Political

The world in which Shakespeare was born

1547

Henry VIII

It was the end of the medieval period in Britain and the beginning of the early modern period. Between these two periods the power balance shifted, the Church became more separate from the state

• The Protestant movement was sweeping through Europe
• The hypocrisy and corruption that the Catholics had introduced was coming to an end. This meant the invention of the Protestants became bigger
• Henry VIII was in power
• During this time Henry was married to Catherine of Aragon, they had a daughter together, Mary, but Henry wanted to divorce her
• The Pope would not agree with it as within the Catholic Church it isn't possible for you to divorce. So, in order to file his divorce with Catherine, he split from the Catholic Church and announced himself as head of the Church of England (which was a protestant church)
• Still a Catholic country the supporters of religious reforms saw this as a chance to end the hypocritical nature of the Catholic church, it became the Reformation
• Henry saw his chance to "fill the country's pockets" and transferred a lot of the monasteries money over to the state and executed any who failed to comply with his demands or anyone who continued to be loyal to Rome (which was the Head of the Catholic church)
• Some Protestants continued to be persecuted for their attempts at reform despite the fact that many of the Kings new Councillors and several of his wives were Protestants
• Henry died in 1547, everything that was changing changed during Henry's reign
• After 1547 there were 4 different monarchs in the space of 11 years. They included:
• Henry's son, Edward who was 10 when he was put on the throne, he was a protestant and he died of TB in 1553
• Lady Jane Grey was on the throne for 9 days, she was also a protestant, but was taken off the throne and executed by the catholic Mary, known as Bloody Mary for her severity of executions of protestants. Mary was Catholic and in the space of 5 years after Lady Jane grey was executed 300 heretics were burnt at the stake, and many more fled the country

1558

• Mary died childless in 1558, her successor, Elizabeth a protestant, became Queen

The monarch when Shakespeare was born

• The State and the Church are closely linked
• Elizabeth's mission statement was to keep peace and civil security at all costs, this is what she aimed to do with her reign
• In Elizabethan England ordinary people's lives were closely monitored by the crown, the Queen's spies
• Transgressions from the law of land came at a heavy cost, this meant that if you broke the law you would be punished heavily, things like stealing etc
• It was a police state (which means tight laws were in place)
• In a single lifetime England went from:
• Roman Catholicism -> English Catholicism -> Guarded Protestantism -> New Aggressive Roman Catholicism -> Protestantism
• It was a disruptive time within the church
• Each shift came with danger, persecution and death, all of this was enough to make people wary, sceptical and able to dodge things
• Shakespeare was born into a time of turbulence, people were making rash decisions and killing each other (on whether you were one religion or the other)
• It wasn't a safe and  settled environment to be born into