Introductory description

This 30 CATS undergraduate final-year module explores the popular and radical dimensions of the civil wars and their aftermath. For the first time, ordinary people played an active and visible role in public affairs of national significance, initially through petitions, demonstrations, and riots. Subsequent topics include the issue of popular allegiance, and the impact of the wars on the civilian population.

Module web page

Module aims

Outline syllabus

This is an indicative module outline only to give an indication of the sort of topics that may be covered. Actual sessions held may differ.

• Topic 1: Reform, Agitation and Revolution, 1640-2
• Topic 2: The Impact of War
• Topic 3: Religious Radicalism in the 1640s
• Topics 4 and 5: The Levellers and the Army
• Topic 6: Winstanley and the Diggers
• Topic 7: The Republic from the Execution of Charles I to the Protectorate
• Topic 8: The Fifth Monarchy Men
• Topic 9: The Quakers
• Topic 10: Oliver Cromwell

Learning outcomes

By the end of the module, students should be able to:

• Demonstrate a systematic knowledge and understanding of the popular and radical dimensions of the civil wars and their aftermath
• Critically analyse and evaluate a broad range of primary sources written in unfamiliar language, and use skills of empathy to engage with views of the world far removed from our own
• Effectively communicate ideas, and make informed, coherent and persuasive arguments, about the popular and radical dimensions of the civil wars and their aftermath
• Critically review and consolidate theoretical, methodological, and historiographical ideas relating to the emergence of radical movements.

Indicative reading list

• M. Braddick, God’s Fury, England’s Fire (2015)
• A, Bradstock, Radical Religion in the English Revolution (2014)
• P. Crawford, 'Women's Published Writings 1600-1700' in Mary Prior, ed., Women in English Society 1500-1800 (1985).
• E. Graham, Her Own Life (1989) (extracts from e.g. Anna Trapnel).
• Petition of Women...5 May 1648 (Levellers) in A.S.P. Woodhouse, ed., Puritanism and Liberty.
• T. Edwards, Gangraena (1646).
• H. Barbour & A.O. Roberts, eds.,Early Quaker Writings.
• Ann Hughes, Gender and the English Revolution (2011)
• Susan Amussen, 'Gender, Family, and the Social Order, 1560-1725' in Order and Disorder in early modern England, ed. A. Fletcher & J. Stevenson (1985), Cf. Underdown's essay in the same collection.
• Ann Hughes Women, Men and Politics in the English Civil War (1999).
• P. Mack, Visionary Women (1993), Parts I and II.
• P. Crawford, Women and Religion in England 1500-1720 (1993), part III.
• Claire Cross, 'He-Goats' before the Flock': A Note of the Part Played by Women in the Founding of Some Civil War Churches', Studies in Church History 8 (1972).
• P. Crawford 'The Challenges to Patriarchalism: How did the Revolution affect Women?' in J. Morrill, ed., Revolution and Restoration (1992).
• C. Durston, The Family in the English Revolution (1989).
• Gentles, 'London Levellers in the English Revolution: The Chidleys and Their Circle', Journ. of Ecclesiastical History, 29 (1978).
• P. Higgins, 'The Reactions of Women, with special reference to women petitioners' in B. Manning, ed., Politics, Religion, and the English Civil War (1973).
• C. Hill, The World Turned Upside Down (1972)
• B. Reay, The Quakers in the English Revolution (1985).
• N.H. Keeble, 'The Colonel's shadow': Lucy Hutchinson, Women's Writing, and the Civil War', in T. Healy & J. Sawday, eds., Literature and the English Civil War (1990).
• Anne Laurence, 'A Priesthood of She-believers: Women and Congregations in Mid-17th Century England' in Women in the Church, ed., W.J. Sheils (Studies in Church History 27, 1990): shelfmark BR 141E2).
• Dorothy Ludlow, 'Shaking Patriarchy's Foundatiions: Sectarian Women in England, 1641-1700', in R.L. Greaves, ed., Triumph over Silence: Women in Protestant History (1985).
• J. Nadelhaft, 'The Englishwoman's Sexual Civil War: Feminist Attitudes Towards Men, Women, and Marriage 1650-1740', Journ. of the History of Ideas, 43 (1982).
• Mary Shanley, 'Marriage Contract and Social Contract in Seventeenth-century English Political Thought', in J.B. Elshtain, ed., The Family in Political Thought (1982).
• S. Shepherd, Amazons and Warrior Women: Varieties of Feminism in Seventeenth-century Drama (1981).
• L. Stone, The Family, Sex and Marriage (1979).
• K. Thomas, 'Women and the Civil War Sects' Past & Present, 13 (1958).
• K. Thomas, 'The Double Standard', Journ. of the History of Ideas, 20 (1959).
• K. Thomas, 'The Puritans and Adultery: the Act of 1650 Reconsidered' in D. Pennington & K. Thomas, eds., Puritans and Revolutionaries (1978).
• R. Thompson, Women in Stuart England and America (1974).
• Christine Trevett, Women and Quakerism (1991).
• E.M. Williams, 'Women Preachers in the Civil War', Journ. of Modern History, 1 (1929).
• K. Wrightson, English Society 1580-1680 (1982).
• C. Russell, The Fall of the British Monarchies 1637-1642 (1991), ch. 10.
• K. Lindley, 'The Impact of the 1641 Rebellion upon England and Wales', Irish Historical Review, 18 (1972).
• J.L. Malcolm, 'All the King's Men: The Impact of the Crown's Irish Soldiers on the English Civil War', Irish Historical Studies, 22 (1979).
• C. Hill, '17th Century English Radicals and Ireland', in his A Nation of Change and Novelty (1990).
• Norah Carlin, 'The Levellers and the Conquest of Ireland in 1649', Historical Journal, 30 (1987).
• J. Rees, The Levellers (2018)
• J. Gurney, Gerrard Winstanley (2013)
• J. Gurney, Brave Community (2007)
• C. Durston, "Let Ireland be Quiet" Opposition in England to the Cromwellian Conquest of Ireland', History Workshop Journal, (1986).
• K. Peters, Perrint Culture and the Early Quakers (2005)
• Gentles, The New Model Army (1992), ch. 11.
• A.L. Morton, The World of the Ranters (1976) (chap. on Walwyn).
• D. Stevenson, 'Cromwell, Scotland and Ireland' in J. Morrill, ed., Oliver Cromwell and the English Revolution (1990), Cf the chapters by Davis and Woolrych.
• T Barnard, Cromwellian Ireland 1649-60.
• K. Bottigheimer, English Money and Irish Land: the Adventurers in the Cromwellian Settlement of Ireland (1971).
• K. Bottigheimer, 'Kingdom and Colony: Ireland in the Westward Enterprise' in K.R. Andrews & P. Hair, eds., The Westward Enterprise (1978).
• N. Canny, 'The Ideology of English Colonization: from Ireland to America', William & Mary Quarterly, 3rd ser., 30 (1973).
• J. Jubbs, 'Several Proposals for Peace and Freedom' in D. Wolfe, ed., Leveller Manifestoes.
• R. Overton, 'The Arraignment of Mr. Persecution' in W. Haller, ed., Tracts on Liberty, vol. 3.
• J. Price, Walwins Wiles (1649), in W. Haller & G. Davies, eds., The Leveller Tracts.

View reading list on Talis Aspire

Subject specific skills

See learning outcomes.

Transferable skills

See learning outcomes.