The seventeenth century

When James I became the first English king of the Stuart dynasty, he was already king of Scotland, so the crowns of these two countries were united. Their linguistic differences were lessened in this century.

In the sixteenth century religion and politics became inextricably linked. This link became even more intense in the seventeenth century. At the beginning of the century, some people tried to kill the king because he wasn't Catholic enough. By the end of the century, another king had been killed, partly because he seemed too Catholic, and yet another had been forced into exile for the same reason.

During the century, Parliament established its supremacy over the monarchy in Britain. Anger grew in the country at the way that the Stuart monarchs raised money, especially because they did not get the agreement of the House of Commons to do so first. In addition, ideological Protestantism, especially Puritanism, had grown in England. Puritans regarded many of the practices of the Anglican Church, and also its hierarchical structure, as immoral. Some of them thought the luxurious lifestyle of the king and his followers was immoral too.

This conflict led to the Civil War, which ended with complete victory for the parliamentary forces. The king (Charles I) was captured and became the first monarch in Europe to be executed after a formal trial for crimes against his people. The leader of the parliamentary army, Oliver Cromwell, became ‘Lord Protector’ of a republic with a military government which, after he had brutally crushed resistance in Ireland, effectively encompassed the whole of the British Isles.

But when Cromwell died, he, his system of government had become so unpopular that the son of the executed king was asked to return and take the throne. The Anglican Church was restored. However, the conflict between monarch and Parliament soon re-emerged. The Monarch, James II, tried to give full rights to Catholics, and to promote them in his government.

The ‘Glorious Revolution’ (‘glorious’ because it was bloodless) followed, in which Prince William of Orange, ruler of the Netherlands, and his Stuart wife Mary, accepted Parliament’s invitation to become king and queen. In this way it was established that a monarch could rule only with the support of Parliament. Parliament immediately drew up a Bill of Rights, which limited some of the powers of the monarch. It also allowed Dissenters (those who did not agree with the practices of Anglicanism) to practise their religion freely. This meant that the Presbyterian Church was guaranteed its legality.

James II, meanwhile, had fled to Ireland. But the Catholic Irish army he gathered there was defeated. Laws were then passed forbidding Catholics to vote or even own land.

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The sixteenth century	\|	The eighteenth century

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