Another in the series on the history of London up to the time of the Great Fire of 1666, largely taken from my book, “The Flower Of All Cities” (Amberley, 2019) …

Stuart History

Under the Stuarts, it was a time of War and Plague and purifying Fire. Of a bloody Civil War, between Royalist and Parliamentarian. And of a peculiarly English revolution under the Parliamentarian Commonwealth and Protectorate of Oliver and Richard Cromwell, which ended with the Restoration of the Monarchy – albeit, importantly, a monarchy that could thenceforth only rule with the consent of Parliament.

It was also, though, the time not only of a continuing Renaissance in the arts, but also of the birth of science, or “natural philosophy”, as it was known. The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, nowadays generally known simply as the…