Year in the Life of Stuart Britain

The Stuart monarchs reigned during a time when Britain was balanced on the brink of change. It was an era torn between absolute monarchy and revolution: kings ruled with iron fists only to be toppled by opponents who laid claim, not to a crown, but to a country. It was an era that saw the carnage of the English Civil War, the execution of Charles I and the rise of Oliver Cromwell's Commonwealth, only to then witness Charles II's restoration, the Great Plague and the Glorious Revolution. In this fascinating, day-by-day account of life in Stuart Britain, diarists such as the famous Samuel Pepys and the gardener John Evelyn brush shoulders with well-known poets and anonymous writers of household records. They describe events from the Great Fire of London and the fall of two kings, to the coronation of Britain s only dual monarchs and the uniting of the English and Scottish crowns.