4.29 Europe: a.d. 1501 to 1600  (Page 23/29)

A former junior officer of Drake's, Admiral Sir Richard Hawkins, later also raided about the Atlantic and around the southern end of South America, eventually to be taken prisoner by the Spanish. He had reported that 10,000 men under his command had died of scurvy and that orange and lemon juice were anti-scorbutic, but his home admiralty did not accept this for another century or more. (Ref. 222 ) It is said that Sir Walter Raleigh brought the potato to England from South America in 1588 and this probably had greater effects on the future of Europe and mankind than the sea battles with the Armada. (Ref. 260 )

There is evidence that between 1/2 and 2/3 of all English households received some part of their income from wages. All through this century the-Tudors depended upon unpaid justices of the peace, always land owners, to apply the laws. Failure to retain support of these land owners could result in revolts and one such uprising did occur against Elizabeth I in 1569-70 called the "Northern Rising". But overall, the last of the century was tranquil and an age of many exceptionally brilliant writers, including Shakespeare, Spenser and Ben Jonson. In 1599 London merchants were so upset over the rise in pepper from 37 cents to $1.00 per pound (these figures are the American equivalents) that they formed the East Indian Company to get their own pepper and thereby unwittingly started the British Indian Empire. (Ref. 8 , 211 )

Scotland

At the end of the last century James IV had promoted the founding of Aberdeen University with the first medical school teaching in Britain and in 1506 he granted a royal charter to a College of Surgeons in Edinborough. After the king's marriage to Margaret Tudor, daughter of Henry VII of England, border peace was obtained at least for while and government, justice and order were improved. Scotland then had a powerful navy and the largest and most modern cannon. After England's Henry VII died in 1509, English border raids resumed and when Louis XII of France pleaded for Scottish aid in his war against the Holy League and the pope, James first moved to the English border with an army of perhaps 20,000 men to meet an English force of about the same size. King James and some 10,000 Scots were killed.

Scotland then again had a child king, James V, less than two years old and who should have had his mother, Margaret Tudor, as regent. She was so for a few months, but when she married Archibald Douglas, the 6th earl of Angus, Scottish lords and Parliament, loyal to France, appointed John Stewart, Duke of Albany, to be regent. He was a grandson of James II, shrewd and intelligent and spoke nothing but French, having lived in France since the age of four. The factions of Angus, Albany and the queen mother all struggled for control and finally in 1526 Angus seized the king and kept him in confinement. John Stewart returned to France, where he was held for four years while Scotland again fell into violent anarchy, with lord against lord and clan against clan. Some semblance of order was restored after 1528 by the 16 year old king, who emerged in some way from his captivity. He obtained some money from the pope and a good deal more from Francois as a dowry for marrying his unattractive daughter. The lady obligingly died within two months and James V then married Mary of Guise, a French widow. She brought a dowry of 150,000 livres. In spite of the king's attempt to promote law and order, great brutalities, fights and noble murders continued. In 1542 an English army again attacked Scotland; the Scots, failing to get French help, were not enthusiastic for the conflict; they lost and James V was killed, leaving an infant daughter who was to become Mary, Queen of Scots. (Ref. 38 , 170 )