History@Portsmouth

University of Portsmouth's History Blog

Tag Archives | seventeenth century

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King Charles I – a man of principle, not a “man of blood”?

By on September 24, 2021 in Learning in Focus, Research in Focus

Many people instinctively blame King Charles I for the British Civil Wars. So recent UoP history graduate Connor Scott-Butcher’s decision to use his dissertation to challenge the idea, perpetuated by the regicides, that Charles was a “man of blood”, and the weight of historical argument ranged against him, always seemed to me a risky and provocative proposition.  Below, Connor writes about how he went about his research.  He gave a few sleepless nights to his supervisor, as well as himself, but the result was a balanced and well-structured argument, based around extensive use of contemporary primary sources. – Dr Fiona McCall. My topic for my dissertation was a thorough examination […]

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Zooming in on seventeenth-century elite food culture

By on August 2, 2021 in Learning in Focus, Research in Focus

Third-year student Ashleigh Hufton writes about the experience of presenting her undergraduate research at the British Conference of Undergraduate Research.  Because of the pandemic, Ashleigh had to get to grips with presenting on Zoom a process she found nerve-racking but a very worthwhile learning experience.  Ashleigh’s dissertation research, ‘Social Differentiation and the Polite Society: Food and Dining in Seventeenth-Century England’ looked at how food culture became symbolic of identity, social status, and power during the seventeenth-century. The type of food consumed, how it was consumed, and what it was consumed with, strictly defined which part of the social scale individuals fell in to.  Taking the lead from French food culture, […]

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“Let’s start at the very beginning”: an attempt to explain the dissertation and provide reassurance

By on July 9, 2021 in Learning in Focus, Research in Focus

By James Farrar, final-year history student at the University of Portsmouth.  James’s supervisor Dr Fiona McCall writes: James was an exemplary dissertation student, always ahead of schedule in planning and carrying out his dissertation work, making him ideally placed to advise others on how to go about it.    James’s dissertation, ‘“This creature not deserving mother’s name”: Female Transgression and Cheap Literature in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century Britain’ investigated how the different degrees of female transgression, everyday and extraordinary, were perceived and written about in cheap literature of sixteenth and seventeenth century Britain.  He found that everyday female transgression, like scolding, was often treated with humour and even gave women […]

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UoP History research seminar: the attack on female deviance under Godly rule, 1645-1660

By on March 12, 2021 in Events, Research in Focus

    On 10th March 2021 the paper in our UoP History Research seminar series was by UoP history lecturer Dr Fiona McCall, who gave a paper on female deviance during the English interregnum, including fighting in church, sexual harassment, drinking, swearing and cursing, adultery and witchcraft.  This paper has been recorded for those unable to attend on the day, see below. We hope to upload further recordings of History Research papers in the near future. Click here for a link to the recording of the seminar (you will need the password: %MT6U8&S)  

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The Impact of Civil War on English Parishes

By on February 9, 2021 in Research in Focus

In November 2020 the University of Warwick Network for Parish Research organised an online symposium on ‘Remembering the Parish’. Fiona McCall, Senior Lecturer in History at the University of Portsmouth, presented a paper, ‘Remembering the ‘Wickedly Wicked’ Times’, looking at loyalist memories criticising the interregnum religious regime.  She was one of four speakers on the memories of the civil war in English parishes; there is a feature on these papers here on the My-Parish website.

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John Lacy as Mr Scruple in the Cheats by John Michael Wright cropped

How people despised and feared the puritans

By on December 3, 2020 in Research in Focus

An article on animosity to puritans was published by history lecturer Dr Fiona McCall recently in The Conversation as part of the 400th anniversary of the arrival of the Mayflower in the United States. She shows how puritans were often depicted as fools until they had a shot at government, and then the humour got darker. https://theconversation.com/mayflower-400-how-society-feared-and-ridiculed-puritans-144232   Fiona specialises in the religious and social history of seventeenth-century Britain, and is currently writing a book, Ungodly Religion in the English Parish, 1645-1660, looking at how and why English people rejected puritan religious extremism in the 1640s and 1650s.    

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