Records of Convocation VI: Canterbury, 1444-1509

The convocation records of the Churches of England and Ireland are the principal source of our information about the administration of those churches from middle ages until modern times. They contain the minutes of clergy synods, the legislation passed by them, tax assessments imposed by the king on the clergy, and accounts of the great debates about religious reformation; they also include records of heresy trials in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, many of them connected with the spread of Lollardy. However, they have never before been edited or published in full, and their publication as a complete set of documents provides a valuable resource for scholarship. This volume contains the acts of convocation during the wars of the roses and the reign of Henry VII. Most of this material has never been published before, and the collection of different sources enables us to see how both Edward IV and Henry VII modernized the institution along the lines of their other administrative reforms. We are also able to trace the church's reaction to the Lambert Simnel affair in the only documents which are exactly contemporary with the events.