Introduction

This indispensable introductory guide offers students a number of highly focused chapters on key themes in Restoration history. Each addresses a core question relating to the period 1660-1714, and uses artistic and literary sources – as well as more traditional texts of political history – to illustrate and illuminate arguments.

Authors and Approach

George Southcombe and Grant Tapsell provide clear analyses of different aspects of the era whilst maintaining an overall coherence based on three central propositions:

• 1660-1714 represents a political world fundamentally influenced by the civil wars and interregnum
• The period can best be understood by linking together types of evidence too often separated in conventional accounts
• The high politics of kings and their courts should be examined within broader social and geographical contexts

Content and Significance

Featuring chapters on the exclusion crisis, Charles II and James VII/II, as well as the British dimension, restoration culture, and politics out-of-doors, this is essential reading for anyone studying this fascinating period in British history.