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•NRLF i^g^^gss GIFT OF JANE KoSATHER ENGLAND UNDER THE YORKISTS 1460-1485 UNIVERSITY OF LONDON INTERMEDIATE SOURCE-BOOKS OF HISTORY. No. I. ILLUSTRATIONS OF CHAUCER'S ENGLAND. Edited by Dorothy Hughes, M.A. With a Preface by A, F. Pollard, M.A., Litt.D., Fellow of All Souls, and Professor of English History in the University of London. Crown Svo, ys. td. net. No. IL ENGLAND UNDER THE YORKISTS, 1460-1485. Illustrated from Contemporary Sources. By IsoBEL D. Thornley, M.A. With a Preface by A. F. Pollard, M.A., Litt.D. No. III. ENGLAND UNDER THE LANCASTRIANS, 1399-1460. [In preparation. Other volumes are being arranged. THE REIGN OF HENRY VII FROM CONTEMPORARY SOURCES. Selected and Arranged with an Introduction. By A. F. Pollard, M.A., Litt.D., etc. In Three Volumes. Crown ^vo. Vol. I. Narrative Extracts. Vol. II. Constitutional, Social, and Economic History. Vol. III. Diplomacy, Ecclesiastical Affairs and Ireland. LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO., London, New York, Bombay, Calcutta, and Madras. ENGLAND UNDER THE YORKISTS 1460-I485 ILLUSTRATED FROM CONTEMPORARY SOURCES ISOBEL D. THORNLEY, M.A. ASSISTANT IN THE DEPARTMENT OF HISTORY, UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, LONDON WITH A PREFACE BY A. F. POLLARD [UNIVERSITY OF LONDON INTERMEDIATE SOURCE- BOOKS OF HISTORY, No. II] LONGMANS, GREEN AND CO. 39 PATERNOSTER ROW, LONDON FOURTH AVENUE & 30th STREET, NEW YORK BOMBAY, CALCUTTA, AND MADRAS 1920 -^ iX y^' .^^ PREFACE. The general scope and object of the series of Inter- mediate Texts, of which the present is the second volume, have been indicated in the preface to Miss Dorothy Hughes's " Illustrations of Chaucer's England ". The first object is to supply University students of history with some means of appreciating and understanding the materials out of which English history is, or should be, constructed ; and the second is to provide a different if not a wider public with a sort of introductory library of English historical sources, particularly with a view to illus- trating those periods which are commonly but erroneously supposed to be poor in original records. The two objects are not incompatible. There is no reason, apart from the limitations of editoiial scholarship, why collections of sources intended for use in schools and colleges should be limited to extracts from printed authorities. There are materials as appropriate in manuscript as in print, far more abundant, and often more apt ; and it is quite feasible, while catering primarily for the needs of junior students, to multiply the printed sources available for their elders. V 414549 vi PEEFACE '' England under the Yorkists " does not make quite the same appeal to students of literature as ^' Illustrations of Chaucer's England ". But for those in search of fresh historical truth it has greater attractions. The stereotyped commonplace that, with the decline of the Middle Ages, the sources of English history diminish in quantity and deteriorate in quality is no more than a hasty generalisation from the facts that the monastic chronicles, which form the bulk of the Rolls Series, dwindle, and that the Rolls Series still constitutes for many students the ne plus ultra of historical research. It would be as rational to think that the sources of English history grow worse in the eighteenth century because the golden age of poli- tical pamphleteering then passed away ; and this, too, would have become a commonplace, did there exist a corpus of political pamphlets so compre- hensive, and so exclusive of other sources, as the Rolls Series of chronicles. The decline of monastic historiography is a symptom of a general failure in outlook and intelligence in monastic orders ; but it was accompanied by a wider development outside their walls which we call the Renaissance. The tree does not die because new buds sap the old leaves, and the withering of monastic records was followed by an efflorescence of other growths. Town chronicles supplant those of the monasteries, lay minds supersede ecclesiastical intelligence, and the activities of the State surpass those of the Church. All these intellectual phenomena, which PEEFACE vii necessarily preceded the cluinges of the sixteenth century, left their mark on the fifteenth and pro- duced fresh categories of historical material. Until, however, the New Monarchy had done its work, England remained locally-minded and English history a matter largely of local record. Hence the importance of those town chronicles, some of them unprinted and none of them collected into a body of historical evidence, upon which Miss Thornley has frequently drawn. The bulk of historical material does not in fact diminish during this period. It changes its form and direction, but it rapidly increases as a whole, in spite of gaps caused by the anarchy of the Wars of the Roses ; and its multifarious variety is ex- emplified in these pages. A striking instance of the neglect of materials is afforded by the Calendars of State Papers. Historians of the sixteenth cen- tury have drawn freely upon them, but medi^cvalists have apparently been under the impression that such sources throw no light upon any period prior to 1485, although the first volume of the Venetian Calendar has been in print for fifty years. There is more excuse for the neglect of the numerous MS. sources from which Miss Thornley has drawn much of her material. Their abundance makes the task of selection arduous ; but few, even among specialists, will fail to find some fresh light on the Yorkists and their kingdom, and Miss Thornley has, in her " Brief Account of Sources," provided viii PEEFACE students with better guidance than has hitherto been available for the Yorkist period. This volume, like its predecessor, is not in- tended to supplant the teacher's comment or the student's thought ; its purpose is to supply the teacher with material for his discourse and the student with food for historical reasoning. For help in interpreting this evidence they must have recourse to histories like the relevant volumes in Longmans' and Methuen's series, Ramsay's ''Lan- caster and York," the later chapters in Stubbs' " Con- stitutional History," and Gairdner's ''Richard III," and introduction to the " Paston Letters ". Every student should have at hand the " Index and Epi- tome " to the Dictionary of National Biography ; ' and even those who possess the Dictionary ' itself will find in these two hundred documents material for correcting and supplementing that monumental work. A. F. POLLARD. CONTENTS. PAGE Preface r A Brief Account of Sources li Note on the Translations xix List of Abbreviations xx Book I. Political 1 Book II. Constitutional lo6 A. Parliament 137 B. Councils 144 C. Royal Revenue 151 D. Lawlessness and Justice ....... 157 Book III. Ecclesiastical 180 Book IV. Economic and Social 198 A. Commercial Treaties and External Trade . 198 B. Industry and Internal Trade 218 C. Social Conditions, Manners, and Customs . 227 D. Education 247 Book V. Ireland 253 Index 263 A BKIEF ACCOUNT OF SOURCES.^ The standard bibliography of the Yorkist period is Dr. C. Gross's '* Sources and Literature of English History from the Earliest Times to about 1485". (2nd ed., 1915.) It includes both secondary authorities and printed collections of sources ; but as many of the records of this period are still unprinted and un- calendared, a brief survey of the more important classes may be useful as indicating the extent and nature of the material from which these extracts are partly drawn. Professor Tout, in the appendix to Vol. Ill of '' Longmans' Political History," says, " The record far excels the chronicle in scope, authority and objectivity, and a prime characteristic of modern research is the increasing reliance on the record rather than the chronicle as the sounder basis of historical investigation. ... Of special importance for the political his- torian are the records of the Chancery and Exchequer." The records of these two great government departments are preserved at the Public Eecord Office, and, with the other records there, have been catalogued and described in S. R. Scargill-Bird's " Guide to the Public Records ". (3rd ed., 1908.) Among the more important classes of Chancery documents are the Patent Rolls, Close Rolls, Charter Rolls, Fine Rolls, Treaty Rolls, Inquisitions, Parliament Rolls, Statute Rolls, Ancient Petitions, and Warrants for the Great Seal. The Patent Rolls,* i.e. the official enrolments of documents—com- missions, appointments, grants, pardons, licences, renewals of charters, royal mandates and many other instruments—cast in ^ Chronicles or collections of records from which extracts appear in this volume are marked with an asterisk. xii A BEIEF ACCOUNT OF SOUKCES a certain form and passed under the Great Seal, have been calendared for the Yorkist period in three volumes, and many extracts have been printed in Rymer's " Foedera ".^ The ex- tracts printed in this volume have been taken from the rolls themselves, a reference to the calendar being added. The Close Rolls,* i.e. the enrolments of mandates, letters, and writs of a more private nature, addressed to individuals, the Charter Rolls, enrolments of charters granted or confirmed, and the Fine Rolls, the records of agreements with, and payments to, the Crown for licences and grants of land or privileges, have not yet been calendared for the Yorkist period ; but extracts from the Close Rolls have been printed by Rymer. Of the Treaty or Foreign Rolls, three series, the French,* Scottish and Gascon, extend to the Yorkist period. The French and Gascon Rolls, which had formerly been concerned with English possessions in France, contain treaties and diplomatic docu- ments relating to European countries generally ; they have not been calendared, but extracts from the French Rolls have been printed by Rymer. The Scottish Rolls, which contain docu- ments relating to preparations for war and peace with Scotland, have been printed, with some omissions, by the Record Com- mission (" Rotuli Sootiae," 1814-8), and extracts also appear in Rymer.

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