ABSTRACT
This chapter examines the early life of Philip Skippon in Norfolk, from his birth in 1598 to the beginning of his European military career in the Netherlands, to clarify how the social, cultural, economic and religious situation of gentry families in this period prompted many young men to undertake military service on the Continent. It argues that contemporary confusion over what merited the status of a gentleman was advantageous to those on the cusp of gentility. Such families exploited their access to the ideals and privileges of the gentry to improve their social standing, though their occupation of the lower echelons of this group made them more status-conscious. Military service was instinctively identified with the gentry and aristocracy and enabled those who undertook it to cultivate a reputation that highlighted virtues associated with gentility. Consequently, it is impossible to discern if those who joined Continental armies in the seventeenth century were motivated by religion, the desire for honour or simply stable employment. However, this chapter takes the view that ideological and pragmatic motivations were not mutually exclusive and maintains that historians should focus less on motivations and more on the opportunities that soldiering provided to fashion a public persona.
