Queen v . Northumberland,and the Control of Technical Expertise

Donald M. B. , Elizabethan copper: The history of the Company of Mines Royal, 1568–1605 (London, 1955), 1–2. Donald's narrative account of the trial (chap. 6) is the fullest secondary treatment it has received to date, and includes transcriptions from a number of the most important primary documents relating to the case.

Nef J. U. , The rise of the British coal industry (2 vols, London, 1932), i, 268.

On the practical and theoretical facets of early modern expertise, see Long Pamela O. , “Power, patronage and the authorship of ars: From mechanical know-how to mechanical knowledge in the last Scribal Age”, Isis, lxxxviii (1997), 1–41; Adams Nicholas , “Architecture for fish: The Sienese Dam on the Bruna River — Structures and designs, 1468-ca. 1530”, Technology and culture, xxv (1984), 768–97; and Ash Eric H. , ‘“A perfect and an absolute work’: Expertise, authority, and the rebuilding of Dover Harbor, 1579–1583”, Technology and culture, xli (2000), 239–68.

There is a large body of literature on the nature of skill and expertise, especially regarding the problem of transmitting and translating them from one place to another. On the difficulty of replicating scientific experiments, see Shapin Steven Schaffer Simon , Leviathan and the air-pump: Hobbes, Boyle, and the experimental life (Princeton, NJ, 1985), chap. 6; and Collins H. M. , “The TEA Set: Tacit knowledge and scientific networks”, Social studies of science, iv (1974), 165–86. Many other historians have explored the economic implications of the difficulty in transmitting technology and technical knowledge from one industrial context to another in various time periods; see Harris J. R. , “Skills, coal and British industry in the eighteenth century”, History, lxi (1976), 167–82; idem, Industry and technology in the eighteenth century: Britain and France (Birmingham, 1972); Mathias Peter , “Skills and the diffusion of innovations from Britain in the eighteenth century”, in The transformation of England: Essays in the economic and social history of England in the eighteenth century (London, 1979); Thirsk Joan , Economic policy and projects: The development of a consumer society in early modern England (Oxford, 1978); More Charles , Skill and the English working class, 1870–1914 (London, 1980); idem, “Skill and the survival of apprenticeship”, in Wood Stephen (ed.), The degradation of work? Skill, deskilling and the labour process (London, 1982); and Godfrey Eleanor S. , The development of English glassmaking, 1560–1640 (Chapel Hill, NC, 1975).

On the early history of the Company of Mines Royal, in addition to Donald's Elizabethan copper (ref. 1), see Scott W. R. , “The constitution and finance of an English copper mining company in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries: Being an account of ‘The Society of the Mines Royal’”, Vierteljahrschrift für Social und Wirtschaftsgeschichte, v (1907), 525–52; idem, The constitution and finance of English, Scottish, and Irish joint-stock companies to 1720 (3 vols, Cambridge, 1910; reprinted Gloucester, MA, 1968), i, passim, and ii, division IV; Collingwood W. G. (ed. and transl.), Elizabethan Keswick: Extracts from the original account books, 1564–1577, of the German miners, in the Archives of Augsburg, tract series, no. VIII (Kendal, 1912); Hamilton Henry , The English brass and copper industries to 1800 (London, 1926; 2nd edn, London, 1967), chap. 1; Rees William , Industry before the Industrial Revolution (2 vols, Cardiff, 1968), especially chaps. 3, 6, and 7; Hammersley G. , “Technique or economy? The rise and decline of the early English copper industry, ca. 1550–1660”, in Kellenbenz Hermann (ed.), Schwerpunkte der Kupferproduktion und des Kupferhandels in Europa, 1500–1650 (Cologne, 1977), 1–40; idem (ed.), “Introduction”, in Daniel Hechstetter the Younger, Memorabilia and letters, 1600–1639: Copper works and life in Cumbria (Stuttgart, 1988); and Ash Eric H. , “‘The skylfullest men’: Patronage, authority, and the negotiation of expertise in Elizabethan England”, Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 2000, chap. 3.

The literature on the techniques, technologies, and innovations of medieval and early modern mining and metallurgy, in England and elsewhere, is vast; see Nef John , The conquest of the material world (Chicago, 1964), chap. 1; idem, Industry and government in France and England, 1540–1640 (Philadelphia, 1940), chap. 3; Parsons William Barclay , Engineers and engineering in the Renaissance (Baltimore, 1939), part III; Bromehead C. N. , “Mining and quarrying to the seventeenth century”, and Forbes R. J. , “Metallurgy”, both in Singer Charles (eds), A history of technology, ii: The Mediterranean civilizations and the Middle Ages, c. 700 BC to c. AD 1500 (Oxford, 1956); Smith Cyril Stanley Forbes R. J. , “Metallurgy and assaying”, in Singer Charles (eds), A history of technology, iii: From the Renaissance to the Industrial Revolution, c. 1500 – c. 1750 (Oxford, 1957); Long Pamela O. , “The openness of knowledge: An ideal and its context in 16^th-century writings on mining and metallurgy”, Technology and culture, xxxii (1991), 318–55; Braunstein Philippe , “Innovations in mining and metal production in Europe in the late Middle Ages”, Journal of European economic history, xii (1983), 573–91; Molenda Danuta , “Technological innovation in Central Europe between the XVIth and the XVIIth centuries”, Journal of European economic history, xvii (1988), 63–84; Dibner Bern , Agricola on metals (Norwalk, CT, 1958); Benoit Paul , “Les techniques minières en France et dans L'Empire aux XVe et XVIe siècles”, Journal des savants, Jan.–June 1988, 75–118; Angel Michel , Mines et fonderies au XVIe siècle (Paris, 1989); Bailly-Maître Marie-Christine , “Notes sur les techniques extractives médiévale du sud de la France”, and Pierre Fluck and Bruno Ancel, “L'exploitation d'un filon: Sa dynamique, vue à travers les sources écrites (condensé)”, both in Les techniques minières de l'Antiquité au XVIIIe siècle (Paris, 1992); Suhling Lothar , “Innovationsversuche in der nordalpinen Metallhüttentechnik des späten 15. Jahrhunderts”, Technikgeschichte, xlv (1978), 137–47; idem, “Bergbau, Territorialherrschaft und technologischer Wandel: Prozessinnovationem im Montanwesen der Renaissance am Beispiel der mitteleuropäischen Silberproduktion”, in Troitzsch Ulrich Wohlauf Gabriele (eds), Technik-Geschichte: Historische Beiträge und neuere Ansätze (Frankfurt am Main, 1980), 139–79; idem, “Schmeltztechnische Entwicklungen in ostalpinen Metallhüttenwesen des 15. und 16. Jahrhunderts”, in Kroker Werner Westermann Ekkehard (eds), Der Anschnitt, Beiheft 2: Montanwirtschaft Mitteleuropas vom 12. bis 17. Jarhundert: Stand, Wege und Aufgaben der Forschung (Bochum, 1984), 125–30, as well as other essays in the same volume; and Westermann Ekkehard , “Zur Silber- und Kupferproduktion Mitteleuropas vom 15. bis zum frühen 17. Jahrhundert”, Der Anschnitt, xxxviii (1986), 187–211.

For early modern primary sources on mining and metallurgy, translated into English, see Agricola Georgius , De re metallica, transl. by Hoover Herbert Clark Hoover Lou Henry (London, 1912; reprinted New York, 1950); The Pirotechnia of Vannoccio Biringuccio, transl. by Smith Cyril Stanley Gnudi Martha Teach (Cambridge, MA, 1959); Lazarus Ercker's Treatise on Ores and Assaying translated from the German edition of 1580, transl. by Sisco Anneliese Grünhaldt Smith Cyril Stanley (Chicago, 1951); and Bergwerk und Probierbüchlein: A translation from the German , transl. by Sisco Anneliese Grünhaldt Smith Cyril Stanley (New York, 1949). On Agricola and his works, see Hannaway Owen , “Georgius Agricola as humanist”, Journal of the history of ideas, liii (1992), 553–60; idem, “Reading the pictures: The context of Georgius Agricola's woodcuts”, Nuncius, xii (1997), 49–66; Naumann Friedrich (ed.), Georgius Agricola: 500 Jahre (Basel, 1994).

Bromehead , op. cit. (ref. 6), 10–12; Nef , Conquest (ref. 6), 35–41. Sweden's copper mining industry constitutes an important exception to the rule. Though never large enough to rival the mining operations of Central Europe, the Swedes mined and smelted copper successfully throughout the medieval and early modern periods; see Donald , op. cit. (ref. 1), 10; Nef , Conquest (ref. 6), 13; Hamilton , op. cit. (ref. 5), 57–60. With respect to English mining, copper had certainly been mined in England throughout the Middle Ages, as was shown in the medieval precedents referred to by both sides during the Queen v. Northumberland trial. However, in comparison with the massive undertakings of Central Europe, or even with contemporary tin, lead, and iron mining in England, English copper mining was insignificant and technologically backward by 1560.

The processes for smelting and assaying are almost identical in principle, differing only in the amount of ore to be treated — The assay being a small-scale test of the ore's metallic content, and hence its profitable smelting potential.

Pure copper metal has a low melting point, and ores of copper oxide and carbonate are comparatively easy to smelt. The ores found in England are composed primarily of copper sulphide, however, which requires considerable prior preparation and a much higher temperature to smelt correctly. See Forbes , “Metallurgy” (ref. 6), 48–50; and below.

See Nef , Conquest (ref. 6), 15–29; and Parsons , op. cit. (ref. 6), 178–9.

The history of German interest in English mining ventures actually dates back at least a generation before Elizabeth's reign. During the 1520s, a German mine manager called Joachim Hechstetter surveyed for precious metals in England and Scotland, and was even named “Principal Surveyor and Master of all Mines in England and Ireland” by Henry VIII. No large-scale mining took place under his tenure, however, and he left England in 1529, after which time interest in English copper mining seems to have stalled. The Germans' interest was only rekindled again after 1560, when the English Privy Council negotiated with German assayers to remove copper from English silver coinage, severely debased during the reign of Queen Mary.

Joachim's son Daniel Hechstetter was the principal mine manager employed by the Company of Mines Royal from 1564 until his death in 1581 (see below), and he may have been introduced to the idea of mining in England by his father very early in his career. However, two of Daniel Hechstetter's relatives by marriage, Hans Loner and Daniel Ulstätt, were involved both in the 1560 refining of the English coinage and in the management of Company of Mines Royal, and probably brought Daniel to the attention of the Company as an established and experienced mine manager. See Hammersley , Hechstetter (ref. 5), 28–50; Donald , op. cit. (ref. 1), 11–12; Hamilton , op. cit. (ref. 5), 1–9.

By the early 1560s, Haug, Langnauer and Company had acquired a near-monopoly on the production of copper in Tyrol, as well the lion's share of the lucrative copper trade in Augsburg. In this they rivalled the control enjoyed by the famous Fuggers a generation or so earlier, a family to which the Haugs were linked through marriage. The Hechstetter family, though their fortunes had declined by mid-century, had also dominated the Augsburg copper trade during the 1510s. Each family had managed to gain Imperial support for their monopoly ambitions by making enormous loans to the Holy Roman Emperor out of their considerable profits. By the time the Haugs sought to undertake copper mining in England, therefore, they were working from a long tradition of royally-sanctioned mining monopolies. See Ehrenberg Richard , Capital and finance in the Age of the Renaissance: A study of the Fuggers and their connections, transl. by Lucas H. M. (London, 1928; reprinted Fairfield, NJ, 1985).

“Book of the license of the mines royall in England, 1564–1565”, 10 October 1564, British Library, London (hereafter BL), Sloane MS, 1709, ff. 40–45.

Plowden Edmund , The commentaries or reports of Edmund Plowden, of the Middle Temple, an apprentice of the common law (Dublin, 1792), 330. This work was originally written in French, and published as Les comentaries, ou les reportes … de dyuers cases (London, 1571). The 1792 edition is the first English translation; it was published for “H. Watts, law-bookseller”, but the translator's name is not included on the title page. The translation does not have standard pagination, but retains marginal notes which mark the pagination of the original folio edition; I have used these in my citations. Except where otherwise noted, my narrative of the trial is taken from Plowden's excellent and detailed record of the proceedings (pp. 310–40). Donald , op. cit. (ref. 1), also contains a useful précis of Plowden's report (pp. 137–45).

“Book of the license of the mines royall in England, 1564–1565”, 10 October 1564, BL, Sloane MS, 1709, ff. 35–37. The mining and smelting works required to process copper ore on a large scale consumed an enormous amount of timber for building supplies and fuel, and also produced a great quantity of sulphurous smoke, which had an unpleasant odour and could kill nearby vegetation.

George Nedham to the Queen, 10 March 1567, Public Record Office, London (hereafter PRO), State Papers, Domestic Series from the reign of Elizabeth I (hereafter S.P.), 12/42/61. Northumberland's cause attracted the sympathies of private landowners throughout England; even as the Court of Exchequer's verdict was handed down, in January 1568, William Humfrey was encountering similar challenges from local landowners in Devon and Cornwall. Humfrey's Company of Mineral and Battery Works had been granted the right to mine for gold, silver, copper, zinc, and other metals in every part of England not already mentioned in the earlier grant to the Company of Mines Royal. The Cornish landowners were so upset that they mounted a challenge to Humfrey's patent in the House of Lords. Although the Northumberland verdict assured the Crown's right to mine copper wherever it might be found, thereby guaranteeing Humfrey's right to mine by royal grant, the challenges so vexed Humfrey that he was moved to suggest to the Queen's principal secretary Sir William Cecil that “it might please the Queen's majesty that some entire court or office for judgment of mineral and metalline causes may be otherwise than at the common law”. Humfrey to Cecil, 25 February 1568, PRO S.P. 12/46/35.

Northumberland's relationship with Elizabeth and her ministers had been rocky almost from the start. He had first come to prominence during the reign of Queen Mary, who restored his family's title and estates to him after they had been attainted by Henry VIII in the wake of his father's participation in the 1536 rebellion known as the Pilgrimage of Grace. Northumberland was an ardent Catholic, and after Elizabeth's succession in 1558, her Protestant ministers did not trust his loyalty; in 1565 William Cecil wrote that Northumberland was “dangerously obstinate in religion”. He was forced to resign his office as lord-warden-general of the east and middle marches in 1560, and his considerable influence in northern England began to wane. Northumberland deeply resented what he considered to be royal interference with the traditional authority of the nobility in local governance, and the 1567 conflict with the Crown over copper mining rights on his estates only made matters worse. Northumberland ultimately joined with the Earl of Westmorland in raising a rebellion to free Mary Queen of Scots and restore the Catholic faith in England in 1569. The rebellion was easily put down, and Northumberland fled to Scotland. In 1572, however, he was surrendered to the English for the sum of £2,000; he was finally beheaded at York on 22 August 1572. For more on Northumerland's troubled relationship with Elizabeth and her government, see James Mervyn , “The concept of order and the Northern Rising, 1569”, in Society, politics and culture: Studies in early modern England (Cambridge, 1986), and the Dictionary of national biography.

Northumberland to the Queen, to the lord treasurer and Sir Walter Mildmay, and to the lord chief baron and the rest of the barons [of Exchequer], 7 February 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/32(I–III).

Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil to Northumberland, 19 February 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/18.

Northumberland to Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil, 26 February 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/32(IV).

Queen to Northumberland, 7 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/25.

Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil to Northumberland, 7 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/26.

Nedham to Cecil, 24 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/39, emphasis added.

Northumberland to Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil, 25 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/40, emphasis added. The bracketed words are my conjectures, as the right-hand margin of the letter is damaged near the top of the page.

Nedham to Cecil, 24 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/39.

Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil to Northumberland, 19 February 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/18; Queen to Northumberland, 7 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/25; Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil to Northumberland, 7 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/26.

Hechstetter and Loner to the Queen, and to Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil, 29 September 1567, PRO S.P. 12/44/15–16.

Agricola , op. cit. (ref. 6), Books 7–9; Parsons , op. cit. (ref. 6), chaps. 11–12.

Humfrey to Cecil, 12 May 1565, PRO S.P. 12/36/49.

Nedham to the Queen, 10 May 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/61.

Thurland and Hechstetter to Cecil, 26 May 1565, PRO S.P. 12/36/59; Hechstetter and Loner to Cecil, 25 June 1566, PRO S.P. 12/40/14. See also Collingwood , op. cit. (ref. 5), 15–17; Hammersley , op. cit. (ref. 5), 50–51.

Although assayers could (and did) provide useful working estimates of an ore's value, in practice assaying ores was neither a simple nor a completely reliable procedure. Even in sixteenth-century German mines, it was normal for more than one assayer to test any given ore, as a precaution against fraud and error. Disagreements over an ore's metal content were common, and might be caused by any number of factors, from variability in the ore veins to local weight/measure differences. The Company of Mines Royal was therefore not being entirely disingenuous in insisting that the value of the Newlands ore could not be accurately known until after the ore had been smelted, especially considering that the Newlands ore proved to be very difficult to smelt. My thanks to André Wakefield for pointing this out to me (personal communication).

Thurland to Leicester and Cecil, 16 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/33. In German-speaking regions, the sovereign monarch's right to control and profit from mineral resources within his realm was known as the Bergregal. Throughout most of the Continent, monarchs generally enjoyed much greater Bergregal than did their English counterparts. This was due in large part to the widespread continental adherence to Roman Law, which had held that all mines on private lands could be taxed by the emperor, while a large proportion of mines belonged to the emperor outright; see Nef , Conquest (ref. 6), 52–61. In early modern practice, however, the details of the Bergregal were not uncontested, and legal battles between sovereigns and local lords were common (Wakefield, personal communication).

Thurland to Leicester and Cecil, 16 March 1567, PRO S.P. 12/42/33.

Ibid., emphasis added.

Agricola , op. cit. (ref. 6), 439.

Nef , Conquest (ref. 6), 36. The Germans had learned to remove silver from copper ore by a process known as liquidation, in which they first added a large quantity of lead to the molten copper. The alloy was then allowed to cool and harden, after which it was cut into bricks and reheated to a temperature sufficient to melt the lead, but not the copper. In such an alloy, silver has a tendency to dissolve in the lead; when the latter melted and separated from the copper, therefore, it took most of the silver with it. The first liquidation generally recovered about 80% of the lead and silver, and could be repeated to recover the rest. The silver could then be separated from the lead by a much older process known as cupellation ( Dibner , op. cit. (ref. 6), 113–18). According to Parsons , op. cit. (ref. 6), the liquidation process was a sixteenth-century German innovation; it was important enough that Agricola dedicated almost all of Book 11 of De re metallica to it.

Thurland and Hechstetter to Cecil, 26 May 1565, PRO S.P. 12/36/59; Hammersley , Hechstetter, op. cit. (ref. 5), 51.

Entry Books of Decrees and Orders, Court of Exchequer, PRO, E.123/1A/93–94.

Nedham to Cecil, 29 August 1567, PRO S.P. 12/43/56.

Hechstetter and Loner to Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil, 29 September 1567, PRO S.P. 12/44/16.

Thurland to the Queen, 29 September 1567, PRO S.P.12/44/14.

Hechstetter to the Queen, 31 May 1567; Calendar of the manuscripts of the Most Hon. the Marquis of Salisbury … preserved at Hatfield House, Hertfordshire, Part I (London, 1883), 345, #1135.

Hechstetter and Loner to the Queen, 29 September 1567, PRO S.P. 12/44/15, emphasis added. Although the Newlands ore indisputably contained a small quantity of silver, there is no evidence that it contained any gold whatsoever; certainly the Company never tried to market any gold from its Cumberland operations.

Hechstetter and Loner to Pembroke, Leicester, and Cecil, 29 September 1567, PRO S.P.12/44/16.

Plowden , op. cit. (ref. 14), 310. For a general summary of the workings of the Court of Exchequer, see Bryson W. H. , The equity side of the Exchequer: Its jurisdiction, administration, procedures and records (Cambridge, 1975).

Plowden , op. cit. (ref. 14), 310. The legal historian Edward Foss, in the preface to his book A biographical dictionary of the judges of England, from the Conquest to the present time, 1066–1870 (London, 1870), provides a brief summary of the development of England's royal courts prior to the nineteenth century. During the thirteenth-century reign of Edward I, Foss writes, royal judicial responsibilities were divided into three separate courts: (1) the Court of King's Bench, originally intended to handle cases relating to the Crown's business, but which eventually won jurisdiction over some purely private cases as well; (2) the Court of Common Pleas, originally intended to handle all private cases; and (3) the Court of Exchequer, which was supposed to handle all cases involving the Crown's revenue, but also developed some manner of private jurisdiction over time. During the reign of Henry VIII, the number of justices for each court was fixed at four apiece (one of whom served as chief justice), for a total of “Twelve Judges of England”, a trope which Foss says “came to be a sacred institution”. Until the reign of James I (1603–25), the justices of the Court of Exchequer (known as the “lord barons of Exchequer”) held a lower legal status than the other justices, and were not even necessarily men of legal training; unlike the other justices, they usually did not go the circuits. In 1579 (eleven years after the conclusion of the Northumberland trial) Queen Elizabeth began to select the barons from among her (legally trained) sergeants-at-law. Although this helped to give the Court of Exchequer a better legal footing, the sergeants rarely had any experience with Crown revenue, and so beginning in 1606 James I made it a point to include at least one baron who did have some fiscal experience, and who understood the King's royal revenue prerogatives. The fact that Queen v. Northumberland unquestionably dealt with matters of Crown revenue and royal prerogative explains why the trial was held to be in the Court of Exchequer's jurisdiction, while the inferior judicial stature of the barons of Exchequer during Elizabeth's reign might explain why they were not permitted to preside over such an important case by themselves. ( Foss , A biographical dictionary, pp. v–xi). As for the specific judges involved in the Queen v. Northumberland trial, in another of his books entitled Tables of the Superior Courts of Westminster Hall, showing the judges who sat in them (London, 1865), Foss provides chronological lists of all the various justices throughout the history of the English royal courts. Those active from November 1567 though January 1568 included: For the Court of Queen's Bench, John Whiddon, Thomas Carus, John Southcote, and Robert Catlin as Chief Justice; for the Court of Common Pleas, John Walsh, Richard Harpur, Richard Weston, and James Dyer as Chief Justice; for the Court of Exchequer, John Birch, George Freville, James Lord, and Edward Saunders as Chief Baron ( Foss , Tables, 53–55).

Plowden , op. cit. (ref. 14), 323.

Ibid., 337.

As mentioned above, virtually all of the profitable copper mines of Central Europe also contained a considerable quantity of silver — In fact, the ores were often mined primarily for their silver content, with the copper itself being smelted and sold as a secondary commodity. The question of whether such bimetallic mines were to be considered primarily as “silver mines” or “copper mines” was less important in the Continental context, however, for the Bergregal of Central European sovereigns usually covered both. Only in the English case, where copper mines had a different legal status than silver mines, were the dichotomy and distinction crucial.

Plowden , op. cit. (ref. 14), 316–23.

Ibid., 328.

Ibid., 329, emphasis added.

Ibid., 336.

The most likely source of the proverb was a case in which Plowden defended a gentleman charged with hearing Catholic mass. Plowden established the fact that the man celebrating the mass was not a Catholic priest, but an informer who was merely pretending to be one in order to implicate those in attendance. Plowden then correctly remarked, “The case is altered: No priest, no mass”, and succeeded in getting his client acquitted; see the Dictionary of national biography.

Plowden , op. cit. (ref. 14), 338.

Ibid., 339.

Agricola, as written above, was widely considered to be the foremost authority on mining and metallurgy during the later sixteenth century. The identity and reputation of Christopher Eucelius, on the other hand, remain unknown.

Plowden , op. cit. (ref. 14), 336.

Ibid., 339, emphasis added.

Ibid., 339–40, emphasis added.

Ibid., 340.

On the use and manipulation of expertise on the part of various early modern regimes, see Vérin Hélène , La gloire des ingénieurs: L'intelligence technique du XVIe au XVIIIe siècle (Paris, 1993); Heller Henry , Labour, science and technology in France, 1500–1620 (Cambridge, 1996); Goodman David C. , Power and penury: Government, technology, and science in Philip II's Spain (Cambridge, 1988); Smith Pamela H. , The business of alchemy: Science and culture in the Holy Roman Empire (Princeton, 1994); Hale J. R. , “Tudor fortifications: The defence of the realm, 1485–1558”, in Colvin H. M. (ed.), The history of the King's works (6 vols, London, 1982), iv, 367–401; Long , “Power” (ref. 3); Adams , op. cit. (ref. 3); Ash , “Dover Harbor” (ref. 3); Mahoney Michael S. , “Organizing expertise: Engineering and public works under Colbert, 1662–83”, typescript in author's possession.

See McConica James , English humanists and Reformation politics under Henry VIII and Edward VI (Oxford, 1965); Zeeveld W. Gordon , Foundations of Tudor policy (Cambridge, MA, 1948); Dowling Maria , Humanism in the Age of Henry VIII (London, 1986); though Alistair Fox and John Guy argue for a somewhat stricter definition of what constituted ‘humanism’ in early modern England: See their book Reassessing the Henrician Age: Humanism, politics, and reform, 1500–1550 (New York, 1986).

On the tumultuous history of monopolies and patents in late sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England, see Price William Hyde , The English patents of monopoly (Boston, 1906); Hulme E. Wyndham , “The history of the patent system under the prerogative and at common law”, The law quarterly review, xii (1896), 141–54; Foster Elizabeth Read , “The procedure of the House of Commons against patents and monopolies, 1621–1624”, in Aiken William Appleton Henning Basil Duke (eds), Conflict in Stuart England: Essays in honour of Wallace Notestein (London, 1960), 57–85; Stone Lawrence , “The fruits of office: The case of Robert Cecil, first Earl of Salisbury, 1596–1612”, in Fisher F. J. (ed.), Essays in the economic and social history of Tudor and Stuart England, in honour of R. H. Tawney (Cambridge, 1961), 89–116; Sacks David Harris , “Private profit and public good: The problem of the state in Elizabethan theory and practice”, in Schochet Gordon J. Tatspaugh Patricia E. Brobeck Carol (eds), Law, literature, and the settlement of regimes (Washington, DC, 1990), 121–42; idem, “The countervailing of benefits: Monopoly, liberty, and benevolence in Elizabethan England”, in Hoak D. (ed.), Tudor political culture (Cambridge, 1995), reprinted in Guy John (ed.), The Tudor monarchy (London, 1997), 135–55; Thirsk , op. cit. (ref. 4).

Price , op. cit. (ref. 65), 33–34.

No mine should be considered a royal mine, Pettus wrote, “Where the Ore which is digged … doth not yield, according to the Rules of Art, so much Gold or Silver, as that the value thereof doth exceed the charge of Refining”. Pettus John Sir , Fodinae Regales, or the history, laws, and places of the chief mines and mineral works in England, Wales, and the English Pale in Ireland (London, 1670), 9, original emphasis. See also Stone Lawrence , The crisis of the aristocracy, 1558–1641 (Oxford, 1965), 338–9.

1 William and Mary, cap. 30, section 4; quoted in Nef , Coal industry (ref. 2), i, 268. The statute was cited and paraphrased in a marginal note in Plowden , op. cit. (ref. 14), 339. See also Nef , Industry (ref. 6), 98–101; and Hamilton , op. cit. (ref. 5), 64.