The various rebellions that took place over the course of the Tudor period could certainly be said to have been part of a larger-scale social conflict between lords and peasants, with historians such as Wagner pointing out that one of the fundamental divisions that defined Tudor society was that between the aristocrat or local gentleman and the common man. Indeed there is some evidence suggesting that key peasant grievances that led to uprisings such as Ketts Rebellion arose from the abuse of privileges by the local aristocracy and gentry, defined by Wall as the wealthiest 3% of English families. Conversely, there is also a wealth of evidence to suggest that the majority of noteworthy rebellions in the Tudor period were in fact initiated and led by rogue members of the nobility against the monarch. For the purposes of this essay therefore, I will be arguing that although there certainly was conflict between lords and peasants that arose due to widening economic disparities between rich and poor, most noteworthy rebellions in the Tudor period, with the obvious exception of Kett’s rebellion in 1549, were not concerned with the economic grievances of the peasantry and therefore not a central part of this social conflict. For the purposes of this essay, the Tudor rebellions will be defined as noteworthy uprisings that took place in the period spanning from the start of Henry VII’s reign in 1485 to the death of Elizabeth I in 1603.
On one hand the Tudor rebellions could be said to have been part of a broader socio-economic conflict between lords and peasants. A key example of this conflict escalating into a full-scale uprising would be Kett’s rebellion in 1549, in which the key grievance listed by peasant farmers in East Anglia was the enclosure of common land , defined as the fencing off of common land by the local landlords, who would then convert the land into pasture for sheep, a trade which was returning exponentially higher profits at the expense of the common farming man as the continental demand for English wool increased and the amount of pasture used by the peasant farmer was reduced . These profits were of course mostly enjoyed by the gentry and aristocracy, who owned a disproportionately large share of sheep and land. The uproar caused by this was exacerbated by further economic grievances such as inflation, causing higher food prices and a contraction in the labour market as population levels recovered following the Black Death. The disproportionately severe effect the economic situation in Tudor England had on the common man is clearly illustrated by the widening economic disparities between gentleman and peasant. Sheppard provides clear evidence of socio-economic polarisation between gentry and peasantry, showing that from 1550 to 1625, the average gentleman’s asset value rose from £25 to £180, while that of the peasant rose only from £2 to £5 in the same period. In this way we can see how the wealth of the Tudor gentry began to accelerate away from that of the common man. This can in turn be explained by recovering population levels in a post-plague England, where the population doubled in the space of 100 years, from 2.5 million in 1520 to 5 million in 1620. This caused increased demand for land and food, resulting in a nine-fold increase in average rents and a four-fold increase in grain prices over the period 1510-1640. When one considers that the upper classes in Tudor England owned a disproportionately large share of land and produce, it is clear that this population recovery benefitted the asset-owning upper class at the expense of the common man. Thus, we can see how the socio-economic grievances highlighted in Kett’s rebellion in 1549 fit into the wider socio-economic conflict between lords and peasants
Save your time!
We can take care of your essay
- Proper editing and formatting
- Free revision, title page, and bibliography
- Flexible prices and money-back guarantee
In my view however, Kett’s rebellion was an exception, as the majority of noteworthy rebellions in the Tudor period were not caused by economic grievances of the peasantry, and in fact were led by the nobility or clergy against the monarch. One key example of this would be the Amicable Grant rising of 1525, in which wealthy taxpayers and clergymen in Hertfordshire, Kent and Essex refused to pay Henry VIII’s tax to fund an invasion of France. Additionally, the perpetrators of the Pilgrimage of Grace in 1536 were nobles in Lincolnshire, namely Barons Hussey and Darcy, two cousins whose ancestors had held lands in Lincolnshire since the Norman conquest. Fletcher and MacCulloch tell us that it was because these two men had recently been ousted in Parliament that they decided to rebel against Henry VIII and publicly oppose the Dissolution of the monasteries, stirring up a total of 40,000 peasants across Northern England who otherwise could have been kept quiet in the same way that the Marquess of Exeter, a loyal aristocrat, was able to keep the peasantry in the religiously conservative west country relatively quiet during the Dissolution of the monasteries. In this way, the peasant rising during the Prayer Book rebellion of 1549, in which religiously conservative south-western peasants protested against further religious reform by forming an army and besieging Exeter, can be explained by the absence of any aristocratic negotiators in the south west at this time to settle the rabble. Thus, we can see that these two rebellions do not fit into the narrative of lord against peasant in an economic context, but rather lord and peasant taking up arms together against the monarch pushing religious reform. One final example of a Tudor rebellion not involving a conflict between lord and peasant would be the Rising of the northern earls in 1569, essentially a conflict between the aristocracy and the monarch as the earls of Westmorland and Northumberland rose questions over the legitimacy of Elizabeth I’s claim to the throne and sought to replace her with Mary, Queen of Scots. Thus, it is fair to say that the majority of Tudor rebellions do not fit into the wider socio-economic conflict of lords against peasants, rather that they involved either peasants or the nobility rising up against the monarch.
It can therefore be said that Tudor rebellions on the whole were not a central part of the broader socio-economic conflict between lords and peasants. While it is true that the primary cause of Kett’s rebellion in 1549 was the enclosure of the common land, an abuse of privilege by local lords which was exacerbated by further economic grievances such as increased rents and drops in wages that benefitted the asset-owning upper class at the expense of the common peasant farmer, it is fair to say that this particular rebellion was an exception. Indeed, most other noteworthy rebellions in the period 1485 to 1603 were initiated and led by rogue members of the nobility against the monarch, in most cases to protest changes to religion or occasionally taxation, which affected the nobility more than the common man due to Tudor England’s progressive tax system which was rare for the time.
Stuck on your essay?
