Breadth 1 - Changing relationships between crown and the nobility: 'over-mighty subjects'

Were major landholders more important as props to the crown or as potential rivals?

• King needed to deal with internal and external threats - expected to be good military leaders
• Head of legal system - had to settle nobles
• Had to have strong personality
• Expected to delegate tasks to nobles

Lands and offices of the state

• Bureaucratic methods:
• The Exchequer - dealt with finances - tax and other revenues
• The Chancery - legal documents etc. - held Great Seal - headed by chancellor (often a bishop)
• The Office of the Privy Seal - travelled with king authenticating documents
• The Kings Chamber - headed by a chamberlain - had power over who could see king etc.
• King also took advice from councillors (nobility) - government policy, justice, order, trade etc.
• The Great Council - Made of any lord in parliment - could be called quickly for emergencies - war, govenment's decisions etc. - king had influence of these lords
• The Continual Council - small group of king's personal advisers - officialised under Richard II
• Key officers appointed by king - treasurer, chancellor, Captain of Calais etc. - often travelled with king and had large estates/power
• Important that king took advice from leading nobles - had most land/power - insulting to take advice from lesser nobles
• However shouldn't be dominated by few individual nobles - 'evil councillors' often blamed
• Royal proclamations legally binding - Nobles and gentry enforced them
• King could call parliment at any time - Nobles, gentry, bishops - key to gain tax for war

Church patronage

• Church very powerful
• Regular clergy - monks, nuns, friars - lived together
• Secular clergy - preiets, deacons - lived among the people
• Clergy took tax exemptions on their land
• Ran own justice system - didn't impose death penalty

Relations with the papacy

• Roman Catholic chruch - first allegiance to the pope
• Pope could approve/disapprove of king - important, e.g. Henry VII
• King asked pope if he could marry distant relation - important political matches
• Had to approve appointments of clergymen - however king had significant influence - needed support of bishops as involved in government offices

Church careers and political advancement

• Allowed for political advancement
• Low gentry could become important figures through the church
• Some nobles 'gave' children to church not needed to continue bloodline

'Over-mighty subjects' and 'under-mighty monarchs': noblemen as necessary props to the crown but also potential rivals

• Nobles had influence on king - either good or bad
• Henry IV's usurpation made king's hereditary claims less legitamate - lots of rebellions followed as nobles saw opportunity to seize throne

Curshing conspiracy by force:examples for the reigns of Henry V and Henry VII

The Southampton Plot: conspiracy agaisnt Henry V in 1415

• Henry had good repuation - wars in France
• However - at start of reign was anti-Lancastrian sentiment
• Southampton Plot aimed to usurp Henry with Edmund Mortimer, earl of March
• Led by Richard Conisburgh (3rd earl of Cambridge), Henry Scrope (3rd Baron Scrope of Masham) and Sir Thomas Grey
• Included…