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The Mayflower carried the Pilgrim Fathers, escaping religious persecution, to the New World.
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Absolute monarch Charles i imposed taxation without parliamentary consent. In reply, parliament presented the Petition of Right, setting
out specific liberties of subjects. The king rejected the petition. -
A stand-off over taxation between the king and parliament which lasted twenty years, called the 'long Parliament' led to the organisation of The Commons by Puritan leaders, who refused to grant the king's requests.
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Irish Catholic rebellion against English protestant settlers ended in
a massacre. -
London playhouses were closed by Act of Parliament.
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A split between the Royalist House of Lords and the Puritan Commons led to the creation of a Parliamentary Army and to the outbreak of Civil War in 1642. Under the leadership of Puritan general Oliver Cromwell, the Army broke the Royalists' resistance at Naseby in 1645. Charles was executed in January 1649. The monarchy, the House of Lords and the Anglican Church were abolished and the English Royal Family went into exile to the court of Louis XIV in Paris.
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England was ruled as a republic referred to as the 'Commonwealth, with Oliver Cromwell (followed briefly by his son Richard) as Lord
Protector from 1653. -
Charles II was called back from France and restored to the throne
after he had promised to re-establish the Anglican Church, demand an oath of allegiance from Non-conformists and Catholics and pardon all rebels except the regicides. -
During the Restoration, scientific enquiry was encouraged and led
to a scientific revolution which reached its highest point with Isaac
Newton, who also became President of the newly chartered Royal
Society, a forum for scientific discussion. -
The plague decimated London, killing more than 20% of its habitants.
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A huge part of London was destroyed in the Great Fire.
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The Royal African Company was engaged in slave trading.
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The Test Act prevented any Catholic from holding public office.
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The Popish Plot, a fictitious Catholic conspiracy invented by Titus
Oates with the alleged aim to murder Charles II, ended with the
execution of several Catholics. -
James II (1685-1688) was Catholic and his main design was to impose the Catholic religion on a Protestant nation. The result was the Glorious Revolution of 1688, which deposed the king. Parliament
offered the throne to William of Orange and his wife Mary under
the conditions defined in the Bill of Rights (1689), which limited
the power of the English monarchy and still applies to the British
Constitution today. -
The Act of Settlement stated that only a Protestant could inherit the crown.
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The Treaty of Union united England and Scotland as 'Great Britain'
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The German King George I became King of England,
the first of the House of Hanover. -
During the reign of George II, the Jacobite leader Charles Edward or 'Bonnie Prince Charlie', grandson of James II, invaded England, but was defeated at Culloden (1746).
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Samuel Johnson completed his famous A Dictionary of the English Language and became one of the most influential figures of the age, fixing the grammar and spelling rules of English.
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America declared its independence from Great Britain.
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The first Papist Act for Roman Catholic relief removed many of the traditional political restrictions on Catholics.