Some historians have argued that England during the seventeenth century developed into a possessive market society, in which labour was a commodity, property rights were absolute, values were determined by the market and relationships were governed by impersonal contracts. Others have traced this process back to the early Middle Ages. Although neither the timing nor the course of this development is ever defined with any precision in the model, business is accorded a primary role in creating a capitalist culture. New groups do of course emerge in all societies and develop as independent subsystems with their own explicit or implicit ideologies, which define new objectives, introduce different modes of conduct and establish new criteria of significance. To what extent did the Stuart business community follow this pattern and serve as a catalyst for change? Did businessmen share similar expectations, set themselves apart and develop their own value system?

The city

The role of business had originally been formalized by urban institutions and it was citizenship which conferred on the man of business the status of burgher. The medieval English cities, like their continental counterparts, had celebrated their emancipation from feudal society by glorifying their citizenry. Until the middle of the seventeenth century, the cohesion of the urban community was reinforced by public display in the streets, churches and Livery halls, by pageants, processions, ceremonials and regular feasts. Ritual dramas, like the Corpus Christi play cycle, functioned as symbols of solidarity; the solemn ceremonies of election and the swearing-in of officers were tangible expressions of citizenship.