Economic Factors' Effects on the Pilgrimage of Grace

Sparked in Lincolnshire in October 1536 and expanding rapidly through

Yorkshire and the far north, the Pilgrimage of Grace was a popular rising that

presented a “major armed challenge to the Henrician Reformation” . The first

modern writers, Madeline Hope Dodds and Ruth Dodds, argued that it was an

association of interest groups with their own worries and priorities. Shortly after,

A. G. Dickens supported the Doddsian argument stating that he saw a

“fundamental divergence of interests and attitudes between gentry and

commons” . Then, C. S. L. Davies offered an alternative argument that

emphasised religion as the cause of the Pilgrimage. In addition, Sir Geoffrey

Elton argued that the Pilgrimage was the result of the “unexpected overthrow of

Anne Boleyn in the spring of 1536 and the consolidation of power at court and in

government by Thomas Cromwell”. Thus, historians have and will continue to

argue endlessly about the true causes of the Pilgrimage; on balance, a collection

of factors contributed rather than an overriding cause. As a result, it is fair to

say that the rising incorporated a mixture of political, religious, social and

economic issues. Therefore, economic factors were only partly to blame for the

Pilgrimage of Grace.

Firstly, politics was partly to blame for the Pilgrimage of Grace; hence, by

early 1527 King Henry VIII sought a divorce from Catherine of Aragon. Though,

it is hard to pinpoint exactly why, the most plausible explanation is his belief

that “his marriage was barren because of its illegality” and Catherine’s failure to

produce a male heir. This is because Henry argued that it was blasphemous of

him to marry his brother’s widow and he needed a son in order t...

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...t, principle, fear-dabbled in treason” , became

involved in the Pilgrimage of Grace. But, Elton’s argument is at least useful in

the sense that it gives a helpful view on popular attitudes during this period.

Works Cited

Beer, Barrett L. Rebellion and Riot: Popular Disorder in England during the reign of Edward VI (1982).

Bush, Michael. ‘Up for the Commonwealth’: the significance of tax grievances in the English rebellions of 1536, English Historical Review 106 (1991).

Davies, C. S. L. ‘Popular Religion and the Pilgrimage of Grace’ in Order and Disorder in Early Modern England, eds. Anthony Fletcher and John Stevenson (1985).

Fletcher, Anthony. Tudor Rebellions (1997).

Hoyle, R.W. The Pilgrimage of Grace and the Politics of the 1530s (2001).

Shagan, Ethan H. Popular Politics and the English Reformation (Cambridge, 2003).