Early Years 1558-1563

• Liz officially a bastard and could not become Queen
• There could be pretender. Mary was legitimate and of correct bloodline
• Gender an issue – John Knox '1558 First blast of the trumpet against the Monstrous regiment of Women' just published – women could not be rulers
• Legitimacy

  • Good polity and luck. No male contender who was Catholic or Protestant with close bloodline to Henry
  • Mary's relationship with King of France meant no support in England
  • Philip preferred a heretic to a French puppet
  • Luck with Gender too as the main proponents of idea that women could not rule were Prots and they were delighted to see her on the throne! Knox quickly retracted. His polemic had been directed at Mary of Guise, Mary QoS, and Mary I
  • She also used her own skill to make her acceptable – claimed she was a providential ruler. Propagandists went into overdrive to promote that notion e.g. God had preserved her under Mary's reign to place her on the throne: the English Deborah
  • Theory of the kings two bodies used also: the office of kingship was male even if occupied by a female. She always referred to herself as a prince but also referenced her vulnerability as a female to exploit the sympathies of her members of Parliament when she needed to
• Mary had returned England to Catholicism with Catholic forms of worship and Pope as Head of Church
• Liz undoubtedly a Protestant and didn't want to see England tied to Rome
• Lords dominated by Catholic Bishops
• English noblemen mainly Catholic
• The Settlement had to go through Parliament as all previous settlements since Henry had
• Settlement

  2 prayers books under Edward 1st Lutheran in nature and the 2nd more Swiss reformed. Also the influence of European theologians
• Religion Settlement

  • Restricted the Bishops persuaded the nobles to support her settlement and act of uniformity
  • Settlement itself was a middle way but not to be confused as between C and Ps was a via media between different Protestant confessions e.g. Lutheran elements in the ornaments and vestments but Calvinist in the Communion dogma of salvation and predestination
  • It allowed those who were prepared to conform to carry on their personal religious beliefs and although frustrating to some puritans and disturbing for Catholics caused no rebellions
• Couldn't hope for alliance with Catholic powers of Sp and Fr but needed support of Phillip
• Still at War with Fr so needed Sp support at peace conference to keep Calais (last possession on Fr lost previous Jan)
• Needed Sp against possible French backing of Mary. She had married the Dauphin! Serious threat
• Needed political amity with Sp because of economic importance of Antwerp
• Relations with Foreign powers

  • Lucky with Phillip (see above)
  • Use force in Scotland to prevent French troops
  • Backed the Fr Huguenots to prevent a French regime concentrating on backing Mary's regime in Scot but failure in New Haven expedition 1562-3 – fingers burned here!!!
• Marriage


  • She was able to dodge this one by playing for time
• In a rough state after war with Fr 1559 Treaty of Cateau-Cambresis
• £300,000 inherited in debt with high interest rates on a signif part of that sum
• Economy

  • End of war with France
  • Economies
  • Recoinage in 1560
  • By 1563 the economy was stabilising
• Foreign powers might join together in a catholic crusade
• If too protestant Catholics might rally to Mary QoS
• Catholics far outnumbered Protestants in England
• Catholic Bishops - Supreme Head of Church passed the Commons but was blocked in the Lords and she had to change to Supreme Gov so Cs could in their minds still believe that the Pope was Head! But despite purging the HoL of the Bishops it still only passed by 3!
• Puritan Choir theory too thin. Not enough of them (19 exiles and not all present in 1559)
• Her own theology – in doctrine Protestant but visually liked the Catholic services, music vestments etc.
• Her own Privy Council were a factor: several Puritan sympathisers, Cecil, Leicester, Walsingham, Hatton
• The Settlement never changed and in 1563 the 39 Articles simply defined and confirmed what had already been decided
• Elizabeth


  Just an old fashioned evangelical humanist – not a believer in hardline Protestantism – 'not a Protestants' Protestant' (D Loades)
• Religious Settlement

  • Driven by caution and political expediency. She had overtly identifed herself with the Protestant cause. Bible given to her by City of London in 1559 just before her coronation and walked out of Chapel Royal on Christmas day 1588 when host was elevated
  • She was bound up with the whole break with the papacy because of her mother
  • Norman Jones believes that she wanted along with Cecil to return to the 1552 settlement just before Edward's death but her preferences and ideology had to be tempered because of the hostility from Lords and Bishops in Parliament
  • The Prayer Book was watered down in 1559 to a blend of the 1549 and 1552 Books, which had elements of both Catholicism and Protestantism
• Religious Settlement


  • 'A masterpiece of theological engineering' D MacCulloch
  • 'Spineless indecision' C Haigh
  • 'Brilliant compromise' S Doran
• The Settlement was a 'religion by law established.' It made England officially Protestant – a confessional church
• England in 1559

  • 30 years of religious flux and uncertainty
  • No one settlement, Henrician, Edwardian and Marian had had time to put down its roots
  • Whiting – people had become indifferent acquiescing to whatever the prevailing regime ordered v Haigh England remained predominantly conservative
• Elizabeth's policy

  'I will not make windows into men's souls' was effectively turning a blind eye despite the official religion
• Elizabeth's aims

  • Order, Outward conformity and Stability
• Injunctions

  • Images which had survived iconoclasm could remain so long as they were no superstitiously abused
  • Communion tables were to replace altars BUT could stand where the old altar had been
  • Traditional wafers rather than common bread could be used
  • She wanted rood screens with crucifixes left but these wee dismantled by the Protestant Bishops around the country
  • She kept the crosses in the Chapel Royal
  • She did not want a purge of the Bishops and only removed those who remained hostile and resistant. She replaced them with moderates e.g. Matthew Parker as AoC a Cambridge academic who had not gone into exile – a Protestant yes but had conformed under Mary and kept his head down
  • No mass purge of parish clergy either. Just wanted them to outwardly conform and many continued to preserve their traditional practices because the settlement was very tolerant in its application. 'liturgical hermaphrodites' C Haigh
  • Allowed clerical marriage –which she hated, but wives not allowed in church precincts and marriages had to be approved by bishops
  • Allowed preaching which she disliked Monuments were destroyed which she expressly did not approve of but did nothing about
  • 12d a month was a very low fine for non-attendance (once a month was a low requirement) equivalent of a days wages for a London labourer. So hardly zealous
• The Vestiarian Controversy of 1563 in convocation proved this. Liz insisted upon keeping the 'rags of Rome' despite the demands of the more radical protestant clergy and Parker enforced this
• Church in the 1560s

  • It was the Queen's religion
  • It was schismatic – Papal authority had been abrogated
  • Protestant in doctrine BUT with the latitude to allow people to read into it what they chose provided they conformed in general
  • The only element which was unambiguous was the Act of Uniformity i.e. the requirement to conform and hold your peace
• This was an age of religious divisions – in Europe Wars of religion would consume many and so the Settlement was a good deal but people didn't know that Liz would last till age of 70 so there seemed much to play for and the two sides had zealots who were consumed with what would happen next
• Catholics

  • C Haigh talks about a significant degree of 'traditionalist survivalism'
  • The early Church clearly tried to accommodate this
  • But the more politically aware and theologically committed were aware that this would lead to the gradual erosion of Catholic principles
  • Church papists would be gradually eroded over time unless resistance could be stiffened
  • All hung on the life of Liz and in 1562 a stark warning of the uncertainty