The handling of the Finances was King Henry VII's most successful domestic achievement. How far do you agree?

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The Wealth of the crown was indeed indicated by the number of lands owned by the king hence there was no surprise in the king asserting policies on England which would ensure that the maximised amount of finances and the land went to the king. King Henry VII is a very good example of a Tudor king who took the opportunity as king to assert as many policies as possible on England especially the Nobility who may have posed a threat to the crown if not handled with effectiveness and the Gentry alike. Some examples of the inducements and sanctions initiated by King Henry VII include Acts of Attainder, the Order of the Garter, Bonds and Recognisances, Feudal Dues in addition to many others.

A large number of sanctions and inducements were established by the King in the aim of fulfilling his concern of gaining as much finances in the form of land, money etc as possible. An important inducement depicting this is Feudal Dues. This is where the King keen to emphasise his value as King asserted his Feudal rights upon the Nobility and set out commissions of inquiry to re-establish his Feudal rights which included Ward ship where the estates of the minors were placed under royal control of the crown until the minors came of age and during the meantime, the estates would be exploited to the maximum extent to increase the profits made by the crown.  Other Feudal rights include Marriage, Livery and Escheats which each involved around a sum of money having to be payed to the crown whether it was from the arranged marriage of heirs and heiresses or to re attain the ability to possess land previously placed under Ward ship. This proved to be highly effective with numbers of payments increasing dramatically along with controlling the power of the Nobility alike.

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In relations to the power of the Nobility, further inducements that played a major role in increasing Finances and handling the power of the Nobility were included the Order of the Garter as well as Patronage. Order of the Garter was a privilege and honour reserved for the King’s closest servants proving rather effective to Henry VII as the receipt received prestige but no lands or power was given to them. 37 knights of Garter were created by the King VII with more than half being given to the King’s closest associates in war and government eg Sir Reginald ...

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