This thesis explores the interaction of bishops with both the English crown and members of late medieval society more generally by focusing on petitions and the supplicatory strategies adopted by bishops in their endeavours to secure legal remedy. Aside from revealing that bishops were often indistinguishable from lay petitioners in terms of the content of their petitions, with many of their complaints arising from their role as great landlords and tenants-in-chief rather than relating to the exercise of episcopal office, this research has also demonstrated that distinct supplicatory cultures separated the clergy from the laity. Notably, whereas petitions from lay supplicants often incorporated crown-alignment rhetoric into their petitions, thereby mirroring the language of ‘common profit’ found in common petitions, petitions from bishops reflected the supplicatory character of the clerical gravamina and presented requests for the exclusive interest of the church. As such, petitions from bishops, alongside the clerical gravamina, encapsulated a set of values, manifest through the use of language and rhetoric, which sought to assert the institutional independence of the church. Yet, despite being part of a supplicatory culture which sought to defend church autonomy and ecclesiastical jurisdictional integrity, the petitionary system in England sapped the supplicatory strength of the clergy and reduced their ability to defend their autonomy in the face of royal demands.

This thesis offers a new approach to the understanding of the recurrent crises of the period c.1320 to 1335, covering the final years of Edward II’s turbulent reign, the deposition, and its repercussions into the period of the Regency and the first years of the majority rule of Edward III. This has been achieved through an archive led study of the accounts of the ‘complaint and redress’ encompassed in the records of the Ancient Petitions presented to the Crown, held by The National Archives and designated as the SC 8 series. These records contain some of the most vivid contemporary and individual records of the lives and concerns of the king’s subjects during this turbulent period. This thesis illustrates that these records contain the genuine ‘voice’ of the petitioners, and can be used to reveal the impact on those seeking the king’s justice during the recurring crises of this defining moment in late medieval English history. Although there has been much interest in the events leading to the deposition and death of Edward II, research to date has focused mainly on its effect on the noble members of society, their place in administrative and governmental history, and the workings of the judicial system. In contrast, this study considers the nature of these complaints and requests in order to illustrate specific events. It places them in historical, social and political context to further illustrate Michael Prestwich’s assertion that ‘personalities mattered more (in the fourteenth century) than abstract principles of reform’. This fresh approach to the study of the petitions examines how the changing fortunes of Thomas 2nd earl of Lancaster, Hugh Despenser the younger, his father Hugh Despenser the elder, Edward II’s queen, Isabella and her partner Sir Roger Mortimer of Wigmore affected the lives of those seemingly unimportant people that made up the majority of the king’s subjects.