This book attempts both to take stock of directions in the field and to suggest alternative perspectives on some central aspects of the period.

Amussen's vivid account of family and village life in England from the reign of Elizabeth I to the accession of the Hanoverian monarchies describes the domestic economy of the rich and the poor; the processes of courtship, marriage, and marital breakdown; and the structure of power within the family and in rural communities.

This diachronic study of Boudica serves as a sourcebook of references to Boudica in the early modern period and gives an overview of the ways in which her story was processed and exploited by the different players of the times who wanted to give credence and support to their own belief systems. The author examines the different apparatus of state ideology which processed the social, religious and political representations of Boudica for public absorption and helped form the popular myth we have of Boudica today. By exploring images of the Briton warrior queen across two reigns which witnessed an act of political union and a move from English female rule (under Elizabeth I) to British/Scottish masculine rule (under James VI & I) the author conducts a critical cartography of the ways in which gender, colonialism and nationalism crystallised around this crucial historical figure. Concentrating on the original transmission and reception of the ancient texts the author analyses the historical works of Hector Boece, Raphael Holinshed and William Camden as well as the canonical literary figures of Edmund Spenser, William Shakespeare and John Fletcher. She also looks at aspects of other primary sources not covered in previous scholarship, such as Humphrey Llwyd’s Breuiary of Britayne (1573), Petruccio Ubaldini’s Le Vite delle donne illustri, del regno d’Inghilterra, e del regno di Scotia (1588) and Edmund Bolton’s Nero Caesar (1624). Furthermore, she incorporates archaeological research relating to Boudica.

Explaining the English Revolution studies the years 1649 to 1653, from regicide to the establishment of the Cromwellian Commonwealth, during which time English writers 'took stock' of a disordered England stripped of the traditional ideas of political, moral, and social order and considered the possibilities for a politically and religiously reordered state.

The Oxford Handbook of the Age of Shakespeare presents a broad sampling of current historical scholarship on the period of Shakespeare's career that will assist and stimulate scholars of his poems and plays. Rather than merely attempting to summarize the historical 'background' to Shakespeare, individual chapters seek to exemplify a wide variety of perspectives and methodologies currently used in historical research on the early modern period that can inform close analysis of literature. Different sections examine political history at both the national and local levels; relationships between intellectual culture and the early modern political imagination; relevant aspects of religious and social history; and facets of the histories of architecture, the visual arts, and music. Topics treated include the emergence of an early modern 'public sphere' and its relationship to drama during Shakespeare's lifetime; the role of historical narratives in shaping the period's views on the workings of politics; attitudes about the role of emotion in social life; cultures of honour and shame and the rituals and literary forms through which they found expression; crime and murder; and visual expressions of ideas of moral disorder and natural monstrosity, in printed images as well as garden architecture.

Not Peace But a Sword provides a case study in religious radicalism, as exemplified by the Puritanism of the English Revolution. Based on sermons preached to the Long Parliament and other political bodies, Stephen Baskerville demonstrates how Puritan religious and political ideas transformed the English Civil War into the world’s first great modern revolution. To understand why, Baskerville analyzes the underlying social changes that gave rise to Puritan radicalism. The Puritan intellectuals developed the sermon into a medium that conveyed not only popular political understanding but also a sophisticated political sociology that articulated a new social and political consciousness. In the process, they challenged the traditional political order and created a new order by appealing to the needs and concerns of a people caught up in the problems of rapid social and economic change. The book explores the social psychology behind the rise of Puritanism, as the Puritan ministers themselves presented it, through textual criticism of their own words, placing them in the mental context of their time, and offers a new understanding of the link between religious ideas and revolutionary politics.