1489, confined in scope to the Isle of Wight and ostensibly made on grounds of dismay at the depopulation of the island and the threat to defence. Penalties were fixed for the engrosser of holdings exceeding a total value of 10 marks per annum.8 In the same parliament, however, another act9 of broader import was passed, foreshadowing the legislative efforts of later periods. Its preamble approached something like a statement of policy. It deplored the decay of villages, the conversion of arable to pasture, unemployment, the decay of tillage, the decay of churches and defences, all ‘to the subversion of the policy and good rule of the realm’, and laid down that any houses that had been let to farm with twenty acres in tillage or husbandry within three years, must be maintained under penalties. This may have been ‘a muddled act’1 in the sense that it did not get to the point of mentioning the practice of enclosure, but it does reveal that Henry VII’s government was beginning to appreciate the social problems arising and was prepared to make some effort, however tentatively to deal with them.
There can hardly be said to be much enlightenment about the two statutory attempts to deal with the problem of vagabonds and beggars; they were merely punitive and cannot be dignified with a place in the history of the poor law. Statute 11 Henry VII, c. 2,2 sought to moderate the harsher provisions of 7 Richard II, c. 5, but ordered vagabonds to be set in the stocks for three days and nights, with bread and water only and then to be sent away. Beggars not able to work were to be sent back to the hundred wherein they were best known or were born or had last dwelt. Statute 19 Henry VII, c. 12, did little but reduce the period in the stocks to one day and night for vagabonds and to provide further for dealing with neglect of their duties by officials concerned in these matters.3
The creation of new coinage would seem to have been a policy upon which Henry VII reached decisions at a very early date. At any rate as early as 2 November 1485 he granted to Sir Giles Daubeney, and Bartholomew Reed of London, goldsmith, the office of master and worker of Monies and keeper of the Exchange in the Tower, to be held jointly according to certain indentures to be made.4 These indentures followed two days later, setting out in great detail the various new coins to be made, their value and weight.5
The new coins were to be a ryal of gold, worth ten shillings, a half ryal and a quarter ryal, an angel worth six shillings and eightpence, and an anglet worth three shillings and fourpence. In silver, there was to be a groat of fourpence, a half groat, a penny (or ‘sterling’), a halfpenny, and a farthing.6 Later, on 28 October 1489, orders were given also for a gold sovereign, worth twenty shillings. A silver testoon or shilling piece was also introduced, perhaps only for a trial period, but notable as being the first English coin to bear a true portrait of the king.7
There had been little change in the design of coins in England since Edward III’s time, and Henry VII’s action in this field has been regarded as a ‘first step in the transition from mediaeval to modern currency’. Edward IV had modified the type of noble and raised its value to ten shillings without making much change in the design, had introduced the gold angel with a conventional type and style and had retained the silver coinage without appreciable alteration.1 Henry VII’s innovations broke away from conventional forms. New denominations in gold and silver were introduced, an artistic portrait was adopted for the silver coinage, and a new design with the royal shield of arms replaced the type first introduced by Edward I. The sovereign, the heaviest gold coin to that date, half of a pound of the Tower weight, was among the first to show the king wearing the closed or arched crown, following the example set in the real d’or coined in the Netherlands by Maximilian as regent for his son Philip in 1487. The closed crown appeared also on the later issues of the new groats and replaced the traditional open crown that appeared on the earlier issues. There can be no doubt that the closed crown had its symbolism, and that its use in Henry VII’s coins gave it a wide publicity. It was meant to give an added aura of magnificence to the king’s portrayal, but whether it could have much imperial connotation at the time is perhaps less obvious. On the other hand, it did very soon acquire such a connotation, and wittingly or unwittingly Henry VII made his contribution to a line of thought and propaganda that was going to bear much fruit in his successor’s time.2
Henry VII clearly concerned himself closely not only with these major innovations but also with the perennial problems of what was to be done about clipped coins and the influx of foreign coinage. The statute 19 Henry VII, c. 5, and the quite numerous proclamations issued testify to this interest. The statute of 1504, followed by an elaborate proclamation, pronounced that all the new gold coins were to pass for their nominal value, the silver groats and half-groats were to pass likewise even if cracked, and the silver pennies also unless clipping had gone beyond a specified point, in which case they were to pass as halfpence.1 On other occasions proclamations were issued, outlawing Irish pence and declaring English pence legal tender;2 outlawing imperial groats and pence;3 and declaring ‘small, thin and old pence’ legal tender provided they were ‘silver and whole’.4 But the problem of clipped coinage, and the difficulty of getting some of the new coins accepted as legal tender, remained until the end, and provoked yet another and very detailed proclamation at a date after 27 April 1507.5
It may well be that the economic achievements of Henry VII’s reign have been underrated,6 and certainly overseas trade increased considerably during the course of the reign, but how far Henry VII himself or his government contributed to this result is more doubtful.
Henry VII did not do very much in any direct way to promote shipping. So far as the royal navy was concerned,7 he left this in a weaker condition than it had been under the Yorkists. The circumstances of their times and needs for war purposes experienced by Henry V, Edward IV, and even Richard III had obliged them to pursue a policy of sustained vigilance at sea. The example of the ways in which Richard, earl of Warwick, had manipulated his private fleet to press his own or other Yorkist political causes in the late years of Henry VI had not been lost on Edward IV, who built up a substantial fleet of sixteen ships by 1481, some of which were used against the Scots, and had resurrected the office of clerk of the King’s Ships at Southampton first set up by Henry V, and did much to make the monarchy into a naval power. It was largely the threat of Henry Tudor’s invasion that had
obliged Richard III to maintain an effective and vigilant naval force, in which he took a personal interest, and he appointed John Howard as the new admiral, and Thomas Rogers as the clerk.
But the very success of Henry’s expedition tended to reduce the immediate need for a strong naval force, and the Yorkist fleet declined. He had seven ships in 1485, mostly taken over from Richard III, but these fell to five by 1488, and this remained the number at the end of the reign, despite some new building to replace old hulks. One of these was the largest naval vessel built up to that date. He could supplement his small fleet by hiring merchant ships at the rate of one shilling per ton per month, impress seamen, supply the senior officers and armament, and use these ships to supplement his fleet on occasions, and sometimes was able to hire Spanish ships for this purpose, and so reduce demands on English vessels. He also paid for the construction of the first dry dock, at Portsmouth, and thus no doubt contributed to the better maintenance of his ships.1 The office of clerk of the King’s Ships remained, but declined in importance and was probably exercised by deputy in the later years. It was hardly the case2 that Henry VII could not afford to improve his naval strength, at any rate in the years during which his finances were healthy, but rather that his foreign policy was such as not to envisage serious military risks involving naval intervention.
Even though the royal navy can hardly be said to have flourished at this time, there is plenty of evidence that English shipping generally prospered during at least the last ten years of the reign, especially in the eastern ports.3 But this was primarily a matter of private enterprise, even though encouraged by the offer of a bounty to private subjects who built large ships4 and by the acts of 1486 and 1489,5 and even though affected, either for better or for worse, by the fluctuations in the economic consequences of his foreign policies.6
It has been shown that although cloth exports increased over the years (from an annual average of 50,878 cloths in the first six years to 81,875 in the last six years – an increase of sixty-one per cent), the export of wool declined by about thirty per cent, ‘gradually killed by heavy taxation and the demands of the home cloth industry’.7 Imports also rose. The value of goods paying the petty customs rose by sixty-eight per cent, those paying poundage by eighty per cent, and imports of non-sweet wine by forty-seven per cent.1
The most recent and detailed research,2 however, has shown the extraordinary degree of fluctuations in the amount of export trade, both in wool and in cloth, which can only be explained in terms of the economic repercussions of Henry VII’s international diplomacy.
In another sphere, not unconnected with foreign policy, Henry VII showed himself capable of unwonted imaginative enterprise, tempered by his more usual caution. In all the circumstances, his patronage and support for John Cabot’s and later Sebastian Cabot’s voyages of exploration created the first period in the history of English participation in overseas discovery.3 He was not, of course, himself the inspirer of the enterprise, nor did the initiative come from him. But he showed sympathy to the proposals put before him, was prepared to make oceanic discovery an element in his foreign policy, and was statesmanlike enough to perceive that the advantages which might be gained outweighed the risks that might ensue from antagonizing Spain and Portugal.4
The first prize for enterprise and initiative, however, must be awarded to those nameless Bristol merchants who from about 1480 onwards undertook voyages for the discovery of lands westward. Their discovery of the Isle of Brazil (Newfoundland?) and their opening up of a fishing ground in that region were remarkable achievements even though they were not widely known, except among the Bristol men and their associates.5 They must have been known to Henry VII (who visited Bristol in 1486 and 1496), and undoubtedly some knowledge of these developments brought John Cabot, a Genoese of Venetian citizenship by 1495, to enlist support for a project of reaching the wealthy parts of Asia by a westward voyage. He got that support, and by 5 March 1496 had succeeded in eliciting from Henry VII himself letters patent, very carefully and precisely worded, authorizing him to undertake a voyage of discovery.6 Cabot and his three sons were given authority to use five ships of any tonnage to sail to all parts of the ‘eastern, western and northern sea’ to discover and investigate ‘whatsoever islands, countries, regions or provinces of heathens, and infidels … which before this time were unknown to all Christians’. Cabot, in short, was given practically carte blanche for his voyage, so long as he kept away from the Christians in Hispaniola. Henry VII would respect Spanish rights to what Spain had already discovered, but was willing enough for enterprises under his patronage to stake a claim in any lands westward newly discovered: nor did he attempt to conceal these plans.
Any lands discovered were to be occupied in the king’s name and the grantees were to become his vassals to hold the lands of him. One fifth of any net profits were to go to him. No other subjects were to intrude without the grantees’ licence, under pain of forfeiture of ships and goods.1
An expedition set out in 1496 but was turned back by bad weather. One small ship, the Matthew, with eighteen men, set out in late May 1497 and made landfall on 24 June. What exactly was the location of the Prima Terra Vista on the American mainland is still a matter of debate, but wherever it was there the banners of Henry VII, of the pope, and of St Mark of Venice were duly planted. But there were signs of inhabitants at the spot, and Cabot ‘being in doubt returned to his ship and returned eastwards’. By about 6 August he was back and was with the king before the 10th. Henry VII’s reaction was to give Cabot an immediate present of £10 – a modest reward for one who was now generally thought to have reached the mainland of Asia and who was now to be treated triumphantly and with much honour, and viewed by foreign envoys with jealous respect.2
Doubtless the political crises of 1497 distracted the king from Cabot’s affairs for some time, but by 13 December 1497 he granted him an annual pension of £20,3 and soon turned with enthusiasm to new plans for a further voyage. Henry VII it is said at this time ‘achieved a brilliant diplomatic coup by securing the Spanish marriage without having to fight for Spain whilst retaining a free hand to probe the oceans’.4 At any rate, he would not listen to any Spanish objections, agreed that Cabot should work westwards and southwards down the mainland, and gave him full authority in new letters patent dated 3 February 1498 which supplemented but did not supersede the earlier ones. Authority was given to impress six English ships not exceeding 200 tons, to be paid for at king’s rates (3d per ton per week), with a general passport for volunteers to go to the land and isles of late found by John Cabot. Henry’s enthusiasm was now sufficient to induce him to equip one of the ships himself and the other four were provided by London and Bristol merchants.1
By early May this second expedition set out. But, although he may have put into Ireland because of climatic conditions, John Cabot then disappeared entirely from the annals of maritime discovery, and of his fate nothing is known.2 It is, however, highly probable that other of the ships did make the voyage, to bring back eventually the disconcerting intelligence that the ‘land and isles of late discovered by John Cabot’ were not Asia.
Further letters patent were issued to other men in 1501 and 1502, with elaborate regulations for colonies, monopolies, and privileges. A company of Adventurers to the New Found lands could somehow come into existence by 1506. But all these efforts were the outcome of the discovery that the New Found lands were not the land of ‘the Great Khan’.3 When therefore John Cabot’s son Sebastian had attracted Henry VII’s attention and goodwill and made his voyage of 1508–9, he went as an explorer for an economic prize – the short way to Asia by a north-west passage. He may indeed have found Hudson Strait and part of Hudson Bay, but when he returned to England Henry VII was dead, and the new court was as yet unresponsive to such enterprises.4
We are not here concerned to trace the struggle between the two great merchant companies of the Staplers and the Adventurers.5 This struggle and the defeat of the former was, we a
re told, largely decided during the reign of Henry VII.6 It was not perhaps exactly a question of the defeat of the Staplers, but rather of decline consequential upon the diminution in the export of wool and rise of the importance of export of cloth that gave to the Merchant Adventurers their growing prosperity and their penetration into the markets of the Netherlands. It can hardly be suggested that Henry VII had any policy of demoting the Staplers and promoting the Adventurers, but circumstances of politics and diplomacy did induce him to encourage, when it suited him, the organization of the Adventurers. It was only during the reign of Henry VII that a measure of government approval was given to the trend which was turning the Netherlands trade into the preserve of a monopolistic London company.1 The organization of exporters of cloth as the Merchant Adventurers was of recent origin as a national body, and their potential value as lenders was only just beginning to attract the attention of the Crown in the days of Edward IV and Henry VII.2
Undoubtedly Henry VII was inclined to view with favour the consolidation of the organization of the Merchant Adventurers, and to use it when circumstances suited.3 As early as 4 February 1486 the Merchant Adventurers of London trading into the ports of Holland, Zeeland, Brabant, and Flanders united together successfully to present a petition, as they had to Richard III, for pardon from all subsidies on goods landed before the first day of the first parliament of the new reign, and it was during these early years of the reign that they secured official recognition by the mayor and Corporation of London. Henry VII’s desire to encourage them was shown by his willingness on occasion to allow his ships to convoy their ships, but did so cautiously; he was glad enough to have their cooperation with his council when their special knowledge might be useful, but quite ruthlessly ignored their interests when the decision was taken to prohibit commercial intercourse with the Netherlands. He might rebuke them if they acted without his licence, but was prepared to admonish the archduke if he thought they were being unfairly treated. After the so-called Intercursus Magnus of 1495 had been negotiated the advantages of promoting a unified trade as a potential diplomatic weapon became more manifest, and the king appointed a governor for the company. The statute 12 Henry VII, c. 6, tacitly admitted the right of the fellowship to compel others to join whilst explicitly limiting the fine that might be imposed to 10 marks, and requiring entrance fees to be raised only by act of parliament.4 In November 1504 king and council in Star Chamber gave judgment upon certain disputes between the Merchant Adventurers and the merchants of the Staple at Calais, to the effect that either body making use of the privileges of the other should be subject to all the regulations and penalties by which the other was bound, and at the request of the ‘society of merchant adventurers’ this judgment was exemplified on the patent roll.1 Subsequent letters patent2 gave authority to the governor to call courts in London of twenty-four or at least thirteen of the company to inflict penalties for disobedience.