Introduction

This introduction suggests that political practices, discourses, and events in fifteenth-century England were shaped by the experiences of those who governed, lived in, and travelled through towns. The tradition, however, of studying individual English towns, rather than assessing the collective influence of multiple towns, has made it difficult for the role of townspeople and urban spaces in English political life to be appreciated. Here, a new methodology is proposed for studying relationships between towns and for tracing the relative strength of this inter-connected ‘urban sector’ at particular points in time. Fluctuations in the membership and strength of this ‘urban sector’ had significant implications for how pivotal events in English history—including the Wars of the Roses—played out.

Edward IV, the Earl of Warwick, and a Changing Urban Sector, 1461–71

In the 1460s the urban political sector altered dramatically. The first three sections of this chapter explain how and why these changes occurred. Two of the features that had discouraged urban political engagement in the 1450s—the failure of royal institutions to facilitate inter-urban contact and the lack of a financial stake for townspeople in the success of royal government—no longer existed. The beginning of Edward IV’s reign also coincided with economic changes that brought artisans and gentlemen into municipal politics, many of whom were highly critical of civic governments. In these circumstances, urban and national politics frequently merged and conflict escalated easily. The final section of the chapter focuses on the significant role played by the urban sector in the civil wars of 1469–71, in which townspeople influenced the discourse employed by the earl of Warwick and dictated the course of events.

The Urban Sector and the Beginning of the Wars of the Roses, 1450–61

Typically, periods of political crisis in medieval England—such as the Barons’ War of the 1250s and 1260s or the troubles of Edward II’s reign—brought towns and their residents to the forefront of national politics, but the early years of the Wars of the Roses proved a notable exception to this rule. The first section of this chapter demonstrates that weakened links between towns, combined with the local dominance of mercantile elites in 1435–50, meant that the urban sector had neither the means nor the will to influence the brewing conflict between the duke of York and the monarchy in 1450–5. The second section, however, shows that the late 1450s saw a return to urban collective action and a ‘politicization’ of townspeople. The re-emergence of a ‘politicized’ urban sector in the Wars of the Roses proved to be a crucial factor in breaking the political stalemate of the 1450s.

The Crown and Urban Corporations, c. 1413–35

This chapter is the first of four chronological chapters examining periodic shifts in the density, membership, and nature of the ‘urban sector’. During the reign of Henry V and minority of Henry VI, municipal governments (rather than individual merchants and lawyers) tended to be the most active protagonists within the urban sector. Moreover, relationships between towns within the urban sector were mediated through the organs of royal government rather than through horizontal ‘networked’ relationships. The first section of the chapter examines how the peculiarly bureaucratic and institutional character of the urban sector can be seen in the operation of naval defence, finance, parliament, and political communication in 1413–35. The second section goes on to explore the ways in which the urban sector of 1413–35 facilitated a shared political culture at urban and national levels, with particular emphasis on the use of councils and the public suppression of dissent.

Conclusion

By studying the urban political sector—a framework within which towns and the people who lived in them could pool their collective resources to influence national politics, and in which the internal governance and political experiences of different individual towns could influence those of others within the sector—it becomes possible to write a history of late medieval English politics that is not focused exclusively on aristocratic landholders. An urban sector model allows for the political might of smaller towns in a centralized monarchy (such as was the case in fifteenth-century England) to be compared more profitably to that exercised by the more celebrated towns and urban leagues of Northern Italy and Flanders. Also, this book’s emphasis on frequent fluctuations in the nature of the English urban sector, rather than long-term trajectories, serves to question evolutionary narratives concerning the transition from the ‘medieval’ to ‘early modern’ English town.

A Basic Framework for the English Urban Sector

What features of the English polity facilitated links between towns and promoted collective urban influence on national politics? Firstly, this chapter traces the ways in which charters and law courts moulded the relationships that townspeople had with the Crown, aristocratic landholders, and (crucially) one another. Secondly, it considers the inter-urban links generated by domestic and international trade, as well as the role in shaping royal policy that townspeople assumed through their mercantile activities. Thirdly, it examines parliament as a venue for interaction between residents of different towns and as a vehicle for the formation of collective goals. Lastly, the chapter explores the role of towns themselves as spaces for the dissemination of political messages.

Mercantile Politics and the Ascendancy of Networks, c. 1435–50

Over the 1430s and 1440s, a subtle but important shift occurred in the nature of urban political agency. In 1413–35, the dramatis personae in the theatre of the English urban political sector were civic governments, but in the years after 1435 collective political action was coordinated instead through informal networks of wealthy merchants. This chapter examines the causes and consequences of this shift in urban involvement in national politics, from public and corporation-based to private and mercantile. The first section examines why the Crown came to rely on mercantile resources in the years following the 1435–6 Burgundian assault on Calais and how merchants used their political leverage to influence royal policy. The second section goes on to investigate the effects that these lateral networks between members of the merchant elite had on the complexion of urban internal politics.