Revolutionary England, C.1630-c.1660 ─ Essays for Clive Holmes

Revolutionary England is a perennially vibrant field of study. The roll-call of events, crises, and changes that electrified mid-seventeenth-century England certainly retains an impressive cumulative force. The descent into civil war, killing of a king, creation of a republic, fits of military government, written constitutions, dominance of Oliver Cromwell, abolition of a state church, eruption into major European conflicts, conquest of Scotland and Ireland, and efflorescence of powerfully articulated political thinking dazzled, bewildered, or appalled contemporaries, and has fascinated scholars ever since. Revolutionary England presents a series of cutting-edge interventions by established and rising authorities in the field. These are intended to honour one of the most respected scholars of early modern England. Clive Holmes has made remarkable contributions to an unusually wide range of fields and subjects of historical enquiry: civil war studies, the history of law, witchcraft, the gentry, and 'popular politics'. Doing full justice to all these subjects in one book would be impossible, but narrowing the chronological field to Clive's mid-seventeenth-century heartland provides a focused volume of essays produced by leading scholars inspired by his scholarship and teaching. Running through the volume are themes that both reflect Clive's own concerns and stand at the centre of current approaches to seventeenth-century studies: the relations between language, ideas, and political actors; the limitations of central government; and the powerful role of religious belief in public affairs.

George Southcombe is Director of the Sarah Lawrence Programme at Wadham College, Oxford, where he is also College Lecturer in History. His publications include English Nonconformist Poetry, 1660-1700 (editor, 3 volumes, 2012) and Restoration Politics, Religion and Culture: Britain and Ireland, 1660-1714 (2010, edited with Grant Tapsell).

Grant Tapsell is Fellow and Tutor in History, Lady Margaret Hall, Oxford. His publications include The Nature of the English Revolution Revisited (edited with Stephen Taylor, 2013); The Later Stuart Church, 1660-1714 (editor, 2012) and The Personal Rule of Charles II, 1681-85 (2007).