from 4 - The earlier Stuart era
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 28 March 2008
In 1603, the Scottish King James VI inherited the throne of England. The following year, he issued a proclamation, changing his title from ‘King of England and Scotland’ to ‘King of Great Britain’. James wanted to unite more than just the crowns of the two kingdoms. His ultimate goal was to create ‘a united British nation’. He introduced a new gold coin, called the ‘unite’ (unit), which featured an inscription declaring ‘I will make them one nation.’ The English and Scots, he argued, were currently ‘two nations’, but both inhabited ‘one Ile of Britaine’, and they were ‘alreadie ioyned in vnitie of Religion and language’. In time, he hoped, the two nations would become one. The ultimate political allegiance of all his subjects – English, Scots, Welsh and Irish – was to himself. It made sense for countries that were already united by their political and religious loyalties, and by geography and language, to enter into still closer union. Writing in favour of the Union, the Scotsman Robert Pont found it remarkable that his country men and the English had so long been mortal enemies. In times past, he argued, God had ‘armed these nations with mallice and hatred one against another’ in punishment of their popish idolatry. Since the Reformation, however, God had changed his attitude towards the two peoples, and if they refrained from angering him by sinning too seriously, it was now possible for them to live together as ‘one commonwealth … in a lovelie and perpetuall peace’.
To save this book to your Kindle, first ensure no-reply@cambridge.org is added to your Approved Personal Document E-mail List under your Personal Document Settings on the Manage Your Content and Devices page of your Amazon account. Then enter the ‘name’ part of your Kindle email address below. Find out more about saving to your Kindle.
Note you can select to save to either the @free.kindle.com or @kindle.com variations. ‘@free.kindle.com’ emails are free but can only be saved to your device when it is connected to wi-fi. ‘@kindle.com’ emails can be delivered even when you are not connected to wi-fi, but note that service fees apply.
Find out more about the Kindle Personal Document Service.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Dropbox.
To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.