1559 to 1565

Literature

The Mirror for Magistrates. Miscellaneous authors. British. 1559. Poetry. Fall of great men in English history; 19 tragedies, each narrated in the first person by the ghost of its subject. Fickle fortune and moral flaws in character are responsible for tragic ends.

Heptameron. Margaret of Navarre. French. 1559. Tales. Unfinished. 72 tales. Modeled on the Decameron, but original tales were based on her own experience. Psychological.

Jerusalem Delivered. Torquato Tasso. Italian. 1559/75. Epic poem. Based on historic events of the First Crusade, 1096-1099. Much intervention by mystical figures. Aladino. Sofronia. Olindo. Clorinda. Argantes. Geoffredo. Dudone. Idraote. Rinaldo. Ottone. Tancredi. Erminia. Solimano. Archangel Gabriel. Ismeno. Guelfo. Ubaldo. Armida. Victory for the Crusaders.

Gorboduc, or Ferrex and Porrex. Thomas Sackville and Thomas Norton. 1561. Play. First Senecan tragedy in English. First English play in blank verse. Used English historical material. Gorboduc and sons Ferrex and Porrex. Porrex kills Ferrex. His mother kills Porrex. The people kill both the king and queen.

Society

1562. A massacre of Huguenots (Protestants) at Vassy, March 1, begins a series of French civil wars. The Huguenots retaliate by murdering priests and raping nuns. Both sides seek to control the government in the absence of a strong crown.

1562. English navigator John Hawkins, 30, hijacks a Portuguese ship carrying African slaves to Brazil. His enterprise marks the beginning of English participation in the slave trade.

Literature

The Ringing Island (Book V of Gargantua and Pantagruel). Francois Rabelais. French. 1562. Fiction. Transparent satire on the luxurious living of the Roman Catholic clergy.

Society

1563. Queen Elizabeth persecutes Catholics, Unitarians (who deny the Trinity), and Brownists--Puritan extremists who will form the nucleus of the Congregational Church.

1563. The Anglican Church (Church of England, or Episcopal Church) is established by the adoption of the Thirty-Nine Articles, a modification of the 42 articles published by Thomas Cranmer in 1551. The Church is largely Protestant in dogma, with a liturgy and hierarchy similar to the Roman Catholic Church.

Literature

The Book of Martyrs (Actes and Monuments of These Later Perilous Days). John Foxe. 1563. Nonfiction. Twice the size of Gibbon's Decline and Fall. Emphasizes martyrs during Mary's reign. Credulous acceptance of stories of martyrdom. Vivid dialogues between persecutors and victims.

Society

1564. The Inquisition forces Andreas Vesalius to make a pilgrimage to the Holy Land as a condition for commuting his death sentence for dissecting human bodies. He will disappear on the pilgrimage.

1565. St. Augustine, Florida, is established August 28 as the first permanent European settlement in North America by Spanish conquistador Pedro Menendez de Aviles.

1565. London's Royal College of Physicians receives authority to conduct dissections of human cadavers.