Crown Land and Royal Patronage in Mid-Sixteenth Century England

Yf you thincke yt to be suche lande as I maye geve wythe my honor, I shall thincke yt verye well bestowyd, for that he is one that hathe well desarvyd yt and hathe had no kynde of recompence. So wrote Mary Tudor to the Marquis of Winchester in 1554. The subject of the Queen's approval was Sir Edmund Peckham, one of her most trusted councilors. The result of that approval was an outright gift of land worth nearly one hundred pounds a year. Land, the basis of the social structure of the age, was one of the crucial instruments of patronage. The crown estate not only had its financial function as a regular source of income and an emergency source of realizable capital, but one directly relevant to social control and to government. It was a means by which past services to the prince could be rewarded and future services perhaps anticipated. The way land was used for this purpose and whether the frequency and extent of its usage can throw any light on problems and methods of government are questions meriting close consideration. The period taken here—the late 1530s to the early 1570s—spans several very different phases of government: how far did policy towards patronage vary from phase to phase? And how far did these variations reflect the needs of each successive government? To acquire an accurate picture of the use of the crown's estate, some localized knowledge is essential.