Global InformationDissolution of the monasteries information
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The dissolution of the monasteries, occasionally referred to as the suppression of the monasteries, was the set of administrative and legal processes between 1536 and 1541, by which Henry VIII disbanded Catholic monasteries, priories, convents, and friaries in England, Wales, and Ireland; expropriated their income; disposed of their assets; and provided for their former personnel and functions.
Though the policy was originally envisaged as increasing the regular income of the Crown, much former monastic property was sold off to fund Henry's military campaigns in the 1540s. He was given the authority to do this in England and Wales by the Act of Supremacy, passed by Parliament in 1534, which made him Supreme Head of the Church in England, he had broken from Rome the previous year, separating England from papal authority. The monasteries were dissolved by these two Acts of Parliament: First Suppression Act (1535) and the Second Suppression Act (1539).
While Thomas Cromwell, vicar-general and vicegerent of England, is often considered the leader of the dissolution, he merely oversaw the project, he had hoped to use for reform of monasteries, not closure or seizure. The dissolution project was created by England's Lord Chancellor, Thomas Audley, and Court of Augmentations head, Richard Rich.
Historian George W. Bernard argues that:
The dissolution of the monasteries in the late 1530s was one of the most revolutionary events in English history. There were nearly 900 religious houses in England, around 260 for monks, 300 for regular canons, 142 nunneries and 183 friaries; some 12,000 people in total, 4,000 monks, 3,000 canons, 3,000 friars and 2,000 nuns. If the adult male population was 500,000, that meant that one adult man in fifty was in religious orders.[1]
- ^ Bernard 2011, p. 390.