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While preparing my doctoral dissertation, I was repeatedly advised director that "studying the Elizabethan army is like studying the Swiss navy."(1) This was a short way of saying that Elizabeth's army was small and hardly significant, if it existed at all. Certainly the Elizabethan army, unlike the navy, had no great victories upon which to build a historical reputation. Standard works by C. G. Cruickshank and Lindsay Boynton have focused on the corruption, localism, and other difficulties which undoubtedly hampered the Elizabethan army.(2) Together, these well-researched works present a portrait of military inefficiency that cannot be denied. Is it fair, however, to judge Elizabeth's army on its faults alone? After all, many of the habits of malfeasance discussed by Cruickshank were typical of all sixteenth-century armies, even the relatively efficient Spanish forces. A broader view of the military situation of Elizabethan England reinforces doubts about the tidy nature of such a judgment.
Certainly, Elizabethan England displayed many superficial elements usually associated with the "military revolution" first identified by Michael Roberts. The widespread appearance of printed military books certainly parallels developments on the continent.(3) The decline of the nobility's monopoly on military knowledge and experience shows the widening effect of arms upon society at large. Interest in groups such as the Honourable Artillery Company shows the type of impulse that is called "middle-class professionalism" when discussed in the Dutch context.(4) Altogether, the amount of military activity in Elizabethan England, both in theoretical writing and practical application, is tantalizing.
Consideration of the relative success of English arms in fulfilling the traditional function of an "army," achieving the aims set for it by the state, raises further questions. A brief recounting of the purpose and accomplishments of Elizabeth's ephemeral army shows that it was more substantial in life than its reputation has been in the intervening centuries. Perhaps military affairs had a deeper impact upon the Elizabethan state than is commonly assumed.
R. B. Wernham has argued effectively that England's war with Spain was primarily a land conflict, focused on the security of the Channel ports of France and the Low Countries.(5) Since this was the primary arena in which England's arms were engaged, success in this theater is a useful measure of the effectiveness of Elizabeth's army...