A New British History?

Gabriel Glickman

Professionalisation of history linked to rise of the nation state

• First professorships in History = government appointments at Oxford and Cambridge.

• Irish Free State – government ministers determine school history curriculum.

Modern meaning of ‘nationhood’

• Nation state = sovereign legal authority.• Nationhood denotes belonging: distinguishing

element of human identity. • But – neither of these elements so clearcut in

the nations of Early Modern Europe.

Theories of nationhood

• Anthony Smith – nations needs common ethno-cultural core, ‘ethnie’.

• Benedict Anderson – ‘imagined communities’: nations the product of the modern world and changing patterns of communication.

• Eric Hobsbawm – nations the product of power elites and state formation.

The problem of British history

• Linda Colley, Britons: Forging the Nation (1992) – Britain an artificial, nation, ‘forged’ by C18th imperial state.

• ‘British history’ therefore a problematic concept for Early Modern period.

• AJP Taylor – argues that ‘British history’ an anachronistic concept before establishment of United Kingdom.

The ‘New British History’

• Key historians J.G.A. Pocock, John Morrill, Brendan Bradshaw.

• Aim to find framework for writing ‘British history’ before establishment of the British state.

• Argue that British history meaningful because of history of interaction and movement of people around ‘Atlantic Archipelago’.

• Events in one domain influence events in another e.g. throne of England taken by a Welshman in 1485 and a Scotsman in 1603.

Britain as part of a ‘Europe of composite monarchies’(J.H. Elliott)

• 1453 - French absorption of old Plantagenet territories e.g. Guyenne, Brittany.

• 1469 – Union of Aragon and Castile• 1500 – Holy Roman Empire divided into six

‘imperial circles’ with own parliaments.• 1514 – Union of Denmark and Norway• 1569 – Union of Lublin• 1618 – Brandenburg-Prussia

Creation of a composite monarchy in Britain

• Aristocratic dynasties rule Anglo-Scottish borders e.g. Neville, Percy, Douglas families.

• Wales – controlled by c. 130 Anglo-Norman ‘marcher lords’ after 1282.

• Ireland – government after 1177 centred on the Pale, controlled by Anglo-Norman magnates esp. Fitzgerald earls of Kildare and Desmond.

• North and West of Ireland ruled by Gaelic clans e.g. O’Neill (Ulster), O’Brien (County Clare)

Cultural and ethnic division in Scotland

• Four separate languages still spoken in Scotland by c. 1450. • Emerging division of Lowlands (Anglophone) and Highlands

(ruled by Gaelic-speaking clans).

• 1521 – John Mair, History of Greater Britain: ‘Among the Scots we find two distinct tongues, so we likewise find two different ways of life and conduct’.

• Highland power held especially by MacDonald Lords of the Isles.

Royal centralisation in England and Scotland pre-1558

• 1496 – James IV of Scotland abolishes the Lordship of the Isles (powerbase of Clan MacDonald).

• 1536-1543 – Henry VIII and Thomas Cromwell enact legal and political union of England and Wales: abolish powers of the marcher lords.

• 1541 – Centralisation in Ireland: English army and administration imposed in Dublin; policy of ‘surrender and regrant’.

Anglo-Scottish rivalry

• English monarchs had claimed rights to throne of Scotland since reign of Edward I.

• 1544-5 – ‘Rough Wooing’: Henry VIII tries to force Scottish noblemen into accepting marriage of (English) Prince Edward to (Scottish) Queen Mary.

• 1559-1587 - Scottish queen Mary Stuart claims throne of England against Elizabeth I.

External factors change relations within British Isles

• Impact of the Reformation – division of Christian world into rival Catholic and Protestant camps.

• Influence of Europe – rival kings and emperors impact on British politics; people in British Isles maintain European allegiances and identities esp. over religion.

- effect seen 1689 when William of Orange takes throne of British kingdoms; 1714 when George I succeeds Queen Anne.

• Growth of an American Empire – need to see American colonies as part of the British polity.