SHP Advanced History Core Texts are the Schools History Project's acclaimed new books for A level History. These books apply SHP's two decades of curriculum development experience to the challenge of helping students make the leap from GCSE to A level. They offer: - clear and penetrating narrative - comprehensively explaining the content required for examination success - thought provoking and relevant activities that explore the content and help students think analytically about the subject - thorough exam preparation through carefully designed tasks that address the distinctive requirements of A Level history - a wide range of revision strategies including structured content summaries This book is an advanced core text on the reign of Elizabeth I 1558-1603. It is designed to give students an insight into the nature of, and the achievements and failures of, Elizabeth's governments. It investigates the changing nature of English society at this time, and explores the ongoing historiographical debate about the period. There is practical guidance in essay writing and revision, along with opportunities for active learning, including decision-making exercises and source-based investigations.

Covering the period from 1558–1603, The Reign of Elizabeth I looks at all the important aspects of the reign of the last of the Tudor monarchs. The volume gives students the critical tools to enable them to perform to their best ability, drawing together the main issues on each topic and providing an accessible guide to the period. Using extensive sources and historiography, Stephen J. Lee explores: the religious settlement government and foreign policy the economy Elizabeth's relationship with Parliament society and culture. Also including a glossary of key terms and a helpful chronology, this is an essential tool for any student of British history.

This book is about the politics and political culture of the 'last decade' of the reign of Elizabeth I, in effect the years 1585 to 1603. It argues that this period was so distinctive that it amounted to the second of two 'reigns'. It also invites readers, at times provocatively, to take a critical look at the declining Virgin Queen. Many teachers and their students have failed to consider the 'last decade' in its own right, or have ignored it, having begun their accounts in 1558 and struggled on to the defeat of the Armada in 1588. Only two major political surveys have been attempted since 1926. Both consider mainly the war with Spain and the politics of war, and each allots inadequate space to Crown patronage, puritanism and religion, society and the economy, political thought, and literature and drama. This book, written by some of the leading scholars of their generation, will be indispensable to a fuller understanding of the age.

First published in 1936, this is a classic account of the reign of Elizabeth Tudor during the Sixteenth Century. The book provides a comprehensive account of the political, economic, social, literary, artistic, scientific, and cultural features that made it one of the richest periods in British history. It ranges from the Religious Settlement, England's relations with France, and the succession to Catholic and Puritan challenges to the establishment, the execution of Mary Stuart, the Armada, the Irish problem, and the later years of Elizabeth’s reign. “Professor Black brought to his task the knowledge and experience of a scholar who is a specialist in the period, the balance and wisdom of a philosophical mind, and the skill of a distinguished stylist. Need one be surprised that his book is not merely a first-rate text-book but a work which any serious-minded person will read with abounding pleasure.”—Sunday Times “This volume is one of those books which are so packed with information that its value can only be discovered in use. For those about to make a serious study of a difficult and complex period of English history it should be a most useful introduction, for Professor Black has the rare virtue of being impartial, even on the most controversial topics....The best advanced text-book of the Elizabethan period that has yet been written.”—Listener “Professor Black’s book is a solid achievement of sound and accurate scholarship, whose clearness of thought and balance in judgement make it a pleasure to read.”—Oxford Magazine “A most moderate, well-balanced, and ably written work, which should form a useful corrective to the many biased and unscholarly publications associated with the period it covers.”—Glasgow Herald

Photographs, illustrations, and text provide information about life in England before and during the reign of Queen Elizabeth I, covering the years between 1533 and 1603, discussing the Queen's court, conditions in London, foreign affairs, and other topics.

The Folger Shakespeare Library includes among its holdings the largest collection of materials in North America relating to Elizabeth I, including 38 documents signed by the queen. On the occasion of the 400th anniversary of Elizabeth's death in March 1603, the Folger Library mounted an ambitious exhibition of more than one hundred books, manuscripts, and works of art from its collections. stunning detail, as affectionate stepdaughter and censorious cousin, as humanist prince, as powerful and often capricious patroness, and as a private person. She was the centre not only of national culture but also of a vibrant court culture with complex ritual practices such as elaborate New Year's gift exchanges and summertime progresses through the countryside. Her self-fashioning literally involved the use of fashion. She dressed to be seen; her clothes made a statement about her power as a female ruler and about the stability and strength of her nation. The many portraits of Elizabeth which survive, including the 1579 Sieve portrait featured on the cover, suggest the complex interplay between the queen's politics of self-display and her powerful vanity. Sheila Ffolliott, and Barbara Hodgdon explore Elizabeth's life, her books, her portraits, the many documents in the Folger Library relating to her, and her continuing charismatic power in British and American culture.

Susan Doran describes and analyses the process of the Elizabethan Reformation, placing it in an English and a European context. She examines the religious views and policies of the Queen, the making of the 1559 settlement and the resulting reforms. The changing beliefs of the English people are discussed, and the author charts the fortunes of both Puritanism and Catholicism. Finally she looks at the strengths and weaknesses of Elizabeth I as royal governor, and of the Church of England as a whole.