The year 1485 has usually been taken to mark the end of the Middle Ages
in England. Of course, nobody at the time would have seen it as such. There was
no reason to think that the new King Henry VII would rule over a country any
different from the one ruled over by Richard III. Before looking at the changes
in England under the House of Tudor it might be worth looking back at some of
the main social developments that had taken place in the late Middle Ages.
Society was still based upon rank. At the top were dukes, earls and
other lords, although there were far fewer as a result of war. Below these
great lords were knights. Most knights, even by Edward I's time, were no longer
heavily armed fighters on horses. They were "gentlemen farmers" or
"landed gentry" who had increased the size of their landholdings, and
improved their farming methods. This class had grown in numbers. Edward I had
ordered that all those with an income of £20 a year must be made knights. This
meant that even some of the yeoman farmers became part of the "landed
gentry", while many "esquires", who had served knights in
earlier times, now became knights themselves. The word "esquire"
became common in written addresses, and is only now slowly beginning to be used
less.
