6. henry vii-economic development: trade, exploration, prosperity and depression

Question 1

explain the agrarian population?

Answer 1

as the population began to increase in the 1480’s there was a move towards more sheep farming as there was an increased demand for wool as trade developed
-the grown of sheep farming meant the loss of common land and changes to enclosure

Question 2

explain trade within the wool industry?

Answer 2

• by the end of the 15th cent, cloth amounted to 90% of english exports
• finished cloth was increasingly exported from London to the commercial centre of Antwerp from where it was sent to all over Europe

Question 3

explain trade?

Answer 3

-henry was eager to develop english trade in order to boost his wealth through customs duties and taxes, and to secure his own positive relationship with foreign powers

Question 4

explain the ways in which Henry used trade to secure positive relationships with foreign powers

Answer 4

• the navigation acts: 1485 and 1489; rules that only English ships could carry certain products to and from English ports: designed to challenge the Hanseatic league which had a monopoly of trade over the Baltic
• Intercursus Magnus: 1499, ended Henry’s 1493 embargo on trade with the Netherlands which stated that =
  
  1. English merchants could export to all of Burgundy except flanders
• however the Hanseatic league was very successful in limiting the development in English trade interests in the Baltic

Question 5

explain early English exploration?

Answer 5

• english sailors were slower at making new discoveries that 15th Spain or the portuguese
• in 1497, John Cabot sailed from bristol in search of new fishing grounds which he found (but failed to return from a second voyage the following year)
• John Cabots son Sebastian was comissoned by HVII to fin the ‘north-west passage’ to Asia in 1508, but HVIII had little interest in supporting the exploration

Question 6

explain prosperity and depression?

Answer 6

• 15th cent was a time of economic stability
• population was growing and trade was expanding (the cloth trade)
• in 1493 and 1496 depression in the cloth trade caused depression