In From the Cold: Notes on Sixteenth-Century English Catholic History

Abstract English Catholic history continues to tread new ground, revisit old theories, and draw together theoretical and geographical frameworks. However, it continues to struggle to be accepted as part of the “mainstream” narrative of English history. In this review essay, I explore three key areas of growth related to the study of sixteenth-century English Catholicism: returning Catholics to the “high politics” of England; a renewed emphasis on gender, particularly the role of religious women; and an international/transnational orientation that reaffirms the close ties between Britain and the Continent. Recently reviewed works include Lillian Lodine-Chaffey, A Weak Woman in a Strong Battle: Women and Public Execution in Early Modern England (2022); Michael Questier, Catholics and Treason: Martyrology, Memory, and Politics in the Post-Reformation (2022); Susan Cogan, Catholic Social Networks in Early Modern England (2021); Javier Burguillo and María José Vega, eds., Épica y conflicto religioso en el siglo XVI: Anglicanismo y luteranismo desde el imaginario hispánico , (2021); Cormac Begadon and James E. Kelly, eds., British and Irish Religious Orders in Europe, 1560–1800: Conventuals, Mendicants and Monastics in Motion (2022); Frederick Smith, Transnational Catholicism in Tudor England: Mobility, Exile, and Counter-Reformation, 1530–1580 (2022); Alexander Samson, Mary and Philip: The Marriage of Tudor England and Habsburg Spain (2020); Deborah Forteza, The English Reformation in the Spanish Imagination: Rewriting Nero, Jezebel, and the Dragon (2022); Liesbeth Corens, Confessional Mobility and English Catholics in Counter-Reformation Europe (2019) as well as work by Michael Questier and Peter Lake.