Henry had spent a lot of money on wars in Europe, expensive clothes and food so he wanted to make up the loss by being head of the church. This meant Henry would have more money for himself. Finally, Henry made himself head of the English Church because he knew that previous kings had been unhappy with the amount of power the Pope had over the English church so he decided he wanted complete control over his country. Henry wanted power to divorce without the Pope's consent and in general Henry wanted more power over England's land. Henry wanted a divorce from Catherine of Aragon because she could not produce a son.
The Church had no incentive to use its property well ... So there was an economic problem. Henry closed down the monasteries so he could collect the taxes as he just wanted more money basicly! Between 1536 & 1540 Henry VII closed down all the monasteries in England. Monasteries were destroyed, their contents and wealth confiscated (& given to the king ) & those who opposed this were hanged.
Wealthy pilgrims often gave expensive jewels and ornaments to the monks that looked after these shrines. Henry VIII decided that the shrines should be closed down and the wealth that they had created given to the crown. The Pope and the Catholic church in Rome were horrified when they heard the news that
The four main reasons for the collapse of the empire are Economics. Power (Army), Religion and Power (Emperor). The first reason for the collapse of the empire is Economics. I can support this as the roman emperors spent a lot of money on showing off to others, making others feel jealous and for their own pleasure. Some of the things they spent it on were golden statues of themselves, banquets that were very expensive and clothes made out of the finest, unique fabrics instead of trying to develop the infrastructure of Rome.
Dissolution of the monateries uk Why did Henry VIII dissolve the Monasteries? [24] Henry VIII started dissolving the monasteries in mid 1530s when his attitude towards them changed completely and he started to shut them down starting with the small houses and then the large ones. One of the main reasons for the dissolution has got to be the fact that there was a lot of wealth in the monasteries and with Henry spending a lot of his inheritance that his father left him he was now looking for new ways to build up some money to fund any military campaigns he was holding and getting all of the items of value would go down better than raising taxes again so Cromwell and his team were sent and they created a list of all the possessions of the monasteries. From that list Henry could see that the money involved in the monasteries is very high so the order was passed. The money was used to help Henry with the money issues he was in as he had a very lavish lifestyle and he needed more money as he had spent all the money Henry II had left for him and it was also a reason for his break from Rome.
Additionally, the underlying problem of who had a greater claim to the crown, instigated when Henry IV usurped the throne from Richard II, was still a concern, and inevitably this was bound to result in a bloody battle in order to settle the disagreement. By 1450, the royal debt had become practically uncontrollable. The monarchy owed massive sums of money, including an ample amount to Richard of York, and the annual income had rapidly plummeted since the reign of Henry IV, partly due to the trade depression and inflation. An increase in loans, and interest payments from Italian bankers and merchants only served to further the problem of serious debt. It was necessary for Henry to continue the war as it would have been disastrous to give up on the fight for French land, but war was expensive and it affected the income of many noble families.
However, Henry and Cromwell had their own private intensions to dissolve the monasteries. The ability to review the church would find or fabricate reasons to dissolve the monasteries. Plus the crown was not financially secure and needed the money of the monasteries. Henry saw that it would be beneficial to him if the Pope’s power in England was weakened and the dissolution gave him the power to do so. The final way that Henry would justify the dissolution was to seize the land of the church and to give
Trade was also disrupted which caused a level of instability in the economy. Finally, war and taxes price increased. Larger, healthier and better trained armies were needed. Most governments started to rely on paid mercenaries to do their fighting for them. The problem with mercenaries is that they were expensive to obtain and even more expensive to retain.
It has been argued that Charles I was the main reason that war broke out. I will be investigating whether this is a far accusation by looking at the long-term and the short-term causes for the English Civil War and assessing how far Charles was really to blame. Firstly, it has been argued that Charles was to blame for the long-term reasons such as wanting to make changes to religion, the power of the king and money. For example, Charles was partly to blame for money because he was trying to buy off the Scottish with £850 a day (which he could not afford) as a result from trying to make the Scottish Puritans. They rebelled and tried to attack.
England for a long time had been told to hate Catholics and when James came from Scotland and became king he decided to marry Henrietta Maria, a Catholic, the people became unhappy because they did not know if their heir would be Protestant or Catholic. In 1625 England became involved in expensive foreign wars - with the Austrian Empire then in 1627 a war against France. This meant that Charles was very short of money and so he forced rich people to lend it to him. In 1628 Charles asked Parliament to let him raise custom duties on wines and many other goods. The MPs were not happy with the forced loans and foreign wars so they presented Charles with the Petition of Rights which was just parliament saying that Charles cannot raise custom duties without parliaments permission.