The Chamber Books of Henry VII and Henry VIII – An Analysis

There is an easy familiarity to the term ‘Chamber Books’.  The phrase is, however, in effect an acronym.  There are others. To nineteenth century antiquarians these same books were ‘Household Books’ (a term that is still found in use), or ‘Privy Purse Accounts’.  That latter description is understandable, since the various books carry the unmistakable sign manuals of the two kings, but it is a misnomer.[16]  There was a keeper of the Privy Purse, responsible for little more than petty cash under Henry VII, and, under Henry VIII, for increasingly large sums of money to the eclipse of the Chamber, but he was not so-called officially until the mid-sixteenth century.[17]  The two offices were distinct. In administrative terms, the ‘Chamber Books’ discussed here were the account books or ledgers maintained by the Treasurer of the King’s Chamber.  John Heron, the second of Henry VII’s treasurers of the Chamber, and who continued until the year before his death in 1522 to serve Henry VIII in that same office, was more direct. The books were ‘The Kinges Boke of his Receiptes’, and ‘The Kynges boke of paymentis’.[18]

The office of the treasurer of the Chamber was an ancient one, firmly embedded within the king’s household, but changing in importance and function over time.[19]  Few directly compiled records have survived from the high middle ages, and none for the Yorkist kings, even if substantial transfers to the Chamber of money nominally under Exchequer control suggests the heightened importance of the Chamber under Edward IV.  ‘The ‘Black Book’ of Edward IV, a set of Ordinances for the governance of the king’s household, places the treasurer of the Chamber within the Jewel House.[20]  This arrangement continued under Henry VII. It in part explains both the operation and the records of Henry VII’s treasury of the Chamber, as well as the liveries given, under the heading of ‘The Juelhouse’, to John Heron, and to one of his clerks, for the funeral of Henry VII’s queen in 1503.[21] By 1509, for the funeral of Henry VII, and again under the same heading, the number of Heron’s subordinate staff given mourning livery had expanded to seven.[22]

The books themselves tell a story beyond mere bureaucratic convention: of John Heron’s close and continual access to the king in the reign of Henry VII, and the Chamber’s place at the heart of that king’s governance as a repository of memory as well as of money. If the relationship was more distant and more structured under Henry VIII, the Treasury of the Chamber continued to trump the Exchequer as, in effect, a national treasury. It was the paymaster for the king’s war machine, and for the creation of a renaissance court.  Under both kings it was a source of ready finance for diplomacy, both for minor expenses and in grand gesture politics. It was the source of ready cash for the maintenance of the king’s household, providing regular bridging loans to smooth the delays inherent in the collection of revenues assigned to the Household by the Exchequer.  It funded building works; the purchase of plate, jewels, books, and rich fabrics; and messenger, informational, and spy networks operating on behalf of the king and the council.  It paid the wages of Chamber staff, that is, the staff of the king’s inner quarters, including the kings’ musicians, fools and jesters; the costs of his entertainments, religious observance and almsgiving; and gambling debts. The books of Henry VIII are often more generous with information than those of Henry VII, recording names rather than just numbers or generic anonymity. Casual rewards ranged from the ephemeral, rewarding the bringers of fruit, fish, and other foodstuffs to the king, to rewards for actions that had a place and influence on the national and international stage.   In numerous instances, however, no reason was given for an individual payment and context, if it can be established at all, must be reasoned from other sources.[23] Even a seemingly self-explanatory entry may conceal a longer story. Yet by the mid-1520s the Chamber’s preeminence at the heart of government had waned, although it still handled large volumes of cash. The diminution in the Chamber’s extra-curricular importance is already apparent in the books before 1521. The story of the eclipse of the Chamber as a leading and semi-autonomous institution, and the disarray into which its records and finances descended mid-century, lies however outside the parameters of the Winchester Project.[24]  So, too, does the wider manuscript evidence of chamber activity and of the two-way flow of cash and information – what could be loosely described as in and out letters and points of contact with other state institutions and individuals – even if the larger whole makes a fascinating story.

Much of the original archive of the treasurers of the Chamber of Henry VII and Henry VIII has been lost.  Within the time frame of 1485-1521, the period covered by the Winchester Project, twelve ledgers are still extant, in the custody of either the British Library or The National Archives. Three chronicle receipts of money into the Chamber; the remainder record payments out and much other matter, mostly bearing on actual and potential sources of revenue, but with an important story to tell of the nature and management of early Tudor government.  In addition the archive includes a number of rough accounts kept by the treasurer’s clerks; files of warrants to the treasurer ordering payment; a few receipts; a small miscellany of other working documents of the Office; a few summary accounts of revenues that fed into the Chamber; and also third-party recognisances and obligations, or legally binding promises to pay, which were formerly in the custody of the treasurer of the Chamber or of the king himself.  Even within The National Archives (formerly the Public Record Office) the archive has not been treated as a distinct fonds; nor is it held together in a single record class. One reason is its interrupted custodial history.

The ‘Queen’s Book’, that is, the particulars of account of her receiver-general, Richard Decons, for the last year for the Queen’s life, was transcribed for the Winchester Project but has no inherent connection with the Chamber archive.[25]  It will be discussed separately at the end of this section.