THE RENAISSANCE
The renaissance began in 1485 with the Tudor’s dynasty and it ended in 1625 with
the first Stuart king, James I.
The first Tudor king was Henry VII who stopped the nobles from raising their own
armies so they couldn’t become serious rivals to his power; he promoted English
trade by giving England a mercantile fleet and sponsoring John Cabot’s expedition to
America where he found Nova Scotia; with the Erasmus of Rotterdam, the
universities of Oxford and Cambridge became centres of humanism in England.
When he died his successor was his son, Henry VII, who married his brother’s
widow Catherine of Aragon.
He was given the title of ‘’defender of the faith’’ from the pope because he wrote a
book where he criticised Martin Luther’s protestant reform.
This happened after Pope Clement VII didn't want to declare his marriage with
Catherine because she had given him a daughter, Mary, and because he wanted to
ally with France against Spain.
Since he wanted a male heir, he broke with Rome and divorced Catherine; then he
married Anne Boleyn who gave him a second daughter, Elizabeth.
In 1534, the Act of Supremacy declared him ‘’Supreme Head of the Church of
England’’, so he now had both temporal and religious powers.
Anne Boleyn was executed for treason, then he married Jane Seymour who gave
him a son, Edward. Jane died in childbirth, and Henry had 3 more wives.
Edward VI was only nine when his father died and since he was too young he was
helped by a council of regency. Religious services were held in English instead of
latin and the book of common prayer in English became obligatory with the act of
uniformity. He died at 6 years old of tuberculosis.
Before dying he appointed his cousin Lady Jane Grey as his successor, but she was
soon imprisoned in the tower of london since Edward’s half sister plotted against her.
Mary I was the first daughter of Henry VIII and she was known as Bloody Mary
because, since she wanted to restore catholicism, she persecuted protestants and,
after marrying Philip II of Spain, England was defeated in a war with France and lost
Calais (the last dominion in France). She died childless.
Her successor was her half sister Elizabeth I.She was called Elizabeth the Great
and her reign was considered England’s golden age because she gave unity to
England and restored protestantism and she didn’t persecute the catholics.
She was called the ‘’virgin queen’’ because she didn’t want to marry a foreign
husband because he would subject England to a foreign government, while an
English one would create factions and plots.
She had to face a lot of plots from her catholic cousin Mary Stuart, queen of
Scots, who wanted the English throne since she was the great granddaughter
of Henry VII. Then she was executed for treason.
She promoted British trade and two of her captains were Sir Walter Raleigh,
who founded the first colony calling it Virginia, and Sir Francis Drake who
