Trial Database：The Tudors, Henry VIII to Elizabeth I, 1509-1603: State Papers Domestic、The Tudors, Henry VIII to Elizabeth I, 1509-1603: State Papers Foreign, Ireland, Scotland, Borders and Acts of Privy Council、The Stuarts and Commonwealth, James I - Anne I, 1603-1714: State Papers Domestic、The Stuarts and Commonwealth, James I - Anne I, 1603-1714: State Papers Foreign, Ireland and Registers of the Privy Council

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1. The Tudors, Henry VIII to Elizabeth I, 1509-1603: State Papers Domestic

Part 1 is the complete series of State Papers Domestic for the Tudor era, encompassing every facet of early modern government including social and economic affairs, law and order, religious policy, crown possessions and intelligence. It includes the papers of Henry VIII, Edward VI, Mary I (and Philip of Spain) and Elizabeth I; those of Cardinal Wolsey, Thomas Cromwell, William Cecil and Francis Walsingham, and many other leading figures of English government, nobility and society. They document the rise and fall of Henry VIII’s six wives, divorces, charges of treason, and executions; they cover all the complications surrounding Henry’s plans for divorce with Catherine of Aragon, the subsequent break with Rome and its repercussions for the faith and allegiances of the country

2. The Tudors, Henry VIII to Elizabeth I, 1509-1603: State Papers Foreign, Ireland, Scotland, Borders and Acts of Privy Council

Part II reunites the Foreign, Scotland, Borders and Ireland papers with the Registers (‘Minutes’) of the Privy Council for the whole of the Tudor period. Together they give comprehensive coverage of international diplomacy, colonial policy, commercial and maritime law, trade and industry and naval and military policy. These documents reveal the inner workings of the Tudor court but also those of its foreign allies and enemies. The reports from ambassadors provide records of the activities, conversations, and relationships at the courts of Europe. Intelligence, marriage and military alliances, treaties, balance of power and religious tensions are some of the recurrent themes. There are letters to Elizabeth I from Russian Tsars and Ottoman Sultans, many to and from the French and Spanish kings, and the Holy Roman Emperor regarding potential marriages for Mary I and Elizabeth, and other correspondence on trade with, for example, the Netherlands and the Hanseatic League.

3.The Stuarts and Commonwealth, James I - Anne I, 1603-1714: State Papers Domestic

The 17th century was a period of revolution and instability with civil wars (1642-6, and 1648), the trial and execution of one king, Charles I (1649), and the forced abdication and exile of another, James II, in the 'Glorious Revolution' (1688-9). A Stuart king, James II, was replaced by a Dutch Stadtholder, William of Orange, who ruled as William III. At the beginning of the Stuart period, James I and VI united England and Scotland, a union only formalised a hundred years later by the last Stuart monarch, Queen Anne. In the middle, England lived through a period of republicanism under the Cromwells.

4.The Stuarts and Commonwealth, James I - Anne I, 1603-1714: State Papers Foreign, Ireland and Registers of the Privy Council

Part IV contains correspondence between Britain and the countries of Europe in the 17th century. Some of these countries have lost their own collections from this period thus increasing the rarity and value of these British State Papers for not just British history but European. All the great international themes of the 17th century play out in document after document: marriage alliances, revolutions, wars and treaties, trade and commerce and religion. Researchers can follow the letters exchanged between the monarchs and rulers of Europe, Russia and the Ottoman Empire, the reports of ambassadors and members of the trading companies, as well as treaties and other documents of trade. By disclosing European rulers’ relationships with each other and offering confidential accounts of court life as seen through the eyes of ambassadors, these documents provide new avenues into exploring and understanding 17th-century international diplomacy, politics, law, religion, travel, trade and colonial expansion. Wars and the balance of power were major themes. The Duke of Marlborough, for example, is the subject of hundreds of documents, written by him, to him or about his campaigns and activities.

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