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  1. In Memory of LAJ_FETT: Please share your remembrances and condolences HERE

Rating the Monarchs of Britain: Now Disc. George III

Discussion in 'Archive: The Senate Floor' started by Zaz, May 27, 2009.

  1. Radical_Edward

    Radical_Edward Jedi Youngling star 3

    Registered:
    May 2, 2002
    This thread never fails to inform, entertain, amuse, and enlighten. It even makes me want to study up on French history (and I'm no francophile)

    Just wanted to share this little beauty: the aforementioned Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia, daughter of James Six-One, great-great-granddaughter of Margaret Tudor, and the one who passed on porphyria to all the houses of Europe

    [image=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/0/05/Elizabeth%2C_Queen_of_Bohemia_by_Gerrit_van_Honthorst.jpg/210px-Elizabeth%2C_Queen_of_Bohemia_by_Gerrit_van_Honthorst.jpg]

    Is it just me, or does she not look like a Stuart? I could have identified her ancestry just from this picture alone, and I'd never heard of her until ten minutes ago. Their families' genes apparently ran very strong and deep.
     
  2. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    The problem with James I's children, is that they looked quite different when young. There are numerous portraits of Elizabeth Stuart, but they don't resemble each other much. When young, her portraits show her as blonde:

    [image=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3438/3773671808_a2555a824c.jpg]

    [image=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3511/3701972847_f5f34a7236.jpg]

    [image=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3480/3772868009_d98a774981.jpg]

    [image=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/4/4a/Eliz_bohemia_3.jpg/180px-Eliz_bohemia_3.jpg]

    When older, she's shown as a brunette:

    [image=http://images2.fanpop.com/images/photos/7100000/Elizabeth-Stuart-Queen-of-Bohemia-Winter-Queen-kings-and-queens-7184098-2087-2560.jpg]

    [image=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3594/3798849998_b59ca17576_o.jpg]

    [image=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3424/3791576353_f6746f967f.jpg]

    [image=http://c3.ac-images.myspacecdn.com/images02/105/m_8770dc50968b44b5a96fc615b11d1cf2.jpg]
     
  3. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    Okay, here we go...

    Mary, Queen of Scots.

    [image=http://englishhistory.net/tudor/relative/maryqosmain13.jpg] Aged 13.

    Reign 14 December 1542 ? 24 July 1567

    Coronation 9 September 1543

    Predecessor James V

    Successor James VI

    Regent James Hamilton, 2nd Earl of Arran (1542?1554)

    Mary of Guise (1554?1560)

    Queen consort of France

    Tenure 10 July 1559 ? 5 December 1560

    Spouses:

    (1) Francis II of France m. 1558; dec. 1560 [image=http://z.about.com/d/womenshistory/1/0/i/S/2/mary_queen_scots_francis.jpg]

    (2) Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley m. 1565; dec. 1567 [image=http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/0/02/Hans_Eworth_Henry_Stuart_Lord_Darnley_and_Lord_Charles_Stuart.jpg] Darnley and his younger brother, Charles.

    (3) James Hepburn, 4th Earl of Bothwell m. 1567; dec. 1578 [image=http://history.wisc.edu/sommerville/367/367images/bothwell.jpg]

    Issue:

    (2) James VI of Scotland & I of England

    House House of Stuart

    Father James V of Scotland

    Mother Mary of Guise

    Born 8 December 1542 at Linlithgow Palace, Linlithgow

    Died 8 February 1587 (aged 44) at Fotheringhay Castle, Northamptonshire
    Burial Peterborough Cathedral; Westminster Abbey

    Description: "Portraits of Mary show that she had a small, well-shaped head, a long, graceful neck, bright auburn hair, hazel-brown eyes, under heavy lowered eyelids and finely arched brows, smooth lustrous skin, a high forehead, and regular, firm features. While not a beauty in the classical sense, she was an extremely pretty child who would become a strikingly attractive woman. In fact, her effect on the men with whom she later came into contact was certainly that of a beautiful woman.[12]

    ...Mary was tall for her age (she attained an adult height of 5 feet 11 inches, which would have made her almost a giant in the sixteenth century"

    Both her parents were very tall. As Mary aged, she began to look much more like her father (long aquiline nose, prominent chin) and she lost the prettier looks of her younger portraits.

    The Situation: Mary succeeded to the throne at the age of 6 days. At the age of five, her mother sent her to France to prevent further attempts by the English to abduct her. She was engaged to Francois, the eldest son of the French King, Henri II. Francois was slightly younger and a stunted, stuttering boy; Mary made a radiant contrast with him. However, the children became fond of each other.

    Mary was in frequent contact with her Guise grandmother and her Guise uncles, the Duc de Guise and the Cardinal de Lorraine. She was a favorite at the French court, but remember: the French were using her as a propaganda tool. So stories of her looks and precocity were everywhere. Mary, unfortunately, became rather used to praise and attention, not understanding that some of it might have been politically motivated.

    Meanwhile, while Mary queened it in France, Scotland was a mess; eventually, in 1554, her mother became Regent and remained so until 1560.

    Mary married Francois in 1558, and when Henry II was killed in a joust in July, 1559, she became Queen of France. Francois was a puppet for her powerful uncles, but he died of an ear infection in December, 1560. He and Mary had no children (Francois does not seem to have been capable of it), so his younger brother, Charles IX, became king.

    Mary suffered a sudden and for her, devastating, loss of caste at Francois' death. Even her uncles lost some interest in her; they had other fish to fry. She tried to recoup by proposing a marriage to Charles IX (who was ten years old). His mother, Catherine de'Medici knew that would mean the return of rule by Mary's uncles and declined. She wanted a crack at it herself. Mary then tried to arrange a marriage to Don Carlos of Spain (mad, bad and homocidal), the heir of Philip of Spain. Catherine managed to kibosh that one, too (Philip was married to her daughter, Elisabeth de Valois, at this time).

    In the end, Mary decided to return to Scotland. Exactly why, no one knows, but the probable reason was to conspire for the throne of England. If she could n
     
  4. Radical_Edward

    Radical_Edward Jedi Youngling star 3

    Registered:
    May 2, 2002
    Re: Elizabeth Stuart,

    Of the four pictures you posted of the younger Liz, three of them show her in a red-headed wig, which no doubt was meant to flatter the famously red-wigged Elizabeth Tudor, whom she was named for (notice also the clothing, makeup, and jewelry that Liz Stuart is wearing, which is nearly identical to that used by Elizabeth I in her portraiture) It all looks to me like part of her family's grand scheme to make nice with the English so that they'd be set for accession, kind of like how every important Iraqi from the 80's onward sported the exact same Saddam mustache, until it became unnecessary in '03. The second image you posted is rather ambiguous, but I'd personally call it her a brunette in that one.

    The portraits of her later in life were made after her own marriage, the death of Elizabeth I, and accession of James VI I, so no need at that point to play dress-up in an attempt to ingratiate herself with the English monarchy.


    Re: Blood Mary,

    The murder of Rizzo in front of Mary and her ladies is IMO one of the most horrific and gruesome acts of violence in the history of European nobility. It sounds so mild: "hacked to death in full view of the queen", but that was only a small part of the physical and psychological torture and humiliation that Darnley's friends put Mary and her ladies through that night. Many people (my mother included) claims that the room that the act happened in is still haunted. I can't blame Mary at all for taking the morning off to play golf on the day of Darnley's funeral.
     
  5. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    I have to point out that Elizabeth Stuart was born in 1596, and thus was only seven years old when Elizabeth I died in 1603. Nor does the hair look red...it looks blonde to me. Both James and his wife, Anne of Denmark, were fair.

    'Bloody Mary' is Mary Tudor. So-called because she burnt people at the stake.

    Mary, Queen of Scots, got no chance to do that, even if she wanted to. No evidence that she was that much of a fanatic, except about becoming Queen of England.

    Yes, the assassination of Rizzo was horrific, but Mary (for once) kept her head. But she knew Darnley was jealous of him, and several other people at court resented him. It wasn't smart to favour him so much, or so intimately, but Mary was flirtatious by nature. It always redounded on her son, too. When an English ambassador commented that James I was known as the "Solomon of Britain" Henri de Navarre (by then King of France) responded sourly, "That's because he's the son of David." It's a canard, by the way. James was certainly the son of Darnley, or as Mary herself put it: "...so much so that it may be ill for him thereafter." [paraphrase]

    Mary was flirtatious, but she was not the sort for back-room rumbles. At least, that's my reading of her character. Of course, that's not the common view, but we will get to that.

     
  6. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    Mary, Queen of Scots, part two:

    Sidebar: Henry, Lord Darnley

    [image=http://www.nationalgalleries.org/media_collection/6/PG%202279.jpg]

    [image=http://images.npg.org.uk/264_325/7/2/mw04272.jpg]

    "Darnley was born in 1545, at Temple Newsam, Leeds, in the West Riding of Yorkshire, England, the son of the 4th Earl of Lennox, and his wife, Margaret Douglas. His father lived in exile in England for 22 years, returning to Scotland in 1564.[1]

    Darnley was related to his future wife in at least four ways: they shared a grandmother in English princess Margaret Tudor (Mary descending from Margaret's marriage to James IV of Scotland, Darnley from Margaret's marriage to Archibald Douglas, 6th Earl of Angus), putting both Mary and Darnley high in the line of succession for the English throne; Darnley was a descendant of a daughter of James II of Scotland and thus also in line for the throne of Scotland; both were descendants of Joan Beaufort, Queen of Scotland (Mary through Joan's marriage to James I of Scotland, Darnley through her marriage to Sir James Stewart, the Black Knight of Lorn); and Darnley's family surname was due to a much more ancient connection to his male-line ancestor, Alexander Stewart, 4th High Steward of Scotland.

    The marriage took place on Sunday 29 July 1565,[2] in the Chapel-Royal of Palace of Holyroodhouse in Edinburgh. On the 30 July Darnley was given the title of King of Scots at a proclamation published at the Cross of Edinburgh,[3] but he was King Consort only, with no royal powers.

    His marriage to Mary, Queen of Scots, was a disaster. Darnley was three years younger than Mary (their birthdays were only a day apart) and not particularly mature. He was unpopular with the other nobles and had a mean and violent streak, aggravated by a drinking problem.[4] Within a short time, Mary became pregnant, but Darnley grew more and more demanding. His jealousy of Mary's private secretary, David Rizzio, by whom it was said that Mary had become pregnant, culminated in the bloody murder of the latter by Darnley and a group of his supporters, in the presence of the queen herself at The Palace of Holyroodhouse, Edinburgh. Archibald Douglas, Parson of Douglas, subsequently secured pardons for all those involved.

    Following the birth of their son, the future James VI, the succession was more secure; in late 1566 and early 1567, Darnley and Mary appeared to be close to reconciliation, as she was often seen visiting his chambers. But Darnley was unpopular and petulant and offended many who should have been his natural supporters, and Mary became frustrated at his insistence that he be awarded the Crown Matrimonial. There was also some evidence that he suffered from syphilis.[4] On 10 February 1567, the bodies of Darnley and his servant at the time were discovered in the gardens of the Hamiltons' house, Kirk o' Field, Edinburgh, where they had been staying. Darnley was dressed only in his nightshirt, suggesting he had fled in some haste from his bedchamber. A violent explosion had occurred that night at the house, but the evidence pointed to Darnley escaping attempted assassination, only to be murdered when he got outside. There was strong evidence that Darnley and his valet had been strangled and that the explosion was set as an attempt to cover up the murders."

    Many a tree has been sacrificed in the cause of arguing that Mary was not guilty of conspiring to murder Darnley. Alison Weir, in fact, recently wrote an entire book to this effect, trying to float the old canard that Mary was 'framed'. Reading such nonsense is a bit like watching people construct Spanish galleons out of popsicle sticks. As one of the few Scottish historians to resist Mary's glamour once commented: "How could she *not* know?" How indeed. Despite the fact that a great majority of the Scottish aristocracy was baying for Darnley's blood, Mary's complicity is pretty obvious. I should make clear here that I believe she had no choice. Moray and Maitland had suggested to her that she divorce Darnley, but that was clearly too dangerous, somethin
     
  7. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    Mary, Queen of Scots, Part III

    [image=http://www.marileecody.com/maryqos/maryqosjames1.jpg]

    "Mary arranged for a mock trial [of Bothwell] before parliament, and Bothwell was duly acquitted on 12 April.[25] Furthermore, some land titles were restored officially to Bothwell as a result of Darnley's death.[26] He also managed to get some of the Lords to sign the Ainslie Tavern Bond, in which they agreed to support his claims to marry the queen. All these proceedings did little to dissipate suspicions against Mary among the populace.

    On 24 April 1567, Mary visited her son at Stirling for the last time. [He was one year old] On her way back to Edinburgh Mary was abducted, willingly or not, by Bothwell and his men and taken to Dunbar Castle, where she was allegedly raped by Bothwell. However, already in October 1566, she had been very interested in Bothwell when she made a four-hour journey on horseback to visit him at Hermitage Castle where he lay ill.[27] On 6 May Mary and Bothwell returned to Edinburgh and on 15 May, at the Palace of Holyroodhouse, they were married according to Protestant rites. Bothwell had divorced his first wife, Jean Gordon twelve days previously.[28]

    The Scottish nobility [and also the populace] turned against Mary and Bothwell and raised an army against them. Mary and Bothwell confronted the Lords at Carberry Hill on 15 June, but there was no battle as Mary agreed to follow the Lords on condition that they let Bothwell go.[29] However, the Lords broke their promise, and took Mary to Edinburgh and imprisoned her in Loch Leven Castle, situated on an island in the middle of Loch Leven. Between 18 July and 24 July 1567, Mary miscarried twins [they were probably Darnley's]. On 24 July 1567, she was also forced to abdicate the Scottish throne in favour of her one-year-old son James.

    On 2 May 1568, Mary escaped from Loch Leven and once again managed to raise a small army. After her army's defeat at the Battle of Langside on 13 May, she fled by boat across the Solway Firth to England."

    And...big mistake. Mary was only 24; had she been older, she might have known that things can change quickly in politics, as soon as a regime becomes unpopular. She might have been restored pretty quickly had she gone to France, instead of England. But to England she went. The question is, why?

    Probably she was chasing the chimera of the English succession again...but there were other considerations. Mary had just married a divorced Protestant commoner; and her continental relatives had been profoundly shocked by her marriage to Darnley, also technically a commoner, though at least he had a good bit of royal blood. She was also suspected of complicity in a murder. Now most of her Guise relatives were a tough, ambitious lot, but two things they would have frowned upon: a lack of Catholic fervour, and a lowly marriage. Also Mary would not have enjoyed facing her ex-mother-in-law, with Catherine de'Medici having the upper hand. Elizabeth, OTOH, had been the only monarch to actually try to help Mary. [Elizabeth's motives involved allowing nobles to unseat a sitting monarch forming a bad precedent.] Mary thought this meant more than it did. She possibly imagined that if she could meet Elizabeth face-to-face, she could persuade her to recognize Mary as her heir. As usual, Mary could not see another person's POV. Elizabeth was not the sentimental type at all. She did not want Mary in her kingdom, but letting her go was probably even more dangerous. In other words: Mary became to Elizabeth what Darnley had been to Mary, a giant headache.

    End of Part Three.
     
  8. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    Part Four:

    Escape and imprisonment in England

    "Mary landed at Workington in England on 19 May and stayed at Workington Hall. She was swiftly imprisoned by Elizabeth's officers at Carlisle Castle. During her imprisonment, she famously had the phrase En ma Fin gît mon Commencement ("In my end is my beginning") embroidered on her cloth of estate.

    Mary was moved to Bolton Castle on 16 July 1568 and remained there under the care of Henry the 9th Lord Scrope, until 26 January 1569, when she was moved to Tutbury Castle.

    After her flight into England, Mary Stuart expected Elizabeth I to help her regain her throne. Elizabeth was cautious, and ordered an inquiry into the question of whether Mary should be tried for the murder of Darnley first. A conference was held in York and later Westminster between October 1568 and January 1569. The accusers were the Scottish Lords who had deposed Mary. For overriding political reasons, Elizabeth neither wished to convict Mary of murder nor acquit her of the same; the conference was intended as a political exercise.

    Mary refused to acknowledge the power of any court to try her since she was an anointed Queen, and the man ultimately in charge of the prosecution, James Stewart, Earl of Moray, was ruling Scotland as regent for Mary's son King James. His chief motive was to prevent a restoration of Mary to the Scottish throne. Mary refused to offer a written defence unless Elizabeth would guarantee a verdict of not guilty, which Elizabeth would not do.
    Mary in captivity, c. 1580

    As evidence, Mary's Scottish accusers presented the "Casket letters"? eight letters purportedly from Mary to Bothwell, reported by James Douglas, 4th Earl of Morton to have been found in Edinburgh in a silver box engraved with an F (supposedly for Francis II), along with a number of other documents, including the Mary/Bothwell marriage certificate. The outcome of the conference was that the Casket Letters were accepted by the conference as genuine after a study of the handwriting, and of the information contained therein. Yet, as Elizabeth had wished, the inquiry reached the conclusion that nothing was proven. In hindsight it seems that none of the major parties involved considered the truth to be a priority. James MacKay comments that one of the strangest 'trials' in legal history ended with no finding of guilt with the result that the accusers went home to Scotland and the accused remained detained in 'protective custody'."

    In 1570, Elizabeth was persuaded by representatives of Charles IX of France to promise to help Mary regain her throne. As a pre-condition, she demanded the ratification of the Treaty of Edinburgh [that Elizabeth Tudor and not Mary Stuart had the right to succeed Mary Tudor], something Mary would even now not agree to. Nevertheless, William Cecil, 1st Baron Burghley, continued negotiations with Mary on Elizabeth's behalf.

    In 1569, Cecil had unofficially appointed Sir Francis Walsingham to organize a secret service for the protection of the realm, particularly the Queen's person. Henceforth, Cecil as well as Walsingham would have many opportunities (and reasons) to watch Mary carefully.

    The Ridolfi Plot, which was a plan to depose Elizabeth with the help of foreign troops, and to place Mary on the English throne, caused Elizabeth to reconsider. With the queen's encouragement, Parliament introduced a bill in 1572 barring Mary from the throne. Elizabeth unexpectedly refused to give it the royal assent. The furthest she ever went was in 1584, when she introduced a document (the Bond of Association) aimed at preventing any would-be successor from profiting from her murder. It was not legally binding, but was signed by thousands, including Mary herself.

    Elizabeth considered Mary's designs on the English throne to be a serious threat, and so eighteen years of confinement followed, much of it in Sheffield Castle and Sheffield Manor in the custody of George Talbot, 6th Earl of Shrewsbury and his redoubtable wife Bess of Hardwick. Bothwell was imprisoned in Denmark, became insane, and died in 1578, sti
     
  9. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    So here we are back to the English Succession. The next King of Scotland, James VI, (crowned 1567) became King of England and Ireland as well (1603). He lost no time at all in shaking the dust of Scotland from his shoes, and he returned only once to Scotland after he succeeded to the throne of England. This was typical of the Stuarts; that they are associated with Scottish nationalism is ye joke. They spent decades coveting the English crown, and once they finally got it, they had little or no use for Scotland and its concerns. Typically, they obtained England and Ireland by descent, and not conquest. They should have been warned by one thing that they didn't really consider: a group of Elizabeth's nobles and bureaucrats decided that James should succeed Elizabeth (who didn't name a successor), despite the Will of Henry VIII, among other difficulties. James succeeded very peacefully, with no dispute from the other possible heirs. James, typically, decided that reflected his power, instead of the truth, which was that it reflected his powerlessness.

    1603 is yet another turning point in history. 1485 was the advent of the Tudors and the end of the medieval period; but the Tudors lasted only three generations and 118 years. The Stuarts managed four generations but only 112 years. During that period, the Stuarts were dethroned three times: 1649, 1688 and 1714. And in 1714, another group of English nobles and bureaucrats decided that the Stuarts were done in the British Isles. The impulse towards democracy was caused by two things: the Stuart's utter incompetence (in general) and their religion (in particular). England had been spared the dreadful religious wars of France in the late 1500's and the Thirty Years' War in Germany. It was their turn. However, though Catholicism triumphed in France and most of Germany, the opposite happened in England, with Protestantism winning the war. This had a curious effect: Protestantism was, by nature, much less centralized and much more radical than Catholicism. The Stuarts could not reconcile their official religion with their political theories--which were authoritarian by nature. They were, however, unable to enforce their views: they weren't great soldiers, or strong men, like the dynasties who had fought over England previously. They got their just deserts, and my response to dumbass historians who mourn over their fate is yar boo sucks to that.
     
  10. Champion of the Force

    Champion of the Force Jedi Grand Master star 4

    Registered:
    Dec 27, 1999
    [face_laugh]

    Once again, a very informative history lesson Zaz. :)

    Out of curiosity, what did Henry stipulate in his will?
     
  11. Gonk

    Gonk Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1998
    This had a curious effect: Protestantism was, by nature, much less centralized and much more radical than Catholicism.

    This is more a judgement of Protestantism of the times they lived in, correct?

    While protestant strains now exist which are still considerably more radical than Catholicism (Pentecostal, Mormon, 7th Day Aventist, and a large amount of Baptist segments) a lot of the major strains at that time or maybe not so long afterward are now relevantly equivalent with Catholicism in terms of how 'radical' they might be (Epsicopalian, Unitarian and of course, Anglican).
     
  12. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    The Will of Henry VIII explicitly disinherited all the descendants of Henry VII's older sister Margaret in favour of his younger sister, Mary Tudor Brandon. Jane Grey was a granddaughter of Mary Brandon.

    Robert Cecil and crew specifically ignored this when choosing among Elizabeth's eligible cousins the next king. There were plenty of good reasons why, the best one being it would have meant civil war.

    Henry VIII bitterly disliked Margaret; she was too much like himself, and he did not like what he saw.

    Mary Brandon's available descendents were extremely unimpressive: she had two daughters. The eldest, Frances Grey had three daughters, only one of which, Katherine, had children, who were doubtfully legitimate. Mary Brandon's younger daughter had one daughter, Margaret Clifford, who had several children, including some sons, but not ambitious ones.

    James did have one genuine contestant for the throne, though: his first cousin, Arbella Stuart, the daughter of his father's younger brother. She tried marrying one of Katherine Grey's sons and got clapped in the Tower for it, where she died.

    Re religion: of course I mean at that time. The Stuarts wanted to be autocrats, who could impose their will on their countries, but they lacked the necessary abilities. James I and Charles II had the brains, but not the guts or energy. James II had the guts and energy (or stupidity, if you will), but not the brains. Charles I was lacking in just about everything necessary, barring effrontery.

    An admission: I am a Presbyterian.

     
  13. Gonk

    Gonk Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1998
    Re religion: of course I mean at that time.

    Well the reason I asked was because depending on the strain, a lot of the same things can be said for Protestantism today depending on the denomination. Perhaps it's no longer assumed "by nature", but the Baptist church is today I'd say rather more radical than Catholicism.
     
  14. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    Protestantism emphasized self-determination; you followed your own conscience. In Catholicism, you were supposed to follow the dictates of the Pope, be he ever so corrupt.

    My theory: England would have been a backwater forever had it stayed or resumed being Catholic. Catholicism at this point anti-technology, anti-learning, anti-free expression. (The Church pardoned Gallileo in 1992...big of them, wasn't it?)

    Another example: "On February 17, 1600, the Catholic Church made a most emphatic and brutal statement. Giordano Bruno, a Dominican friar, figure 1, turned philosopher, was burned at the stake in Rome. In keeping with the punishment he suffered the heretic's fork, a cruel Y-shaped object, the branched end of which passed into his jaw while the lower end was positioned behind his breastbone to force his mouth shut. Bruno had been found guilty of heresy and the fork meant that he could not longer "spread the word". His crime? Well, he was a sort of "hippie" and among his rather "way out" views for the time, he believed and maintained the Copernican model of the universe - that is the Earth not the Sun was at the center of the universe - and also that the universe was infinite - with the possibility of multiple inhabited worlds. Both views were heresy in the eyes of the Roman Catholic Church. The Catholic Church itself was under considerable threat at the time through the Protestant Reformation and what it feared most was "new" ideas. The current view of the Church at that time was that God's Earth and God's children occupied a special place in the universe - they were at its very center. The Church, then, provided the unspoken word of God and it spoke from Rome. Giordano Bruno had spoken out against this dogma and for that crime he was investigated by the Holy Inquisition in Rome. His interrogator, Robert Cardinal Bellarmine - we'll meet him again later in the story - found the case against Bruno proved and so he suffered the ultimate punishment. Today, in Rome, in the Campo dei Fiori - which translates as the Field of Flowers - once the scene of public executions, you will find a statue of Giordano Bruno."

    When Charles I's Archbishop, Laud, started restricting books and learning, you could see the writing on the wall. Elizabeth had not indulged in censorship, unless it was treasonable, and James I was not much inclined either. Charles was trying to Romanize the English Church and the Scottish Kirk and the English Church didn't like it; but the Scottish Kirk hated it, and the subsequent explosion took the Stuarts down with it.

    Irony: The fiercest rebellion against the Stuarts was in Scotland.

     
  15. farraday

    farraday Jedi Knight star 7

    Registered:
    Jan 27, 2000
    You don't think Bruno's claim that Jesus wasn't divine but instead a successful magician might have had something to do with the accusation of heresy?

    The claims about technology you're making are a bit overblown, and suggesting it would lead to stagnation seems wrongheaded. I would suggest that the rise of Protestantism in Northern Europe was influenced by the same factors that lead to the Northern European Renaissance, but hardly caused it.

    Any benefit you might grant Protestantism for breaking a sole authoritarian relationship is rather diminished by the fact the Church, Catholic or Protestant, was seen as the legitimizer of the state, which means that catholic or Protestant, fighting the church was treason.

    I would suggest the real advances were made by humanists, who were both Protestant and catholic and whose arguments struck not at the root of religion, but at the Conservative authoritarian religious control exhibited by both Catholics and Protestants.

    To put it another way, I'd rather have my government designed by Jefferson than Winthrop, be he ever so Protestant.
     
  16. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    England was a world power under Elizabeth; it became much less than that under James I (including being humiliated in the 30 Year's War) and under Charles II, it took another mortifying beating from the Dutch (at sea, yet!) Prior to William of Orange, the only time England received any respect in this century was when Oliver Cromwell was in charge. You would think that the Continental powers would spurn Cromwell, a commoner, wouldn't you?; they didn't, because they recognized a tough and able customer when they saw one. The Stuarts were neither tough nor able, though James II made a try at it. He might have been successful had he left religion out of it; but he would not, with predictable results.

    Any country in which the Inquisition operated was a backward country, IMO, in that they tried to control thought, and learning. The Jesuits were a similar (if not as bad) plague in France. This resulted in the revolutionaries in France attempting to suppress religion, and from then on, revolutions featured anti-clericism, the Churches (including Protestant ones) were seen as instruments of repression. Of course, in some countries, they were--in Spain, Sicily, and Ireland, for three examples.

    Of course, Catholicism has become much more radical these days--particularly in response to totalitarianism.
     
  17. farraday

    farraday Jedi Knight star 7

    Registered:
    Jan 27, 2000
    Which operates under a mistaken belief that the Inquisition was inherently papal. True, there was a papal inquisition, but the Spanish Inquisition answered tot he King of Spain, not the Pope. The fact the Jesuits rose to power in France was a response not only to the Huguenots but an attempt by the French to tie themselves in with papal authority in their eternal quest to overthrow the Habsburgs as supreme power in Europe.

    Let's examine Descartes. Great French thinker, undoubtedly a key figure in the philosophical underpinnings of the enlightenment. A devout Catholic educated at a Jesuit University, and yet his books ended up banned by the Pope.

    You, I think, are focusing on the last part and thus condemning Catholicism as anti learning when the matters are far more complicated then Protestantism good Catholicism bad, which is what your initial post was suggesting.

    Renaissance Protestantism was not about following the dictates of your conscience, except maybe in extreme forms practiced by smaller congregationalists. I think some of the eastern European sects may fit into this category.

    Protestantism, as practiced, was a means of subjugating Church authority to the crown, most blatantly in England, but just as fully in the atrocious number of Germanic states. Humanism is the real source, in my estimation, of the advances made during the enlightenment, and it was just as inimical to the Protestant established church as the Catholic.
     
  18. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    Huh? When did I say the Inquisition was papal, and furthermore, who cares?

    Let's not, except to note that this great French thinker spent a lot of time outside France (usually in the Dutch Republic, and he died in Sweden), had to suppress some of his own work because of the Church's reaction to Gallileo, and was denounced as a heretic by Blaise Pascal.

    Catholicism is not anti-learning. Of course, there is learning and then there are new ideas. Unless, of course, you believe the earth is flat.

    You just contradicted yourself in this quote.

    Well, we are not going to agree on that one, but you are certainly entitled to your opinion.
     
  19. farraday

    farraday Jedi Knight star 7

    Registered:
    Jan 27, 2000
    Your problem, Zaz is you're crediting Protestantism as a whole with any liberalism from the extreme congregationalists and ignoring the conservative established churches simply because you'd rather blame the problems on the conservative Catholic Church. You were nto allowed to follow your own conscience in the CoE, that's why the Puritans started leaving in the first place. Hell you want to talk about the established churches persecution of anabaptists? There is a reason most Mennonites are in former colonies, and not Europe. Hell the US ended up with a crap load of religious minorities fleeing Protestant northern Europe.

    You are painting a rosy picture of Protestantism that is incredibly at odds with both reality and the educational tone of this thread.

    "Catholicism at this point anti-technology, anti-learning, anti-free expression."
    "Catholicism is not anti-learning. Of course, there is learning and then there are new ideas. Unless, of course, you believe the earth is flat."

    This is *******, and you're better than that.
    Please check your sense of religious superiority at the door.
     
  20. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    I like my sense of religious superiority. I pet it, and groom it, and call it George. I suggest you name yours Aloysius. (If we profess a religion, we obviously think it the best available to us. Any other conclusion is just PC nonsense). At no point, however, have I told you or anyone else you have to agree with me. Obviously, you don't. Which is fine with me, and only to be expected in, as they say, a free country. We are, however, discussing a period when the religion of the ruler was dead serious business, because his or her religion was expected to be that of the people he ruled. We saw Navarre win France, but he had to turn Catholic to do it. He protected the Huguenots the best he could, but this protection would not be permanent, as we shall see, as it affected the rule of the fourth and last, Stuart King, James II when he tried to institute a French-style nation state in the British Isles.

    We were discussing James I of England and James VI of Scotland, who are one and the same. James was the best Stuart King of England (out of four), but this is tepid praise, unfortunately.

    OTOH, most historians agree that he was a highly effective King of Scotland, with a few caveats. (He did not reform the creaking legal system, for example). Because James had every reasonable expectation of succeeding Elizabeth in England, he stayed out of open disputes with England, with the unexpected benefit that he did not, unlike all the previous Jameses, die young. He kept the barons under reasonable control, consulted his Council, was much more hard-working and involved than his useless mother and foolish father. When an irritated bishop described him as "God's silly vassal" to his face, he didn't clap him in irons, he just laughed...he did have a sense of humour.

    But James had had a champion unhappy childhood, (not unlike Elizabeth's), and like her, it had left him with a lot of baggage and a host of neurotic symptoms. It would affect his family life and the three kingdoms he eventually ruled.

    We formally start the English Stuarts tonight.

     
  21. farraday

    farraday Jedi Knight star 7

    Registered:
    Jan 27, 2000
    Your sense of religious superiority is getting in the way of your historical accuracy. Maybe you should stop pampering George so much and put him on a diet so he doesn't eclipse your intellectual honesty when religion enters the picture.
     
  22. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    I like George pleasingly plump. :D

    And all history worth its salt has a subjective subtext. It's not a PC contest. This is my opinion. Only.
     
  23. Gonk

    Gonk Jedi Grand Master star 6

    Registered:
    Jul 8, 1998
    Catholicism is in a way like Rome: too big to judge in many ways. There was plaenty of problems with Church leadership -- Leo X had some extremely large contributions to the birth of the Protestant movement (A Medici Pope... they would have fared better if they'd elected Tony Soprano) and the less said about that earlier 'schism' fiasco, the better.

    But it's interesting one brings up the inquisitions. Actually the Spanish Inquisition was an anomoly in how they were run. There were of course a large number of inquisitions. France had an Inquisition. As did many parts of Germany. And they had them at different periods of time. Many of these inquisitions were called in response to large numbers of accusations of herecy and witchcraft by a local populace. And so the Catholic church would send representatives... and in fact when you look at the statistics (yes, records fo these things were kept and still survive), the numbers of people executed once a formal inquisition was called went DOWN.

    The Church -- although it certainly was guilty of its own motives -- was also regardless responsible for keeping much of the knowledge throughout the Dark Ages. It founded the first universities, and many of the arguments that were later to spur on the Athiests actually originally stemmed from the Church's full investment into the practice of theology. By the time these arguments started to be used by people like Rene DesCartes things had come as full circle as Louis XVI thinking helping out the American Revolution was a bright idea, but it's still noteworthy to acknowledge where it all came from.
     
  24. Zaz

    Zaz Jedi Knight star 9

    Registered:
    Oct 11, 1998
    Next: James VI of Scotland and James I of England and Ireland

    King of Scots:

    Reign 24 July 1567 ? 27 March 1625

    Coronation 29 July 1567

    Predecessor Mary I

    Successor Charles I

    Regents:

    James Stewart, Earl of Moray (his half-uncle)
    Matthew Stewart, Earl of Lennox (his paternal grandfather)
    John Erskine, Earl of Mar
    James Douglas, Earl of Morton


    King of England and Ireland

    Reign 24 March 1603 ? 27 March 1625

    Coronation 25 July 1603

    Predecessor Elizabeth I

    Successor Charles I

    Consort Anne of Denmark

    Issue:
    Henry Frederick, Prince of Wales (d. aged 18) [image=http://www.shafe.co.uk/crystal/images/lshafe/Oliver_Prince_Henry.jpg]
    Elizabeth, Queen of Bohemia (ancestress of the Hanoverians) [image=http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3629/3394593963_7891539d63.jpg]
    Charles I of England [image=http://www.iatwm.com/200602/TEFAF2006/CharlesI_Peake.jpg]
    Robert Stuart, Duke of Kintyre (d. in infancy)

    Father Henry Stuart, Lord Darnley
    Mother Mary I of Scotland
    Born 19 June 1566(1566-06-19)
    Edinburgh Castle, Scotland
    Died 27 March 1625 (aged 58)
    Theobalds House, England

    The Situation: When Mary fled to England, James was still an infant. He had a series of regents, including his uncle, Moray (who lasted 3 years until he was assassinated); his grandfather, the Earl of Lennox (who lasted 1 year until he was killed); the Earl of Mar (one year prior to being poisoned), and finally the Earl of Morton (six years, until James, aged 15, executed him). James was seduced, also aged 15, by his father's cousin, Esme Stuart (despite the name, a male). James had a lonely, miserable childhood; he was raised by George Buchanan, his tutor, who was harsh and beat him, but did instill in him a love of learning. His French-raised cousin seemed acutely fascinating to him. Their liaison lasted a year, before Esme Stuart returned (permanently) to France (James was forced to exile him).

    [image=http://www.hrp.org.uk/Images/James%20I%20c%20Philip%20Mould%20Ltd,%20Bridgeman%20Art%20Library.jpg]

    Description: Blonde, blue-eyed, & bearded, James had weak legs (due to rickets in childhood) and ill-health (due to porphyria).

    His marriage: James seems to have been bisexual; he had at least one affair with a woman, and several with men). He married Anne of Denmark, born 1674, when she was 14 and he was 22, and they had nine children, three of whom survived infancy. [image=http://www.portcities.org.uk/london/upload/img_400/Bhc4251.jpg]

    Anne was strong-willed and interested in the arts (a taste shared by both her sons). But when she and James moved to England in 1603, they started drifting apart, and James became enamoured of a series of male favourites. She converted to Catholicism, in what seems to have been a bid for attention. James wasn't interested (nor was anyone else; but it's a record; all four of the Stuart Queen consorts were Catholic, which wasn't a good plan in an overwhelmingly Protestant country. Curiously, the two male consorts were both Protestants).

    His favorites: After Esme Stuart, the next important one was Robert Carr, a Scotchman (1606-1615), and then George Villiers, the Duke of Buckingham (1615-1625). These liaisons were not harmless, because after the death of Robert Cecil in 1612, James used these catamites as his first Ministers. Neither of them were the equal of Cecil, or even close. Some historians dispute that his relationships with Carr and Buckingham were physical, which shows that some historians are idiots.

    Writings: "In 1597?98, James wrote two works, The Trew Law of Free Monarchies and Basilikon Doron (Royal Gift), in which he established an ideological base for monarchy. In the Trew Law, he sets out the divine right of kings, explaining that for Biblical reasons kings are higher beings than other men, though "the highest bench is the sliddriest to sit upon".[35] The document proposes an absolutist theory of monarchy, by which a king may impose new laws by royal prerogative but must also pay heed to tradition and to God, who
     
  25. saturn5

    saturn5 Jedi Padawan star 4

    Registered:
    Aug 28, 2009
    The beginnings of modern Britain here, both in a greater sense of unity with England and Scotland and with the flight of the Earls in Ireland under James' rule, paving the way for unfication of all three nation in the United Kingdom.