Please enable JavaScript.
Coggle requires JavaScript to display documents.
What were the key changes that Henry VII made to royal finance 1485-1509? …
What were the key changes that Henry VII made to royal finance 1485-1509?
The Exchequer and the Chamber systems
By the late
1490s
the Chamber had become the centre of most royal finance collections and accounting
In the first year of Henry's reign, Henry received a mere
£11,700
from his lands, whereas Richard is estimated to have gathered
£25,000
in one year
The Chamber had direct supervision of the King himself, while the Exchequer has its own officials, meaning Henry had less control over it
Initially, Henry relied on the Exchequer to organise his finances however he shifted towards using the old Yorkist system, the Chamber, as it meant that financial management would now be part of he royal household and therefore under direct supervision of the King
The Exchequer was a system that ran royal finances by employing its own officials. The Exchequer kept accurate accounts however was considered to be slow and less efficient compared to the Chamber, which may suggest why Henry changed the system he used during his reign
Ordinary revenue
Crown lands
Henry's priorities were to ensure that his Crown lands were as extensive as possible
Henry VII greatly increased the amount of land he had as a result of attainders, the Act of Resumption (
1486
) and forfeitures. During his reign, there were
138 attainders
, although
46 were reversed
.
The Act of Resumption
in
1486
enabled the King to recover for the Crown all lands, offices and revenues that had been lost since
1455
, with a second act that followed in
1487
Henry gained additional lands by attaining lands from Richard III and his followers after Bosworth
In
1495
, an Act of Parliament confirmed to Henry VII all the land of
Richard III
Henry changed rules in order that land would no longer be under the control of the Exchequer and instead under the control of the
surveyors, receivers and auditors
who specialised in maximising income
In the early years of Henry's reign, as a result of Crown lands he made
£3000 per annum
, while by the end of his reign it was
five times larger
than this
Henry VII had more crown land than previous monarchs
Customs duties
Henry took care to
increase
this source of income by cracking down on
corrupt officials
, and by twice updating the
Book of Rates of Customs Duties
The growth of customs duties was primarily due to the recovery inn trade after the late medieval depression
Prerogative duties
- exports of wool, woolfells, leather and cloth and on some imports
Import and export duties of
tonnage
and
poundage
, and a
subsidy
on wool exports were granted for life in the
1485 Parliament
Through custom duties, Henry VII made
£10,000
more per annum than Henry VI, who only made £30,00 per annum
Profits of justice
Henry VII had a policy of punishing by fine, even in some treasonable cases that should have had the death penalty
Fees paid for royal writs and letters- no court action could start without them
Due to many profits of justice not being recorded it is hard for historians to tell the income from them however it was unlikely to have been a significant part of royal revenue
Bonds and recognisances
Through Henry's reign he increased the amount of nobles who were under these as before his reign, only
1/62 noble families
were under these
A recognisance
was a formal acknowledgement of a debt or an obligation that already existed, with the understanding to pay money if this obligation were not met
Through Henry's reign he made these be collected by the
Learned Council
Bonds
were written agreements whereby a person promised to pay a sum of money if they failed to keep their promises
Feudal obligations
All tenants-in-chief were obliged to pay an aid to the King on the Knighting of his eldest son and marriage of his eldest daughter
£30,000
was collected on the posthumous Knighting of Prince Arthur
Henry set up the office of the Surveyor of the King's Prerogative under Sir Edward Belknap
With previous monarchs these were extremely ineffective due to the Wars of the Roses, while with Henry these proved to be quite successful as he made quite a lot of money through feudal dues/ obligations
Extraordinary revenue
Benevolences
A type of forced loan with no repayment
In
1491
, Henry raised
£48,500
to take his army to France
Clerical (church) taxes
Simony
- the selling of Church appointments
Vacant bishoprics
- on the death of a bishop, his post would be kept vacant for the time and the King would protect the revenue in the meantime
Each clerical grant raised approximately
£9000
, proving to be significant in increasing revenue for Henry
Similarly to loans, these were used with previous monarchs however there was little records of these so we are unable to compare these to Henry's clerical taxes income
Loans
Loans from
richer subjects
in times of emergency, it seems as if Henry paid them all back
Throughout Henry's reign it is estimated that he gained
£203,000
through loans
Compared to previous monarchs we are able to see how much money Henry was given, while with previous monarchs although they did use loans there were very few records of them and so we are unaware of whether they were actually repaid
Parliamentary grants
To help the King when the national interest was threatened
Henry used these to his advantage, for example:
in
1487,
he requested for them to pay for the Battle of Stoke
in
1489
, to go to war against the French
in
1496
, for the defence against the Scots and Warbeck
Through Parliamentary grants it seemed as if Henry VII achieved efficient tax collection
Henry VII asked for quite a few Parliamentary grants however on some occasions he was not given the amount he desired, while when Edward IV called Parliament for finance it was always granted
The French pension
Part of the
Treaty of Etaples (1492)
by which a pension was paid by the King of France as a bribe to remove English armies from French soil
Charles VIII of France agreed to repay arrears in the French pension amounting to a total of
£159,000
over several years
This did not exist with previous monarchs and so increased Henry's royal finance significantly compared to that of other monarchs