Stuart Britain: A Very Short Introduction (Paperback)

Originally published as part of "The Oxford Illustrated History of Britain", John Morrill's description of Stuart Britain sets the Revolution into its political, religious, social, economic, intellectual and cultural contexts. It thus seeks to integrate what most other surveys pull apart. It gives a graphic account of the effects of a century-long period during which population was growing inexorably and faster than both the food supply and the employment market. It looks at the failed attempts of successive governments to make all those under their authority obedient members of a unified national church; it looks at how Charles I blundered into a civil war which then took on a terrifying momentum of its own. The result was his trial and execution, the abolition of the monarchy, the House of Lords, the bishops, the Prayer Book and the celebration of Christmas. As a result everything else that people took for granted came up for challenge, and this book shows how painfully and with what difficulty order and obedience was restored. The text is intended for the general reader or students of the Stuart period of British history.