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The Dissolution of the Monasteries (referred to by Roman Catholic writers as the Suppression of the Monasteries) was the formal process, taking place between 1536 and 1540, by which King Henry VIII confiscated the property of the Roman Catholic institutions in England and arrogated them to himself, as the new head of the Church of England. These processes should be seen against the larger background of the Protestant Reformation taking place in continental Europe. Cardinal Wolsey had obtained from the Papacy a bull authorizing some limited reforms in the English Church in 1518. Acts reforming certain Church abusive practices were passed in November 1529. They set caps on fees for probating wills and mortuary expenses for burial on hallowed ground, tightened regulations covering rights of sanctuary for felons and murderers, and reduced to four the number of Church offices to be held by one man. Resistance among the ecclesiastics was stiff.
It has been suggested that getting the lands and treasuries of those religious houses was as much Henry's purpose in splitting with the Church of Rome as getting divorced from Catherine of Aragon; however, the evidence points away from this, since he spent five years pressuring the Pope for his annulment before finally giving up and splitting from Rome. Rather, having gained control over the church, he was unable to resist the temptation to use its wealth to clear the country's debts - especially as the church had an income three times greater than that of the state.
Henry had himself declared Supreme Head of the Church of England in February 1531. In April 1533 an Act in Restraint of Appeals, eliminated the right of clergy to appeal to "foreign tribunals" (Rome) over the King's head in any spiritual, financial matter.
Then in 1534 Henry had Parliament authorize Thomas Cromwell, a layman in the King's service since 1530, to "visit" all the monasteries (which term includes abbeys and convents), ostensibly to make sure their members were instructed in the new rules for their supervision by the king instead of the pope, but actually to inventory their assets. A few months later, in January 1535 when the consternation at having a lay visitation instead of a bishop had settled down, Cromwell's visitation authority was delegated to a commission of laymen. This phase is termed the "Visitation of the Monasteries."
In the summer of that year, the visitors started their work, and "preachers" and "railers" were sent to deliver sermons from the pulpits of the churches on three themes:
- The monks and nuns in the monasteries were sinful "hypocrites" and "sorcerers" who were living lives of luxury and engaging in every kind of sin there was.
- Those monks and nuns were sponging off the working people and giving nothing back and, thus, were a serious drain on England's economy.
- If the king got all the property the abbeys had, he would not need any taxes from the people ever again.
Meanwhile, during the last half of 1535, the visiting commissioners were sending back written reports to Cromwell of all the scandalous doings they said they were discovering, sexual, as well as financial. The law Parliament enacted in early 1536, relying in large part on the reports of impropriety Cromwell had received, provided for the king to take all the monasteries with annual incomes of less than £200, and that was done: the smaller, less influential houses were emptied and their property confiscated. Monastic life had been in decline. By 1536, the thirteen Cistercian houses in Wales had only 85 monks among them. Their reputation for lax probity was likely overstated, however.
The moves did not raise as much capital as had been expected, even after the king re-chartered some of the confiscated monasteries and confiscated them again. In April 1539 a new Parliament passed a law giving the king the rest of the monasteries in England. Some of the abbots resisted, and that autumn the abbots of Colchester, Glastonbury, and Reading were executed for treason in doing so, to set an example. The other abbots gave in and signed their abbeys over to the king. Some of the confiscated church buildings were destroyed by having the valuable lead removed from roofs and stone reused for secular buildings. Some of the smaller Benedictine houses were taken over as parish churches, and were even bought for the purpose by wealthy parishes. The tradition that there was widespread destruction and iconoclasm, that altars and windows were smashed, partly confuses the damage with the greater damage wrought by the Puritans in the next century. Relics were discarded and pilgrimages discouraged, however. Places like Glastonbury, Bury St Edmunds and Canterbury that had thrived on the pilgrim trade suffered setbacks.
Henry needed cash. Many of the abbeys were resold, at bargain rates, to the new Tudor gentry, alligning them as a class more firmly to the new Protestant settlement.
Other losses to posterity included widespread destruction of many valuable books held in the monastic libraries. It is believed that many of the earliest Anglo-Saxon manuscripts were lost at this time. Monastic schools and hospitals were also lost, with serious consequences locally.
Many of the dismantled monasteries and friaries were sold for nominal amounts (often to the local townspeople), and some of the lands the king gave away; there were also pensions to be paid to some of the dispossessed clerics. Many others continued to serve the parishes. Although the total value of the confiscated property has been calculated to have been as high as £200,000 at the time, the actual amount of income King Henry received from it from 1536 through 1547 averaged only £37,000 per year, about 20% of what the monks had derived from it.
The Dissolution was not popular throughout England. In 1536 there were major popular risings in Lincolnshire and Yorkshire and, a further rising in Norfolk the following year. Rumors were spread that the king was going to strip the parish churches too, and even tax cattle and sheep. The rebels called for an end to the dissolution of the monasteries, for the removal of Cromwell, and for the Catholic Mary Tudor to be named as successor. Henry defused the movement with promises, then summarily executed some of the leaders.
See also
External links - Dissolution of the Monasteries (http://www.britainexpress.com/History/Dissolution_of_the_Monasteries.htm)
- BBC Timeline: (http://www.bbc.co.uk/history/timelines/britain/tud_dissolution.shtml) Dissolution of the Monasteries
- Catholic Encyclopedia: (http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/10455a.htm) Suppression of English Monasteries
References - D Knowles, The Religious Orders in England, vol III (1959)
- J Youings, The Dissolution of the Monasteries (1971)
- C Haigh, The Last Days of the Lancashire Monasteries and the Pilgrimage of Grace (1969)
- B Bradshaw, The Dissolution of the Religious Orders in Ireland under Henry VIII (1974)
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