Prior to any military campaign, a significant amount of administrative and logistical groundwork had to be covered. Men had to be recruited to fight in the king's armies, food with which to feed them and weapons with which to arm them had to be gathered, and money to pay for all of this had to be raised. This was one of the most complex and crucial aspects of warfare in the fourteenth century, and it has received plentiful attention from historians. Beginning in earnest with H. J. Hewitt's seminal work in 1966, the additions of Michael Prestwich and Andrew Ayton, along with innumerable others, have provided a strong core of research from which a detailed account of military logistics in later medieval England can be gleaned. Despite this, the important role of the household knight has not always received the recognition it deserves. This is a significant omission for household knights featured among the most prominent individuals involved in financing, supplying and recruiting royal armies under Edward III. This chapter thus seeks to add a further layer of detail to our understanding of military preparation in fourteenth-century England by considering the role of the royal household knights within it. It begins by examining the contributions that they made to raising money and supplies, followed by their efforts in recruiting an army, before finally assessing their involvement in shipping.

Money and Supplies

Finance

War in the fourteenth century was, as it has always been, expensive. In the 1330s, Edward spent roughly £30,000 a year on his military endeavours, while an eye-watering £337,104 was invested in foreign war between 1338 and 1340. Compared to the ordinary income of the crown, which averaged little over £10,000 a year, these sums were vast. In order to pursue his military interests, Edward therefore needed to exploit other sources of income. There were two routes open to English kings in the fourteenth century. The first and most common was direct taxation of movable goods, for which the king needed the assent of parliament; alternatively, funds could be raised through a range of other, extraordinary measures, such as experimenting with indirect taxes and monopolies on the wool trade, the realm's greatest commodity, or taking out loans from the merchant community or the famous Italian banks.