Restoration of royal authority

About the relationship between King and Church (and the barons) 1154-1174

The key personnel at the heart of Henry II's financial and administrative reforms were the sheriffs - the men who represented the king in the provinces.

By the mid-twelfth century the sheriffs of England had become too powerful

(Barons acquired sheriffdoms as part of their personal estates before the reign of Stephen)

In 1170 Henry set up a special commission to enquire into malpractices (illegal actions) into local government - the activity of the sheriffs. The King wanted to ascertain (find out/make sure) the financial exploitations of the country, in the four years of his absence since 1166. 

The 'Inquest of the Sheriffs' reflects the authority of the English Crown. As a result, almost all were replaced.

After 1170, sheriffs were civil servants and agents of the King, who owed everything to royal service.

Henry: dynamic personality, impatient, observant, strong willed = just the man many barons didn't want as king.

Henry needed a stable government during his absences, thus introduced Thomas Becket as England's chancellor in 1154

The first five years of Henry's reign were devoted to rebuilding a stable government in England after the anarchy of Stephen's reign. His determination to recover what had been lost and restore the power of the English king were the dominant themes of the early years of his reign.

Through the creation of charters, letters and writs, Becket made the royal will possible. The chancellor was the head of the royal secretariat. 

The new King had to deal with the overmighty barons who had flourished under Stephen

The finances paid into the exchequer were far from consistent - corrupt barons pocketing taxes?

In 1155, Henry ordered the surrender of all the royal lands in England which had been given away or otherwise lost during Stephen's reign.  This involved a systematic nationwide inquiry into landholding. 

He dismissed two-thirds of the sheriffs he had inherited from Stephen

Set about destroying private castles that had been erected during Stephen's reign without royal permission. In 1154 one in five castles was royal. In 1214 it was one in two.

In 1158 a new coinage of uniform weight and design was issued.

Henry's foreign commitments meant that he required loyal and capable deputies in his absense: the chief justiciars, Earl Robert of Leicester and Richard de Lucy played crucial parts.

By 1158, the amount of territory subject to the English King's direct control had been restored to its pre-1135 levels. 

Henry, determined not to be dominated by his powerful subjects, created no new earldoms. The powers of the remaining earls were reduced too. (No new earldoms came into existence under Richard's reign either)

The knights came to form the backbone of local administration

The survey of 1166 revealed the extent of the resources at the king's disposal in his capacity as the kingdom's greatest feudal lord. 

 The King could impose further control over barons if they were indept to him. As many offered large sums of lands for their inheritance, the money was paid off over several years. However, this meant that the King could use this dept as a form of patronage, enforcing control or even breaking someone completely. In 1154 there were 24 earls. By 1189 there were only 12.

Sheriffs: first point of contact between central and local government, collected the king's money, administered justice, kept the peace, and maintained castles. They wielded enormous power within their counties. In the Inquest of the Sheriffs in 1170 Henry removed 22 of the 29 sheriffs, as they were abusing and exploiting their position. 

Stephen's reign caused much damage to royal finances. Although Henry managed to increase finances during his reign, only in three years (1177, 1185 and 1187) did Henry II's income match that of King Henry I.

The extent of Henry's royal authority in 1154 was limited: royal revenues, lands, castles and sheriffdoms were all down. Many things had been granted away, with the far north of England in the hands of the King of Scots

How he restored royal authority: 1) Leading magnates - restoring RA revolved around a series of high-risk assaults on leading magnates, depriving them of royal demesnes, counties, castles and earldoms.

2) Royal lands - At the start of his reign he sieged the Bellemes. In 1155 he destroyed the position which William, Count of Aumale, held in Yorkshire. Then took the royal castle of Bridgnorth, Norwich, Pevensey and Lancaster. He also took Newcastle from the King of Scots = the kingdom was whole once more

3) Henry completed the expulsion of foreign mercenaries and the demolition of unlicensed castles which Stephen had begun 

4) Erased baronial coinages. In 1158 he issued a penny with a new design. This was continued until 1180

Henry revived the workings of royal forest law, which had lapsed during Stephen's reign. The whole exercise was highly unpopular, associated with making money rather than protecting hunting. Offences included waste (cutting down trees for firewood), assart (clearances to create new arable land) and making enclosures. These were punishable by fines.

Bureaucratic government = system of government where important decisions are made by state officials rather than individuals.  

In Henry's absence, Queen Eleanor (who saw over the heads of senior officials and issued written commands to magnates, sheriffs and exchequer), the great ministers Robert, Earl of Leicester, and Richard de Lucy formed the bureaucratic government, effectively enforcing royal authority in the King's absence.

New Page