7

“The Worship and Welfare of the Whole Household”

Since the reign of Edward IV, the royal household had been divided into two separate departments, the Chamber, or the domus regis magnificencie (the King’s House of Magnificence), which comprised the “above-stairs” apartments where the King lived; and the Household (which was different from the “household,” which meant the whole court), formerly the Hall; this was the domus providencie (the House of Providence), the “downstairs” kitchens and offices that serviced the Chamber and facilitated the display of royal magnificence.¹ The nominal head of the entire royal household was the Lord Great Chamberlain; the office was held by successive earls of Oxford until 1540.

At the head of the Chamber was the Lord Chamberlain. From 1526, his department was officially in two sections:² the Privy Chamber, with a staff of gentlemen, grooms, esquires, ushers, and pages, who all looked after the King’s personal needs; and the Great Chamber, with a similar staff, which comprised the outward chambers and the Privy Wardrobes.

The Lord Chamberlain was also responsible for all those who worked in the Chamber, such as the royal chaplains, physicians, cupbearers, sewers (who waited at table), carvers, craftsmen, musicians, entertainers, watermen, and guards. The Lord Chamberlain could have as many as four hundred people under his jurisdiction; by 1547, about half of them were in posts “worth a gentleman’s having.”³ Henry VIII’s first Lord Chamberlain was his cousin Charles Somerset, Earl of Worcester, an illegitimate scion of the Beaufort family.

The Lord Chamberlain was always an experienced nobleman and councillor; his role was both administrative and political, for he often advised the King or spoke for him in the Council or Parliament. He was also responsible for arranging court ceremonies. He was assisted in his duties by his deputy, the Vice Chamberlain; this was Sir Henry Marney, a privy councillor who in 1497 had helped suppress the Cornish rebellion against Henry VII, and had been rewarded with the Order of the Bath at Henry VIII’s coronation.

The Queen’s Side had a similar organisation, under the authority of her Chamberlain, although it was smaller than the King’s, and many of its members were women.

The Household was headed by the Lord Steward, who was always a senior nobleman and whose office dated from Saxon times. His legal jurisdiction extended throughout the Verge of the Court, the area, or liberty, within a ten- or twelve-mile radius of wherever the King was staying. Much of his work was delegated to his subordinates—the Treasurer, Vice Treasurer, and Comptroller—on the Board of the Greencloth, the controlling body of the Household, although his post was no sinecure, and he took an active role and interest in the running of his department. George Talbot, Earl of Shrewsbury, whose motto was “Ready to accomplish” and whose family had a long tradition of service to the Crown, had been Lord Steward since 1502, and would remain in post until his death in 1538.

The Lord Steward was in charge of twenty-five service departments, five hundred staff, and vast financial expenditure. He was responsible for the provision of food, heating, lighting, and cleaning services for the whole court.

Outside the jurisdiction of the Lord Chamberlain and Lord Steward were other household departments, including the Office of the Revels, the Jewel House, the Office of the Tents, the Office of Works, the King’s Barge, the Royal Mews and Kennels, the Royal Ordnance, the Stables, and the Chapel Royal.

Given the numbers at court, the prevalent chaos, and the need to reconcile strict expenditure with the outward show of royal magnificence, the household administration was generally managed skilfully and efficiently. It was given two major overhauls in Henry’s reign—by Cardinal Wolsey in 1526 and by Thomas Cromwell in 1539—and frequent ordinances had to be issued against waste, disorder, and infringements of the rules; but it remained a stable, strongly bureaucratic institution.

The Lord Chamberlain, the Lord Steward, and the Master of the Horse were the three “Great Officers of the Household”; next in importance came the Vice Chamberlain, the Treasurer, and the Comptroller. These six officers all carried white wands of office signifying that they held their authority direct from the King; they were therefore known as the White Sticks. The Treasurer and Comptroller were subordinates of the Lord Steward and ranked immediately below him. The Lord Steward and his officers occupied good lodgings in the service quarters, where it was customary for servants to sleep and eat communally in or above their various departments.⁴

The office of Treasurer, held from 1502 to 1522 by Sir Thomas Lovell, was first instituted in the reign of Edward III. The Treasurer was responsible for the purchasing of provisions for the household and for the efficiency of his staff, “cherishing the good officer and punishing the evil-doer.”⁵ The office of Comptroller dated from the time of Edward IV. The Comptroller kept detailed accounts, sanctioned payments, audited returns, and managed the Treasurer’s finances. Sir Edward Poynings, who had served the Crown in Calais and Ireland, was Henry VIII’s first Comptroller.

Each Household department had a Serjeant, Keeper, or Master in charge, and under him a staff of yeomen, grooms, and pages. Much of the administrative work was done by clerks. Nearly all Household servants were male; the younger ones usually lodged in the palace, the older ones lived outside with their families whenever possible, since there were few married quarters. The same names occur frequently in the records (Weldon is one), which suggests that a certain nepotism was at play. Nevertheless, all servants were expected to be “personages of good honesty, gesture, behaviour and conversation.” ⁶

Only six women were employed in the Household. Five of them worked in the Laundry. One, Anne Harris (of whom more will be said later), dealt only with the King’s linen, while the rest worked for his successive queens. ⁷ The other female employee, “the wife who makes the King’s puddings,” ⁸ worked in the Confectionary; her name was Mrs. Cornwallis, and the King was so enamoured of her cooking that he rewarded her with a fine house in Aldgate.⁹ She was lucky, since female servants were paid less than their male counterparts.

The Household also employed many part-time and casual servants, as well as artists, craftsmen, tailors, embroiderers, silkwomen, masons, labourers, bricklayers, carpenters, plumbers, and plasterers. Numbers of gardeners were on the payroll, along with women who worked as “weeders in the King’s garden.”¹⁰ Master Walsh, a gardener at Greenwich, earned £3.10s (£750) a year; he probably worked on a part-time or seasonal basis. Jasper, a gardener at Beaulieu, earned the same amount quarterly, and supplemented his income with frequent rewards of 6s.8d (£101.50) from the King for bringing fresh herbs wherever Henry was staying.¹¹

Despite the strict social hierarchy that existed in the royal household, relationships that would have been unthinkable in later centuries flourished. The King took an interest in the members of his Household and was on good terms with many of them. Between 1527 and 1539, Richard Hill, the Serjeant of the Cellar, often played cards and dice with his sovereign; the Clerks of the Greencloth repeatedly petitioned the King on behalf of their friends; and when Henry went to war, he took many of his Household servants with him.

Competition for places in the Chamber and Household was often fierce, not only because it was a high honour to be employed by royalty, but also because the conditions of service were excellent compared with elsewhere. Jobs were relatively secure, and a certain status attached to them; there was no official retirement age, and servants could continue to work as long as they were able. It was rare for anyone to be dismissed for misconduct, and although the Lord Steward was commanded by the King to lay off staff who were “impotent, sickly, unable and unmeet” for work,¹² those affected could make a profit from the sale of their posts (a practice condoned by the White Sticks, even though it was illegal), and would usually receive a pension from the monarch. Most redundancies occurred when a queen consort died; those dismissed would receive a quarter’s pay. When staff were temporarily off sick, they could receive good “board wages” in lieu of lodgings and allowances.¹³

Salaries, wages, and allowances were determined by the White Sticks, and were listed in a detailed ledger. The King was a generous employer who paid his Chamber staff twice what a noble such as the Earl of Northumberland would have done, and they also received tips on a graduated scale for specific tasks. Household servants’ pay was somewhat lower, but could be supplemented by perquisites. Salaries varied surprisingly: the Cofferer earned £50 a year, about the same as the Master of the Minstrels, while a Page of the Chamber got double that “during pleasure.”¹⁴ There is evidence that salaries rose gradually during Henry’s reign. Household servants were paid by the Cofferer, Chamber servants by the Exchequer or the Treasurer of the Chamber. In 1539, the Cofferer was made responsible for paying everyone; in the first year he outlaid £33,000 (£9,900,000). ¹⁵

Most servants had an established right to certain perquisites, which were basically the unwanted by-products or rejects of their departments. Perquisites included candle ends, unbroken meats (i.e., untouched food left on the table), discarded saddles and bridles, deerskins, wine casks, lambs’ and calves’ heads, feathers from poultry, and the giblets and dripping from roast meat. These items could be kept for personal use or sold for high profits. There was usually a ready market for them: for example, courtiers not entitled to eat at the King’s expense were always eager to buy food.¹⁶

Servants trained on the job and, provided they proved competent and flexible, had good opportunities for promotion. Promotion was at the discretion of the Lord Chamberlain or the Lord Steward and the Board of the Greencloth, and was usually awarded on the recommendation of a Serjeant or Clerk of the appropriate department. The career prospects were so good that a high-ranking gentlemen such as Sir John Gage, who served as Vice Chamberlain (1528–1536) and Comptroller (1540–1547), was delighted to secure for his son James the humble post of Groom. James rose quickly through the ranks, and later became a Master of the Household. ¹⁷ A scullion might be trained as a cook, and so be set up in a career for life. There is evidence that servants also transferred from department to department,¹⁸ often to their profit. Versatility served one well in the Household.

Servants were required to wear liveries in red or the Tudor colours of green and white, and were provided with two sets a year, for winter and summer. In 1534, Hans Holbein painted a miniature of an unknown man in royal livery, with HR embroidered with a flourish on his red doublet. ¹⁹ Privy Chamber servants were distinguished by a livery embroidered with the King’s arms and Tudor roses.

Good work practices and conduct were constantly reinforced. Both the King and his Household officers demanded a high standard of service. Servants were to be unobtrusive when in attendance on the monarch, and under no circumstances were they to scratch themselves, pick their noses, blow those noses on their sleeves, spit, belch, “claw their cods,” or breathe stinking breath over their master.²⁰ Discretion was mandatory: upon taking up a post, every member of the household, of whatever rank, had to take an oath swearing loyalty to the King and promising not to work for anyone else and to carry out his or her duties faithfully and diligently.²¹

Henry himself, with his eagle eye for detail, was a stickler for punctuality. If he gave a courtier leave of absence, he expected him back by a set time, and woe betide anyone who was late. The Clerks Comptroller of the Board of the Greencloth maintained “establishment lists” of servants and their duties on rolls of parchment, and they would check every day to see that no one was absent and that all persons were where they should be; a servant could take leave only with the prior permission of one of the White Sticks. Wages were docked for unauthorised absences. The same lists were used to check whether unauthorised persons were working in the Household. If any was found, the Serjeant at the head of that department would be penalised with the loss of two days’ wages if he did not immediately expel the interloper.²² The Board also prepared an “ordinary” listing those persons entitled to bouche of court.²³

Early in the reign, the poet Andrew Barclay visited court and came to the conclusion that Henry VIII’s servants were underoccupied and lazy:

They have no labour, yet are they well beseen,
Bearded and guarded in pleasant white and green.

Some were also careless, quarrelsome, dishonest, dirty, and surly. ²⁴

Barclay evidently spent a night in one of the common sleeping chambers, and was appalled by the behaviour of the occupants:

It is great sorrow for to abide their shout,
Some fart, some flingeth, and other snort and rout;
Some buck and some babble, some cometh drunk to bed,
Some brawl and some jangle, when they be beastly fed;
Some laugh and some cry, each man will have his will,
Some spew and some piss, not one of them is still.
Never be they still till middle of the night,
And then some brawleth, and for their beds fight.

The Household Ordinances make it clear that stealing was rife, yet few offenders were ever caught. Those serving at table were not allowed to wear cloaks in case they were to smuggle out food beneath them.²⁵ The Eltham Ordinances of 1526 forbade courtiers and servants to “despoil commodities in gentlemen’s houses” when the court was on progress, “because it is often daily seen that, as well in the King’s own houses, as in the places of other noblemen and gentlemen, locks, tables, forms, cupboards, trestles and other household implements be purloined and taken away, to the King’s great dishonour.”²⁶ Even the nobly born, it appears, were no respecters of property.

The Board of the Greencloth, which was to be found in the Counting House, was the chief governing body of the Household. It was so called because its officers sat around a table, or board, covered with a green baize tablecloth. Since the reign of Edward IV, the Board had maintained “the worship and welfare of the whole household,”²⁷ and it had its own coat of arms depicting a key and a white rod on a green background. At Hampton Court, the Counting House was housed in the room directly above the entrance to the service complex, which is to the left as one faces the main gatehouse; its windows afforded a good view of the comings and goings in the court below. Similar arrangements were in place at other palaces.

The Board of the Greencloth was responsible for administration, finance, personnel, discipline, and provisioning.²⁸ At least one of the White Sticks had to be present at the Board’s daily meetings, with two or three Clerks of the Greencloth who assisted them.²⁹

Much of the work was done by the Cofferer—under Henry VIII, this office was first held by John Shurley—who received money allocated to the Household, issued advances to purveyors, settled their accounts, and paid out wages. He had to keep weekly records of expenditure, based on daily figures supplied by the Serjeants of the various departments, and make quarterly returns. It was the job of the Clerks to visit the larders and kitchens daily and check the stores.

Henry VIII had to dig deep into the wealth left by his father in order to finance his court and household and maintain the degree of magnificence appropriate to his position as king. Before long, his inheritance was spent. The annual revenues of the Crown remained stable, thanks to fixed rents and dues, at about £100,000 (£30 million) throughout the reign. Consequently, rampant inflation and rising prices caused by Henry’s wars and the demands of a growing population made inroads into the royal finances. Out of their income, Tudor monarchs had to fund all the expenses of government and administration, yet throughout the period the cost of maintaining the court was enormous, amounting to about one-third of the royal income. That there was no criticism of this underlines the unquestioning acceptance of the majestas of the sovereign.

The King sought to solve his financial problems by twice devaluing the coinage (in 1526 and 1539), by borrowing, and by purchasing property in order to increase his income from rents. Both Wolsey and Cromwell brought in measures to reduce wastefulness in the royal household, but to little avail. Henry died in debt.

The Chamber had two financial departments. The Treasury of the Chamber had originally been a chest containing money for the King’s private use, but by the time of Henry VIII it had become an important financial department receiving the bulk of the royal revenues and funding many of the King’s wide-ranging interests and commitments, such as state affairs, tournaments, wages, tips, gambling debts, and offerings at shrines. The Treasurer of the Chamber, initially Sir John Heron, was in charge of these funds.³⁰The King’s Privy Purse, which was equally important, if not more so, was held by the Groom of the Stool, who was head of the Privy Chamber; its funds were used for royal enterprises such as maintaining palaces or purchasing plate, jewels, and tapestries.³¹

The third financial department of the court was the Great Wardrobe, which had been its chief treasury since the fourteenth century. In 1445, it had been established at Baynard’s Castle in London, where were stored furnishings, fabrics, clothing, liveries, and the finery needed for ceremonial occasions. The Keeper of the Wardrobe was responsible for purchasing these items, keeping them in repair, and issuing them to the court when needed. The Offices of the Revels and the Tents came under his jurisdiction.

Security was somewhat lax at court. The King was an exalted being, but he remained very accessible to his subjects. Renaissance monarchs were supposed to be highly visible, and this often precluded taking strict security measures. Yet certain precautions were in place.

Entry to the court was controlled by the Serjeant Porter, who kept watch at the service gate for unauthorised persons or servants attempting to smuggle out stolen goods or provisions. He and his staff searched the palace three or four times a day to make sure that no “vagabonds, rascals or boys” had slipped in unnoticed.³² The Porter carried a staff of office, signifying his authority, and was provided with a small pair of stocks in which to restrain offenders.³³ He himself could lose wages or be fined if he was lax in his duties.

The Yeomen of the Guard, armed with fearsome gilt halberds, swords, and silver breastplates, were lined up along the walls of the Great Watching Chamber, guarding the entrance to the royal apartments around the clock. Founded in 1485 by Henry VII, the Yeomen of the Guard were the sovereign’s permanent personal bodyguard, under the command of their Captain (who, under Henry VIII, was the Vice Chamberlain, Sir Henry Marney), and responsible for keeping the King safe at all times. They were of yeoman birth, and had to be “good archers, hardy, strong and of agility.”³⁴ Most were chosen for their size and strength: “They were all very handsome, and by God, they were like giants!” exclaimed a Venetian envoy in 1515. ³⁵ Wherever the King went, they lined the way. During the Field of Cloth of Gold, when he approached, they cleared the crowds “by force. Drawn up in broad ranks on this side and that, the glittering guard of King Henry makes a wide path, 200 halberd-bearers in all, gleaming with gold.” ³⁶

In time of war, the Yeomen of the Guard were divided into two sections, archers and mounted halberdiers. Their numbers fluctuated: Henry VIII increased the Guard from 300 to 600 for his French campaign of 1513; in 1526, their numbers, which had fallen to about 200, were reduced to 100. By 1547, there were 150 of them.³⁷ Twelve members of the Yeomen of the Guard were permanently stationed at the Tower of London, and were called Tower Warders (the name Beefeaters does not occur until the seventeenth century).

The earliest picture of a Yeoman of the Guard appears on an Anglo-French treaty of 1527:³⁸ he wears the original green-and-white-striped velvet tunic³⁹ embroidered back and front with the crowned Tudor rose “with spangles of silver and gilt” and goldsmiths’ work. ⁴⁰ Each guard had three changes of livery: one for state occasions (as just described), a similar everyday livery made of cheaper cloth, and a “russet” livery, which may have been worn for the night watches. The famous scarlet livery was first introduced in 1514, and replaced the green and white tunics around 1530.⁴¹

In 1509, Henry VIII instituted another troop of royal guards, the Band of Gentlemen Pensioners or “Gentlemen of the Spears,” a mounted bodyguard, armed with spears and lances, whose duty it was to look to his safety on the field of battle, at court, and on ceremonial occasions. The King seems to have copied this idea from Louis XI of France, who in 1474 had founded the “Gentilhommes de l’Hotel du Roy ou Pensionnaires.”⁴² Unlike the Yeomen of the Guard, who were cheaper to maintain but not so prestigious, the fifty Gentlemen Pensioners were of aristocratic birth; they were highly paid,⁴³ better armed, with swords, halberds, battle-axes, and poleaxes, and had to provide three servants each. They wore the fine clothes of gentlemen; the chronicler Edward Hall once saw them dressed in cloth of gold and mounted on horses caparisoned with the same. Full training was given to recruits as yet “unexercised in the feat of arms.”⁴⁴ Their first captain was Henry Bourchier, Earl of Essex, and their first lieutenant Sir John Pechy.

Every door in the King’s apartments was fitted with a lock made by the royal locksmith, Henry Romains.⁴⁵ The King himself held one master key, and an appointed officer another. The Groom of the Stool, as head of the Privy Chamber, held a full set. There were two locks on the door of the wine cellar, and on the door of the room at Hampton Court where the King stored his paintings.⁴⁶ The Queen held her own privy keys. Occasionally, Romains was ordered to change all the royal locks. ⁴⁷ When Henry went on progress, he took with him a portable lock for his bedchamber door, and Romains went, too, to fit it. One such lock survives; originally at Beddington Park, it is now in the Victoria and Albert Museum, and bears the royal arms and a Tudor rose; a facsimile is at Hever Castle.

Every gentleman considered it his right to carry a sword, and honour demanded that insults or “proud and opprobrious words”⁴⁸ be met with a challenge. Although there is little evidence of duelling, violence did break out at court from time to time, and occasionally the King himself intervened, declaring “he would have no grudge among his gentlemen.” ⁴⁹ Below stairs, there were frequent fights.

Because violence occurring in such close proximity to the King constituted a serious threat to his safety, Parliament imposed ruthless penalties. A man who struck another and drew blood within the Verge of the Court could be sentenced to a fine, imprisonment, and the loss of his right hand. In 1542, one Collins, a gentleman, was hanged for committing manslaughter within the Verge of the Court,⁵⁰ and on another occasion three servants found guilty of murder were hanged in their royal livery, as a deterrent to others.

Young men indulging in unwise excesses of high spirits might find themselves under house arrest or in prison for a time. Prostitutes working near the royal palaces did a roaring trade; one courtier, who acted as a pimp, jokingly suggested that the King reward him for his services with a patent.

It was the duty of the Knight Marshal and his team of Provost Marshals to expel “all such common women as follow the court” and to patrol the palace and deal with troublemakers. They were dealt with by the Lord Steward’s court and either fined or sent to prison. Swearing, drunkenness, “haunting bad houses,” fighting, and drawing graffiti—hugh penises were a favourite—on the palace walls were all punishable by warnings, loss of wages, one month’s imprisonment, or dismissal.⁵¹

The King’s valuables—jewellery, plate, and money—were stored either in the palace’s Jewel House or in the privy coffers in his lodgings. ⁵² The Master of the Jewel House was responsible to the King for the security of the treasures deposited with him, which were locked in strong-boxes called standards⁵³ behind barred windows. Yet not all Jewel Houses were very secure: the one at Hampton Court was by the service gate. The King stored only lesser articles there, and kept his more precious belongings in his coffers.⁵⁴