The Elizabethan Age
Queen Elizabeth I (1558-1603)
Privy Council
Formed by intellectuals and chief advisers
Sense of stability and union
Pope Pius V excommunicates the Queen (1570)
Urges Catholics to depose her
Many plots against her were suppressed
Mary Stuart, Queen of Scotland and pretender for the English throne, tries to secure the power to her husband Philip of Spain
She was imprisoned, but not killed yet
Executed in 1587
Empire-building race with Spain (16th century)
Naval war
Started from the raid of a Spanish ship bringing back precious metals from America
England defeats Spain (1588)
England becomes the greatest naval power in the world
"Virgin Queen" because she never married anyone in order to keep stability to her power
Captured the imagination and hearts of poets
Represented the idealised woman of medieval courtly love
She was the center and everything revolved around her
Intellectuals were still prosecuted by the church for discoveries that were considered heretic
They would gather in private rooms to discuss these theories
The Faerie Queene (1590-96) by Edmund Spenser
Seen as the leader of a reformed Empire, though she abandons the idea in the last year of reign