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THE PRIVY COUNCIL OF JAMES V OF SCOTLAND, 1528–1542*

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 December 2015

AMY BLAKEWAY
AMY BLAKEWAY*
Affiliation:
University of Kent
*
School of History, Rutherford College, University of Kent, Canterbury, Kent, ct2 7nzA.L.Blakeway@kent.ac.uk
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Abstract

The development of the Scottish privy, or secret, council has hitherto been located in the 1540s and attributed to the pressures on government brought about by royal minority. Concomitantly, scholarship exploring the personal rule of James V (1528–42) has focused on the king's relations with individual magnates and neglected the subject of institutional development during his reign. Through an examination of commentary on the council outwith the council register, ranging from acts of parliament to correspondence and reports by foreign observers, this article posits a significantly earlier date for conciliar development in Scotland than has hitherto been appreciated. The council is visible throughout the personal rule of James V, assuming a particularly significant role in Anglo-Scots diplomacy from 1540 until 1542, when it was delegated by James to respond to letters during his frequent absences from Edinburgh. This aspect of council activity provides an example of institutional development facilitating rather than hindering the continuation of a peripatetic royal court, an unusual combination in not only a Scottish but a wider European context. Reassessing the significance of James V's council thus has broader implications for understandings of his kingship and the expansion of crown power in sixteenth-century Scotland, whilst throwing light on questions of Anglo-Scots diplomacy.

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The Historical Journal , Volume 59 , Issue 1 , March 2016 , pp. 23 - 44
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Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2015 

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Footnotes

*

Earlier drafts of this material were presented at the St Andrews Politics of Counsel Workshop in October 2012 and the Sixteenth-Century Society Conference 2014. I should like to thank those present, and the anonymous reviewers for the Historical Journal, for their comments. All sums of money are pounds Scots.

References

1 Council of Scotland to James Learmonth, 22 July [1542], Edinburgh, National Records of Scotland (NRS) SP13/30/2.

2 It is cited in none of the following calendars of correspondence or investigations of James V's career: J. S. Brewer et al., eds., Letters and papers, foreign and domestic, of the reign of Henry VIII (21 vols., London, 1862–1932), xvii; Denys Hay, ed., Letters of James V collected and calendared by the late Robert Ker Hannay (Edinburgh, 1954); Jamie Cameron, James V: the personal rule, 1528–1542 (Edinburgh, 1998); Andrea Thomas, Princelie Majestie: the court of James V of Scotland, 1528–1542 (Edinburgh, 2005).

3 Council of Scotland to James Learmonth, 30 July [1542], NRS SP13/30/1; Council of Scotland to James Learmonth, 21 Aug. [1542], NRS SP13/30/3.

4 Julian Goodare, The government of Scotland, 1560–1625 (Oxford, 2004), p. 130.

5 Dale Hoak, The king's council in the reign of Edward VI (Cambridge, 1976); John Watts, Henry VI and the politics of kingship (Cambridge, 1996); Stephen Alford, Kingship and politics in the reign of Edward VI (Cambridge, 2002).

6 Classic contributions to this discussion include Elton, G. R., ‘Tudor government: the points of contact, 2: the council’, Transactions of the Royal Historical Society, 25 (1975), pp. 195–211CrossRefGoogle Scholar; John Guy, ‘The privy council: revolution or evolution’, in Christopher Coleman and David Starkey, eds., Revolution reassessed: revisions in the history of Tudor government and administration (Oxford, 1986), pp. 59–85; Dale Hoak, ‘Two revolutions in Tudor government : the formation and organization of Mary I's privy council’, in ibid.; John Guy, ‘Tudor monarchy and its critiques’, in John Guy, ed., The Tudor monarchy (London, 1997), pp. 78–109. For the Tudor council in a broader geographical context: Jon G. Crawford, Anglicizing the government of Ireland: the Irish privy council and the expansion of Tudor rule, 1556–1578 (Blackrock, 1993).

7 For a fuller discussion, see Trevor M. Chalmers, ‘The king's council, patronage, and the government of Scotland, 1460–1513’ (Ph.D. thesis, Aberdeen, 1982); Atholl Murray, ‘Exchequer, council and session, 1513–1542’, in Janet Hadley Williams, ed., Stewart Style, 1513–1542: essays on the court of James V (East Linton, 1996), pp. 97–117, at p. 105; Goodare, Government of Scotland, pp. 128–72; A. Mark Godfrey, Civil justice in Renaissance Scotland: the origins of a central court (Leiden, 2009).

8 For an account of the changing nature of their records, see T. Thomson et al., eds., Acts of the lords of council, 1501–1503 (ADC) (3 vols., Edinburgh, 1839–1991), iii, pp. xii–xxiii.

9 Chalmers, ‘King's council’, p. 7.

10 W. K. Emond, ‘The minority of King James V, 1513–1528’ (Ph.D. thesis, St Andrews, 1988).

11 Murray, ‘Exchequer, council and session’, p. 105.

12 Efforts were made sporadically from the late fifteenth century onwards to separate the judicial record from other business: ADC, iii, pp. xx–xiii.

13 R. K. Hannay, The College of Justice: essays on the institution and development of the court of session (Edinburgh, 1933); A. Mark Godfrey, ‘Jurisdiction in heritage and the foundation of the College of Justice in 1532’, in Hector MacQueen, ed., Stair Society Miscellany, iv (Edinburgh, 2002), pp. 9–36; John Cairns, ‘Revisiting the foundation of the College of Justice’, in Hector MacQueen, ed., Stair Society Miscellany, v (Edinburgh, 2006), pp. 27–50; Godfrey, Civil justice.

14 Godfrey, Civil justice, pp. 146–7; Murray, ‘Exchequer, council and session’, p. 109.

15 Godfrey, Civil justice, pp. 106–7.

16 Ibid.; Murray, ‘Exchequer, council and session’, pp. 115–16; Goodare, Government of Scotland, p. 130. For the privy council as a court and the details of its jurisdiction and procedural practices, see P. G. B. McNeill, ‘The jurisdiction of the Scottish privy council, 1532–1708’ (Ph.D. thesis, Glasgow, 1960), pp. 32–7.

17 NRS CS6; NRS CS7. Selections from the public business printed in R. K. Hannay, ed., Acts of the lords of council in public affairs, 1501–1554 (ADCP) (Edinburgh, 1932).

18 ADCP, p. xliii.

19 McNeill, P. G. B., ‘Clerk of the privy council’, Juridical Review, 7 (1962), pp. 55–8Google Scholar, at p. 55.

20 Privy Council Register, 1545–7, NRS PC1/1; ADCP, p. xliii.

21 Marcus Merriman, The rough wooings: Mary, Queen of Scots, 1542–1551 (East Linton, 2000), pp. 148–9. Hertford, Lisle, and Sadler to Henry VIII, 9 May 1544, British Library (BL) Add. MS 32654, fo. 179v; Anon., The late expedicion in Scotlande, made by the kynges hyghnys armye, vnder the conduit of the ryght honorable the erle of Hertforde, the yere of our Lorde God 1544 (London, 1544), sig. Biii.

22 ADCP, p. 581.

23 NRS CS6/21, fo. 108r. See also NRS CS6/21, fo. 140r.

24 Numerous non-conciliar documents were also burned during the English occupation: NRS CS7/2, fo. 37v; NRS CS7/4, fo. 135v; NRS CS7/5, fo. 54r. Earlier scholars have also posited the existence of lost council records: ADCP, p. vi; ADC, iii, p. xxiii.

25 Jenny Wormald, Court, kirk and community: Scotland, 1470–1625 (London, 1981), p. 13.

26 Goodare, Government of Scotland, pp. 130–1.

27 Ibid., pp. 130, 135.

28 Elton, ‘The council’, pp. 197, 203 especially.

29 ‘Secret Counsall n.’, Dictionary of the Scots Language, 2004, Scottish Language Dictionaries Ltd, www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/dost/secret_counsall, accessed 29 Apr. 2015.

30 ‘Privé n.’, ibid., www.dsl.ac.uk/entry/dost/dost44584, accessed 29 Apr. 2015.

31 Céderic Michon, ‘Conseils et conseillers sous François Ier’, in Céderic Michon, ed., Les conseillers de François Ier (Rennes, 2011), p. 36.

32 John Guy, ‘The French king's council, 1483–1526’, in Ralph A. Griffiths and James Sherborne, eds., Kings and nobles in the later middle ages (Gloucester, 1986), pp. 274–94, at p. 276.

33 Michon, ‘Conseils et conseillers’, p. 37.

34 Ibid., p. 38.

35 Goodare, Government of Scotland, p. 130. For an English parallel, see Watts, Henry VI, p. 126.

36 Gordon Donaldson, Scotland: James V to James VII (Edinburgh, second impression, 1971), p. 62; Wormald, Court, kirk and community, p. 12; Cameron, James V, pp. 1–8.

37 Cameron, James V.

38 Wormald, Court, kirk and community, p. 15.

39 Cameron, James V, pp. 292–4. For further comment on James's court, see Thomas, Princelie Majestie.

40 Eure to Henry VIII, 9 Feb. 1542, BL Add. MS 32637, fo. 19r.

41 Amy Blakeway, Regency in sixteenth-century Scotland (Woodbridge, 2015), pp. 46–8.

42 ADCP, pp. 277, 290, 294, 315; Cameron, James V, pp. 63–4, 70–1.

43 ADCP, p. 277. Gavin Dunbar, archbishop of Glasgow, was listed twice both by his position as chancellor and his ecclesiastical title.

44 Ibid., p. 290.

45 Ibid., p. 291.

46 Ibid., p. 294.

47 Cameron, James V, p. 52.

48 ADCP, p. 294.

49 Ibid., p. 315.

50 For comparable instances, see Blakeway, Regency, p. 178.

51 Godfrey, Civil justice, pp. 106–11; Emond, ‘Minority of King James V’, p. 549.

52 Michon, ‘Conseils et conseillers’, pp. 36–8; Elton, ‘The council’, pp. 201–3; Céderic Michon, ‘Essai de synthèse’, in Céderic Michon, ed., Conseils & conseillers dans l'Europe de la Renaissance v. 1450–v. 1550 (Rennes, 2012), pp. 349, 351–2.

53 ADCP, p. 327.

54 Ibid., pp. 327–9. For broader context, see Cameron, James V, p. 77.

55 ADCP, pp. 382–97; C. Patrick Hotle, Thorns and thistles: diplomacy between Henry VIII and James V, 1528–1542 (Lanham, MD, 1996), pp. 60–78; Richard Hoyle, ‘The Anglo-Scottish War of 1532–3’, in Camden Society Miscellany, xxxi (London, 1992), pp. 23–9.

56 ‘Answers to be made by the King's Grace’, [May 1532], NRS SP13/25. A possible clue to the identities of the individuals present at these discussions is revealed in the list of names written on the verso.

57 K. M. Brown et al., eds., The records of the parliaments of Scotland to 1707 (St Andrews, 2007–15) (RPS), 1535/46, www.rps.ac.uk, accessed 15 Oct. 2015.

58 Roger Mason, Kingship and the commonweal: political thought in Renaissance and Reformation Scotland (East Linton, 1998), pp. 91–2; Roger Mason, ‘Kingship and commonweal: political thought and ideology in Renaissance Scotland’ (Ph.D. thesis, Edinburgh, 1983), pp. 67–74. For an overview of the term in the English context, see Burgess, Glenn and Knights, Mark, ‘Commonwealth: the social, cultural, and conceptual contexts of an early modern keyword’, Historical Journal, 54 (2011), pp. 659–87Google Scholar; and John Watts, ‘“Common weal” and “commonwealth”: England's monarchical republic in the making, c. 1450–1530’, in Andrea Gamberini, Jean-Philippe Genet, and Andrea Zorzi, eds., The languages of political society: Western Europe, 14th–17th centuries (Rome, 2001), pp. 147–63 at p. 149.

59 Margaret to Henry VIII, 28 July 1535, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 52r.

60 RPS, 1535/4, www.rps.ac.uk, accessed 15 Oct. 2015.

61 Cameron, James V, p. 133.

62 W. K. Dikson, J. B. Paul, J. R. H. Stevenson, and J. M. Thomson, eds., Registrum magni sigilli regum Scotorum: the Register of the Great Seal of Scotland (11 vols., Edinburgh, 1882–1914), iii, p.1618.

63 ADCP, p. 459.

64 ‘Instructions for Henry Ray’, [6 Apr. 1537], BL Caligula B III, fo. 250r.

65 Eure to Cromwell, 6 Apr. 1537, The National Archives (TNA) SP1/117, fo. 265r; Harry Ray, ‘Answer to articles of instructions for repairing in Scotland’, Apr. 1537, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 102r.

66 Sutehyll to Clifford, 16 Apr. 1537, TNA SP1/118, fo. 201r.

67 Sutehyll to Fitzwilliam, 4 Sept. 1536, TNA SP1/106, fo. 102r; Louther to Cumberland, 6 Apr. 1537, TNA SP1/118, fo. 11v. The proclamation to muster is recorded in the later missive (fo. 11r) but who ordered it is unclear.

68 Cameron, James V, p. 134; Blakeway, Regency, pp. 15, 45, 116, 188.

69 James V to Henry VIII, 20 May 1536, TNA SP49/4, fo. 129v; Hotle, Thorns and thistles, pp. 91–3, 99.

70 Hotle, Thorns and thistles, pp. 141–91.

71 Eure to Cromwell, 26 Jan. 1540, BL Royal MS 7 C 16, fo. 137.

72 Hotle, Thorns and thistles, p. 145; Thomas, Princelie Majestie, pp. 143–4; Carol Edington, Court and culture in Renaissance Scotland: Sir David Lindsay of the Mount (1486–1555) (East Linton, 1994), p. 50.

73 Council of Scotland to Eure, 27 Apr. 1540, BL Royal MS 18 B VI, fo. 89r. Eure's letter to James is not extant and is uncalendared: Hay, ed., Letters of James V; Brewer et al., eds., Letters and papers, xv.

74 James V, letters commendatory for David Herald and Thomas Ramsay, 26 Apr. 1540, NRS GD149/264, fo. 149r.

75 Council of Scotland to Radcliff, 24 July 1541, BL Add. MS. 32646, fo. 210r.

76 Account of Haddon Rig for Learmonth, [Aug. 1542], NRS SP13/31; James V to James Learmonth, 2 Sept. 1542, NRS SP13/32; Huntly to James Learmonth, 7 Sept. 1542, NRS SP13/33.

77 Hertford to the English council, 29 Nov. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 160r.

78 Harry Ray, ‘Account of the murder of Somerset Herald’, 14 Nov. 15[42], TNA SP49/5, fo. 104r.

79 Ibid., fo. 104r.

80 Ibid., fo. 104v.

81 Ibid., fo. 105r.

82 See also Harry Ray, ‘Report on Scotland’, [June 1541], BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 167r.

83 Felicity Heal, ‘Royal gifts and gift-exchange in sixteenth-century Anglo-Scottish politics’, in Steve Boardman and Julian Goodare, eds., Kings, lords and men in Scotland and Britain, 1300–1625 (Edinburgh, 2014), pp. 283–300, at pp. 286–7.

84 Ray, ‘Report on Scotland’, [June 1541], BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 167r. Standard 44s payments: Thomas Dickson et al., eds., Accounts of the lord high treasurer of Scotland (TA) (13 vols., Edinburgh, 1878–1977), vii, pp. 309, 416, 431. For larger payments, see TA, vii, pp. 289, 308, 317, 323, 466. For Henry to James, see TA, vii, pp. 449, 482.

85 TA, vii p. 449.

86 James V to Wharton, 14 Feb. 1538, TNA SP1/129, fo. 41v; James V to Wharton, 11 Jan. 1540, TNA SP1/157, fo. 37v; James V to Norfolk, 8 Sept. 1537, TNA SP 1/124, fo. 196v.

87 See for instance Aberdeen: James V to Henry VIII, 11 Oct. 1541, TNA SP49/5, fo. 58; Falkland: James V to Christian of Denmark, 5 Sept. 1541, BL Royal MS 18 B VI, fo. 127v; Stirling: James V to Paul III, 9 Apr. 1541, BL Royal MS 18 B VI, fo. 116r.

88 James V to Thomas Wharton, 7 Feb. 1540, BL Royal MS 18 B VI, fo. 81r; James V to council at York, 7 Feb. 1540, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 127r; James V to Norfolk, 12 Mar. 1541, TNA SP49/5, fo. 48r; James V to Eure, 21 July 1541, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 180r; James V to Llandaff, [1541] BL Royal 18 B VI, fo. 129r.

89 Hotle, Thorns and thistles, pp. 146–8.

90 Key contributions include Head, D. M., ‘Henry VIII's Scottish policy: a reassessment’, Scottish Historical Review, 61 (1982), pp. 1–24Google Scholar; Roger Mason, ‘The Reformation and the origins of Anglo-British imperialism’, in Roger Mason, ed., Scots and Britons: Scottish political thought and the Union of 1603 (Cambridge, 1994), pp. 161–86; Merriman, Rough wooings; Claire Kellar, Scotland, England and the Reformation, 1534–1561 (Oxford, 2003). Hotle, Thorns and thistles, pp. 157–84, surveys previous discussion.

91 Scottish Council to Learmonth, 30 July [1542], NRS SP13/30/1.

92 James V to Henry VIII, 29 July 1540, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 130r.

93 Scottish council to Rutland, 2 Sept. 1542, BL Add. MS 32647, fo. 104r.

94 Scottish council to Eure, 28 Nov. 1542, TNA SP1/174, fo. 136r.

95 Proclamation against ballads slandering Henry VIII, 5 Feb. 1539, BL Caligula B VII, fo. 247r.

96 ‘Dominus Concilii’ to Margaret, 13 Oct. 1515, BL Caligula B VI, fo. 135r; ‘ane part of ye Regentis and Counsale of Scotlande’ to Dacre, 19 Nov. 1516, BL Cotton Caligula B VI, fo. 541r; ‘Secret counsale chosin be the Estatis of the Realme’ to Henry VIII, 12 Mar. 1525, TNA SP49/3, fo. 4v. One example of a letter bearing signatures might be from the council although those who signed described themselves as ‘Chapellanis and Oratoris’: Moray, Beaton et al. to Margaret, 24 Nov. 15[23], BL Caligula B I, fo. 326r.

97 Scottish council to Elizabeth, 22 Aug. 1560, TNA SP52/5, fo. 14; Scottish council to Elizabeth, 30 Aug. 1560, TNA SP52/5, fo. 63r.

98 Jacqueline Vaughan, ‘Secretaries, statesmen and spies: the clerks of the Tudor privy council, c. 1540 – c. 1603’ (Ph.D. thesis, St Andrews, 2007), p. 56; Watts, Henry VI, pp. 126–7, 209.

99 Henry to Westmorland & Cumberland, 20 May 1541, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 165v; Ray, ‘Report on Scotland’, [June 1541], BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 167r; Eure to Henry VIII, 9 Feb. 1542, BL Add. MS 32637, fo. 19r; Rutland et al. to English council, 5 Sept. 1542, BL Add. MS 32647, fo. 100r; Angus to Norfolk, 2 Oct. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 21r; Hertford et al. to English council, 1 Dec. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 171r; Eure to Lisle, 4 Dec. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 177r; Lisle to Henry VIII, 7 Dec. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 184r. Notably, all these letters are in a collection which seemingly originated in the archives of the council in the north: J. Bain, ed., Hamilton papers (2 vols., Edinburgh, 1890), i, p. ix.

100 Eure, ‘Articles of the affairs & occurrants of Scotland’, July 1541, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 181r; Radcliffe to Ferniherst, 26 Oct. 1541, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 246r. See also Cameron, James V, pp. 293–4.

101 Landaff to English council, 14 Aug. 1542, BL Add. MS 32647, fo. 25r.

102 Goodare, Government of Scotland, p. 129.

103 Moray to Norfolk, 31 Oct. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 118r.

104 Lisle to Henry VIII, 21 Dec. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 228r.

105 Kisby, Fiona, ‘Kingship and the royal itinerary: a study of the peripatetic household of the early Tudor kings, 1485–1547’, Court Historian, 4 (1999), pp. 29–39CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Thomas, Princelie Majestie, pp. 50–4, 244–6. For the court settling in Edinburgh, see Dennison, E. Patricia and Lynch, Michael, ‘Crown, capital and metropolis: Edinburgh and Canongate: the rise of a capital and an urban court’, Journal of Urban History, 32 (2005), pp. 22–44CrossRefGoogle Scholar, at p. 38; Amy Juhala, ‘An advantageous alliance: Edinburgh and the court of James VI’, in Julian Goodare and Alasdair A. MacDonald, eds., Sixteenth-century Scotland: essays in honour of Michael Lynch (Leiden, 2008), pp. 337–63, at p. 338.

106 Cameron, James V, pp. 133–7. For John Stewart, duke of Albany, see Emond, ‘Minority of King James V’, pp. 167, 314; For James VI, see Goodare, Government of Scotland, p. 136. More broadly, see Blakeway, Regency, p. 45.

107 Goodare, Government of Scotland, pp. 141–2.

108 Kisby, ‘Kingship and the royal itinerary’, pp. 30–1.

109 Chancellor and Scottish council to Radclyff, 24 July 1541, BL Add. MS 32646, fo. 210; chancellor and Scottish council to Rutland, 5 Sept. 1542, BL Add. MS 32647, fo. 104. No original items signed from the council without the chancellor remain extant. One letter from the ‘Council of Scotland’ rather than the ‘Chancellor and council’ survives in a near-contemporary copy, with no note made of any associated seals. It is unclear if the anomaly was in fact a mistake by the copyist: Scottish council to Eure, 27 Apr. 1540, BL Royal MS 18 B VI, fo. 89r.

110 Scottish council to Henry VIII, 21 Dec. 1542, BL Add. MS 32648, fo. 232r.