The Wars of the Roses - Alison Weir [7]
During the fifteenth century some attempts were made to regulate the laws of succession, but the highest legal authorities in the land, fearful of reprisals from interested magnates, repeatedly refused to pronounce conclusively on so weighty a matter, saying that the issue could not be determined by reference to common law.
The Wars of the Roses were primarily wars between the great magnates. The magnate class consisted of a small number of dukes – usually related to the royal house – marquesses and earls, and a great number of barons, knights and gentry. These were the men who owned most of the landed wealth of the kingdom and who exercised the greatest influence in their own territories, where they were respected and often feared.
John Russell, Bishop of Lincoln and Lord Chancellor in the 1480s, looked upon the English nobility as the rock and firm ground in a storm-tossed sea. Upon their shoulders lay the responsibility for the government of England. The nobility looked to the crown for promotion and rewards in return for services rendered in politics, in the field of battle, in the administrative departments of the royal household, in the diplomatic service, or in local government.
Rank was everything. During the Wars of the Roses, experienced commanders deferred to teenage boys simply because the latter were of the blood royal. The higher the rank, the richer the lord. A great magnate such as the Duke of York enjoyed an annual income of above £3000.* A baron could expect around £700 per annum, a knight anything between £40 and £200. The cost of building a defensive castle, such as Caister in Norfolk, was in the region of £6000.
From the fourteenth century onwards, the number of magnates had diminished. Wars, plagues, feuds and tournaments had led to many male lines dying out. Titles were frequently transferred via the marriages of heiresses, and inheritances grew consequently larger. By the fifteenth century the magnates, though fewer in number, had wider lands, greater wealth, and more power than ever before. Very few of the old Anglo-Norman families were left, but prominent families of the period – the Montacutes of Salisbury, the Courtenays of Devon, the Percies of Northumberland, the Nevilles, FitzAlans, Beauchamps, Staffords and Mortimers – were descendants of barons and knights, and were almost indistinguishable from this group, from which they frequently chose marriage partners. Many knightly families such as the Tiptofts and Bonvilles enjoyed substantial lands and influence, and would in the fifteenth century be elevated to the peerage. They would also look to increase their wealth by intermarrying with rich, mercantile families.
By the mid-century many of the great magnates were creating considerable wealth for themselves by investing in trade, while judicial marriage alliances were calculated to extend still further their lands and influence. Thus evolved what Lord Chief Justice Fortescue referred to as the ‘over-mighty subject’, who could command the loyalty and support of a huge army of tenants and retainers. Indeed, the prestige of a nobleman during the period came to be measured by the size of his private army and his ‘affinity’, those who were bound by contract to serve him.
By the reign of Henry VI (1422–61), feudalism had given way to what is often now