Unit information: English Civil Wars, 1625-1662 in 2020/21

Unit name	English Civil Wars, 1625-1662
Unit code	HISTM0088
Credit points	20
Level of study	M/7
Teaching block(s)	Teaching Block 2 (weeks 13 - 24)
Unit director	Dr. Reeks
Open unit status	Not open
Pre-requisites	none
Co-requisites	none
School/department	Department of History (Historical Studies)
Faculty	Faculty of Arts

Description including Unit Aims

This unit explores the causes, course and consequences of the most calamitous wars in English history. What started as an attempt to restrain the royal prerogative morphed into a full-throttled assault on the old order. Removing monarchy proved easy compared to attempts to establish a republic, which floundered against the radicalisation of former supporters, the apathy of a divided country, and the weight of its own contradictions.

Historians are blessed with both a high-quality source base and a topic that captures the public imagination, but many of the key questions remain unresolved. Why did England slide into war in 1642? Why did Parliament win and why did the winners divide among themselves? Why was Charles I executed? Why did the English experiment with republicanism fail?

This unit will place particular focus on the English experience but will locate that experience in British and European contexts. Seminars will take their cue from past and present historiographical debates and key sources like Parliamentary Acts and Ordinances, printed newsbooks, diaries and journals, and various local records such as those of parish churches and incorporated town governments.

The unit aims to:

1. Provide students with a knowledge of past and ongoing historical debates and the means to interrogate them.
2. Explore the areas where work remains to be done and encourage students to research them.
3. Provide students with a knowledge of the plentiful available sources and the means to engage with them.
4. To prepare students for undertaking independent advanced-level research.

Intended Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this unit students will be able to:

1. Identify and analyse recent historiographical developments and longer-term trends in English Civil War studies.
2. Analyse, synthesise and evaluate a range of primary sources using appropriate methodologies.
3. Design and frame a research question within relevant historiographies, theories and methodologies.
4. Compose an extended historical argument rooted in primary source analysis.

Teaching Information

Teaching will be delivered through a combination of synchronous and asynchronous sessions, including group seminar-style discussion and self-directed exercises.

Assessment Information

One 5000-word essay (100%). [ILOs 1-4].

Reading and References

Caroline Boswell, Disaffection and Everyday Life in Interregnum England (Boydell: Woodbridge, 2017)

Richard Cust and Ann Hughes, Conflict in Early Stuart England, 1603-1642 (Routledge: Abingdon, 1989)

Rachel Foxley, The Levellers: Radical Political Thought in the English Revolution (Manchester University Press: Manchester, 2014)

Ian Gentles, The English Revolution and the Wars in the Three Kingdoms, 1637-1653 (Routledge: London and New York, 2007)

John Morrill, The Revolt of the Provinces: Conservatives and Radicals in the English Civil War, 1630-1650 (Longman: London, 1982)

Conrad Russell, The Fall of the British Monarchies, 1637-1642 (Clarendon: Oxford, 1995)