1. The English Renaissance

2. The Coming of the Renaissance
The Renaissance was a flowering of literary, artistic and intellectual development that began in Italy in the fourteenth century.
It was inspired by the arts and scholarship of ancient Greece and Rome, which were rediscovered during the Crusades

3. Key Characteristics of the Renaissance
Religious devotion of the Middle Ages gave way to interest in the human being’s place on this earth
Universities introduced a new curriculum, the humanities, including history, geography, poetry, and languages
Invention of printing made books more available
More writers began using the vernacular

4. Figures of the Renaissance
Mostly Italians
Dante, author of The Divine Comedy
Petrarch, wrote lyric poetry in the form of sonnets
Leonardo Da Vinci, a painter, sculptor, architect, and scientist
Da Vinci typifies a Renaissance man—a person of broad education and interests whose curiosity knew no bounds.

5. The Age of Exploration
Renaissance thirst for knowledge lead to a great burst of exploration.
Crusades opened routes to Asia soon monopolized by Italian merchants.
Explorers from other nations searched for all-sea routes aided by compass and advances in astronomy.
Culminated in Columbus’s discovery of the New World in colonization

6. England in the Age of Exploration
1497—Italian-born John Cabot reached Newfoundland (an island off the coast of Canada) and perhaps the mainland
Cabot laid the basis for future English claims in North America.

7. The Protestant Reformation: Questioning the Catholic Church
A growing sense of nationalism led many to question the authority of the church.
Complaints:
the sale of indulgences
payment to the church (like taxes)
church leaders favored Mediterranean powers over northerly countries
the educated questioned the Church teachings and hierarchy

8. Erasmus
Dutch thinker whose edition of the New Testament raised questions about standard interpretations of the Bible.
Focused attention on issues of morality and religion
Morality and religion became the central concerns of the English Renaissance

9. Martin Luther
Erasmus paved the way for the split in the Roman Catholic Church in 1517.
German monk Martin Luther nailed a list of dissenting beliefs (“ninety-five theses) to the door of a German church.
The intent was to reform the Catholic Church, but actually divided the church and introducing Protestantism.

10. Results of the Protestant Reformation
Swept through Europe
Frequent wars between rulers with different beliefs
Persecution of Catholics and Protestants
Division of Protestants—Lutherans and Calvinists (Puritans and Presbyterian sects)

11. Tudor England Tudor dynasty ruled from 1485-1603.
Time of stability and economic expansion
London a metropolis of 180,000 people
Many saw the changes as a threat to the old familiar ways
Feared new outbreaks of civil strife (War of the Roses)

12. Henry VII First Tudor monarch
Inherited an England depleted by civil war
Before his death in 1509, he rebuilt the treasury and established law and order.
Henry VII restored the prestige of the monarchy and set the stage for his successors.

13. Signature of Henry VII

14. Henry VII Gallery

15. Henry VIII Catholic (even wrote a book against Luther)
Relationship with the Pope did not last
Marriage to Catherine of Aragon produced no male heir
Henry tried to obtain an annulment to marry Anne Boleyn
The Pope refused, but Henry married anyway

16. Henry VIII Gallery

17. Henry’s Break with the Church
Henry’s defiance led to an open break with the Roman Catholic Church.
The Act of Supremacy (1534) gave Henry full control of the Church in England and severed all ties with Rome.
Henry became the head of the Anglican Church (the new Church of England).
He seized Church property and dissolved the monasteries.

18. The Aftermath Henry used ruthless measures to suppress opposition.
He even had his former friend and advisor, Thomas More, executed, because More refused to renounce his faith.
Henry married six times.
His first two marriages (Catherine and Anne) produced two daughters, Mary and Elizabeth.
His third wife, Jane Seymour, bore him a son, Edward, who was still a frail child when Henry died in 1547.

19. The Six Wives of Henry VIII

20. Edward VI Became King at 9; died a 15 (1553)
Parliamentary acts during his reign changed England’s religious practices and sent England on its way to becoming a Protestant nation.
English replaced Latin in church.
The Anglican prayer book, Book of Common Prayer, became required in public worship.

21. Edward VI gallery

22. Bloody Mary Mary I, Edward’s half sister; a Catholic
Mary restored Catholic practices and papal authority to the Church of England.
Mary married her Spanish cousin, Phillip II, making England a part of the powerful Spanish state. (During this period of nationalism, many found her acts unpatriotic)
Mary also persecuted Protestants: she ordered the execution of some 200 Protestants during her reign, strengthening anti-Catholic sentiment in England

23. Signature of Mary I

24. Mary I Gallery

25. Elizabeth I
After Mary’s five year reign, her half-sister, Elizabeth came to the throne.
Elizabeth was the last of the Tudors, dying unmarried and childless.
Elizabeth received a Renaissance education, became a patron of the arts, and Elizabethan came to describe the English Renaissance at its height.

26. Elizabeth and the Church
Ended religious turmoil
Reestablished the monarch’s supremacy in the Church of England
Restored the Book of Common Prayer
Instituted a policy of religious moderation

27. Foreign Affairs
France and Spain, England’s two greatest rivals, often worked with Catholic factions in England.
Both nations fought to dominate England.
Elizabeth and her counselors played one side against the other, using offers of marriage as bait.
This cleverness allowed England a period of peace and allowed commercial and maritime interests to prosper.

28. Mary, Queen of Scots
Elizabeth’s Catholic cousin, Mary Stuart; queen of Scotland by birth and next in line to the British throne (granddaughter of Henry VII)
Catholics did not recognize Henry VIII’s marriage to Anne Boleyn, Elizabeth’s mother, and considered Mary Stuart the queen.
Mary was a prisoner of England for 19 years and the center of numerous plots on Elizabeth’s life.
Eventually Mary was convicted of plotting to murder Elizabeth and went to the block in 1587, a Catholic martyr.
“In my end is my beginning”—Mary’s death led Catholic Spain to declare war on England.

29. Elizabeth’s Signature

30. Elizabeth I Gallery

31. England vs. Spain
Spain rejected English claims in America and resented the fact that English privateers had been attacking and plundering Spanish ships.
Privateers like John Hawkins and Francis Drake operated “on their own,” but were really under the authority of Queen Elizabeth.

32. The Spanish Armada
After Mary’s execution, King Phillip II prepared a Spanish armada of 130 warships to attack England.
In 1588, English sailors defeated the Armada in the English Channel.
This event marked the decline of Spain and the rise of England as a great sea power

33. From Tudors to Stuarts
Elizabeth’s death marked the end of the Tudor dynasty.
To avoid civil strife, Elizabeth named King James VI of Scotland her successor (son of Mary Stuart).
James was a Protestant.
The reign of James I ( ) is now known as the Jacobean Era

34. King James I Strong supporter of the arts
Furthered England’s position as a world power
Sponsored the establishment of the first English colony in America—Jamestown
Believed in “divine right” monarchy and had contempt for Parliament (power struggle)
Persecuted Puritans (House of Commons)—James’s persecution prompted a group of Puritans to establish Plymouth colony in 1621

35. The English Renaissance
Architects designed beautiful mansions
Composers wrote new hymns for Anglican service and popularized the English madrigal
Renaissance painters and sculptors moved to England (Hans Holbein the Younger was court painter to Henry VIII)
Opened public schools (like private secondary schools today)
Improvements at Oxford and Cambridge

36. Elizabethan Poetry
Perfected the sonnet and experimented with other poetic forms
Philip Sidney wrote the first Elizabethan sonnet cycle (a series of sonnets that fit together as a story)—Astrophel and Stella
Edmund Spenser wrote a long epic, The Faerie Queen, in complex nine-line units now called Spenserian stanzas
Christopher Marlowe popularized pastoral verse (idealizes the rural life)

37. The Poetry of William Shakespeare
Shakespeare changed the pattern and rhyme scheme of the Petrarchan sonnet, creating the English, or Shakespearean, sonnet

38. Elizabethan Drama
Reintroduced tragedies—plays in which disaster befalls a hero or heroine
Reintroduced comedies—plays in which a humorous situation leads to a happy resolution.
Began using blank verse
Christopher Marlowe was the first major Elizabethan dramatist.
Marlowe may have rivaled Shakespeare as England’s greatest playwright had he lived past thirty.

39.                    
Christopher Marlowe

40. Sir Walter Raleigh (ca. 1552-1618) The Nymph's Reply

41. “He was not of an age but for all time.”
Shakespeare began his involvement with the theater as an actor.
By 1592, he was a popular playwright whose works had been performed at Elizabeth’s court.
After the Globe Theater was built in 1599, many of his plays were performed there.
Shakespeare wrote thirty-seven plays: nine tragedies, several comedies, ten histories, and a number of play classified as tragic comedies.

42. Shakespeare Festival - Clemson University

43. Elizabethan and Jacobean Prose
Philip Sidney’s Defense of Poesie is one of the earliest works of English literary criticism.
Thomas Nashe’s Unfortunate Traveler, a fictional adventure, was a forerunner of the novel.
Walter Raleigh wrote his History of the World during his confinement in the Tower of London (was beheaded for allegedly plotting against James I)
The leading prose writer of the time was Francis Bacon.

44. The King James Bible
The most monumental prose achievement of the English Renaissance
Commissioned by King James on the advice of Protestant clergymen
Took fifty-four scholars three years to complete
Is now among the most widely quoted an influential works in the English language