Chronology: Key Events in 1485–1603

1486: Lovel conspiracy.
1486–87: Simnel rebellion (1).
1489: Yorkshire rebellion (2).
1491–97: Warbeck rebellion (3).
1497: Cornish rebellion (4).
1523: Parliamentary subsidy voted: £136,000 collected by 1525.
1525: Amicable Grant (5).
1534: Peacetime parliamentary subsidy passed; Silken Thomas uprising (6).
1536: Statute of Uses (7); dissolution of the smaller monasteries; disturbances in Lincolnshire; the Pilgrimage of Grace begins inYorkshire (8).
1548: Surveys of dissolved chantries; murder of William Body in Cornwall.
1549: Western rebellion in Devon and Cornwall; Kett’s rebellion in Norfolk (9).
1553: Northumberland’s coup in the name of Lady Jane Grey.
1554: Wyatt’s rebellion in Kent (10).
1558: Shane O’Neill’s rebellion begins in Ulster (11).
1569: Munster rebellion begins (12).
1569–70: Rising of the Northern Earls (13).
1579: Geraldine rebellion starts (14).
1595: Tyrone rebellion begins (15).
1596: Oxfordshire rising (16).
1601: Essex’s rebellion (17).

1. Simnel claimed to be the Earl of Warwick, who had escaped from the Tower in London. Henry defeated the rebels at Stoke: the Earl of Lincoln and Lord Lovel died on the battlefield and Simnel was given life imprisonment.
2. After a bad harvest, the county was not prepared to pay a tax to meet Henry’s war costs in Brittany. The Earl of Northumberland was murdered by a mob and the uprising which followed was put down by the Earl of Surrey.
3. This dynastic rebellion was potentially very serious. Warbeck was promised support from Scotland, France, Burgundy and Ireland; he remained at large for eight years and, unlike Simnel’s rebellion where Henry proved the boy was an impostor, the real Duke of York who had been murdered by Richard III could not be produced.
4. The sum of £88,000 was collected nationally to fund a war against Scotland. The Cornish felt it had nothing to do with them. As many as 15,000 rebels marched to Blackheath, where many were slaughtered, but Henry had been alarmed and never tried to levy a new tax.
5. Wolsey proposed a non-parliamentary tax of one-third on clerical goods and one-sixth on lay goods. Opposition was widespread but was most vociferous at Lavenham in Suffolk. Henry VIII backed down and blamed Wolsey.
6. ‘Silken’ Thomas O’Neill began a rebellion on hearing of the arrest of his father, the Earl of Kildare. Thomas and his five uncles were finally arrested and brought to London in 1537 where they were tried and executed.
7. The Statute of Uses was a law designed to prevent landowners from conveying their property to trustees on behalf of an heir to avoid paying inheritance tax to the crown. Many gentry resented its effects and Aske, who led the rebellion, was a landowning lawyer and well aware of the implications of this recent piece of legislation.
8. Historians still argue about the causes of the Pilgrimage of Grace. It began in Lincolnshire where three royal commissions were at work in 1536. One was seeking to close the small monasteries; a second was collecting the parliamentary subsidy and a third was surveying church goods. All were sensitive issues. Although the rising was put down, further protests began in neighbouring Yorkshire and spread throughout the north of England. Minor nobles, gentry, commons and clergy joined in the largest revolt of this period.
9. 1549 saw several minor disturbances and two major rebellions. In each case, social, economic and religious discontent combined at a local level to spark widespread protests. The minority of Edward VI also loosened
   people’s natural loyalty to the crown and the Duke of Somerset was viewed with increasing suspicion as either an incompetent regent or a dangerous reformer.
10. This was the only sizeable rebellion to dynastically challenge a Tudor monarch in London. 3000 supporters crossed the Thames at Kingston and made their way towards the Tower only to be halted at Ludgate hill.
11. Shane resented losing his earldom to his brother, murdered him and then turned against the English government in Dublin. The rebellion ended when he was killed in a brawl with rival clans in 1567.
12. James Fitzmaurice Fitzgerald rose up against English plantations in Munster and his colleague Edmund Butler attacked settlements in Leix-Offaly. Over 800 rebels were executed but Fitzgerald escaped to France.
13. Religious and dynastic causes appear to lie behind this revolt. The majority of the 6000 rebels were tenants and sub-tenants of leading Catholic landowners and forced to take part.
14. Fitzgerald returned from the continent and raised Irish rebels against Elizabeth’s religious and political policies. Fitzgerald was killed and the Earl of Desmond assumed command until his capture and execution in 1583.
15. Hugh O’Neill, the Earl of Tyrone, raised support from every Irish province against English rule. Elizabeth underestimated the scale of this revolt, made several unwise appointments and deployed insufficient resources until her military commander, Lord Mountjoy, persuaded Tyrone to submit in 1603.
16. In the wake of high taxation, bad harvests, disease and local enclosures, four rebels planned a rebellion near Oxford and were promptly arrested.
17. The earl tried to raise London against the Queen’s council so that he could recover his political power and influence. Only 300 men joined him and the rising lasted 12 hours.