Why are the medieval Archbishops of York interesting?

The 14th century was a formative period in the development of both the North of England, and the Kingdom of England as political-cultural entities.

It culminated in the execution of Richard Scrope, the Archbishop of York, for treason following his participation in a northern rebellion against Henry IV in 1405. These events were unprecedented, created an international scandal, and their aftermath would condition northern identity and royal government of the north for centuries to come.

The Northern Way begins from the suggestion that we cannot understand these events without understanding the role of the Archbishops of York as northern leaders in the century before 1405.

As a result of the Scottish Wars of Independence, beginning in 1296, the English state adopted new processes for governing the region to the north of the Trent. The Church provided active leadership in the war through the mobilisation of material supplies, recruitment of soldiers and bureaucrats and even, sometimes, military leadership. Senior churchmen also promoted the cults of northern saints, such as the former Archbishop St William of York, as a means of encouraging support and loyalty among local communities.

Much of this promotion centred on the personalities of the Archbishops of York. In addition to their political leadership, they were instrumental in securing key government jobs for many northerners and they were active in the pastoral reform of both the clergy and the laity. They published new guides for parish priests to instruct the laity, supervised and sought to reform religious communities, built up networks of supporters among local elites and invested in local charities and local infrastructure. Their achievements were memorialised in new chronicles and in a greatly enlarged York Minster whose newly-glazed windows celebrated the history of the northern church and the leadership of its Archbishops.

The project examined both the political activities of the Archbishops, and their patronage of local communities and families. Our work is of import to all those interested in northern identity, society and region, past and present.

Find out more about the medieval Archbishops of York

What did they do?

The York registers

The wider archival context