Edward III and the English Peerage: Royal Patronage, Social Mobility, and Political Control in Fourteenth-century England

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Boydell Press, 2004 - Biography & Autobiography - 232 pages
Patronage was central to medieval kingship, and a crucial facet of royal power. This book, the first in-depth examination of this crucial facet of royal power, offers a detailed analysis of how Edward III, one of the most successful and, to use a modern term, charismatic of medieval English monarchs, used royal favour to create a "new nobility" and to reward and control the established peerage. Dr Bothwell shows how judicious use of largesse helped to produce domestic stability and encouraged the successful prosecution of foreign wars. Further, the study demonstrates how the nature of royal patronage came to reflect changes in feudalism, land law, finance, and the Church and the consequences of these changes for the more general history of medieval patronage, the evolution of the Lords and Commons, and the state of royal power both at the centre and in the localities. Overall, it is a clear, concise study of how Edward III used patronage to reposition the monarchy after the vicissitudes of his father's reign and a problematic minority.

J.S. BOTHWELL is Lecturer in Later Medieval English History, University of Leicester.

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Contents

5
5
The new nobility 15 5682
15
Mechanisms of royal largesse
28
Royal feudal rights
46
Annuities and assignments
78
Routine patronage
93
Contemporary response
113
Distribution of royal favour
138
Appendix key
163
Escheats expectancies and forfeitures
170
Marriage rights and arrangements
184
Wardships and custodies
192
Annuities
200
Principal geographical interests of new men
207
Index
222
Copyright

Kings the parliamentary peerage and royal patronage in
154

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Page 211 - A Perfect Copy of all Summons of the Nobility to the great Councils and Parliaments of this Realm, from the 49th of King Henry III. until these present Times, SK.

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