Economic developments in Elizabethan England

Question 1

What makes it difficult to be absolutely certain about the value to the economy of trading activities during the reign of Elizabeth?

Answer 1

The lack of reliable statistical evidence

Question 2

What two things can be said about the pattern of trade in E’s reign ?

Answer 2

1) The value of internal trade considerably exceeded that of foreign trade - the biggest single development in internal trade was the growth in shipping of coal from Tyne to Thames to meet the demand of the growing demands from London (some exported across north sea for rapidly developing trade with France)
2) A wider range of luxury foreign goods came to be imported during E’s reign, suggesting that such goods were becoming affordable for a wider range of the population

Question 3

What two other things can be said about the pattern of trade in E’s reign ?

Answer 3

3) The cloth trade with the Netherlands, while remaining important, declined relatively as part of the economy. The Antwerp cloth market had declined from the early 1550’s and William Cecil was anxious for political reasons to end the dependence on a single market - alternative trade developed based on the north German port of Emden but the major move was to Amsterdam, whose commercial growth came at the expense of Antwerp, which remained under Spanish control
4) Though attempts to establish new over-seas markets did take place e.g. in Russia, these remained economically marginal

Question 4

What was the involvement of Africa in English attempts to expand trade?

Answer 4

Guinea = main centre for African trade - Guinea became used as the starting point for John Hawkins’ move into the American - in the process he invented the English slave trade

Question 5

What did John Hawkins do?

Answer 5

Made three expeditions from 1562, acquiring slaves in Africa that he then transported and sold in South America

Question 6

Was Hawkins successful and did he have support?

Answer 6

First two expeditions financially successful but he also succeeded in irritating Spanish authorities
By time of second expeditions in 1564 he had secured investment from prominent courtiers e.g. Earl of Leicester, as well as support from the Queen who supplied ships - for a price
Third expedition also attracted royal support but went disastrously wrong when Hawkins fleet was blockaded in a Mexican port, although some gold did get back to England

Question 7

What else did Hawkins activities do and what does this suggest?

Answer 7

Antagonised further the already strained relationship between England and Spain - the fact the queen was prepared to become involved suggests that she was willing, in return for a profit, to risk antagonising Philip II

Question 8

What were the main changes in English trading pattern?

Answer 8

1) The main market for English wool moved from the southern to the northern Netherlands
2) There was an increase in trade with the Ottoman empire
(despite this England remained relatively backwards in its exploitation of trading opportunities in E’s reign

Question 9

What trading companies were set up to widen England’s trading interests and were they successful?

Answer 9

The Muscovy Company had been incorporated in 1555 (under Mary) to trade with Russia and northern Europe, though it failed in the long-term to compete effectively with the Dutch
The Eastland company set up in 1579 to trade in the Baltic but had similarly limited effect
The Levant Company, founded in 1581 as the Turkish company enjoyed success in its attempts to develop trade with the Ottoman empire
The East India company was set up in 1600 to trade with Asia but it had less investment compared with the Dutch East India company and therefore found it difficult to compete in the short term

Question 10

Were the new trading companies significant by the end of Elizabeth’s reign?

Answer 10

All still relatively modest companies, however, there was a significant change in that (excluding the Eastland Company), they were all joint-stock companies owned by their shareholders in a model of organisation which would prove essential to future capitalist development

Question 11

What are joint-stock companies?

Answer 11

Businesses which are owned by their shareholder, who profit in proportion to the relative size of their shareholding

Question 12

What was of little importance at the time but assumed greater significance in light of subsequent developments and whose idea was it?

Answer 12

The extension of trade to the mainland of North America and the attempt to form a colony in north Virginia
Suggestion that England should start colonising North America originated with entrepreneur and explorer Humphrey Gilbert

Question 13

Who was the colonisation of North America then encouraged by?

Answer 13

Richard Hakluyt in ‘a Discourse of Western Planting’ published in 1584
Hakluyt was a clergyman and geographer, who was closely linked to Gilbert’s half brother, Walter Raleigh, so through Raleigh, presented the Discourse to the queen

Question 14

Who did Raleigh gain the support of and what then happened?

Answer 14

A number of prominent investors, including Sir Francis Walsingham and in 1585 he received from the queen a patent to colonise what would be known as Virginia
Two expeditions eventually made land on Roanoke Island in what would become North Carolina

Question 15

What was the outcome of Raleigh’s expedition and why?

Answer 15

Unfortunately for his investors and the settlers who died in the process - the attempts at colonisation proved disastrous due to a combination of bad organisation, bad luck and reluctance of the queen to give the matter priority when she faced war with Spain
Permanent English colonisation of Virginia had to wait until the reign of James I

Question 16

What broad trends can be detected in terms of prosperity and land?

Answer 16

Generally, landowners benefited from the economic trends present in E’s reign
Land incomes rose and many landowners acquired a range of material possessions which would have been unknown to their grand parents generation
In many case landowners had been able to benefit from the generosity of Henry VIII and Edward VI who, looking for a quick profit, sold much of the land which they had acquired through the dissolution of Church property often at knock-down prices

Question 17

What was out of the consequences of the selling of land cheaply by Edward and Henry?

Answer 17

Huge proliferation of building, not just of great houses but of more modest but still imposing, country houses
A building boom of unprecedented scale took place in E’s reign

Question 18

At a more modest level of society what were farmers able to benefit from?

Answer 18

The rise is agricultural prices - Essex clergyman Willian Harrison in his ‘Description of England’ 1577, noted the improvement in living standards enjoyed by farmers (especially those in the south-east)
Inventories taken at death confirmed this pattern of improvement which was only interrupted by bad harvests

Question 19

What is the issue with the debate about the relationship between trade and prosperity

Answer 19

Lack of hard evidence

Question 20

Broadly speaking what have economic historians In the first half of the 20th century tended to argue about prosperity of trade and what about the second half?

Answer 20

That trade was buoyant in Elizabethan England, reinforced by the evidence of shipbuilding which took place at the time
Second half of the century = a more pessimistic view tended to dominate with historians emphasising what was seen as a desperate search for new markets to off-set the long-term decline in the cloth trade - reinforced by the argument English financial institutions were much less sophisticated than their counter-parts in the Netherlands, Germany and Italy

Question 21

Despite it being impossible to generalise about urban prosperity what is clear about some old-established towns and why?

Answer 21

Towns such as Stamford and Winchester did decline during E’s reign
Urban decay particularly associated with corporate boroughs that had been heavily dependent on the cloth industry, at this had migrated to more rural areas

Question 22

Which towns improved?

Answer 22

Other old-established towns such as York and Norwich continued to improve
Relatively new urban settlements like Manchester and Plymouth also developed

Question 23

Which towns tended to do well?

Answer 23

Tended either to have a broad range of manufacturing industry or were unincorporated towns in which industry was able to develop without hinderance of regulation

Question 24

What is one issue with urban prosperity that was very difficult to resolve and did it effect everyone?

Answer 24

The impact of the growth of London on other urban centres
It was often alleged at the time that the growth of London, both as a port and an industrial centre had a detrimental effect on other towns and cities - however some places, most importantly Newcastle, benefited from supplying London’s economic needs

Question 25

Why did not all share the prosperity?

Answer 25

For many, real wages fell which was a particular problem at times of harvest failure and the impact was particularly bad when there were successive bad harvests making the experience of 1594-97 when there were four successive poor harvests catastrophic for some
Apparently 9/44 harvests could be described as poor

Question 26

How much did real wages collapse by?

Answer 26

By 1596 they had collapsed to less than half the level which they had been just nine years earlier - providing the context for the one real subsidence crisis of E’s reign 1596-97

Question 27

While distress was common throughout the Kingdom where do conditions appear to have been worst?

Answer 27

In the far north with starvation the outcome both in more remote rural areas and in the urban centre of Newcastle - which had attracted the poor from across the region
The corporation of Newcastle reported burying 25 homeless people who were presumed to have starved

Question 28

What is clear from taxation records and similar sources?

Answer 28

That the wealthiest part of the country was the south-east, closely followed by Norfolk and Suffolk and the ‘inner west country’ counties of Somerset, Gloucestershire and Wiltshire
The poorest counties were those in the north and in the west-midlands - this tends to be reflected in income levels among different social groups

Question 29

What is an example of evidence of inventories of goods left by labourers?

Answer 29

That of Hertfordshire for example suggests they left goods worth almost three times as much as their counterparts in northern England and therefore it is little wonder the depression of the mid-90’s impacted the north so much

Question 30

What was the overall economic record or Elizabethan government and what should be remembered?

Answer 30

Mixed - must be remembered concept of economic policy didn’t really exist - ministers tended to react as they saw fit at the time, sometimes by passing legislation such as the Statute of Artificers, which quickly became redundant

Question 31

What was the governments main priority and was this threatened?

Answer 31

The maintenance of public order - many of the political elite considered this threatened by the subsidence crisis of the 1590’s

Question 32

What were relationships with the crown and the landed elites + the commercial elites of the city of London like?

Answer 32

The crown became closer with the two groups during the reign, especially through participation in joint-stock companies , which helped to lay the way for future commercial expansion