A BRIEF SURVEY of TUDOR WESTMINSTER SCHOOL E a Smith
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A BRIEF SURVEY OF TUDOR WESTMINSTER SCHOOL E A Smith In January 1540 Abbot Benson and twenty-four monks surrendered the Abbey to the king; it was immediately reformed as a collegiate foundation. The foundation document lists the Dean and Prebendaries, followed by the Master and Second Master, and forty Scholars. This period in his reign was a time during which Henry’s ideas were to develop, and so it was that for a brief period the Abbey became a cathedral under Bishop Thomas Thirlby. The Head Master during the period of change, John Adams, soon gave way to Alexander Nowell (famous both for his catechism, and for the invention of bottled beer1). It seems likely that the monopoly of Grammars used in schools also found use in Westminster. But as in many Schools the teaching round was leavened a little by the reading and performance of plays, introducing Terence as a medium through which Latin speech was practised and extended. It is possible that there were at this stage some boarders at the school as well as the day boys. The date at which the old granary was given to the School for the use of the boarding scholars is unknown. The scholars shared a table in College Hall. There was a yearly sum paid to each scholar, from which an allowance for boarding might, for example, be paid to Prebendaries, who often gave lodging. Henry had been educated by professional teachers, but it was some time into his reign that the potential power of his schooling became unlocked. Though the Reformation has often been cited as a movement that promoted education, it is clear from closer study that Henry’s engagement in the field of education was usually a response to the negative impact on education of other policies put into action. Henry’s first step after the break with Rome in 1534 with the Act of Supremacy was to have his new status as head of the church published not only by priests in their parishes, but also by schoolmasters to their pupils. But his first indirect influence on education was the result of his institution of first fruits (tax of entire income of first five years) and tenths (ten percent of subsequent salaries) in 1535, which had a devastating impact on the recruitment of teachers. So much so that it was abolished by Mary, and when later reintroduced by Elizabeth, it was not applied to teachers. By dissolving the monasteries Henry sought to abolish monastic life, and therefore the schools for novices with it. Most foundations would have had both almonry schools and song schools, and many, of course, grammar schools, but by 1540 the whole educational provision in most big religious houses had been swept away. With 840 houses lost there must have been as many as 10 000 school places abolished. It gradually dawned following the dissolution that some ecclesiastical foundations, and their attached institutions, had been necessary for maintaining control over social structures. In 1539 a bill was very rapidly passed by Parliament establishing new cathedrals and the necessary collegiate foundations which included “children brought up to learning”. Some of the buildings of the old foundations would be used to house the new grammar schools2. Apart from foundations based upon 1 Fuller’s Worthies, ed by P Austin Nuttall, 1840: “It happened in the first of queen Mary he was fishing upon the Thames, an exercise wherein he much delighted ,.. leaving a bottle of ale, when fishing, he found it some days after, no bottle, but a gun, such the sound at the opening thereof: and this is believed (casualty is mother of more inventions than industry) the original of bottled ale in England.” 2 It is telling that in autumn 1541 (this date from recent dendrochronological research on roof timbers), Henry caused to be built the new schoolmaster’s house at Westminster (now Liddell’s House, but until WWII, cathedrals, Henry also resurrected earlier collegiate foundations, such as that of St Mary’s, Warwick. There are autograph notes of 1539, by Henry, describing his wishes for the new collegiate foundations. Each cathedral was to have choristers and a master, and a grammar school where Latin, Greek, and sometimes Hebrew were to be taught. There were to be scholars who would have free board and for whom provision was to be made for them to go to one of the universities It is significant that Henry insisted upon the use of uniform grammar from which pupils were to be taught. In 1540 the first edition of Institutio Compendiaria totius Grammaticae was published. It was heavily based on the grammar written for St Paul’s by Colet and Lily (Dean Colet had founded St Paul’s School, and was under the humanist influence of his close friend Erasmus) which was later revised by Wolsey. A further work based on Lily was added in 1542, An Introduction of the Eyght Partes of Speeche, and the two subsequently always published together (the last edition was in 1858). It is interesting to note that uniformity on grammars was imposed before any equivalent uniformity of religious beliefs or practices was imposed. Though Henry began to look at chantries towards the end of his life, it was under Edward that their abolition was achieved. But Edward’s response in terms of replacing the attached schools was meagre in the extreme, he began creating new schools in 1550 and managed only an average of six in each of the subsequent years of his short reign. One reform that Edward did impose was the introduction of a catechism. Perhaps the key reform, which did not receive official approval until after Edward’s death, was the provision that every parish clerk was to instruct the children of the parish in the catechism and the alphabet. This is the first sign of a move to universal education. There appear to be few changes at Westminster under Mary. It was during her reign Nicholas Udall3 was appointed Head Master (1555). In 1534 he had been appointed Headmaster of Eton College, and in that same year published his Floures for Latine Spekynge, a Latin textbook which was reprinted several times over the next fifty years, and became a standard school text. What marked it out was its use of conversational Latin, based on usage in Terence. It was under Mary that the system by which clergy were trained was reformed and diocesan control established. The impetus began with Cardinal Pole’s input in the first year of her reign; in particular she insisted that the teachers be examined. What lay behind the changes that Mary put into effect was that school was the right place to establish religious habits in the next generation. Of course, if opponents to reform could control education then they could also frustrate the spread of reform. We might assume that Bishop Bonner of London, a strong supporter of Mary’s policies, made sure that the foundation at Westminster was up to the mark. It is possible to speculate that there was a good relationship between Westminster School and the monarch: there is in Peterborough Cathedral library, a prayer offered by the scholars of Westminster for a successful outcome to one of Mary’s pregnancies (that was actually to prove a phantom pregnancy). It was during Mary’s reign that Edward Grant became Head Master and during his time using his newly published grammar, Spicilegium, Greek was to flourish. The educational policy of Queen Elizabeth was essentially the same as that of her father Henry VIII, of Edward VI , and of Mary. The founding of new schools continued at the same modest rate as it had under Mary. Though a number of ‘free grammar schools of Queen Elizabeth’ were established, most continuously in use as the Head Master’s House, its top floor having been added by Busby, no doubt so that he could board even larger numbers, to his greater profit.). 3 It has been suggested that while at Eton College Udall was known as a flogger. But it should be stated that the use of the birch as a corrective was entirely commonplace at this period and would not have been deemed exceptional. There are further rather unsavoury suggestions why he was removed from Eton, but that he was appointed to Westminster surely implies these to be without foundation. of these were in fact by private rather than state benefaction. What Elizabeth contributed was the framework for governance and the power of schools to acquire land and property. Many medieval grammar schools had been the result of a wealthy merchant, for example, endowing a chantry chapel and a priest to pray for his soul, and to provide education for the scholars of the parish. With the abolition of chantries under Edward in 1548, many of these endowments disappeared. The practical contribution that Elizabeth made was to re-endow five of these. Soon after her accession, Elizabeth’s first act in Parliament in 1559 was to ensure her ability to grant charters and make new statutes for cathedrals and schools. The implication in education is that like her father, Elizabeth was responding to the turmoil that ensued as a result of the changes in religious policy: schools were caught up in the wholesale change; schools in cathedral closes were created to fill the gap caused by monastic dissolution. Specifically at Westminster, the Act was followed by a charter for the College in 1560. The statutes for the management of the School were not embedded in the charter. There were several attempts to bring this lacuna to the royal attention: the Dean, William Bill, had considerable influence over earlier draft statutes and it is to him that much of structure the curriculum is owed.