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Elizabeth I after 1588: did her government decline?

The defeat of the Armada in 1588 was Elizabeth's greatest moment. Her last fifteen years were much harder: war, debt, hunger, rebellion in Ireland and a power struggle at court. Was her government weaker at the end of her reign, or did she keep control?

This page goes with our main Elizabeth I guide. It's most useful for AQA's Elizabethan England, c1568-1603 and OCR B's The Elizabethans, 1580-1603, which both run to the end of her reign. Edexcel's Elizabeth course stops in 1588.

Popular and effective are not the same

Questions about the 1590s often ask whether Elizabeth's government became less popular or less effective. Keep the two ideas apart. Popular means people liked and supported the queen and her ministers. Effective means the government kept order, raised money, defended the country and got its way. A government can be unpopular and still effective: high taxes are unpopular, but they can pay for a war that keeps the country safe.

Timeline, 1588-1603

The war with Spain went on

The war didn't end in 1588. It dragged on until after Elizabeth's death, and peace was only made in 1604. An English attack on Spain and Portugal in 1589 failed badly, with heavy losses. England had successes too, like the raid on Cadiz in 1596, and Spain's later armadas in 1596 and 1597 were broken up by storms. English troops also fought Spain in the Netherlands and in France.

Verdict: effective at keeping England safe, but expensive and with few big wins.

Money

War cost far more than the Crown's normal income. Elizabeth paid for it by asking Parliament for extra taxes, selling Crown land, borrowing, and rewarding courtiers with monopolies instead of money. She still left debts of around £350,000 when she died. That was a lot, but Philip II of Spain went bankrupt more than once.

Verdict: the money held out, but the methods, especially monopolies, made the government less popular.

Ireland

In 1594 Hugh O'Neill, Earl of Tyrone, led a rebellion against English rule that spread across Ireland. In 1598 his forces crushed an English army at the Yellow Ford. Essex was sent with the largest army Elizabeth ever sent to Ireland, but in 1599 he made a truce with Tyrone and came home without permission. His replacement, Lord Mountjoy, slowly won the war. A Spanish force that landed at Kinsale in 1601 was defeated, and Tyrone surrendered in March 1603, just after Elizabeth died.

Verdict: slow and very costly, but in the end the government won.

The crisis of the 1590s

Four bad harvests in a row from 1594 to 1597 sent food prices soaring. Wages didn't keep up, and in some areas people went hungry. In 1596 a small group in Oxfordshire planned a rising against enclosing landowners, but hardly anyone turned up and some of the leaders were executed. Parliament passed new poor laws in 1597, and the 1601 Poor Law made every parish collect a poor rate to help the poor who couldn't work.

Verdict: hard times made the government less popular, but there was no major uprising, and the government's answer lasted for over 200 years.

Monopolies and the Golden Speech

A monopoly gave one person the sole right to make or sell a product, such as salt, starch or playing cards. Elizabeth granted them to reward courtiers without spending her own money, but they pushed up prices. MPs complained in 1597, and in 1601 the anger in Parliament was so strong that Elizabeth promised to cancel the worst monopolies. She then met MPs and gave what became known as her Golden Speech:

Verdict: the anger shows how unpopular the system was, but the speech shows Elizabeth could still win people back.

Faction and the Earl of Essex

Elizabeth's older advisers died one by one: Leicester in 1588, Walsingham in 1590 and Burghley in 1598. Court split between two rivals: Robert Cecil, Burghley's son, and Robert Devereux, Earl of Essex, the queen's young favourite. After his failure in Ireland, Essex was banned from court and lost his valuable monopoly on sweet wines. On 8 February 1601 he marched into London with a few hundred followers, hoping the people would rise and help him remove his enemies. Almost no one joined him. He was tried and executed on 25 February.

Verdict: the rebellion shows how bitter faction had become, but its quick collapse shows the queen's authority was still strong.

So, did her government decline?

• Yes: constant war, debt, monopolies, hunger, rebellion in Ireland, faction at court and an ageing queen who still wouldn't name an heir.
• No: England stayed safe, Ireland was won, the poor laws worked, Essex's rebellion failed in a day, and in 1603 James VI took the throne peacefully, helped by Robert Cecil's careful planning.

Practice questions

1. Explain what was important about Essex's rebellion in 1601. (8 marks)
2. Write an account of the ways Elizabeth's government dealt with poverty in the 1590s. (8 marks)
3. "Elizabeth's government lost control in the last years of her reign." How far do you agree?

Questions 1 and 2 are in the style AQA uses. Here is a plan for question 1:

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Updated 18 October 2026