The Alchemical Patronage of Sir William Cecil, Lord Burghley
The Alchemical Patronage of Sir William Cecil, Lord Burghley
The Alchemical Patronage of Sir William Cecil, Lord Burghley
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Chapter Three: Alchemy and Crown Finances<br />
Elizabeth‘s finances were under considerable pressure during two periods. <strong>The</strong><br />
first, in the years immediately after her accession to the throne, from 1558 to 1568, saw the<br />
Crown, faced with a hostile France, having to deal with a legacy <strong>of</strong> inflation and debt.<br />
During the second, from the late 1580s to the end <strong>of</strong> her reign, war with Spain stretched<br />
the normally frugal monarch‘s finances almost to breaking point. During both periods<br />
<strong>Cecil</strong> played a central role in attempts to stabilise Crown costs and increase Crown<br />
revenues. Although the Earl <strong>of</strong> Winchester—described by A.G.R. Smith as ―one <strong>of</strong> the<br />
great administrators <strong>of</strong> Tudor England‖—acted as Elizabeth‘s <strong>Lord</strong> Treasurer until 1570,<br />
by the time <strong>of</strong> her accession the venerable councillor was in his mid eighties. 1 As a result,<br />
his influence was much diminished even before Elizabeth dismissed him as speaker <strong>of</strong> the<br />
House <strong>of</strong> <strong>Lord</strong>s on account <strong>of</strong> ―the Decay <strong>of</strong> his Memory and Hearing, Griefs<br />
accompanying hoary Hairs and old Age‖. 2 With Winchester‘s star waning, <strong>Cecil</strong>, as the<br />
Queen‘s Principal Secretary, demonstrated a considered concern for the Crown‘s finances,<br />
playing a central role in obtaining essential subsidies from Parliament. 3<br />
<strong>The</strong> debasement <strong>of</strong> the coinage during the first half <strong>of</strong> the sixteenth century caused<br />
the Elizabethan government enormous problems. War with France in the 1540s had left<br />
England in enormous debt, and so under Henry VIII and Edward VI, the treasury<br />
employed an old trick in order to restore the royal finances: reducing the precious metal<br />
content <strong>of</strong> English coins to extract increased revenue from existing gold and silver stocks. 4<br />
<strong>The</strong> treasury‘s overzealous activities during the Great Debasement, as historians have<br />
termed it, fuelled the inflation that plagued sixteenth century England. 5 At the same time<br />
the massive influx <strong>of</strong> Spanish silver from the New World decreased the value <strong>of</strong> both the<br />
1 A. G. R. Smith, <strong>The</strong> Government <strong>of</strong> Elizabethan England, London, 1967, p. 52.<br />
2 Anon., Journal <strong>of</strong> the House <strong>of</strong> <strong>Lord</strong>s: Volume 1: 1509-1577, London, 1802, p. 637.<br />
3 Graves, <strong>Burghley</strong>, p. 42.<br />
4 C. E. Challis, <strong>The</strong> Tudor Coinage, Manchester, 1978, pp. 81-111.<br />
5 Ibid.<br />
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