The Popes and Britain: A History of Rule, Rupture and Reconciliation

Stella Fletcher

Feb 2017 · Bloomsbury Publishing

About this ebook

When the British thought of themselves as a Protestant nation their natural enemy was the pope and they adapted their view of history accordingly. In contrast, Rome's perspective was always considerably wider and its view of Britain was almost invariably positive, especially in comparison to medieval emperors, who made and unmade popes, and post-medieval Frenchmen, who treated popes with contempt. As the twenty-first-century papacy looks ever more firmly beyond Europe, this new history examines political, diplomatic and cultural relations between the popes and Britain from their vague origins, through papal overlordship of England, the Reformation and the process of repairing that breach.

About the author

Stella Fletcher is Associate Fellow at the Centre for the Study of Renaissance at Warwick University. She has taught at the universities of Manchester and Liverpool and at King Alfred's College, Winchester. She is the author of Cardinal Wolsey: A Life in Renaissance Europe.