Elizabethan England, c1568-1603

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1

11
1555
1558: Elizabeth crowned
1559: Religious settlement

1562: Elizabeth nearly dies of smallpox

2. Life in Elizabethan times

1565

7
2

12
3. Troubles at home and abroad
1568: Mary, Queen of Scots exiled to England
1. Elizabeth’s court and Parliament

1569: The Northern Rebellion

1570: Papal Bull
1. Elizabeth’s court and Parliament

1571: Ridolfi Plot

1572: Actors in England have to be licensed
1575

1576: Peter Wentworth arrested

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3

13
1580: Drake completes circumnavigation

1581: Elizabeth knights Sir Francis Drake

1583: Throckmorton Plot

1584: Raleigh given royal permission to explore
2. Life in Elizabethan times

1585: Colony established at Roanoke

1585

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4

1586: Babington Plot

14 1587: Mary, Queen of Scots executed

1588: Spanish Armada

1590s: Series of bad harvests

1592: Raleigh dismissed from court

1593: Catholics not to travel further than 5 miles
1595

10

15

1600: East India Company established

1599: Opening of The Globe theatre
1601: Essex’s rebellion
1601: Poor Law introduced
3. Troubles at home and abroad

1603: Elizabeth dies

1605
 1. Elizabeth’s court and Parliament 2. Life in Elizabethan times 3. Troubles at home and abroad

Hardwick Hall How to structure your answer: ‘The main change that Elizabethan manor houses
demonstrated was stated factor’. How far does a study of
Hardwick Hall support this statement? Explain your answer. You
Paragraph 1: should refer to Hardwick Hall and your contextual knowledge.
Stated factor
Factors: (The main change that Elizabeth manor houses
Paragraph 2: Paragraph 3: demonstrated was…)
Elizabethan England, c1568-1603

Other factor 1 Other factor 2  the greater prosperity of their owners

 the gentry class was becoming wealthy
Paragraph 4:  the country was at peace
Judgement  new renaissance architecture
 new technological developments

1. Elizabeth’s court and Parliament

Elizabeth becomes the Queen
 Elizabeth’s legitimacy (right to rule)
questioned due to her mother’s (Anne
Boleyn) marriage to Henry VIII
 Also faced the challenge of being a
female ruler
 Arrested for treason twice before
becoming Queen
 Her early troubled life prepared her
well for her reign.
Elizabeth’s royal court
 The royal court was a collection of
people, not a place.
 She was surrounded by 500 courtiers,
who all competed for power/influence
 Elizabeth used patronage to encourage
loyalty; giving courtiers land/titles in
return for their support
 The royal court was the source of the
major trends/fashions in England.
Privy Council
 Elizabeth’s group of her 19 must
trusted advisers
 Made up members of the nobility and
the gentry
 William Cecil; Elizabeth’s chief minister
 Robert Dudley (Earl of Leicester);
Elizabeth’s favourite and keen Puritan
 Sir Francis Walsingham; Elizabeth’s spy
master and keen Puritan.
The marriage question
 1562: Elizabeth nearly dies of smallpox;
Parliament concerned about the lack of
an heir
 Suitor 1: Robert Dudley; possibly
murdered his wife
 Suitor 2: King Philip of Spain; a Catholic
and had been married to Mary
 Suitor 3: Francis, Duke of Anjou and
Alencon; Elizabeth was too old for him.
Earl of Essex’s rebellion (1601)
 Robert Devereux, Dudley’s step-son,
became close to Elizabeth and was sent
to Ireland to defeat a rebellion (failed)
 Essex banned from court and had his
sweet wine monopoly removed
 Essex mounted a poorly led rebellion to
take Elizabeth prisoner
 1601: Arrested; executed for treason
 Elizabeth’s authority still strong in 1601.

2. Life in Elizabethan times

Rise of the gentry
 Pre-Elizabeth, nobility had been the
most powerful people in England
 Members of the gentry went from local
landowners to national influence
 The gentry became richer during
Elizabeth’s reign (trade/exploration and
the rising population)
 Gentry keen to demonstrate their new
wealth; Bess of Hardwick for example.
Elizabethan theatre
 Actors had to be licensed from 1572
onwards
 First theatre, The Theatre, built in 1576
 The Globe opens in 1599
 Theatre popular due to both rich and
poor being able to attend
 Strong opposition to theatre from the
London Authorities and the puritans
 Actors performed for Elizabeth at court.
Poverty
 Growing poverty levels in Elizabeth’s
reign; population growth, bad harvests,
enclosures and closure of monasteries
 Elizabethans categorised the poor into
the deserving poor (need help) and the
undeserving poor (no help needed)
 Workhouses set up to provide support
 1601: Poor Law introduced; turning
point in attitudes/help for the poor.
Sir Francis Drake
 Privateers and sailors challenged
Spanish dominance in the Americas
 1560s: John Hawkins captured and
traded African slaves in the Americas
 1580: Sir Francis Drake became first
English to circumnavigate the globe
 1581: Drake knighted by Elizabeth
 Frequent attacks and raids on Spanish
ships; Cadiz in 1587.
Sir Walter Raleigh
 1584: Raleigh given royal permission to
explore and colonise American land
 Raleigh claimed an area in America and
named it Virginia after Elizabeth
 1585: Raleigh establishes colony at
Roanoke (does not last)
 1592: Raleigh banned from court for
secretly marrying one of Elizabeth’s
ladies-in-waiting.

3. Troubles at home and abroad

Religious settlement
 Elizabeth inherited a country divided
and scarred by religious tension
 1559: Elizabeth embraced features of
both Protestantism and Catholicism
 Elizabeth made herself head of the
Church in English; all church services
and texts had to be in English
 Catholic practices banned in public
 Allowed private Catholic worship.
Puritanism
 Extremely strict Protestants
 Wanted rid of all Catholic features;
opposed religious settlement
 Dudley and Walsingham were puritans
 Edmund Grindal, Archbishop of
Canterbury, sacked by Elizabeth for
encouraging prophesyings
 Replaced by John Whitgift; cracked
down on Puritanism.
Catholic threat
 1568: seminary set up in Netherlands
to train priests who would come to
England to convert Protestants
 1570: Pope Pius V issued the Papal Bull
that excommunicated Elizabeth; he did
this encourage rebellions in England
 Jesuit missionary priests arrived in 1580
 1581: Recusancy fines increased
 1585: All Catholic priests exiled.
Mary, Queen of Scots
 1568: Elizabeth’s Catholic cousin and
heir to the throne, exiled to England
 1569: Northern Rebellion; northern
Earls try to put Mary on the throne.
 1571: Ridolfi Plot; as above
 1583: Throckmorton Plot; as above
 1586: Babington Plot; as above, but
Walsingham proves Mary’s involvement
 1587: Mary executed.
Spanish Armada
 1588: Armada launched by Philip in
response to Mary’s execution
 Spanish forces sailed to Calais to collect
Dutch soldiers; attacked by Drake who
used fireships to split up the armada
 Battle of Gravelines; 5 ships destroyed
 The wind blew the Spanish around
England; shipwrecks and starvation
 Spanish ships and leadership inferior.