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The king was made « Supreme Head of the Church of England ». -
Act of Succession: made Anne Boleyn a legitimate Queen. -
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Wales were conquered in the 13th century, and finally integrated to the Kingdom of England in 1536. -
Series of rebellions and manifestations against Henry VIII's policies concerning the Church, especially monasteries.
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In 1557 a revolt was led by John Knox, he tried to convince Mary Stuart to adopt protestant ideas. -
Queen Mary I died of illness in 1558. -
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After Mary’s reign, she reaffirmed the authority of the Queen over the Church, she became Supreme Governor of the Church of England. -
Every parish had to use the Book of common prayer, and people who did not attend an Anglican service were fined. -
The 39th article of faith (1563 – 1571) : Stated the doctrine of the Church, a revised and tamed version of Edward VI”s 42 articles. It still is the main doctrinal frame for the Anglican church of today.
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In 1568, civil war in Scotland. -
Mary Stuart had to abdicate in 1568. -
In 1569 took place the Northern Rebellion : Animated by the Earls of Westmorland and Northumberland, they were back by 6000 insurgents. Their aim was to replace Elizabeth by Mary, Queen of Scots (Catholic and next heir in line). The rebellion was crushed. -
lIn 1570, just after the rebellion, the Pope Pius V excommunicated Elizabeth. -
The 1581 Act to retain the Queen’s Majesty’s Subjects in their due Obedience : Death penalty for converts; Catholic mass forbidden.
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In 1588 appeared a complete Bible in Welsh. -
Elizabeth defeated the Invincible Armada in 1588. -
Very educated, raised as a Protestant in Scotland, James I was also a firm believer in the divine right of king, which he even theorized in his book Basilikon Doron, published in 1599. -
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James succeeded to Elizabeth I in 1603. Smooth transition engineered by Robert Cecil. James combined his title in England with his stature as King James VI of Scotland since 1567 -
Puritans were particularly hopeful for an extended religious toleration toward their faith. Indeed James held Calvinist views. They presented him the millenary petition at the very start of his reign, 1603. -
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In early November 1605 a group of conspirator planned to put some explosives under the parliament and kill James I. Today, Guy Fawkes Night is still celebrated every 5th of November with great bonfires and burning of Fawkes’ effigy : popular anti-papism / anti-Catholicism. -
Flight of the Earls, in 1607. The plantations were enforced even more brutally under Charles I by his Lord Deputy of Ireland… -
In 1610, the Great Contract between King and Parliament stipulated that the King received a fixed sum for his annual expenses.
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Some radical Puritans/Dissenters left England, some famously boarding on the Mayflower to create the first New England colony in Plymouth (1620). -
James I had to summon a Parliament in 1621 to ask for money and taxes to fund the war.
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Another Parliament took place in 1624 and voted funds for the war on Spain.
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In June 1628, the King was forced to call Parliament again, and the Parliament issued the Petition of Right. -
Next session of the Parliament in January 1629.
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From 1629 to 1640, Charles will rule without Parliament. Historians called this moment “The Eleven Years Tyranny”.
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In Scotland, the attempt to enforce uniformity went through the imposition of the Book of Common Prayer / New Prayer Book in 1637. -
The peace treaty of Ripon was signed in October 1640. -
Charles I, in a catastrophic financial and political situation, had to call Parliament again. This one will stand until 1660 : the long parliament.
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In October 1641, a Civil War broke out : The Irish Rebellion. -
the Grand Remonstrance of 1641. After some heated debates opposing John Pym’s partisans and more conservative MPs, this radical text was adopted. -
In August 1642, Charles formally declared war on Parliament. The Civil War has now officially started ! -
Very unpopular measures were voted, in a radical puritan spirit : plays and theatre forbidden (1642). Clash between puritan idealism and common customs.
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The first Civil War will oppose the Cavaliers (Royalists) and the Roundheads (Parlementarians).
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The NMA was created in 1644 by the Parliament. It was a national, centralized army, with a fixed wage. Religious fervour among these troops – the Praying Army. Mostly Puritans.
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In June 1645, at the Battle of Naseby, the Roundheads and their New Model Army backed by the Scots won a decisive battle. It established their superiority over royalists’ forces. -
In May 1646, the King surrendered to the Scots, who handed him to Parliament.
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the King escaped in November 1647, he forged an alliance with the Scots promising the installation of Presbyterianism over England : -
The Parliament decided to disband the New Model Army, to settle peace… But they did so without paying the soldiers what they were due ! This led to a mutiny in June 1647, and the NMA seized the King !
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the Putney Debates of October/November 1647.
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In December 1648, the Army’s Colonel Pride entered the Parliament to arrest 45 conservative MPs : the Pride’s Purge that led to the formation of the very radical and quite reduced Rump Parliament, that put the King on trial for high treason -
Second Civil War (January-Autumn 1648).
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In 1649, another Irish Rebellion broke out. Cromwell’s army repressed and installed a severe repression towards Catholics
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In 1649, massacre of both soldiers and civilian at Drogheda and Wexford. Spirit of revenge from the 1641 Irish Rebellion. -
King Charles I will be executed in 1649. -
Radical puritan sects like the Quakers or the Ranters were persecuted under the 1650 Blasphemy Act.
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Cromwell dissolved the Rump. -
The 16th of December 1653, The Barebones Parliament dissolved. End of the Commonwealth / Start of the Protectorate. -
Started a successful war against Spain that anchored English presence in the West Indies (conquest of Jamaica).
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Cromwell died in 1658. -
Charles II, on exile in the Dutch republics, published the Declaration of Breda in 1660. -
The King was restored on the 29th of May 1660. But he couldn’t claim to be an absolute King as his father was. -
Act of uniformity, the Book of Common Prayer imposed again.
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Charles II married the Catholic princess Catherine of Braganza in 1662 -
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The Popish Plot of 1678 : Rumours of a plot organised by the French to assassinate Charles II and to put his catholic brother on the throne. The Parliament decided to execute 35 people. -
Between 1678-1681, political crisis that aroused from the fact that the next heir to the throne, Charles II’s brother James, was a catholic. Charles had no (legitimate at least…) child.
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The Exclusion Crisis: The Parliament tried to debar James from succession. Charles reaction was to dissolve Parliament.
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James Francis Edward was born on the 10th of June 1688. -
The 1689 Toleration Act will offer extended toleration for dissenters (not for Catholics). -
England became a Constitutional Monarchy, framed by the 1689 Bill of Right.
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In 1690 William lands in Ireland with his army and win a short war : treaty of Limerick in 1691. -
The Bank of England was created in 1694. -
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Under William (died 1701) and Anne, very costly war against Louis XIV France : The War of Spanish Succession (Spain’s King Charles II died childless in 1700) -
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In 1707, Act of Union between England and Scotland. -
Philip was confirmed as King of Spain, but had to renounce to his right to inherit the French throne.
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Queen Anne died in 1714. -
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The first rebellion, in 1715, sought to install the “old pretender”, James Francis Edward Stuart (1688-1766, the one whom its birth led to the Glorious Revolution !).
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Robert Walpole (a Whig) was the first Prime Minister of Britain, effectively in office from 1721 to 1742.
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The second rebellion, in 1745, to install the “young pretender”, Charles Edward Stuart (1720-88), aka “Bonnie Prince Charlie). Led to the final Jacobites’ defeat at the Battle of Culloden (1746).
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The Seven Years War (1754-63) opposed a French coalition to the English, mostly over questions of colonial and naval control. The Treaty of Paris of 1763 made Britain victorious.
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The Boston Tea Party of 1773 paved the way for the American Revolutionary War (1775-1783). Interestingly, the revolutionaries invoked the rights of the freeborn Englishmen !
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From the 1780s, the Tories were back in government – end of the Whig hegemony.
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In 1783, Britain recognized the independence of the United States through the Treaty of Paris. -
George III had to face the impact of the French Revolution of 1789. Britain fought the revolutionary forces and later the Napoleonic forces. There was also a huge repression toward English radicals – some French émigrés brought their ideas with them. -
In 1798 : another Irish Rebellion – caused by the old resentment against English rule, but also by the revolutionary fever after the French revolution. -
The rebellion was crushed, and in 1801, Acts of Union : Created the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland. The Parliament of Ireland was integrated to London’s Parliament. -
In 1801, the London Stock-Exchange was founded. -