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William Warham, Lord Chancellor of England (1504--1515) and Archbishop of Canterbury (1503--1532), was Desiderius Erasmus's most generous and consistent patron; in Erasmus's words a "sacred anchor" for him. The relationship between the two men connected with and contributed to a complex process of historical change. First of all, Warham and Erasmus were both associated with the paradigm shift which we now call the Northern Renaissance. Warham's academic background and his travels on the continent motivated him to support the study of Greek, new research in theology and the revival of classical learning. His money and political support acted as a force enabling Erasmus to get his New Testament work completed and published. Erasmus's New Testament research in turn facilitated the biblical scholarship of the Reformation and definitely motivated William Tyndale, among others. The reform which the collaboration of Warham and Erasmus helped to unleash was hence more radical than either had ever anticipated. Once religious reform started, neither man could control its pace although each made an effort to do so. The aim of this thesis is to show the significance of their relationship to the two individuals themselves, and also, more importantly, to analyze the dynamics of their collaboration and to demonstrate how and why it acted as a catalyst for religious change in England. Books have been written about More and Erasmus and Colet and Erasmus; the absence of a book about Warham and Erasmus has meant that the nature and significance of their relationship have not, as yet, been fully understood.

This thesis addresses a significant, though largely unexplored, part of the Marian Counter-Reformation. Queen Mary and her ministers expected the University of Oxford's contribution to the success of their plans for the English Church to be decisive. From her letter to the University in August 1553, only weeks after her accession, in which she announced her intention of laying the foundations of her ecclesiastical policy in Oxford, the academy underwent a transformation. After decades of trauma which had left the University poor, empty and (literally, in some parts) crumbling, Mary's reign gave the University a purpose, something which had been difficult to discern since the Dissolution of the Monasteries had deprived it of a large proportion of its students and lecturers. Mary and, after November 1554, Reginald Cardinal Pole undertook an extensive programme designed to reform and restore the University, a programme which was willingly and tirelessly taken up by those sympathetic to it in the University. This had its theological, ecclesiastical, liturgical and architectural elements, each of which will be considered in this thesis. Its central claim is not just that the existing picture of Mary Tudor's Church is incomplete without the inclusion within it of the restoration of Catholicism in Oxford, but that it is in Oxford, and perhaps only there, that all the different elements of her religious policy can be seen for what they are: a consistent whole, conceived and executed with one purpose: the reintegration of the English Church into the universal Catholic body.

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It is not the purpose of this dissertation to present a history of Purgatory; rather, it is to show through the history the influence of purgatorial doctrine on the English lay community and the need of that community for this doctrine. Having established the importance this doctrine held for so many in England, with an examination of the chantry institution in England, this study then examines how this doctrine was stripped away from the laity by political and religious reformers during the sixteenth century. Purgatorial belief was adversely affected when chantries were closed in execution of the chantry acts under Henry VIII and Edward VI. These chantries were vital to the laity and not moribund institutions. Purgatorial doctrine greatly influenced the development and concept of the medieval English community. Always seen to be tightly knit, this community had a transgenerational quality, a spiritual and congregational quality, and a quality extending beyond the grave. The Catholic Church was central to this definition of community, distributing apotropaic powers, enhancing the congregational aspects, and brokering the relationship with the dead. The elements of the Roman liturgy were essential to community cohesiveness, as were the material and ritual supports for this liturgy. The need of the community for purgatorial doctrine shaped and popularized this doctrine Next, an analysis of surviving and resurging elements of expiatory rites is explored; ritual, especially that surrounding death, as well as the relationship with the dead, were sorely missed when stripped away through political actions linked to Protestant belief. This deficiency of ritual aspects within the emerging Protestant religion became evident in further years as some of the same customs and rituals that were considered anathema by Protestants slowly crept back into the Protestant liturgy in an attempt to restore the relationship between the living and the dead. Strong evidence of this is provided through sixteenth to nineteenth century death eulogies, surviving rites of expiation, as well as lay essays and popular literature discussing the phenomenon called the Sin-Eater.