Eltham ordinances
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The Eltham Ordinance of January 1526 was the failed reform of the
English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...
court of
Henry VIII Henry VIII (28 June 149128 January 1547) was King of England from 22 April 1509 until his death in 1547. Henry is best known for his six marriages, and for his efforts to have his first marriage (to Catherine of Aragon) annulled. His disa ...
by Cardinal
Thomas Wolsey Thomas Wolsey ( – 29 November 1530) was an English statesman and Catholic bishop. When Henry VIII became King of England in 1509, Wolsey became the king's almoner. Wolsey's affairs prospered and by 1514 he had become the controlling figur ...
. It is named after the
Eltham Palace Eltham Palace is a large house at Eltham ( ) in southeast London, England, within the Royal Borough of Greenwich. The house consists of the medieval great hall of a former royal residence, to which an Art Deco extension was added in the 1930s. ...
in
Kent Kent is a county in South East England and one of the home counties. It borders Greater London to the north-west, Surrey to the west and East Sussex to the south-west, and Essex to the north across the estuary of the River Thames; it faces ...
where Wolsey devised his plan. The Ordinance, which targeted Wolsey's influential opponents from the
Privy chamber A privy chamber was the private apartment of a royal residence in England. The Gentlemen of the Privy Chamber were noble-born servants to the Crown who would wait and attend on the King in private, as well as during various court activities, f ...
, would have given the Cardinal immense political power, but the plan did not materialize.


Background

Wolsey jealously watched the rising influence of Henry's courtiers. By around 1518 he himself amassed enough influence to control the access of lay courtiers to the king but the Privy chamber and the King's council remained a formidable obstacle.Tittler, Jones p. 34. In 1526 Wolsey settled for a radical reform of the court. According to the Eltham Ordinance, the court council should have been reduced in size to a compact, working council that could accompany the King during his travels. There would have been twenty permanent council members, "the most important officers of the realm", who would meet the King daily at his dining chamber. They would have been free from private affairs and capable of giving attention to all the important issues of the government. The Ordinance began with a statement that during Henry's absence from the Court in London the latter "hath been greatly hindered and in manner subverted, which by little and little is now come more and more unto an indirect course far from good constitutions of old times..." "rascals and vagabonds now spread and remaining and being in all the court..." Pincombe and Shrank wrote that the excuse of Henry's absence "was nothing more than a convenient fiction". The primary aim declared in the Ordinance was quite practical: to limit the expenses of the court,Tittler, Jones p. 62. especially on the move. Royal Progresses of the
Tudors The House of Tudor was a royal house of largely Welsh and English origin that held the English throne from 1485 to 1603. They descended from the Tudors of Penmynydd and Catherine of France. Tudor monarchs ruled the Kingdom of England and it ...
, accompanied by countless courtiers, attendants and their servants devastated the country. The royal train had to move regularly to new areas simply to obtain new sources of food. Financial strain caused by England's wars with
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was another consideration. However, the actual financial standing of the government and the degree of the need to control expenses remain uncertain.


Content

The Ordinance was presented as a serious attempt to reform the court, continuing the household reform of 1525,MacCullough, p. 78. and formulated as a detailed set of rules regulating the life of the court.Pincombe, Shrank p. 171. Pincombe and Shrank wrote that the degree of regulation, down to "the management of spent candles", was "
utopia A utopia ( ) typically describes an imaginary community or society that possesses highly desirable or nearly perfect qualities for its members. It was coined by Sir Thomas More for his 1516 book ''Utopia (book), Utopia'', describing a fictional ...
n in scale and ambition". The lists of household items regulated by the Ordinance (like candle wax) provide the historians an insight into what was deemed expensive or rare.Pincombe, Shrank p. 172. These items, now considered ordinary, formed the "spatial decorum" of the court. The Ordinance was filled with precautions against theft of household items, even furniture, indicating that such theft was commonplace. It attempted to expel "rascals and vagabonds" and replace them with "servants honest in gesture and behaviour". To maintain the moral standard, the Ordinance prescribed creation of a perfectly transparent environment, devoid of private places, where every person would be always watched and evaluated. Pincombe and Shrank noted that the duality of imaginary order and real-life disorder evident in the Ordinance is also present in contemporary literature like the Welles Anthology and the plays of
John Heywood John Heywood (c. 1497 – c. 1580) was an English writer known for his plays, poems, and collection of proverbs. Although he is best known as a playwright, he was also active as a musician and composer, though no musical works survive. A devout ...
.Pincombe, Shrank pp. 173-174. Wolsey managed to steer the new council to judiciary issues and away from foreign relations, thus completing the formation of the
Star Chamber The Star Chamber (Latin: ''Camera stellata'') was an English court that sat at the royal Palace of Westminster, from the late to the mid-17th century (c. 1641), and was composed of Privy Counsellors and common-law judges, to supplement the judic ...
.MacCullough, p. 26. Bishop John Clerk, Dean
Richard Sampson Richard Sampson (died 25 September 1554) was an English clergyman and composer of sacred music, who was Anglican bishop of Chichester and subsequently of Coventry and Lichfield. Biography He was educated at Trinity Hall, Cambridge, the Paris S ...
, Secretary William Knight and Chancellor
Thomas More Sir Thomas More (7 February 1478 – 6 July 1535), venerated in the Catholic Church as Saint Thomas More, was an English lawyer, judge, social philosopher, author, statesman, and noted Renaissance humanist. He also served Henry VIII as Lord ...
formed the inner permanent Council attendant to Henry, of which no less than two persons accompanied the King at all times.Elton, p. 145. Wolsey's opponents Sir William Compton, the
Groom of the Stool The Groom of the Stool (formally styled: "Groom of the King's Close stool, Close Stool") was the most intimate of an List of English monarchs, English monarch's courtiers, responsible for assisting the king in excretion and hygiene. The physica ...
,
Sir Francis Bryan Sir Francis Bryan (about 1490 – 2 February 1550) was an English courtier and diplomat during the reign of Henry VIII. He was Chief Gentleman of the Privy chamber and Lord Justice of Ireland. Unlike many of his contemporaries, Bryan always ret ...
, Sir Nicholas Carew, and
Thomas Thomas may refer to: People * List of people with given name Thomas * Thomas (name) * Thomas (surname) * Saint Thomas (disambiguation) * Thomas Aquinas (1225–1274) Italian Dominican friar, philosopher, and Doctor of the Church * Thomas the A ...
and
George Boleyn George Boleyn, Viscount Rochford (c. 1504 – 17 May 1536) was an English courtier and nobleman who played a prominent role in the politics of the early 1530s. He was the brother of Anne Boleyn, from 1533 the second wife of King He ...
, on the contrary, had to leave the court.


Denouement

Wolsey's plan as a whole, however, "did not leave the drawing board". In 1527 he failed to secure annulment of the marriage between Henry and Queen
Catherine Katherine, also spelled Catherine, and other variations are feminine names. They are popular in Christian countries because of their derivation from the name of one of the first Christian saints, Catherine of Alexandria. In the early Christ ...
and fell out of favor. By 1529 he was stripped of his court office and property. After his death the plan was resurrected by
Thomas Cromwell Thomas Cromwell (; 1485 – 28 July 1540), briefly Earl of Essex, was an English lawyer and statesman who served as chief minister to King Henry VIII from 1534 to 1540, when he was beheaded on orders of the king, who later blamed false charge ...
in the Cromwellian Ordinances of 1538–1540.Tittler, Jones p. 39.


See also

*
Eltham Palace Eltham Palace is a large house at Eltham ( ) in southeast London, England, within the Royal Borough of Greenwich. The house consists of the medieval great hall of a former royal residence, to which an Art Deco extension was added in the 1930s. ...


Notes


References

* Elton, Geoffrey Rudolph (2003).
Studies in Tudor and Stuart Politics and Government: Tudor politics
' (Volume 1 of Studies in Tudor and Stuart Politics and Government: Papers and Reviews). Cambridge University Press. . * MacCulloch, Diarmaid (1995).
The reign of Henry VIII: politics, policy, and piety
'. Palgrave Macmillan. . * Pincombe, Mary; Shrank, Cathy (2009). ''The Oxford Handbook of Tudor Literature''. Oxford University Press. . * Tittler, Robert; Jones, Norman Leslie (2004).
A companion to Tudor Britain
' (Volume 15 of Blackwell companions to British history). Wiley-Blackwell. . * * Mattingly, Debra (2016).
The Eltham Odinances A new perspective
Havencroft Studios. {{ISBN, 9781365454578 1526 in England Tudor England Henry VIII Legal history of England 1526 in law