Birmingham 1066-1625
|
| Birmingham began life inauspiciously
as a way through a marsh to other more important places, but
grew to be one of the great cities of the kingdom. The evolution
of citizenship in this period, like the growth of Birmingham
itself, came in slow uneven stages - illustrated here by documents
that provide 'snapshots' in time.
|
|
Birmingham in the Domesday Book
Document
(161k) |
Transcript |
Citizenship at the time of Domesday
When the Domesday
survey was commissioned, Birmingham was a small village, and
no free men are listed in the manor .
We associate citizenship with towns, but there is little evidence
of town-based citizenship at the time of Domesday. The size
of important towns like London and Winchester tended to be
underrepresented in the Domesday Book. One reason for this
may have been the difficulty of recording their population
accurately; also, many towns were underpopulated after the
destruction wrought by the Norman conquest. In and around
a village, there was certainly little alternative to feudal
service. |
Medieval mayhem
Birmingham's central position meant it was vulnerable to
the many rebellions, wars and insurrections that made their
way towards London from Wales or the north, and the basic
rights of individuals would have been badly affected by conflict
and instability. In 1486 - when Henry VII was cementing his
position as king, after ousting Richard III - Birmingham found
itself caught up in the aftermath of the rebellion led by
Sir Humphrey Stafford against Henry's government. After suppressing
the rebellion, which was centred on Worcester, Henry sent
commissioners of Oyer
and Terminer
to Birmingham and Worcester 'to enquire into murders, rapes,
insurrections, and rebellions in Warwickshire and Worcestershire'.
|
Rebellion and royal justice in Birmingham
Document
|Transcript
|
 |
Although this rebellion was put
down successfully, more followed. John de la Pole, Earl of Lincoln,
had pledged allegiance to Henry and was the man addressed in
Henry's commission appointing the sessions held in Birmingham
in 1486. He had, however, been named by Richard III as his heir,
and he led his own, larger, rebellion in the following year. |
Topping up the royal coffers
Unlike many towns, Birmingham had never been particularly
reliant on its market. But craftsmen, including goldsmiths,
appear very early in Birmingham documents; and metalworking,
the source of much of the city's explosive growth in later
years, was well established in the Middle Ages. By the time
of the manorial survey in 1529, the market itself was flagging,
lasting from 'ten in the forenoon...; but until three of
the after noon'. The same survey refers to the sorry state
of the manor itself after the insanity of the previous manorial
lord and the minority of the current one, Edward Birmingham.
|
|
The Birmingham family lose their manor
Document
(410k) | Transcript
|
Henry VIII was famously short of money, and his
ministers were clever at devising ways of getting it. These
included not only expedients that affected the life and liberties
of the whole nation, like the dissolution
of the monasteries,
but also local measures of questionable morality. The decline
of the manor of Birmingham and the weakness of its leading family
gave Henry a golden opportunity to enrich the Crown. |
Challenges to royal
authority
In documents that have survived from the 16th century, we
begin to find a lot more detail concerning the lives of the
ordinary people of Birmingham and evidence of challenges to
royal authority on the basis of law. The system whereby monopolies
in moneymaking mercantile ventures were granted to Crown favourites
was very unpopular with tradespeople. Monopolies were attacked
for their adverse effect on trade; and they also enlarged
the state at the expense of individual freedom, since the
system encouraged and relied upon informers to enforce it.
Dorothy Rastell was connected to a notable local family but
risked the displeasure of the Crown by running a pub in Birmingham
without paying the relevant monopolist, Edward Horsey, Captain
of the Isle of Wight, for the privilege.
|
Dorothy Rastell, rogue vintner
Document
(673) |
Transcript |
Cocking a snook at Star Chamber
Document
(1568k) | Transcript
|
The Colemores were another prominent
Birmingham family, and they appear alongside the Birminghams
themselves on the jury panel for the sessions held in the town
in 1486 (see above). From a case heard by Star
Chamber
in 1615, Edward Colemore, a merchant and citizen, emerges as
having considerable power over the lives of his neighbours -
even over such a traditionally powerful figure as a local churchman.
|
| Details of the libel case in Star Chamber that
had resulted in Edward Colemore's earlier conviction are recorded
in another National Archives document (STAC 8/272/19), which runs to 150 folios
of parchment and tells us a great deal about the position of
the Colemores in Birmingham society and their relationships
with their neighbours and with the authorities. Happily it reproduces
the libel in full. |
|
|
Citizen power
The movement towards citizenship shown in these documents
is halting and fitful, but we have come a long way from the
Domesday Book to Edward Colemore. From a small group of powerful
clerics and noblemen under the king imposing law on a powerless
peasantry, we arrive at a situation where a local citizen
is able to use the law to persecute and impoverish an influential
churchman and evade the authority of Star
Chamber
- a much feared court, which men of Colemore's background
and legal keenness managed to abolish within 30 years of the
case. Seen in this light, it could be argued that the most
powerful figure in the last of the documents reproduced here
is the merchant citizen, Edward Colemore, himself.
|
| |
| back to top of page
|
|
The National Archives > ExhibitionsCitizenship
