The English Republican Exiles in Europe during the Restoration

Offers a transnational perspective on 17th-century English republicanism, focusing on the lived experiences of English republican exiles.

Gaby Mahlberg (Author)

9781108841627, Cambridge University Press

Hardback, published 1 October 2020

300 pages
16 x 23.5 x 2.5 cm, 0.62 kg

'The appealingly written book continues the trend in British historiography of recent years to free English and British history from its insular, narrow and/or Atlantic orientation and instead to link it more closely with continental European developments. This includes the political and, above all, the religious-denominational conditions, which the author takes a convincing look at. The work therefore opens up exciting insights into the mixed relationships between religion and politics, exemplified by the living environments of three fascinating personalities.' Alexander Schunka, Sehepunkte (translated from German)

The Restoration of the Stuart monarchy in 1660 changed the lives of English republicans for good. Despite the Declaration of Breda, where Charles II promised to forgive those who had acted against his father and the monarchy during the Civil War and Interregnum, opponents of the Stuart regime felt unsafe, and many were actively persecuted. Nevertheless, their ideas lived on in the political underground of England and in the exile networks they created abroad. While much of the historiography of English republicanism has focused on the British Isles and the legacy of the English Revolution in the American colonies, this study traces the lives, ideas and networks of three seventeenth-century English republicans who left England for the European continent after the Restoration. Based on sources from a range of English and continental European archives, Gaby Mahlberg explores the lived experiences of these three exiles - Edmund Ludlow in Switzerland, Henry Neville in Italy, and Algernon Sidney - for a truly transnational perspective on early modern English republicanism.

Introduction
Part I. Networks and communities: 1. Cross-channel connections
2. Local support, confessional and cross-confessional connections
Part II. Exiles, assassins and activism: 3. The nature of exile and its dangers
4. Plots, conspiracies and ideas
Part III. Works of exile: 5. Ludlow's protestant vision
6. Sidney's rebellious vision
7. Neville's utopian vision
Epilogue
Bibliography
Index.

Subject Areas: Hoaxes & deceptions [JFHX], Popular beliefs & controversial knowledge [JFH], Society & culture: general [JF], Society & social sciences [J]