Theagnus dei, Catholic devotion, and confessional politics in early modern England

2018 ◽  
Vol 34 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Aislinn Muller
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
The Political ◽  
Elizabeth I ◽  
Critical Part ◽  
Sacred Objects

After 1571 Catholic sacred objects were outlawed in England, and the possession of such objects could be prosecuted under the statute ofpraemunire. Despite this prohibition sacred objects including rosaries, blessed beads, and theagnus dei(wax pendants blessed by the pope) remained a critical part of Catholic devotion. This article examines the role of theagnus deiin English Catholic communities and the unique political connotations it acquired during the reign of Elizabeth I. It assesses the uses of these sacramentals in Catholic missions to England, their reception amongst Catholics, and the political significance of theagnus deiin light of the papal excommunication of Elizabeth I in 1570.

The Cartographic Image of ‘The Country’ in Early Modern England

1979 ◽  
Vol 29 ◽  
pp. 129-154 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victor Morgan
Keyword(s):  
Political Culture ◽  
Early Modern ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
The Political ◽  
Elizabeth I ◽  
Renaissance England ◽  
The Common

Some four hundred years ago this month Stephen Limbert, master of Norwich School, stood before the gates of the Great Hospital and addressed his well-turned Latin phrases to an audience almost as eminent as that gathered here today. Elizabeth I and her mobile summer court were on progress, and Norwich, the second city of the kingdom and capital of a region that was both the agricultural and manufacturing heartland of England, was determined to impress its monarch with both its loyalty to the Tudor dynasty and its contribution to the common weal—so it hired an impecunious London hack, sometime soldier and court hanger-on, Thomas Churchyard, to write the script. In part, at least, this no doubt accounts for the frequently reiterated commonplaces of Elizabethan propaganda embodied in such of those pageants and speeches as survived the intermittent downpours that sent both Her Majesty and her municipal hosts scurrying for cover on more than one occasion during her visit. Neither did Master Limbert's disquisition differ in its enthusiasm for Elizabethan rule from those of his metropolitan confrère. ‘It is reported’, he told Her Majesty, ‘that Aegypte is watered with the yerely overflowing of the Nilus, and Lydia with the golden streame of Pactolus, whyche thing is thought to be the cause of the greate fertilytye of these countries: but uppon us, and farther, over all Englande, even into the uttermoste borders, many and maine rivers of godlynesse, justice and humilitie, and other inumerable good things … do most plentifully gush out … from that continuall and most aboundaunt welspring of your goodnesse … With what prayses shall wee extoll, with what magnificent wordes shall we expresse, that notable mercie of your Highnesse, most renowned Queene’, sentiments that earned the former Norwich schoolmaster the Queen's invitation to kiss her ungloved hands, and sentiments that direct our attention to the symbols and image-creating aspects of the political culture of renaissance England.

Spectres of Female Sovereignty in Shakespeare’s Plays

2016 ◽  
pp. 111-130
Author(s):  
Susan Frye
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Political Thought ◽  
Female Body ◽  
The Political ◽  
Elizabeth I ◽  
Henry Viii ◽  
The Winter's Tale ◽  
Henry V ◽  
Winter's Tale

Spectres of historical queens in several of Shakespeare’s plays recall the political importance not only of queens themselves, but of the vexed issue of sovereignty as it was gendered in early modern political thought. Representations of and allusions to Elizabeth I and Mary Queen of Scots in Henry V, Henry VIII, and The Winter’s Tale expose the strategies through which actual queens as well as their supporters authorized and defended early modern female sovereignty. At the same time, because female sovereignty rests on the connection between the female body and the political body, definitions of female sovereignty remain unstable, capable of both reinforcing and disrupting the connection. When Shakespeare creates his historical and fictional queens, he raises their spectres as untimely versions of female sovereignty as well as the uncanny role of the female body in representing time itself.

ANTI-EPISCOPACY AND GRAPHIC SATIRE IN ENGLAND, 1640–1645

2004 ◽  
Vol 47 (4) ◽  
pp. 809-848 ◽  
Author(s):  
HELEN PIERCE
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Visual Media ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
The Political ◽  
Graphic Arts ◽  
Graphic Satire ◽  
Low Culture ◽  
Diverse Audience

This article examines the role of graphic satire as a tool of agitation and criticism during the early 1640s, taking as its case study the treatment of the archbishop of Canterbury and his episcopal associates at the hands of engravers, etchers, and pamphlet illustrators. Previous research into the political ephemera of early modern England has been inclined to sideline its pictorial aspects in favour of predominantly textual material, employing engravings and woodcuts in a merely illustrative capacity. Similarly, studies into the contemporary relationship between art, politics, and power have marginalized certain forms of visual media, in particular the engravings and woodcuts which commonly constitute graphic satire, focusing instead on elite displays of authority and promoting the concept of a distinct dichotomy between ‘high’ and ‘low’ culture and their consumers. It is argued here that the pictorial, and in particular graphic, arts formed an integral part of a wider culture of propaganda and critique during this period, incorporating drama, satire, reportage, and verse, manipulating and appropriating ideas and imagery familiar to a diverse audience. It is further proposed that such a culture was both in its own time and at present only fully understood and appreciated when consumed and considered in these interdisciplinary terms.

scholarly journals THE QUEEN’S QUEENDOM: NEGOTIATING THE RHETORIC OF THE ELIZABETH–ANJOU COURTSHIP (1572–1584)

2016 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 98-110
Author(s):  
Amritesh Singh
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Body Politic ◽  
Early Modern England ◽  
Political Authority ◽  
The Political ◽  
Elizabeth I ◽  
Male Body ◽  
Gendered Identities ◽  
Male Subjects ◽  
Two Bodies

This article juxtaposes the letters written by Elizabeth I to her last suitor, Francis, Duke of Anjou, with John Stubbs’ virulent tract The discoverie of a gaping gulf (1578) that opposed the match to propose that Elizabeth I challenged her belligerent male subjects in a game of semiotic control. I suggest that Elizabeth I fashioned her own ‘queendom’ – a discursive realm that complemented her political kingdom – where she attempted to formulate a code of masculinity that would celebrate gynaecocracy and facilitate a consummation of her sexuality. I show how, in her correspondence with Anjou, Elizabeth I sought to create a model husband for herself who would be sympathetic and subordinate to her political authority. I tease out the playful intercourse between the amorous and the political in Elizabeth I’s language to argue that she insisted on a unique union of her two bodies (the male body politic and the female body natural) which has largely gone unnoticed in current scholarship. Through a close engagement with Elizabethan rhetorical practices, this article aims to inspire a more nuanced reading of gendered identities in early modern England.

Intertheatricality and Propaganda

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laurence Publicover
Keyword(s):  
Early Modern ◽  
Real World ◽  
The Political ◽  
Merchant Of Venice ◽  
The Merchant Of Venice ◽  
Political Background ◽  
Controversial Nature

This chapter analyses the ways in which the collaborative drama The Travels of the Three English Brothers defends the Sherley brothers’ real-world political endeavours across Europe and Persia through its intertheatrical negotiations. Explaining the political background of those endeavours and their controversial nature, it illustrates how the playwrights liken the Sherleys to the heroes of dramas that had been popular on the early modern stage over the preceding twenty years, in particular Tamburlaine and The Merchant of Venice. It also examines the significance of Francis Beaumont’s specific parody, in The Knight of the Burning Pestle, of an episode in Travels in which the Persian Sophy acts as godfather to the child of Robert Sherley. The chapter concludes with a discussion of the role of playing companies in shaping dramatic output.

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