Section C

• monasteries and nunneries:

  -at the start of Henry's reign England had 8000 monks and 2000 nuns and the focus of their day was religious contemplation

  -they were meant to be poor, chaste and obedient and so they were often treated with respect

  -monasteries owned around a third of all land in England

  -the top 20 houses had incomes of over £1000 a year which made then as wealthy as nobles

  -wealthy children were often educated by monks and nuns

  -they would pray for the souls of the dead and people often paid them to

  -travellers could use religious houses as a place to stay

  -they produced beautiful works of art

  -poor people could receive food and help

  -sick people were treated in hospitals set up by monasteries
• cromwells commission of 1535:


  -the reason given publicly for the dissolution of the monasteries was their spiritual and moral decay

  -in 1535 Cromwell ordered a series of visitations

  -the findings were listed in a document called compendium compertorum

  -they found that monks were taking part in homosexual acts or had mistresses

  -nuns were having children

  -abbot Hexham of whitby was in league with French pirates

  -the evidence was not reliable as inspectors only spent a few hours at each house and used bullying tactics when talking to the monks and nuns

  -the inspectors like Richard Layton and Thomas Legh were ambitious men who were trying to give Cromwell the evidence he wanted so they could get ahead

  -there were still soke good monasteries like Whalley Abbey in Lancashire which distributed 22% of its income to charity
• New religious ideas:

  -protestants didn't belive in purgatory so nunsand monks weren't getting paid as much to pray for the dead

  -Henry refounded two monasteries is 1537, Bisham Abbey and Stixwold to pray for him and Jane Seymour
• Loyalty:

  -Henry d the loyalty of the monasteries

  -the 1534 act of supremacy plaved Henry in charge of the church but many religious houses still had links to the pope

  -only 18 monks refused to swear the oath of succession and they were executed
• money:

  -a survey into monasteries wealth, called the Valor Ecclesiasticus revealed monks owned one third of English land and had a total income of £160,000 a year which was three times more than the royal estates income

  -Henry needed money to finance his wars and protect England against possible catholic invasion

  -if he could get the monasteries money then he would no longer need to rely on parliament to grant him taxation and could avoid a tax payers revolt

  -any land taken from the monasteries could be given as gifts as a way of buying support from nobility
• the process of dissolution:

  -parliament passed the first act of dissolution in March 1536 which closed 300 smaller monasteries with an income of less than £200 a year

  -at the end of 1537 they decided to dissolve the larger monasteries aswell for more money

  -each monastery was targeted individually in another series of visitations and invited to surrender their houses to the king as a gift

  -in 1539 parliament passed a second act of dissolution confirming the voluntary surrenders

  -the process had been completed by 1540
• impact of the dissolutions:

  -hundreds of huge buildings lay empty so the remains were often looted and the stone was used to build houses and feild walls

  -it was an act of cultural vandalism as much beautiful architecture was lost along with libraries, art and stained art glass windows

  -95% of English medieval arts was destroyed
• the winners:

  -the dissolution removed a powerful symbol of Catholicism

  -for Henry it brought huge financial gain as all land and propert from the monasteries became his

  -henrys income more than doubled from around £100,00 to £240,000 a year

  -this helped to pay for the war against france and Scotland and allowed for castle building other coast to ward of invasion

  -over time Henry sold most of the monastic land so nobility could buy the land, and a lot of estates were bought by those who would have remained handless like wealthy merchants or lawyers
• the losers:

  -heads of house were granted a relatively grand pension while ordinary monks and nuns were given a one off payment of 20 to 30 shillings

  -monks did better than nuns as 6500 out of 8000 monks secured employment in a church but a significant number were left in hardship

  -Englands 2000 nuns suffered the most as they couldn't marry or work in churches

  -nuns pension was only £2 a year and they had to return to their families and hope to get looked after

  -communities also lost out on the charitable work

  -some landlords who replaced the monks were ruthless, raised rent and threw tenants off the land

  -monastic schools were also closed reducing education for the children of the poor

  -many people were angry as the tombs of their ancestors on the monasteries were demolished and now nobody could pray for their souls either