1633 to 1635

Society

1633. Galileo goes on trial at Rome, April 12, and is threatened by the Inquisition with torture on the rack if he does not retract his defense of the Copernican idea that the sun is the center of the universe and the earth a movable planet. Galileo yields and is sent to his villa outside Florence where he will be confined for the remaining 9 years of his life.

1633. Rene Descartes takes warning from the trial of Galileo. Now living in Holland, Descartes stops publishing in France.

Literature

"The Canonization." John Donne. British. 1633. Poetry. The love between him and his mistress is deep and unworldly. They are saints of love. Vehemently colloquial and full of conceits.

"The Collar." George Herbert. British. 1633. Poetry. Rebels against the profitless service of God. Abruptly, totally reconciled. The collar = the clerical collar.

The Temple. George Herbert. British. 1633. Poetry. Collection of 160 religious poems.

"Go and Catch a Falling Star." John Donne. British. 1633. Poetry. Series of impossible feats is less difficult than the task of finding a woman "true and faire."

"Twicknam Garden." John Donne. British. 1633. Poetry. The paradoxes of fidelity and falseness in love. Intensity of feeling.

Society

1634. French explorer Jean Nicolet, 36, makes an expedition to Lake Michigan and Wisconsin.

1634. Lord Calvert establishes a Maryland settlement that will welcome Protestants as well as Roman Catholics.

1634. Villagers at Oberammergau in the Bavarian Alps vow to enact a passion play at regular intervals if they are spared by the Black Death. The folk drama with its anti-Jewish slurs will be performed every 10 years for centuries.

Literature

The Two Noble Kinsmen. John Fletcher. British. 1634. Play. Palamon and Arcite--the same as Chaucer's "Knight's Tale." Two friends vie for the same girl. Duel. Winner gets the girl; loser to be executed. Arcite wins, falls from horse; before dying gives girl to Palamon.

Comus. Milton. British. 1634. Masque. Theme: struggle between chaste temperance and sensual pleasure with both causes eloquently represented.

Society

1635. The Academie Francaise is founded to establish rules of grammar and correct usage and to cleanse the French language of "impurities."

1635. Boston Public Latin School opens. It is the first secondary school in the American colonies.

1635. England gets her first inland postal service as mail coach service begins between London and Edinburgh.

Literature

Medee (Medea). Corneille. French. 1635. Play. First tragedy by Corneille; Medea's bloody vengeance on the faithless Jason.

The Lady of Pleasure. James Shirley. British. 1635. Play. Taming an extravagant wife by imitating her behavior.