COLLEGE OF LIBERAL ARTS
History 512
England Under the Stuarts
“This blessed plot, this earth, this realm, this England…”
Dr. Melinda Zook
Phone: 494-4134
Email: mzook@purdue.edu
Office: University Hall 327
Office hours: Wednesdays, 10:30-11:30 & by appointment
Spring 2014
Univ. Hall 310
MWF, 9:30-10:20
Course Description
This course is an examination of the history of England during the period of the Stuart dynasty,
1603-1714. We begin, however, by exploring the events and unresolved issues created by the
English Reformation in the mid-sixteenth century. Religious inspiration, disputes, and intense
controversy, both political and theological, will play fundamental roles throughout the stormy
years of the Stuart monarchs. Another major focal point will be era of the Civil War, regicide,
Revolution, and the Protectorate of Oliver Cromwell. The tumultuous politics of the latter Stuart
era will also figure prominently in our investigation as well as the development of modern
political ideologies and political parties. This course is also interested the daily lives of ordinary
English people; the roles of class and gender; and popular culture and belief systems.
Required Texts
Mark Kishlansky, A Monarchy Transformed: Britain, 1603-1714 (Penguin, 1997)
Mary E. Fissell, Vernacular Bodies: The Politics of Reproduction in Early Modern England
(Oxford, 2004)
William Shakespeare, Macbeth (Folger Shakespeare Library edition, 2013)
Blair Worden, The English Civil Wars, 1640-1660 (Phoenix, 2010)
Aphra Behn, Oroonoko (Penguin, 2003)
Requirements
All students will take three in-class essay exams based on the lectures and readings and complete
two short (3 or 4 page) essays based on the readings. Graduates must complete three additional
short essays based on primary source readings in consultation with me.
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Grades will be calculated as follows:
Attendance & Discussion
Exams
Short Essays
15%
15% each
15% each
Attendance at all class meetings is MANDATORY. Each class missed will result in the loss of a
half-grade.
Rules of the Game:
Never walk into class late. Turn off all gadgets once you enter the class room. If you use a laptop
during class, you may only use a word processing program (absolutely no internet).
Use proper email etiquette (an email should begin with a salutation such as “Dear Professor X;” and
end with a proper closing, such as “Sincerely” or “Yours.”).
Students who plagiarize any portion of their written assignments will be removed from this
course and the incident will be reported to the Dean of Students.
Schedule of Readings, Lectures & Discussions
M/Jan. 13
Introduction to the Course
W/Jan. 15
Where does our story begin?
England prior to the Sixteenth Century
F/Jan. 17
Kingship at the outset of the Sixteenth Century
W-F/Jan. 22-24
Henry VIII’s dynastic matter &
The English Reformation
M-W/Jan. 27-29
The Little Tudors & further Reformation
F/Jan.31
Discussion of Fissell, Vernacular Bodies
Read Introduction & Chapters 1 & 2
2
M/Feb. 3
The Virgin Queen
W-F/Feb. 5-7
Elizabethan Legacies
Read Kishlansky, Chapters 1 & 2
M/Feb. 10
The Reign of James IV & I
Read Kishlansky, Chapters 3 & 4
W/Feb. 12
James I & the Historians
F-M/Feb. 14-17
Read & Discuss Macbeth
W/Feb. 19
Watch Macbeth
F/Feb. 21
First Exam
M-W/Feb. 24-26
Charles I & the Road to War & Revolution
Read Kishlansky, 5 & 6
F/Feb. 28
The Civil War & the Historians
Read Kishlansky, 7
M/March 3
Discussion of Worden, The English Civil Wars
W-F/March 5-7
Cromwell
Read Kishlansky, 8
3
M/March 10
Discussion of Fissell, Vernacular Bodies
Read Chapters 3, 4 & 5
W/March 12
Second Exam
F/March14
Library Day: No Class
M-W/March 24-26
The Restoration Settlement & the Trials of the Regicides
Read Kishlansky, 9
F/March 28
One Restoration Life: Aphra Behn
M/March 31
Discuss Oroonoko
W/April 2
The End of Charles II's reign
Kishlansky, 10
F/April 4
The Popish Plot & the Exclusion Crisis
M/April 7
The Life and Theories of John Locke
W/April 9
James II's Reign & Monmouth's Rebellion
Kishlansky, 11
F/April 11
Library Day: No Class
M/April 14
The Glorious Revolution & the Bill of Rights, 1689
4
W/April 16
Discussion of Fissell, Vernacular Bodies
F-M/April 18-21
The Reign of William III
Kishlansky, 12
W-F/April 23-25
The Reign of Queen Anne
Kishlansky, 13
M-W/April 28-30
Great Britain in the Eighteenth Century
F/May 2
Review
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Hist 512: Graduate Student Reading Assignments
Please read three of the following primary sources. After you have read each, read four or five
secondary readings about each source. Write a three to four page essay discussing the following:
1)
2)
3)
4)
begin with a proper introductory paragraph
Devote 2 or 3 paragraphs to discussing the content of the primary work
Discuss the scholarly interpretations of the work
Conclude by discussing the work’s significance in Stuart history
Choose from:
James I, The True Law of Free Monarchies
Francis Bacon, New Atlantis
Francis Bacon, The New Organon
Shakespeare, The Tempest
Robert Filmer, Patriacha
Margaret Cavendish, duchess of Newcastle, The Blazing World
John Milton, Paradise Lost
Henry Neville, The Isle of Pines
John Bunyan, Grace Abounding to the Chief of Sinners
John Bunyan, Pilgrim’s Progress
Richard Baxter, Saints Everlasting Rest
Margaret Fell Fox, Women’s Speaking Justified
Aphra Behn, The Roundheads or The Widow Ranter
John Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel (to the reader, parts 1 and 2)
Thomas Hobbes, Leviathan
Algernon Sidney, Court Maxims
John Locke, A Letter Concerning Toleration
John Locke, Two Treatises of Government
Daniel Defoe, A Free Born English Man
Daniel Defoe, Robinson Crusoe
Daniel Defoe, A Journal of the Plague Year
Mary Astell, A Serious Proposal to the Ladies
Mary Astell, Reflections upon Marriage
Please be sure to read a variety of works (religious, literary, political/philosophical). Inform me of
your choices. Your papers are due any time prior to the last week of classes. I may ask for
revisions.
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