Money For The Crown And Henry example essay topic

Henry VII was a successful monarch in many ways and managed to improve the country and make the monarchy more secure than it had been under previous kings. He was particularly successful at controlling the nobility, establishing a dynasty and at handling foreign policy and had a lot of success in his handling of the government and finance although it has to be made clear that he was not entirely successful. Henry was very successful at controlling the nobility mainly through threats and controlling their wealth through various methods. A lot of henrys methods for controlling the nobility such as acts of attainder and benevolences were also used to gain a lot of money for the crown. He issued some 140 acts of attainder against many nobles. Acts of attainder were acts passed by parliament that declared all a traitors property forfeit to the crown.

These acts helped the crown gain a lot of money, for example, the one passed on Sir William Stanley gained the crown lb 9000 upon its being passed and lb 1000 every year thereafter. They were also used as a means of securing loyalty in future as they could be reversed when Henry was sure of the person's loyalty again. Benevolences were forced loans where nobles were made to loan money to Henry with little or no prospect of it being paid back. This stopped previously over mighty subjects from becoming too powerful and there able to challenge the kings authority. This was also the aim of henrys policy that banned private armies without the kings consent, this was a law broken by the Earl of Oxford for which he was punished. Henry showed no favoritism towards different nobles as can be seen in the cases of Sir William Stanley and the Earl of Oxford as both had been loyal supporters yet were still punished.

This shows that Henry crushed any and all forms of rebelliousness or even the appearance of it. This would have helped control the nobility, as they would have known that any attempt at challenging Henry would be crushed and punished severely and the fact that he punished even supposed favourites. Another way he controlled the nobility and saved money was by issuing fewer patronages than any monarch before him, as theses required both land and money grants, during his entire reign he issued only three patronages requiring land and money grants. He also used the order of the garter of which he issued approximately 30 as this required no money or land grants. Henry used both of these as awards for loyalty already proven in contrast with previous monarchs who granted peerages and other order to secure loyalty. Henry's handling of the nobility was mostly successful although his unwillingness to go to war made him quite unpopular as the nobles could not do their chivalric duties by which they proved them selves brave and honourable.

Henry was very good at controlling people and things and used wardships to ensure loyalty of some nobles and to get money from estates. Wardships occurred if a noble died leaving his estate to a child, by issuing a ward ship Henry essentially took control of the nobles estates until he felt the child was old enough to run them this should have been when the child turned eighteen. However, if Henry was not convinced of their loyalty to him he could keep the estate under wardship which also meant anything it produced went to the crown. Financially Henry was also very successful this was partially linked to his controlling of the nobles as a lot of the policies he used to control the nobles also gained him a lot of money. In addition to this his unwillingness to go to war saved money and his dealing with other countries also sometimes gained him money. Henry liked to have a personal control of his finances and consequently used the chamber instead of the exchequer to deal with money as money from the exchequer had its own financial officials who had to approve requests for money from the king whereas the chamber was under direct supervision of the king giving him much more control.

The 1486 act of resumption gained him money buy reclaiming any lands sold off by previous monarchs without any compensation being made to the previous owners. In his dealing with other countries he also secured extra finance. The 1492 treaty of 'Etaples with France secured a pension from the French king for Henry in return for which Henry had to take his troops out of France although he didn't have to renounce his claim to the French throne. He raised customs duty by 20% and made the collection of duty and taxes more efficient and effective to the point that income from taxes increased by 45% from lb 29000 to lb 45000.

All these measures where important for securing more money for the crown and Henry was so successful that by the end of his reign his annual income was lb 113000 which was three times that of Henry VI and made him the first monarch in a long time to pass down a solvent crown to his son, even though he was only in credit by lb 9000 although this was very little in contrast to the French king it was still important and helped to secure his dynasty. Securing a Dynasty was vitally important for Henry as the previous four kings had all failed to pass down there crowns to their children successfully. In order to be able to do this Henry had to have children but he also needed to have control of anyone with a claim to the throne. Henry's method of controlling nobles with a claim to the throne was to unite the houses of Lancaster and York by marrying Elizabeth of York.

This could have backfired and created rivalries and jealousies as it did when Edward IV married an Englishwoman. Henry had also promised to marry Elizabeth to appease the Yorkists who supported Richard. Henry had four Children Margaret, Arthur, Henry and Mary. This was good because if he had only had one son he would have had no one in 'reserve' if Arthur died or became unable to rule which is, in fact, what happened.

He neutralised threat from overseas to hid dynasty my negotiating the treaty of medina del Campo 1489 in which he married his son, Arthur, to Catherine of Aragon and made Spain agree to help England subdue France if Necessary. The North of England was particularly supportive of the Yorkists and in an attempt to win them over Henry organised a procession around the country so he could try and win their support. Henry was very successful at securing a dynasty as he not only passed on a solvent crown to his son, Henry V, but he also made it possibly for the Tudors to rule England for the next 118 years, until 1603. Henry was successful at dealing with foreign countries even though trying to keep on good terms with both countries cost him some support from the nobles at home. He managed to remain on good terms with both France and Spain this was important because if he had the support of France and Spain he could use one against the other to prevent a threat against England. He signed treaties with both countries the treaty of 'Etaples with France in 1492 and the treaty of Medina del Campo with Spain in 1489 were both important as they made Britain more secure within Europe.

Henry had to be on good terms with France and Spain to stop any risk of them backing any rebellion in Scotland or England and to save the expense of going to war although Henry's perceived peacefulness did make England look weak to other countries. Henry reacted to things as they happened and was often very shrewd, when the Netherlands accepted Perkin Warbeck as King of England Henry banned trade with them in order to force the rulers of Holland to abandon this. So although he was not entirely successful he managed to remain on good terms with most of Europe and where he didn't he didn't resort to war although this made England look weaker. Henry had a good grasp of his government, both local and central. When he came to power he kept most of Richard's council only replacing those most loyal to the old king. This not only gave him their experience but helped stop discontent there may have been from the Yorkists.

He did have a parliament but didn't really use it, as it was called only six times during his reign. One of his policies that made him unsuccessful was The Council Learned led by Empson and Dudley. The job of this council was to organise debt collection and they were unpopular because they could try people without a jury and this in addition to other factors led to resentment against their cruelty. Henry's use of local government was very successful at controlling people and also tried to reduce the power of the nobility. He did this by making mostly small landowners and people with no property Justices of the Peace (JP's), who were similar to judges. This was because people with little wealth or influence were unlikely to be able to use the authority being a JP gave them against Henry, unlike a larger landowner.

So Henry's successful with local government happened mainly due to his centralization of the local government, which helped extend his power and authority as well as helping to control the nobility. In conclusion it is possible to say that Henry was a largely successful monarch as he managed to improve the country greatly. He passed on a solvent crown and founded a dynasty the lasted over a century with little opposition from the nobles whom he controlled effectively. He managed to maintain good relationships with Europe often to his own benefit as seen in the treaties with France and Spain. His government policies were quite successful but the council learned was possibly one of his biggest failures as it made him extremely unpopular and had he not subdued any and all opposition effectively and efficiently this may well have cost him the crown through a rebellion from the nobles and the people.