New history books reviewed
JOANNE PAUL enjoys a vivid portrait of a pioneering Tudor banker whose economic mastery and total disregard for moral norms did much to originate the modern stereotype
The Tudor period is infamous for its ruthless, self-serving, take-no-prisoners characters. The trio of Thomases – Wolsey, More and Cromwell – ministers to the diabolical despot Henry VIII, compete in the public imagination for the position of worst baddie, with their respective lists of public corruptions, fiery executions and mistreatment of kin and allies. The Tudor period seems to be the historic embodiment of the old maxim about the corruptive influence of power; even its heroes and saints require some selective editing to escape the condemnation of the historical gaze.
Into this shadowy context enters a fourth Tudor Thomas: Sir Thomas Gresham, the banker. A cynical 21st-century observer could be forgiven for thinking that, if anyone was going to be self-serving and Machiavellian in the cut-throat world of Tudor politics, it might be the banker. John Guy’s impressive and original Gresham’s Law shows conclusively that Gresham does not escape the modern stereotype. In fact, he may have originated it. As Guy writes, Gresham was the “first high priest of market economics”, whose “dark wizardry” set England up for the financial stability that underpinned its later economic and imperial global mastery.
Guy does a venerable job of elucidating this arcane economic magic. A historian dedicated to and expert in the archives, Guy draws vivid portraits of the Tudor world and those who lived in it from the dense texts he uncovers. It is a great gift
to the field of history that the 500th anniversary of Gresham’s birth prompted Guy to turn to a figure whose important role in the development of Tudor politics, and the English economy, is often overlooked.
There is no question that economics often motivated the great tectonic shifts of Tudor politics. In an age when mercantile and banking interests played such a pivotal role in the shape of Europe, few historians have been brave enough to try to explain their mysterious complexities. As Guy writes, “entire regimes could stand or fall on the strength of their credit ratings”, and for a ruler “to survive, she had to be solvent”. Guy presents this reality starkly and clearly to his readers, a reality Gresham grasped better than his contemporaries – for which, Guy argues, he ought to be remembered.
Guy’s portrait is complete and wideranging, detailing not only Gresham’s political and business enterprises but his often dramatic personal life. Whereas the contemporaries with whom he shared a name, Wolsey, More and Cromwell, all have a level of ambiguity about their personalities which has variously thrown them into the roles of hero, villain and anti-hero, a reader struggles to imagine a BBC drama with Gresham as protagonist.
For all his importance to crown and history, Gresham emerges as a thoroughly unpleasant fellow. His siblings deeply distrusted him for his unabashed self-interest, and his wife loved and loathed him by turns. The rushed marrying-off of his 13-year-old illegitimate daughter, the product of an affair in Antwerp, provides one of the less subtle instances of Gresham’s cold and calculating view of the world. Not only did he marry her off as soon as was acceptable, but he swindled both bride and groom out of the money they were to live on and refused to support his daughter in the months before she was old enough to live with her new husband. Fortunately for the teenager, her new groom was supportive and kind, and paid for this time himself, even providing her with the education necessary to write missives to her mother on the continent.
Through stories like these – including Gresham’s well-earned and entirely satisfying comeuppance later in life – Guy presents the reader with a complete portrait of his subject, drawn from his deep engagement with the archival material. In this arena Guy is unquestionably the master, and it is a joy to read a book in which the vivid detail and compelling stories one enjoys are all so thoroughly researched.
The final chapters of the book chart events after Gresham’s death, the plight of his widow and the establishment of Gresham College. Even this was a somewhat cruel posthumous sting by Gresham (he never ceases to disappoint) aimed at the Corporation of London and the Mercers’ Company. His will set out that in order for them to retain the Royal Exchange (originally Gresham’s exchange), they had to help fund the college, which quickly became a burden.
Here, however, Guy’s book wanders beyond the boundaries of his usual authority. The final three chapters detail the history of Gresham College in the 17th and 18th centuries, the portrayal of Gresham on the
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early 17th-century stage (including a weak connection to Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens) and the modern development of his reputation. This final chapter is the most confusing, taking the reader all the way up to the 21st century and Gresham College’s online virtual learning programme, then back to a reassessment of Gresham’s character and biography, and then hurtling forward again, ending with a long quote from a speech by Thatcher against a European bank. These chapters are oddly arranged and not nearly as satisfying as those that precede them.
The attempts, nonetheless, to draw parallels with and connections to the present day do make sense. Gresham’s approach to life and business – mixed as they often were – is both thoroughly embedded in his time and strikingly modern. Guy points out that Gresham’s ideas are still relevant to understanding the 2008 financial crash, and we might add that his biography also sheds light on why his present-day successors remain on top even after the economy came down around them.
Gresham didn’t burn heretics at the stake or have queens beheaded. He was never the monarch’s right-hand man, and he died of a stroke that had nothing to do with an axe. Nevertheless, John Guy’s latest book shows readers the importance – in both politics and history – of following the money to root out the shadowy sources of power.