The election of knights of the shire for Rutland took place at meetings of the county court held at Oakham. Indentures survive for the Parliaments between 1542 and 1558, all written in English except the first, which is in Latin. The contracting parties are the sheriff and ‘the inhabitants and freeholders’, between 20 and 40 being named, most of them yeomen. In 1529 Sir Everard Digby returned himself.4

The two leading families of Digby and Harington, both connected with the earls of Rutland, virtually shared the representation with Anthony Colly, who was comptroller of the 1st Earl’s household. Andrew Nowell’s displacement of Colly in the autumn of 1553 cannot be satisfactorily explained, but his knowledge of land ownership in the county and his dealings with Kenelm Digby’s father-in-law may have contributed: Nowell was the only knight of the shire during the period not born and bred in the county. John Hunt was a cousin of Kenelm Digby who as sheriff in 1554 returned him to Parliament. Edward Sapcote’s father had sat for Rutland in the previous century but his own return in 1539 probably owed as much to links with the recently ennobled Sir John Russell, Baron Russell, as to his personal standing. Rutland was one of the counties where provision was made for the building of a new gaol under the Act of 1532 (23 Hen. VIII, c.2), which was renewed several times during the period.