Preface

Summary

The Tudor Navy featured prominently in the Society's early publishing programme. Sir John Laughton's two inaugural volumes on the Armada were soon followed by Sir Julian Corbett's work on the preceding campaigns; meanwhile Michael Oppenheim and Alfred Spont had documented the other end of the Tudor age. Since then, however, only one volume in the main series has been wholly devoted to the period, returning to the Spanish war. The middle years of the sixteenth century have featured in three of the seven volumes of The Naval Miscellany and in the Society's all-embracing Centenary volume. A few papers from these years are also printed in works of wider scope. It was only by way of celebrating the Millennium that the Society finally published the great illuminated inventory of Henry VIII's fleet, an undertaking first planned in 1895. Though more interest in the late Henrician navy has developed as a result of the recovery of the Mary Rose, the reigns of Edward VI and Mary I, and the early years of Elizabeth I, remain largely bypassed in naval history. This neglect is not wholly surprising, for it is a period neither marked by a great maritime victory, nor associated with any famous commander. Yet this was a vital time for the administration of the navy, set up at the very end of Henry's reign, and it saw the apprenticeship of many who would lead the service in Elizabeth's later years. There is therefore a gap in the Society's coverage, which is now to be filled in two linked volumes. The second, Elizabethan Naval Administration, is built round a single large document, the Navy Treasurer's Quarter Book account for 1562–63; it is otherwise selective of a very large mass of material. Nothing so extensive exists before 1558, but this means that for the reigns of Edward and Mary the collection can be much more comprehensive. In particular, we are able to include all the extant Treasurer's and Victualler's accounts for the two reigns, printed here for the first time from the original rolls in the Public Records. Entries taken verbatim from the State Papers augment the calendar summaries previously published, and correct a good many errors.