William Harrison and sixteenth century humanism

Abstract

William Harrison's reputation is well established as the leading authority on the social conditions of Tudor England and his "Description of England" is generally acclaimed as the most valuable source of social history that exists for the Elizabethan period. To look upon him solely as a commentator on Elizabethan society is, however, to miss the point that he was primarily an historian engaged upon research for a history and that the "Description of England" was a by-product of that research. To his contemporaries he was a man of learning, an historian of merit, and the friend of such notable scholars as Harvey, Stow and Camden. His "Chronology" was never published, although Holinshed made use of it in manuscript form, and it is our loss that the manuscript copy of Harrison's history was lost from the Derry Diocesan Library in the nineteenth century. The purpose of this thesis is to examine William Harrison's place in the intellectual history of the sixteenth century and to look at his work in the context of the transformation taking place in the approach to the study of history, changing the largely uncritical medieval attitude into the scholarly method of Renaissance humanism. The impact of the new methods of accurate scholarship upon him personally is discussed as well as his interest in new trends in scholarly thought. The extent to which he shared the continental humanists'concern to understand their society and analyse the forces at work within it, as well as to make that knowledge generally available for the good of the commonwealth, is also focused upon. In producing such a comprehensive survey of the life, people and land of Elizabethan England, Harrison was making a new departure and he found a pattern already set on the European continent. He was well aware that his work was novel in England and he called himself an innovator, expressing the hope that others would follow his example in extolling and displaying their native land. The way in which he presented topographical facts was of particular relevance to later antiquaries and marks a step in the development of antiquarian studies. Harrison had the wide-ranging intellectual interests of the Renaissance scholar: history, archaeology, etymology, natural history, medicine, weights and measures, coins, map-making, chronology and the development of language. He knew Greek, Latin and Hebrew well; and he had also taught himself Anglo-Saxon, the Scottish version of English and the rudiments of the Welsh language. Patriotism and concern for the good of the commonwealth were powerful elements of English humanism and, despite the fact that Harrison was a clergyman, the secular motive was the force which underlay his interpretation of society. Divine interpretation had no place in his scheme of things: he looked to the state to provide defence, order and the maintenance of religion and it was to "law and nature" that he turned to "permit all men to live in their best manner".