History in Focus: Elizabeth I and James VI and I | about | home |
|
|
You will find below a selection of resources for the study of the reigns of Elizabeth and James, including websites, articles, book reviews, sample chapters and a bibliography. |
Opinion 'Elizabeth' at the National Maritime Museum |
||
Image © National Maritime Museum, London 'Elizabeth': an exhibition at the National Maritime Museum, Greenwich It is perhaps easy to forget that many of the central dramas of the Tudor dynasty were not played out within the heart of London, as we sometimes tend to assume, but in the palaces which surrounded the city – at Richmond, Windsor Castle, Hampton Court or at Greenwich. The fact that so many important events took place in Greenwich Palace makes it an appropriate setting for an exhibition about Elizabeth I, and one which by its very location requires some kind of imaginative response, trying to envision the Tudor brick-built riverside palace that no longer remains. Henry VIII, Mary I and Elizabeth I were all born there. Edward VI died there. Anne Boleyn was arrested on charges of treasonous adultery after a tournament held there in 1536; over fifty years later it was there that her daughter finally signed the death warrant for Mary, Queen of Scots. The very location of the exhibition compels you to envisage the Tudor palace that lay beside the river. As this exhibition makes clear, however, it has to be remembered that Elizabeth’s birth at Greenwich, in September 1533, was to the dismay of her parents and the consternation of the regime of the time. Henry VIII had moved heaven and earth to annul his first marriage to Katherine of Aragon, and marry Anne Boleyn, and both his personal convictions and the royal propaganda of the time seemed to rest on the assurance that he was hereby doing the will of God. Both parents had firmly believed that God would bless their cause by sending the long-awaited son and heir. The arrival of a princess was a blow to royal confidence, to the new royal marriage, and to the still very shaky infrastructure of an English Church independent of the papacy. One of the most poignant exhibits in this exhibition is the letter from Anne Boleyn to Lord Cobham, announcing the new arrival, which had been prepared before the actual birth. The announcement of God’s mercy and grace ‘in the deliverance and bringing forth of a Prince’, has been hastily altered, with the addition of an ‘s’, to make the prince into a princess. This one small detail suggests the degree of confidence with which a son was expected, and commensurately, the scale of the disappointment which must have followed. From this unfortunate beginning, the exhibition traces Elizabeth’s difficult youth through the reigns of father, brother and sister, and manages to submerge the rather tired familiar story of her tempestuous childhood and adolescence in the remarkable details of the events and personalities of this time. From the point of her accession, the exhibition branches out, moving from her family history, private tribulations and convictions, to her public life at court, the iconography of her queenship, the questions of religion, marriage and foreign policy, the problems of succession and the difficulties of her final years. The rationale of the exhibition was to concentrate on Elizabeth herself rather than on the Elizabethan age in general, but the scope of the exhibits is broad. One especially apposite emphasis is the importance of trade and exploration – it was from Greenwich that Elizabeth bade farewell to Martin Frobisher, sailing off in search of the North-West Passage. Thus the wider implications of Elizabeth’s reign are included alongside the more personal details. This exhibition brings together a fabulous selection of portraits, manuscripts and artefacts, and undoubtedly should be seen by everyone with even a slight interest in Tudor history. Some of the images will be familiar, but most are not, and even the portraits well-known from book illustrations take on a new glow when seen in the original. The private side of Elizabeth emerges in objects such as the locket ring which opens to show portraits of Elizabeth and Anne Boleyn, side by side, but which closed gives no indication of the hidden, and perhaps painful, family link it depicts. The book of Katherine Parr’s prayers, translated by the young princess into Latin, French and Italian as a New Year’s gift to her father in 1546, demonstrates her scholarship, but also suggests her need to conciliate her father – the preface reiterates several times the bond between them – as well as perhaps hinting at the personal piety which continues to evade easy categorization. At the other end of the scale we see the maps which indicate the mental world of the time: the commercial atlas in which Cecil scribbled notes concerning recent explorations, and details of how to address foreign rulers correctly; the pair of celestial and temporal globes which map out both earth and skies as they were perceived in the fifteen-nineties. In this section the existing Elizabethan collection of the National Maritime Museum finds a perfect setting, and books, maps, charts and scientific instruments all testify to the extraordinary achievements of the Elizabethan seafarers. This had a human side too: the gorgeous Drake Locket Jewel, reportedly presented by the queen when she knighted Drake in 1581, was to appear as a precious heirloom in a portrait of one of his descendants in 1884. This echoes the appearance of more straightforwardly religious heirlooms in the exhibition, the possessions of Mary, Queen of Scots, lent by the descendants of the recusant families of the time who, in defiance of the authorities, treasured them as relics, and passed them down to future generations. The iconography of Elizabeth is perhaps more well-known, but still fascinating, and thankfully there are more measured claims made here for its significance than sometimes appear. The splendour of some of the portraits contrasts well with some of the more homely artefacts of life at court; the slightly crude stove-tile with the royal cipher, and the sturdy candle-sconce which bears the royal coat of arms. The reappearance of these royal arms in a painted triptych from a Suffolk parish church reinforces how the Elizabethan religious settlement, whatever its doctrinal ambiguities, sought to replace traditional religious imagery with more politicized royal emblems. In this, at least, Elizabeth seems to have followed her father’s lead. The doors of this triptych, when closed, reveal a selection of biblical texts denouncing the use of religious images, showing the close accommodation possible between royal propaganda and puritan convictions. This is one aspect of Elizabeth’s regime which could perhaps have been more clearly conveyed; the iconographic ideal of the queen has long since taken on a secular life of its own in the popular imagination, and it could have been more strongly emphasized how large a part of this emerged initially from the Protestant mythology of the reign. It is a slight surprise to find the Elizabethan ‘via media’ in religion so calmly asserted by the exhibition, given that it is still a debatable assessment of Elizabeth’s own views, and definitely does not fully reflect the state of the Elizabethan Church of the time. It is the later development of Elizabeth’s reputation that is responsible here, and although this is dealt with in the catalogue (Elizabeth, ed. Susan Doran (London: Chatto & Windus and the National Maritime Museum, 2003)), it could have been called into question more vigorously by the exhibition itself. The fact that this exhibition is being used, we are told, as the basis for a study in contemporary leadership and business skills, founded on the premise that Elizabeth inherited a ‘business in ruins’ and turned England into ‘the richest and most powerful nation in Europe’, does pose some interesting questions about the relationship between historical truth and historical hype. Equally, the recurring references to how Elizabeth laid the foundations for ‘the world’s greatest Empire’ give some cause for anxiety. No doubt the problem with any exhibition these days is how to marry the views of the historical experts with the views of those responsible for marketing and public relations. It seems a shame, however, that this wonderful exhibition should have to delve at all into such facile distortions. The video introduction also strikes a sour note, harping on a kind of Cinderella story, in which we marvel at Elizabeth’s progress from ‘vulnerable teenager’ to arguably England’s ‘greatest leader’. The truth of Elizabeth’s story is in itself spectacular and fascinating enough, as this exhibition more than amply demonstrates. It should not have to sentimentalize, or dramatize what is already so obviously extraordinary. Yet the overall impression drawn from this exhibition is, in the end, one of great subtlety, and the exhibition for the most part does full justice to the complexities and ambiguities of Elizabeth’s reign. It does not patronize the general public with too much over-simplification, and assumes, reasonably enough, that anyone whose imagination is fired by these exhibits might well be prepared to think more deeply about them. The inclusion of transcripts of key documents in the exhibition brochure is a good indication of this, and the whole is supported by the superb catalogue which accompanies the exhibition, edited by Susan Doran. This has essays by a range of Elizabethan experts, which manage to be clear and concise enough for the non-specialist without losing any of the historical depth – it also has an array of beautiful illustrations, meticulously referenced and explained. There is, fortunately, too broad and varied an array of historical evidence here to let glib generalization eclipse historical veracity, and the messages conveyed by this exhibition manage on the whole to be informative without being dogmatic or sensationalist. Given the enormity of the challenge posed by Elizabeth’s reputation, this is an impressive achievement. The exhibition runs until 14 September 2003 at the National Maritime Museum: for more details, please see www.nmm.ac.uk Lucy Wooding, King's College London Conrad Russell's James VI and I and rule over two kingdoms: an English view first appeared in Der Herrscher in der Doppelpflicht: Europäische Fürsten und ihre Beiden Throne, ed. H. Duchhardt (Mainz, 1997), pp. 123-37, and is reproduced in English for the first time in the IHR's journal Historical Research. The article compares English and Scottish responses to the union of the crowns in 1603 following the accession of James VI and I, examining the reluctance of the English to rethink their ideas on sovereignty, and the problems inherent in an 'imperfect union'. Click here for more information about the journal, including a list of forthcoming articles
|
|
|||
|
The 400th anniversary of Elizabeth I's death and the accession of James VI & I marks interesting times for the study of the two reigns, with traditional forms - political, legal and biographical histories - vying with more interdisciplinary, culturally-rooted accounts for shelf space. The history of the Elizabethan and Jacobean periods is populated with memorable figures, not least the monarchs themselves, and biographical approaches have always loomed large in the historiography. Three recent works that attempt to re-assess the 'storied reputations' as their reviewer John Cramsie puts it, are Pauline Croft's King James (Palgrave, 2003), Alan Stewart's The Cradle King: a Life of James VI and I (Chatto and Windus, 2003), and Carole Levin's The Reign of Elizabeth I (Palgrave, 2002). Biographical traditions and traditional source material, however unreliable it might be, have influenced the reception of Elizabeth I and James VI & I in sharply opposing ways, and Cramsie's review suggests that whilst revisionist studies have contributed to a more sympathetic reappraisal of James I's reign in particular, the dismal account of his kingship that characterised earlier 'toxic treatments', can still shape modern historical portraits. Elizabeth I's continuing popularity is such that she ranked amongst the top ten 'Great Britons' in the 2002 BBC poll. Explanations for this longevity, and the ways in which this appetite for the 'Virgin Queen' was fed by literature, art and myth in the decades and centuries following 1603 are ventured in two recent books: The Myth of Elizabeth, edited by Susan Doran and Thomas S. Freeman (Palgrave, 2003) and England's Elizabeth: an Afterlife in Fame and Fantasy, by Michael Dobson and Nicola Watson (OUP, 2002).
Chapter 7 of Susan Doran's England's
Elizabeth, 'Virginity, Divinity and Power: the Portraits
of Elizabeth I' is available here. Download
sample chapter In his review of Levin's account of Elizabeth's reign, Cramsie notes that the themes of 'religion, marriage and succession' dominate - a domination reflected in other recent works. The transformation of England and Wales into a Protestant kingdom was still in its infancy at the beginning of Elizabeth's reign, and was by no means complete at the end of James's. Elizabeth's ambivalence about the necessary extent of religious reformation certainly plays a large part in this uneasy transition. In reviewing a work that focuses on one of Elizabeth's 'hotter' Protestant subjects, William Harrison (G.J.R. Parry, A Protestant Vision: William Harrison and the Reformation of Elizabethan England (CUP, 2002 [1987])), Andrew Hadfield argues that it is only through exploring the aspirations and frustrations of a Protestant radical like Harrison, and through appreciation of the ' close relationship between religion, politics and historical writing', evident in the work of a man like Harrison, that a fuller understanding of Tudor and Elizabethan intellectual culture can be reached. The consequences of religious upheaval in both the spiritual and legal arenas during Elizabeth's reign, and exploration of the roots of Elizabethan failure to sustain a religiously 'mixed polity' in the reign of her father, are features of John Guy's work, collected in the book of essays, Politics, Law and Counsel in Tudor and Early Stuart England (Ashgate, 2000). As the reviewer Christopher Brooks notes, 'Guy's view of English political development eschews any model of progressive linear development across the later sixteenth and seventeenth centuries', and asserts that Elizabeth's management of her counsellors and churchmen, both liberal and radical, particularly in the last two decades of her reign, laid some of the grounds for civil war in the next century. Other aspects of the Elizabethan 'mixed polity' have been explored by historians: notably the reception and perception of immigrants into England. This 'highly emotive topic', as the reviewer Nigel Goose calls it, is the subject of Laura Hunt Yungblut's book, Strangers Settled Here Amongst Us - Policies, Perceptions and the Presence of Aliens in Elizabethan England (Routledge, 1996). While Goose is sceptical that Yungblut's book sheds any new light on the conventional foci of work on aliens -- their demographic presence, levels of xenophobia against them and their socio-economic contribution to English society -- he nevertheless concludes that it 'can only serve to draw attention to the opportunities that still exist for more detailed research into alien immigration … for both sources and topics for further exploration are clearly available in abundance'. Elizabeth's failure to marry and to
produce the necessary Tudor heir, and the succession crisis
this fuelled, has also attracted the attention of historians,
both in terms of how the crisis was managed and the Stuart dynasty
installed without bloodshed (see Pauline Croft's introduction
above); and more generally, in how early modern governments
handled the uncertainties of dynastic stability and disruption
(whether through natural or unnatural causes). As Robert Oresko
notes in his review of Howard Nenner's book, The
Right to be King: The Succession to the Crown of England. 1603-1714
(Macmillan, 1995), James I and VI's 'tenacious adherence' to
his 'indefeasible hereditary right' to be king, indisputably
shaped Stuart destiny on the English and, as importantly, Scottish
thrones. Indeed, as Nenner acknowledges in his response, 'the
problem of monarchical succession in Stuart England was not
sui generis' in early modern continental Europe; nor is it without
relevance in contemporary England, where the longevity of yet
another Elizabeth, and debate about the suitability of adhering
to a straightforward dynastic descent, means that the succession
question is far from just being merely academic. Special reader discounts are available on selected titles in the Bibliography |
||||
| Elizabeth and James on the Web There are surprisingly few high quality websites presenting resources for the study of Tudor and Stuart history, let alone offering information about Elizabeth, James or the succession. Those that there are have in many cases been created to mark the very anniversary celebrated in this issue of History in Focus. For the study of Tudor history generally, including the reign of Elizabeth, the excellent Tudor England 1485 to 1603 is a very good starting point, offering a range of royal biographies, primary sources, general resources, bibliographies and links. Other sites, such as Elizabeth's pirates and Print and censorship in Elizabethan society offer an insight into more specific areas of sixteenth-century life. Elizabeth herself is the subject of a number of sites, ranging from The National Archives' The Great Seal of Elizabeth, which uses the seal as an entry point into a wider study of the reign, to the National Maritime Museum's comprehensive Elizabeth, which arises out of the exhibition to mark the 400th anniversary of Elizabeth's death and James's succession. For the succession itself, The Union of the Crowns, 1603-2003 focuses primarily on the Stuart dynasty, but provides a good general background to the centuries of conflict between England and Scotland leading up to Elizabeth's death. For James VI and I, one profitable route of study lies in those resources provided for the Gunpowder Plot in 1605, as on the website of The Gunpowder Plot Society, or the BBC's What if the Gunpowder Plot had succeeded? |
||||
|
Acknowledgements The Institute of Historical Research is grateful to the National Maritime Museum for permission to reproduce three of the images included in these pages. |
||||
|
||||
In
England, after the death of Lord Burghley in 1598, his
son Sir Robert Cecil was the queen's principal secretary
of state and most influential privy councillor. Essex's
rebellion convinced Cecil that the succession must be
settled before Elizabeth's death. It was too risky to
leave the matter open, since further tumults could destabilise
both England and Scotland. In April 1601 James sent two
envoys south, to repair the damage in relations caused
by Essex's revolt, and Cecil indicated his willingness
to co-operate. An exchange of letters began, but a secret
correspondence with a foreign monarch was a treasonable
offence. Cecil was risking his career and perhaps his
life, so the letters were partly encoded; Cecil was '10',
Elizabeth was '24', James was '30'. The king was reassured
by his new-found alliance with the secretary and promised
that he would not aim for the English throne except through
his firm amity with the queen. He put aside any thoughts
of intervention and Cecil ensured that a substantial increase
was added to the English pension which James already received.
Elizabeth wrote to him in May 1601, indicating he would
get an extra £2,000 per annum, but that these 'offices
of extraordinary charge and kindness' would only continue
while they were 'both thankfully accepted and and sincerely
requited and deserved'. It seems likely that she understood
that Cecil was negotiating with James. Even though Elizabeth
refused to acknowledge him openly, he was her most suitable
heir and in her letters she addressed him as 'dearest
brother and cousin'.
As
the reviewer Anne McLaren observes, if the 'overt political
significance' of the identification of Elizabeth as England
embodied has faded, the multiple cultural resonances of Gloriana
are still powerful, even in their most 'brazenly fictitious'
forms (for example, Blackadder). Despite differences in approach,
McLaren recommends both books for exploring perceptions of Elizabeth's
person (as a woman) and related personifications (as virgin,
as England, amongst many others) in relation to wider concerns
about gender and power, and towards Englishness (and Britishness).