by Gwyn, Peter
In arriving at any assessment of Wolsey’s achievement, some allowance must be made for the political realities of the time. The Church constituted a number of extremely powerful and wealthy interest groups, none of which would welcome interference in its affairs from any quarter. It is difficult to say what made life more difficult for a reformer: the ability of any one of these groups to resist intervention, or the existence of the groups themselves and the consequent rivalries between them. As regards the former, it is worth recalling the almost successful efforts of the Observant Franciscans who had powerful enough friends at Rome to obtain the support of the pope himself to prevent a legatine visitation of the Greenwich house. The problem of conflicting interest groups, although implicit in much of the discussion, may not so far have been sufficiently highlighted, but, arguably, it was Warham’s inability to dominate these groups that undermined his efforts at reform. Despite a theoretical primacy, an archbishop of Canterbury’s authority over the English Church was very limited. For all practical purposes York’s northern province was outside his control. Over the religious orders, he had no more jurisdiction than any other bishop, which is to say that he could intervene only in the affairs of the non-exempt monasteries in his own diocese and, for a brief period, in any diocese in which there was an episcopal vacancy. He could, indeed, summon southern convocation, though in practice he only did this when a parliament was called, but his efforts to push through reform there were not very successful, in part at least because he became embroiled in a major row over competing jurisdictions with a group of his suffragans led by the extremely influential Richard Fox. Moreover, what this conflict showed up was that Warham did not have the support of the king, and, indeed, in 1515 he found himself in direct conflict with Henry over the Standish affair.
What Wolsey brought to the task of reform were just those things that Warham lacked: immense political skill and Henry’s full support. It was easy enough for the likes of Colet and Fisher, with their limited responsibilities and scholarly interests, to deplore the the way in which the Church had become so enmeshed in the affairs of Caesar as to leave precious little time or room for the affairs of God. But while a yearning for the ‘purity’ of the early days of the apostles was understandable, whether the reality of being a small persecuted sect would have fulfilled these yearnings is another matter. And in the early sixteenth century the reality was that religious and secular life were so intertwined, and the need of both Church and Crown for each other so established, that, while there was room to argue about the nature of the relationship, divorce or disestablishment was not a possibility. Thus, it was precisely what in 1519 Bishop Fox called his ‘great skill in business, whether divine or human’ that enabled Wolsey during the 1520s to provide the right conditions for the Church to flourish. There were no more attacks from the Crown lawyers. There were no damaging disputes between different interest groups within the Church. The standards expected from its various members were publicly restated and it was made clear that where necessary the legatine authority was available to ensure that these were enforced. Far from being ‘despotic’, a possible criticism of Wolsey is that he was not willing enough to ignore the legal restraints that, for instance, made the removal of unsatisfactory heads of religious houses so difficult. It may also be that he did not attempt enough, though the force of such a criticism derives from, in this account, the mistaken notion that everything was terribly wrong with the English Church. In fact, during his last eighteen months in power Wolsey did embark upon some major reforms, prompted, so it will be argued, by a growing fear of the Lutheran threat. It was a threat that Wolsey took extremely seriously, but then the argument here has been that Henry’s cardinal legate always had the best interests of the English Church at heart.
1 See pp.102-3 above. This chapter could not have been written without the help of Stephen Thompson. The references to his important thesis, ‘English and Welsh bishops’, are comparatively few only because it was completed after this chapter was written.
2 Pollard, pp.165-7 remains one of the best accounts of the distinction between legate a latere and legatus natus.
3 M.J. Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, pp.166 ff. for the best available survey of the various extensions based in part on his search of the Vatican archives, which I have not been able to do. However, I have given his references to them, as they are not available in print, and may be of some use: 10 June 1519 (Reg. Vat, 1200, fos 34-41v; KCA, DR c/R7 (Fisher’s Register), fos.100v-101v;LP, iii, 475). Jan. 1520 (Reg.Vat, 1200, fo 344). Jan. 1521 (Reg.Vat, 1177, fo.50; Rymer, xiii, p.734). 1 April 1521 (Reg.Vat, 1202, fos.39 ff; Rymer, xiii, pp.739-42). July 1521 (Reg.Vat, 1202, fo 110). Jan. 1523 (LP, iii, 2521, 2771, 2891). Jan. 1524 (LP, iv, 14, 115, 126 not discovered by Kelly in Vatican register). 21 Aug. 1524 (Wilkins, iii, 703-4). See also M.J. Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, pp.168-71.
4 From this point Wolsey will usually be referred to just as legate rather than more correctly legate a latere.
5 Cavendish, pp.15-16. Cavendish writes that this disagreement took place before Wolsey became cardinal, but if it occurred at all, it could only have done after, when there were genuine reasons for disputing who legally had precedence. In a parallel case, Eugenius IV had ruled that Cardinal Kemp had precedence over Archbishop Chichele, despite the fact that Kemp was then only archbishop of York. For the disagreement see M.J. Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, pp.150-1.
6 Visitations made following the death or translation of a bishop and before the consecration of his successor. See Register of Henry Chichele for the best account of Canterbury’s powers.
7 Cavendish’s version; see Cavendish, p.91; Hall, p.758.
8 A rather composite picture of Wolsey’s ecclesiastical reputation, but see Dickens, English Reformation, pp.38-41, and more recently Haigh’s comment: ‘But while no charge against Wolsey was too gross to be impossible, Wolsey was not the Church’ (History, 68, p.394).
9 Rymer, xiii, pp.621-2.
10LP, ii, 4170.
11 GRO, MS 9531/9/fo.136; Registrum Caroli Bothe, p.65.
12 Richard Fox, pp.114-17.
13LP, iii, 63.
14LP, iii, 77.
15LP, iii, 162.
16 Richard Fox, pp.114-17.
17 Ortory, pp.255-9.
18 Ibid, p.258.
19 Ibid, p.255.
20 In fact if conflict at the 1523 convocation is discounted, for which see pp.286 ff. below, there is no evidence that the two men did not get on, and when Wolsey had his important conversation with Fisher about the divorce in 1527, he began by saying: ‘My Lord, you and I have been of an old acquaintance, and the one hath loved and trusted the other’; see St. P, i, p.198 (LP, iv, 3231). Of course, Wolsey was intending to please Fisher in beginning thus, but if his remarks were blatantly untrue, it would have hardly have been a very intelligent opening gambit.
21 Owst, pp.210-86.
22 Harper-Bill, JEH, 29, p.12.
23 Printed in Lupton, pp.293-304; for Kelly’s redating to 1510 from 1512 see Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, p.112. Harper-Bill in History, lxxiii, p.191 retains the traditional dating without comment.
24 Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, p.114.
25Registrum Caroli Bothe, p.66.
26Visitations in the Diocese of Lincoln, xxxiii, pp.148-52; see also Bowker, Secular Clergy, pp.124-6, though the implication that the contents of the legatine constitutions are known is misleading.
27 For Ely see EDR B/2/l/fos.18 ff.; discussed in Heal, ‘Bishops of Ely’, pp.51-3.
28Visitations in the Diocese of Lincoln, xxxiii, 148.
29Rymer, xiii, p.740, from the legatine commission of April 1521 which greatly increased the scope of Wolsey’s powers.
30 Williamson, p.164. I have found this article to be the most useful work on the general issue of the role and authority of papal legates.
31Lyndwood, pp.11, 154.
32 Bowker, Secular Clergy, pp.125-6.
33 Wi
lkins, iii, pp.662-82.
34Registrum Caroli Bothe, p.66: ‘de habitu clericorum deque vita moribusque ordinandorum . . alia capitula et articulos prelotos tangentes’.
35 Wilkins, iii, p.661; Richard Fox, p.122 (LP, iii, 414) in which he accepts Wolsey’s arguments for postponement.
36 Pantin (ed.), English Black Monks, pp.118-19 for the Benedictines; Butley Priory, pp.36-9 for the Augustinians; LP, iii, 475 for the Cistercians.
37 Together the three orders comprised about 80 per cent of all monastic houses. For a useful summary of facts and figures see Hughes, pp.31 ff.
38 Knowles, Religious Orders, iii, pp.33-8. For Richard Redman’s visitations of the Premonstratensians see ibid, pp.39-51.
39 Burne, pp.1-35.
40 See especially Haigh, Reformation and Resistance, pp.118 ff.
41 Bowker, Henrician Reformation, pp.44-f., 122-3. In Chichester the bishop presented to 23 out of 278 benefices, though during his long episcopate Sherborne was able to increase that number to 32; see Lander, ‘Diocese of Chichester’, pp.191 ff.
42 Richard Fox, p.95 (LP, iii, 2207).
43 Ibid, pp.150-l.(LP, iv, 3815).
44 Ibid, pp.86 ff.
45 Ibid, pp.79-80 (LP, ii, 730).
46Visitations c.1515-1525.
47 S. Thompson, ‘The bishop in his diocese’, p.75.
48Visitations of the Diocese of Norwich.
49 Lander, ‘Diocese of Chichester’, pp.163 ff.
50 Longland.
51 Bowker, Henrician Reformation, pp.12, 17-28.
52 Perry, p.712 for the abbot’s authorization, and for transcripts of all the documents see ibid, pp.704-22; also Visitations in the Diocese of Lincoln, xxxv, p.209.
53Visitations in the Diocese of Lincoln, xxxv, p.214.
54 For Longland’s request to Wolsey for help in appointing a new abbot see LP, iv, 5189, though there dated 1529; see also Knowles, Monastic Orders, iii, pp.70-2.
55 Knowles, Religious Orders, iii, pp.91-9 for portraits of both men.
56 Pantin (ed.), English Black Monks, pp.117-22.
57 Hughes, p.67 for this translation; Latin text in Pantin (ed.), English Black Monks, pp.123-4.
58 Knowles, Religious Orders, ii, pp.182-4.
59 William More, p.108. More’s journal contains further evidence of the 1520 general chapter.
60 Wilkins, iii, pp.683-8; see also Chapters of the Augustinian Canon, pp.xxxv-viii.
61 Wilkins, 688: ‘Et si quid religiosis huiusmodi onerosum nimis et importabile, sive aliquid addendum vel minuendum in eisdem statutis compertum ficerit, id tune moderare et reformare, ac eisdem addere vel diminuere, secundum quod res expostulare videbitur curabimus’.
62 For the history of this order during this period see Colvin, pp.227 ff; Knowles, Religious Orders, pp.39-52.
63 Knowles and Hadcock, pp.135-6, 194-9.
64 For the lower figure see Hughes, p.70, for the higher Knowles, Religious Orders, iii, p.52.
65 Knowles, Religious Orders, iii, p.52.
66CWM, 4, pp.83-4, 347.
67 See p.47 above.
68 Scarisbrick, in Reformation, p.6 says one in five gave money to friars, while Bowker, in Henrician Reformation, p.48, suggests 22 per cent for the archdeaconry of Lincoln but in the archdeaconry of Buckingham nothing was given. See also Whiting, SH, 5, p.70.
69 For the Franciscan Observants in England K.D. Brown is now the major work. Sadly it was not available to me when I was writing this chapter, but I am grateful for the author’s comments on my own treatment of the order. See also Knowles, Religious Orders, iii, pp.10-13, 206-11.
70King’s Works, pp.96 ff.
71 Knowles, Religious Orders, pp.206-11.
72LP, iv, 477, 478.
73LP, iv, 610.
74LP, iv, 759.
75Monumenta Franciscana, p.190 for an account of the visitation.
76 It was K.D. Brown who suggested I reconsider my rather over-optimistic remarks about the choice of Standish.
77LP, iv, 587, 1777. I remain sceptical about the illegality, if only because in most cases Wolsey showed a great concern to act within the law and the gaps in the evidence make any certainty impossible.
78Monumenta Franciscana, pp.190-1.
79 Roth, pp.431 ff for the whole episode.
80LP, iii, 2163. Dowman acted as auditor in Wolsey’s court of audience; Wolman was Wolsey’s vicar-general at Bath and Wells 1518-22, and also presented the case against the validity of Henry VIII’s marriage to Catherine when the matter appeared before Wolsey’s legatine court in 1527.
81Registrum Statutorum et Consuetudinem Ecclesiae Cathedralis Sancti Pauli Londiniensis, pp.249-63.
82 Rymer, xiii, p.734.
83 Ibid, pp.739-42.
84 M.J. Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, p.171, where he gives as his source Reg.Vat. 1202, fo 110.
85LP, iii, 127; for the other letter see LP, iii, 98.
86 M.J. Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, p.182. Certainly their appearance in LP in 1519 seems too early, because it was not until June 1519 that Wolsey knew that his legatine powers would continue after Campeggio’s departure.
87LP, iii, 2625.
88LP, iii, 2633, 2752. See also M.J. Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, pp.182-7; Kitching, pp.191-213.
89 M.J. Kelly, ‘Canterbury jurisdiction’, pp.42-94.
90 LRO Bishop’s Possessions, Manional, unnumbered box. I am grateful to M. Bowker for a copy of this document and for much other help.
91 Kitching, p.195 states that the goods worth £100 had to be in one diocese, but this worries me.
92 BL Add.MSS, 48012.
93LP, v, 450.
94LP, iv, 6075 art.31. The article does not specify that only wills in the diocese of York were at issue, but since the archbishops of York appears not to have exercised any prerogative jurisdictions over wills until the Elizabethan period I am assuming this to be so; see Kitching, p.193.
95 Hall, p.765.
96 See Bowker ‘Some archdeacons’ court books’, pp.294-301.
97SR, p.286.
98 Bernard, EHR, xcvi, p.772.
99 In 1524 the executors of Sir Thomas Lovell paid £66 13s 4d for his probate in the joint-prerogative court with some additional fees to various officials amounting to about £20. His wealth is not known, but given his many years in royal service it must have been considerable; see LP, iv, 366.
100LP, iv, 3395. For Sir William Compton’s will see LP, iv, 4442.
101LP, iii, 2752.
102 135 LRO, Bishop’s Possessions, Marional, unnumbered box.
103 For Chichester BL Add MSS 34317, fo.33; for Ely LP, iii, 599; for Hereford Registrum Caroli Bothe, pp.189-90; and for Norwich LP, iv, 5589.
104 Guy, EHR, xcvii, pp.482-3.
105 In saying this, I am disagreeing with Guy’s interpretation in EHR, xcvii and following Bernard in JEH, 37 and Scarisbrick in Cambridge Historical Journal, xii.
106 LRO Bishop’s Possessions, Manorial, unnumbered box.
107LP, iii, 599, where it is placed in 1519. But Heal (‘Bishops of Ely’, pp.46-7) argues for 1523 or 1524, and of these two I prefer the latter, for that with Warham was only signed in January 1523.
