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The earlier history of the English central archival system has been surprisingly underresearched.This book-length examination remedies this gap. Part One investigates the genesis of English archives, the background conditions ofstorage and retrieval which shaped archival work and access, and the various governmentalattempts at reforming the archival system and their political significance. Part Two examinesthe direct use of archives in the constitutional debates via the career of the judge Sir EdwardCoke (‘the father of the common law’) and the biographies of three individuals who were, atvarious points, charged with the keeping of archives: Sir Robert Cotton, John Selden, andWilliam Prynne. Finally, Part Three analyses a very different archival world, the King's ownprivate State Paper Office, investigating its restrictive access regime as a point of contrastwith that of the ‘public records,’ its probable uses as a centre for intelligence gathering, andthe intimate involvement of its most prominent Keeper Sir Thomas Wilson in high politicaland judicial intrigue on behalf of the Crown.