Middle English Literature

English Rising of 1381. New York: Viking.
Hilton, R. H. and T. H. Aston (eds.) (1984) The English Rising of 1381. Cam-
bridge: Cambridge University Press.
Justice, S. (1994) Writing and Rebellion: England in 1381. Berkeley: University of
California Press.
Oman, C. (1969) [1906] The Great Revolt of 1381. Oxford: Clarendon Press.
British Library MS Stowe 1047, fols. 340r–350r. In V. H. Galbraith (ed.) (1927) The Anonimalle
Chronicle, 1333 to 1381. Manchester: Manchester University Press, 133–50 (selections).
Language: French
Manuscript date: ca. 1396

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At this time
1
the commons of southern England suddenly rose in two
groups, one in Essex and the other in Kent, to do evil against the duke of
Lancaster and the other lords of the realm because of the very grievous
tenths, fifteenths, and other subsidies lightly conceded in parliaments and
levied by extortion from the poor people. These subsidies did nothing for
the kingdom’s profit but were spent badly and deceitfully to the great im-
poverishment of the commons, who therefore rose, as you will now hear.
Because in the year 1380 subsidies had been granted lightly at the parlia-
ment of Northampton
2
and because it seemed to various lords and the
commons that the said subsidies had not been properly nor honestly collected
but were commonly taken from the poor and not the rich – to the great
profit and advantage of the collectors and the deception of the king and the
commons – the king’s council appointed certain commissions
3
to inquire in
every township how they had been levied. Among these commissions, one
for Essex was sent to one Thomas de Bamptoun,
4
seneschal of one lord,
who was considered a king or great lord in that country because of his large
state. One day before Whit-Sunday
5
he sat in the town of Brentwood in
Essex in order to make an inquisition, and he showed the commission that
had been sent to him to raise the money that was in default and to inquire
how the collectors had levied the aforesaid subsidy. He had summoned
before him the townships of a neighbouring hundred and wanted to have
from them a new subsidy, commanding the people of those townships to
make a diligent inquiry, give their replies, and make their payment. Among
these townships was Fobbing, where people responded that they would not
pay anything because they already had an acquittance from him for the said
subsidy, at which the said Thomas strongly threatened them, and he had
with him two of our lord king’s sergeants-at-arms. Out of fear of his malice,
the people of Fobbing took counsel with those of Corringham, and the
people of the two towns rose and assembled, sending instructions to the
people of Stanford-le-Hope to rise with them for the common profit of all.
Then the people of these three townships came together to the number of
a hundred or more and, with one assent, went to the said Thomas de
Bamptoun and openly gave him the answer that they would not deal with
him nor give him any money. At this the said Thomas commanded the
1
June 1381.
2
The first poll tax in 1377 was one grant, the second in 1379 was graduated according to
status, but this third poll tax was a flat rate of 1 shilling (three grants).
3
On March 16.
4
Bamptoun’s name was correctly John.
5
The day before Whit-Sunday was Saturday, June 1.
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sergeants-at-arms to arrest the people and put them in prison, but the
commons rose against them and would not be arrested but made ready with
the purpose to kill the said Thomas and the two sergeants. So Thomas fled
towards London to the king’s council, and the commons went into the
woods because of their fear of his malice, hiding there for some time until
they were almost famished and afterwards went from town to town, rous-
ing other people to rise against the great lords and the good men of the
country.
Because of these things that happened to the said Thomas, Sir Robert
Bealknap, Chief Justice of the Common Bench of our lord the king, was
sent into the country on a commission of trailbaston,
6
and indictments
against various persons were laid before him. The people of the country had
such fear that they intended to abandon their holdings. So the commons
rose against him, came before him, and told him that he was a traitor to the
king and the kingdom, and that he malevolently and maliciously wanted to
show them as in default by means of the false inquests presented before
him. They made him swear on the Bible that never again would he hold
such sessions nor act as a justice in such inquests, and they made him tell
them all the names of the jurors. They took all the jurors that they could,
beheaded them, and threw their houses to the ground. The said Sir Robert
hastily went home without any delay. Afterwards, the said commons as-
sembled before the Whit-Sunday to the number of fifty thousand, and they
went to the various manors and townships of those who would not rise with
them and threw their buildings to the ground and set them on fire. At this
time they captured three of Thomas de Bamptoun’s clerks, cut off their
heads, and carried them about with them for seven days on poles as an
example to others. And they wanted to kill all the lawyers, all the jurors, and
the king’s servants they could find. Meanwhile, all the great lords of that
country and other nobles fled towards London or to other counties where
they might be safe.
Now, at that time the high master of the Hospital of St. John of
Clerkenwell in London
7
had a very fine and pleasant manor in Essex, which
he had ordered to have victuals and other necessities for the holding of his
general chapter, so it was stuffed full with wines and nicely stocked for such
a lord and his brothers. The commons came to the said manor, ate the
food, drank three casks of good wine, and razed the building and burned it
to the great damage and loss of the said master. Then the commons sent
6
Warrants against anyone who harmed the king’s lieges.
7
Sir Robert Hales, the Treasurer.

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various letters to Kent, Suffolk, and Norfolk, so people would rise with them
and, when they were assembled, they left in a number of companies, doing
great harm in the surrounding countryside.
Afterwards, on Whit-Monday
8
a knight of our lord the king’s household,
Sir Simon de Burley by name, came to Gravesend in the company of two
of the king’s sergeants-at-arms, and there he charged a man with being
his own serf. The good men of the town came to the knight to make an
agreement because of their respect for the king, but the said Sir Simon
would not take less than three hundred pounds in silver, a huge amount for
the said man. At this the good men prayed that he mitigate his demand, but
they could not come to terms nor get him to lower the sum even though
they said to Sir Simon that the man was a Christian and of good repute, and
so ought not to be ruined forever. Wherefore, the said Sir Simon became
irritable and angry, and he greatly despised these good townsfolk and, out
of the haughtiness of his heart, he made the sergeants bind the said man and
take him to Rochester castle for safe-keeping, from which came great evil
and mischief. After his departure, the commons began to rise, embracing
the men of many townships in Kent.
And at this time a justice was assigned by the king and his council to go
into Kent on a commission of trailbaston in the same manner as in Essex.
With him went a sergeant-at-arms of our lord the king named Master John
Legge, carrying with him a great number of indictments against various
people of that area to make the king rich. They wanted to hold their
sessions at Canterbury, but they were turned back by the commons.
After this, the commons of Kent, without a leader or a chief, gathered
together in great numbers day by day. On the Friday [after] Whit-Sunday
9
they came to Dartford, took counsel together, and ordained that no one
who lived anywhere within twelve leagues of the sea should come with
them but should guard the coasts from enemies. They said among them-
selves that there were more kings than one and that they would neither
suffer nor have any king except King Richard. At this same time the com-
mons of Kent came to Maidstone, cut off the head of one of the best men
of the town, and cast to the ground various houses and tenements of people
who would not rise with them, as they had done before in Essex. On the
Friday after that, they came to Rochester
10
and there met a great number of
the Essex commons, and because of the case of the Gravesend man, they
8
June 3.
9
I.e., June 7, but probably June 5.
10
The events at Rochester actually occurred Thursday, June 6.
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besieged Rochester castle in order to free their companion from Gravesend
whom the aforesaid Sir Simon had imprisoned. They made a strong assault
on the castle and, although the constable defended it vigorously for half a
day, he at last delivered the castle to them because of the fear he had of the
great multitude of people without reason from Essex and Kent. The commons
entered the castle and took their companion and all the other prisoners out
of the prison. Then the men of Gravesend returned home with their com-
panion in great joy and without doing anything more, but the others from
Maidstone took their way with the rest of the commons through the sur-
rounding countryside, and there they made their chief one Wat Tyler of
Maidstone to maintain them and counsel them.
On the following Monday, after Trinity Sunday,
11
they came to Canterbury
before the hour of noon, and four thousand of them entered the mother-
church of St. Thomas at the time of high mass and, kneeling, all cried with
one voice to the monks to elect a monk to be archbishop of Canterbury,
“For he who is archbishop now is a traitor and will be beheaded for his
iniquity,” and so he was within five days.
12
And when they had done this,
they went into the town to their companions, and with one assent they
summoned the mayor, bailiffs, and commons of the said town and exam-
ined them as to whether they would swear with good will to be faithful and
loyal to King Richard and to the loyal commons of England or not. The
mayor replied that they would willingly do so, and they swore their oaths.
Then the rebels asked them if there were any traitors among them, and the
townsfolk said there were three and named them. These the commons
immediately dragged out of their houses and cut off their heads. After-
wards, the commons took five hundred people of the town with them
towards London, but the others they left to guard the town.
At this time the commons had as their counsellor a chaplain of evil
disposition named Sir John Ball, and that Sir John advised them to get rid
of all the lords, archbishops, bishops, abbots, priors, and most of the monks
and canons so that there should be no bishop in England except for one
archbishop, who would be himself. He also said that there should be no
more than two monks or canons in each religious house and their posses-
sions should be divided among the laity, for which he was considered a
prophet by the commons. He worked with them day by day to strengthen
them in their malice, and he got a good reward later: he was drawn,
disemboweled, hanged, and beheaded as a traitor.
11
June 10.
12
Simon Sudbury became archbishop in 1375 and was beheaded June 14.

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After this, the said commons went to various towns and raised the
people, some willingly and others against their will, until they had gathered
a good sixty thousand. And as they went towards London, they met several
men of law and twelve of the king’s knights of that country; they captured
them and made them swear that they would support them or else they
would be beheaded. They did much damage in Kent, notably to Thomas de
Heselden, a servant of the duke of Lancaster,
13
because of the hatred they
had for the said duke, and they cast his manors and houses to the ground
and sold his livestock – horses, oxen, cows, sheep and pigs – and all sorts of
meal at a cheap price. Every day they desired to have his head and the head
of Sir Thomas Orgrave, Clerk of the Receipt and Sub-Treasurer of England.
When the king heard of their doings, he sent messengers to them on the
Tuesday after Trinity Sunday,
14
asking why they were doing these things in
this manner and why they had risen in his land. And they replied by the
said messengers that they had risen to save him and to destroy traitors to
him and to the kingdom. The king again sent messengers to them, wanting
them to cease their activity out of reverence to him until he could speak
with them, and that he would make reasonable amends for the evil done to
them according to their will. The commons sent through his messengers
that they desired to meet and speak with him at Blackheath. The king sent
back a third time saying that he would willingly come to them the next day
at the hour of prime,
15
in order to hear their intentions. Then the king, who
was at this time at Windsor, moved as hastily as he could to London. At
that moment the mayor and the good men of London came to meet him
and to bring him safely to the Tower of London. And all the council as well
as all the lords of the surrounding area assembled there, namely the arch-
bishop of Canterbury and Chancellor of England; the bishop of London;
16
the master of the Hospital of St. John of Clerkenwell (who was Treasurer
of England); the earls of Buckingham, Kent, Arundel, Warwick, Suffolk,
Oxford, and Salisbury; and others to the number of six hundred.
On the eve of Corpus Christi Day
17
the commons of Kent came to
Blackheath, three leagues from London, to the number of fifty thousand to
await the king, and they displayed two banners of St. George and sixty
pennons; and the commons of Essex came to the other side of the water to
13
Controller of John of Gaunt’s household.
14
Tuesday, June 11.
15
6 a.m.
16
William Courtenay, bishop 1375–81.
17
Wednesday, June 12.
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the number of sixty thousand in order to help them and have the king’s
reply. On this Wednesday, the king being in the Tower of London and
thinking how to handle the affair, had his barges made ready, took with him
in his barge the archbishop, treasurer, and others of his council, and four
other barges for his men, and travelled to Greenwich, three leagues from
London. There the said chancellor and treasurer informed the king that it
would be too great a folly to go to the commons, for they were men lacking
in reason and did not have it in them to behave well.
Because of the chancellor’s and treasurer’s persuasion, the king would not
come to them, so the said commons of Kent sent a petition to him, calling
for him to grant them the heads of the duke of Lancaster and fifteen other
lords, of whom fourteen were bishops present with him in the Tower
of London. And these were their names: Master Simon of Sudbury, archbi-
shop of Canterbury and Chancellor of England; Sir Robert Hales, prior of
the Hospital of St. John, Treasurer of England; the bishop of London;
Sir John Fordham, clerk of the Privy Seal and bishop-elect of Durham;
18
Sir
Robert Belknap, Chief Justice of the Common Bench; Sir Ralph Ferrers;
Sir Robert Plessington, Chief Baron of the Exchequer; John Legge, sergeant-
at-arms of our lord the king; Thomas de Bamptoun already mentioned, and
others. To this the king would not assent, whereupon the commons sent to
him again a yeoman, praying that he would come and speak with them. He
replied that he would do so willingly, but the said chancellor and treasurer
counselled him to do the opposite and to tell them that if they would come
to Windsor on the following Monday, they would have a suitable response
there. And the said commons had among themselves a “wache worde” in
English: “With whom haldes yow?” And the response was, “Wyth Kynge
Richarde and wyth the trew communes,” and those who did not know how
or would not reply were beheaded and put to death.
And at this time there came a knight in all the haste he could, crying to
the king to wait, and the king was startled and waited for his arrival and to
hear what he wished to say. The said knight came to the king and notified
him that he had heard from a servant, who had been held by the rebels for
the day, that if the king went to them, all the land would be lost, for they
would never allow him to leave them for any reason, but that they wanted
to take him with them around all of England, and they would force him to
grant them all their wishes and that their purpose was to kill all the lords
and ladies of great renown as well as all the archbishops and bishops, abbots
and priors, monks and canons, parsons and vicars on the advice and counsel
18
Bishop 1382–8.

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of the aforementioned Sir John Ball. Therefore, the king returned to London
as quickly as he could, and he was at the Tower at the hour of tierce.
19
At
that time the man, called before the yeoman, hastened to Blackheath, cry-
ing out to his companions that the king had left and that it would be good
for them to go on to London to pursue their purpose.
[The chronicle goes on to describe how the commons of Kent and Essex
forced prisoners from various jails, burned ecclesiastical and legal records,
beheaded 18 people, and destroyed buildings, including John of Gaunt’s
Savoy manor, an action which the chronicle attributes to Londoners.]
At this time a great body of the commons went to the Tower of London
to speak with the king and, as they could not get to speak with him, they
laid siege to the Tower from the side of St. Katherine’s, towards the south.
And another part of the commons, who were in the city, went to the
Hospital of St. John, Clerkenwell, and on their way they burnt the place
and houses of Roger Legett, questmonger, who had been beheaded in
Cheapside, and all the rented properties and tenements of the Hospital of
St. John they could find. Afterwards, they came to the beautiful priory of
the said hospital and set on fire many fine and delightful buildings within
the same, great damage and horrible actions for all time to come. Then they
returned to London to rest or for more mischief.
At this time the king was in a turret of the great Tower of London, and
he saw the manor of the Savoy, the Hospital of Clerkenwell, the houses of
Simon Hosteler near Newgate, and John Butterwick’s place burning all at
once. He summoned all the lords about him in a chamber and asked the
counsel what should be done in such a necessity. None of them could or
would give him counsel, so the young king said that he would order the
mayor of the city to command the sheriffs and aldermen to have it cried
within their wards that all people between the age of fifteen and sixty years,
on pain of life and limb, should go next morning (which was Friday) to
Mile End, and meet him there at seven of the bell. He did this in order that
all the commons, who were there around the Tower, might be made to
abandon the siege and come to Mile End to see and hear him so that all
those who were in the Tower could leave safely at their desire and save
themselves as they wished. But it came to nothing, for some of them did
not have the good fortune to be saved.
Later on that same Thursday, the said feast of Corpus Christi, the king
was in the Tower, thoughtful and sad, and he climbed onto a little turret
19
9 a.m.
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near St. Katherine’s where a large number of the commons were lying. And
he had it proclaimed to them that they should all go peacefully to their
homes, and he would pardon them of all their kinds of offences. But they
all cried with one voice that they did not want to go before they had the
traitors within the Tower and had charters to free them from all manner of
serfdom and they had certain other kinds of things, which they wished to
demand. The king benevolently granted all and made a clerk write a bill in
their presence in this manner: “Richard, king of England and France, gives
great thanks to his good commons for that they have so great a desire to see
and keep their king, and grants them pardon for all manner of trespasses,
and misprisions, and felonies done up to this hour and wills and commands
that every one should now immediately return to his own home, and wills
and commands that everyone put his grievances in writing and have them
sent to him, and he will provide, with the aid of his loyal lords and his
good council, such remedy as shall be profitable both to him and to them as
well as to the kingdom.” He put his signet seal to this document in their
presence and then sent the said bill by the hands of two of his knights to
those around St. Katherine’s. And he caused it to be read to them, and the
man who read it stood on an old chair above the others so that all could
hear. All this time the king was in the Tower in great distress of mind. And
when the commons had heard the bill, they said that it was nothing but
trifles and mockery. Therefore, they returned to London and had it cried
around the city that all lawyers, all those men of the chancery and the
exchequer, and everyone who knew how to write a brief or a letter should
be beheaded wherever they could be found. At this time they burnt several
more houses in the city, and the king himself ascended a high garret of the
Tower in order to watch the fires. Then he descended again and sent for
the lords to have their counsel, but they did not know how they should
counsel him and were surprisingly abashed.
On the next day, Friday,
20
the commons of the country and the commons
of London assembled in fearful strength to the number of a hundred thou-
sand or more, besides some four score who remained on Tower Hill to
watch those who were in the Tower. Some went to Mile End, on the way
to Brentwood, to wait for the king’s arrival because of the proclamation
that he had made. Others came to Tower Hill and, when the king learned
that they were there, he sent them orders by a messenger to join their
companions at Mile End, saying that he would come to them very soon. And
at this time in the morning he counselled the archbishop of Canterbury
20
June 14.

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and the others who were in the Tower to go down to the little water-gate
and take a boat and save themselves. And the archbishop did it in this
manner, but a wicked woman raised a cry against him, and he had to return
to the Tower to his confusion.
By seven o’clock the king himself came to Mile End and with him his
mother in a carriage, and the earls of Buckingham, Kent, Warwick, and
Oxford, as well as Sir Thomas Percy, Sir Robert Knolles, the mayor of
London, and many knights and squires, and Sir Aubrey de Vere carried the
royal sword. And when the king arrived and the commons saw him, they all
knelt down to him, saying, “Welcome, our lord King Richard, if it pleases
you; we will not have any other king but you.” And Wat Tyler, their master
and leader, prayed on behalf of the commons that the king would suffer
them to take and deal with all the traitors against him and the law. And the
king granted that they should have to do as they liked with all who were
traitors and who could be proved to be traitors by the law. The said Walter
and the commons were carrying two banners as well as pennons and smaller
pennons while they made their petition to the king. And they required that
from then on no man should be a serf nor make homage or any type of
service to any lord but should give four pence for an acre of land. They
asked also that no one should serve any man except at his own will and by
means of regular covenant. And at this time the king made the commons
array themselves in two lines, and had it proclaimed before them that he
would confirm and grant to them that they should be free, and generally
should have their will, and that they could travel through all the realm of
England and take all the traitors and bring them safely to him, and then he
would deal with them as the law demanded. Under this grant, the said Wat
Tyler and commons took their way to the Tower to seize the archbishop
and the others while the king remained at Mile End.
At this time, the archbishop had sung his mass devoutly in the Tower and
confessed the prior of the Hospital of Clerkenwell and others, and then he
heard two or three masses and chanted the Commendatio, the Placebo and