English Literary History
(Adapted from Thrall, Hibbard, & Holman, A Handbook to Literature)
? B.C.-A.D. 428, Celtic and Roman Britain
Ø 55-54 B.C., Julius Caesar invades
Ø 82, Roman power established
Ø 313, *Christianity established in
Ø 410, *
428-1100, Old English (Anglo-Saxon) Period
Ø 449, traditional date (from Gildas and Bede) for Germanic invasion by Hengist and Horsa
Ø ca. 450-ca. 700, composition of Old English poems: Beowulf (epic), Waldhere (Fragmentary epic), Finnsburg (fragmentary, related to Beowulf), Widsith (lyric, account of poet), Deor's Lament (lyric, account of poet), The Wanderer (reflective poem on fate), The Seafarer (reflective, descriptive lyric on sailor's life), The Wife's Complaint, The Husband's Message (love poems), Charms
Ø ca. 500-ca. 700, *Christian culture flourishes in
Ø 509, *closing of Athenian philosophical schools
Ø ca. 524, *influential medieval Latin work by Boethius, "Consolation of Philosophy"--would be translated into English by King Alfred, Chaucer, Queen Elizabeth
Ø 570-632, *Mohammed
Ø 590-604, *Pope Gregory the Great (Gregorian Calendar, Gregorian music)
Ø 597, the missionary
Ø 600-700, establishment of powerful Anglo-Saxon kingdoms
Ø ca. 633, *The Koran
Ø ca. 670, Caedmon, Hymns (first English poet known by name)
Ø ca. 700, "School of Caedmon"; Beowulf composed in present form
Ø 731, "Ecclesiastical History" (Latin) by The Venerable Bede
Ø 750
Ø ca. 750-ca. 800, flourishing Christian poetry in
Ø 787, first Danish invasion
Ø ca. 800, Latin "History of the Britons" by Nennius (Welsh)--first mention of Arthur
Ø 800-814, *Charlemagne's reign in
Ø 850
Ø ca. 850, Danish conquest
Ø 871-901, Alfred the Great; translations of Pope Gregory's Pastoral Care, Boethius, Orosius, Bede; Anglo-Saxon Chronicle revised and continued to 892; West Saxon Martyrology; sermons; saints' lives
Ø ca. 875-900, *probable beginnings of medieval dram in dramatatization of liturgy
Ø 893, Life of Alfred the Great by Asser
Ø 901-1066, Chronicle continued; poetry, sermons, Biblical translations and paraphrases, saints' lives, lyrics
Ø ca. 937, Battle of Brunanburh (heroic poem)
Ø 950-1000, monastic revival under Dunstan, Aethelwold, and Aelfric
Ø ca. 950, Junius MS written, containing Caedmon poems
Ø 971, Blickling Homilies
Ø ca. 975, St. Ethelwold's Concordia Regularis, directions for acting a trope at Winchester--earliest evidence of dramatic activity in England
Ø 979-1016, second period of Danish invasions
Ø ca. 991, Battle of Maldon (heroic poem)
Ø 1000
Ø 1000-1200, transition from English to Norman French. Decline of Anglo-Saxon heroic verse and reduced literary activity in English, with some development of medieval English lyrics, germs of English romances
Ø ca. 1000, Anglo-Saxon Gospels; Aelfric's Sermons; Beowulf MS written
Ø 1000-1025, The Exeter Book (MS containing Cynewulf poems)
Ø ca. 1000-1100, Vercelli Book (Anglo-Saxon MS); probable period of full development of Christmas and Easter cycles of plays in
Ø 1017-1042, Danish kings
Ø 1042-1066, Saxon kings restored
Ø 1066, Battle of
Ø 1066-1154,
Ø 1079-1142, *Abelard (French), ecclesiastical philosopher, lover of Heloise
Ø 1086, Domesday Book (English census)
Ø 1087-1100, William II--centralization of kingdom
Ø 1098-1099, First Crusade
1100-1350, Anglo-Norman Period
Ø 1100
Ø 1100-1200, *French literature dominates
Ø ca. 1100-1250, *Icelandic sagas written: Grettirsaga Volsungsaga, etc.
Ø ca. 1100, "Play of St. Catherine" acted at Dunstable--first recorded miracle, or saint's, play in England; *earlier tales in Welsh Mabinogion; *"The Book of the Dun Cow" (earliest existent MS containing early Irish romantic literature); *French poetry--lyric in Provence--"the first modern poet," Count William of Poitiers; narrative in North, Chanson de Roland (epic)
Ø ca. 1125, Henry of Huntingdon and William of Malmesbury (chronicles)
Ø ca. 1136, Latin "History of the Kings of Britain" by Geoffrey of Monmouth: Arthur as national hero, first romantic account of Arthurian court
Ø 1150
Ø 1150-1200, *influential French poets: Wace, Chretien de Troyes, Marie de France, Benoit de Ste. More, etc.
Ø ca. 1150, *The Nibelungenlied (German epic poem)
Ø 1154-1399, Plantagenet kings (Henry II to Richard II)
Ø 1154, end of Anglo-Saxon Chronicle (
Ø ca. 1185-1190, *Giraldus Cambrensis, "Itinerary" (description of
Ø 1187, *Saracens capture
Ø 1199-1216, reign of John
Ø 1200
Ø ca. 1200-1250, King Horn (English metrical romance)
Ø ca. 1200-1225, *Arthurian romance material in French prose and poetry
Ø ca. 1205, Layamon, Brut
Ø 1215, Magna Charta
Ø ca. 1225-1274, *St. Thomas Aquinas, scholastic teacher and writer influential throughout
Ø ca. 1230, ca. 1270, *Roman de la Rose (French) by Guillaume de Lorris and Jean de Meun
Ø 1250
Ø ca. 1250, Nicholas of Guilford, The Owl and the Nightingale, the "Cuckoo Song" ("
Ø 1258, Henry III uses English as well as French in proclamation
Ø 1265-1321, *Dante: Vita Nuova (ca. 1294); Il Convito (begun ca. 1300), De Vulgari Eloquentia (ca. 1305, criticism), Divina Commedia (ca. 1307-21)
Ø ca. 1300-1350, Guy of Warwick, Havelok the Dane, Richard Lionheart, Amis and Amiloun (romances)
Ø ca. 1300, *Marco Polo, Travels
Ø 1304-1374, *Petrarch--influence on English poetry, esp. sonnet sequences: eclogues (Latin, ca. 1350), Sonnets to Laura (ca. 1350)
Ø 1311, Fest of Corpus Christi est., leading to cyclic plays and possibly use of movable stages or "pageants"
Ø 1313-1375, *Boccaccio--influence on Chaucer and Renaissance authors: Ameto (1342, "first pastoral romance"). Decameron (ca. 1350)
Ø 1328?,
Ø 1337-1453, The Hundred Years' War
Ø ca. 1340-1400, Chaucer: The Book of the Duches (ca. 1379), House of Fame (ca. 1379), Troilus and Criseyde (ca. 1383), Legend of Good Women (ca. 1385), "General Prologue" to Canterbury Tales (ca. 1387--some tales written earlier, some later)
Ø 1346, Battle of
Ø 1348-1350, Black Death
1350-1500, Middle English Period
Ø 1350-1400, Sir Eglamour, Morte Arthure, Sir Gawayne and the Green Knight, Athelstan, William of Palerne, Sir Ferumbras, Sir Isumbras, etc. (romances)
Ø ca. 1360, The
Ø 1362, English language used in court and in opening Parliament
Ø ca. 1362 and after, Piers Plowman
Ø ca. 1375, Paternoster and Creed plays (forerunners of morality plays)
Ø ca. 1380, Wycliffe et al., English Bible
Ø 1381, Wat Tyler's rebellion
Ø ca. 1385, English used in schools
Ø 1390-92, Glower, Confessio Amantis
Ø 1399-1461, House of Lancaster (Henry IV to Henry VI)
Ø 1400
Ø 1400-1450, Lancelot of the Lake, Four Sons of Aymon, Squire of Low Degree, Huon of Bordeaux, Sir Triamour, Godfrey of Boulogne, etc. (romances in prose and verse)
Ø 1400-25,
Ø 1400, *Froissart, Chronicles (French)
Ø ca. 1412, Hoccleve, The Regiment of Princes
Ø 1413-22, reign of Henry V
Ø 1415, Battle of
Ø ca. 1415, Lydgate, Troy Book
Ø 1422-1461, reign of Henry VI
Ø ca. 1425, humanist active: Lydgate, Pecock, etc.; English students attend Italian universities;
Ø 1440, Galfridus Grammaticus, Promptorium Parvalorum (English-Latin word list, beginning English lexicography)
Ø 1450
Ø 1450, Jack Cade's rebellion
Ø ca. 1450, *Gutenberg press
Ø ca. 1450-1525, Scottish poets of Chaucerian school: Henryson, Dunbar, Douglas, probably King James I of
Ø ca. 1450-1490, *Platonic Academy at
Ø 1453, *Fall of
Ø 1455-1485, Wars of the Roses
Ø 1456, *The Gutenberg Bible
Ø ca. 1460-1529, John Skelton
Ø 1461-1485, House of York (Edward IV to Richard III)
Ø 1469, Sir Thomas Malory completes writing of Le Morte Darthur (pub. 1485)
Ø 1474-1532, *Ariosto
Ø ca. 1474, Caxton prints (at
Ø 1475-1500, renewal of French influence and continuation of Italian influence, transition to Renaissance, printing of books in
Ø ca. 1477, Caxton's press set up at
Ø 1478-1535, Sir Thomas More
Ø 1485-1603, House of Tudor (Henry VII to Elizabeth I)
Ø 1485-1509, reign of Henry VII
Ø 1485, Caxton publishes Malory's Morte Darthur
Ø ca. 1490-1553, *Rabelais
Ø 1490-1520, "Oxford Reformers" (Linacre, Grocyn, Colet, Erasmus, More) active: classical scholarship, humanistic education
1500-1660, The Renaissance
o 1500-1537, Early Tudor Age
Ø ca. 1500, Everyman
Ø 1503?-1542, Sir Thomas Wyatt
Ø ca. 1508, Skelton, Philip Sparrow
Ø 1509-1547, reign of Henry VIII
Ø ca. 1511, *Erasmus, The Praise of Folly (Latin--social satire)
Ø 1515-1568, Roger Ascham
Ø 1516, More, Utopia
Ø 1516, *Ariosto,
Ø 1516-1547, Henry Howard, Earl of
Ø 1517, *Luther posts theses in
Ø 1519, *Cortez conquers
Ø ca. 1520, Skelton's poetical satires (Colin Clout, Why Come Ye Not to Court, etc.)
Ø 1525
Ø 1525, Tyndale, New Testament printed at
Ø 1528, *Castiglione, The Courtier
Ø ca. 1530-1540, Heywood's Interludes (realistic farce)
Ø ca. 1530, "New Poetry" (Italian influence) under way
Ø 1531, Elyot, The Book of the Governour
Ø 1532, *Machiavelli, The Prince (written 1513)
Ø 1533, separation of English church from
Ø 1534, Act of Supremacy: Henry VIII head of Church of England; *Loyola founds Society of Jesus (Jesuits)
Ø 1535, suppression of monasteries, execution of More; Coverdale's first complete English Bible; *Rabelais, Gargantua
Ø 1536, execution of Tyndale; *Calvin, Institutes of Christian Religion (Latin)
Ø 1538, Sir Thomas Elyot, Dictionarie
Ø 1540, English Bible ("Great Bible") set up in churches
Ø 1543, *death of Copernicus
Ø 1547-1553, reign of Edward VI
Ø 1547, execution of
Ø 1548-1552, Book of Common Prayer
Ø 1550
Ø 1550-1575, *the Pleiade group of French poets (Du Bellay, Ronsard, etcc.)
Ø ca. 1552-1599, Edmund Spenser: early poetry (1576-80), The Shepheardes Calender (pub. anonymously, 1579), Faerie Queene (1590-96), Amoretti and Epithalamion (1595)
Ø ca. 1552-1618, Sir Walter Raleigh: failed effort to colonize
Ø ca. 1552, Udall, Ralph Roister Doister (first "regular" English comedy)
Ø 1553-1558, reign of Mary
Ø 1554-1586, Sir Philip Sidney: Defence of Poesie (written ca. 1581, pub. 1595),
Ø ca. 1555, Roper, Life of Sir Thomas More; Cavendish, Life of Cardinal Wolsey
Ø 1557, Songs and Sonnets (Tottel's Miscellany);
o 1558-1603, Elizabethan Age
Ø 1558-1575, period of experiment and preparation: translations numerous, classics often translated into English through French versions, interest in lyrics
Ø 1559, Elizabethan Prayer-book; The Mirror for Magistrates
Ø 1561-1626, Francis Bacon
Ø 1562, Sackville and Norton, Gorboduc acted (first English tragedy)
Ø 1562-1618, Samuel Daniel
Ø 1536, Foxe, Book of Martyrs (Latin original, 1559)
Ø 1563-1631, Michael Drayton: Heroical Epistles (1597)
Ø 1564-1593, Christopher Marlowe: Tamburlaine (1587), Doctor Faustus (ca. 1588)
Ø 1564-1616, William Shakespeare
Ø 1564-1642, *Galileo
Ø 1570, Ascham, Schoolmaster
Ø 1572, *Massacre of St. Bartholomew
Ø 1573-1631, John Donne
Ø 1573-1637, Ben Jonson: Everyman in His Humour (1598)
Ø 1575
Ø 1575-1590, activity of Shakespeare's predecessors and early contemporaries: Kyd, Lyly, Marlowe, Peele, Greene, Nash; court comedies, melodramatic tragedies, chronicle history plays popular; interest in literary criticism; Puritan attack on poetry; patriotic poems; translations; Spenser's early work; early pastoral and euphuistic romances
Ø 1575, mystery plays still being acted at
Ø 1576, The Theatre (first
Ø 1578, Holinshed, Chronicles
Ø 1579, Lyly, Euphues, the Anatomy of Wit; North, trans. of Plutarch's Lives
Ø 1579-1625, John Fletcher
Ø 1580-1600, Elizabethan "novels" popular: Lyly, Greene, Lodge, Sidney, Nash, Deloney; pastoral poetry popular
Ø 1580, *Montaigne, Essays
Ø 1581, *Tasso, Jerusalem Delivered (Italian romantic epic)
Ø 1582-1600, Hakluyt publishes collections of "voyages," Renaissance and medieval
Ø 1586, Kyd, The Spanish Tragedy
Ø 1587, execution of Mary Queen of Scots
Ø 1588, defeat of Spanish Armada
Ø 1590
Ø 1590-1600, richest decade of Elizabethan literature: activity in poetry (lyrics, pastorals, sonnets, dramatic poetry, historical verse, didactic verse, patriotic verse, classical verse-satire
Ø 1591-1596, flourishing period of sonnet cycles:
Ø 1591-1674, Robert Herrick
Ø 1593-1683, Izaak Walton
Ø 1593-1633, George Herbert
Ø 1597, King James (of
Ø 1600
Ø 1600, England's Helicon (poetical miscellany)
Ø 1602, Campion, Observations in the Art of English Poesie
Ø ca. 1602, Daniel, Defence of Ryme
o 1603-1625, Jacobean Age
§ (1603-1649, the Stuarts)
Ø 1603-1625, reign of James I--union of English and Scottish crowns
Ø 1603, T. Heywood, A Woman Killed with Kindness
Ø 1604, Shakespeare, Othello
Ø 1605, Bacon, Advancement of Learning; *Cervantes, Don Quixote, Part I
Ø 1606, Shakespeare, Macbeth, King Lear; Jonson, Volpone
Ø 1607, Shakespeare,
Ø 1609, Shakespeare, Sonnets (written earlier); Beaumont and Fletcher, Philaster; Dekker, Gull's Hornbook
Ø 1610
Ø 1610, Jonson, Alchemist
Ø 1610-1611, Shakespeare, Cymbeline, Winter's Tale, Tempest
Ø 1611, King James (Authorized) trans. of Bible
Ø 1612, Bacon, Essays; Donne, First and Second Anniversaries
Ø 1614, Raleigh, History of the World; Webster, Duchess of Malfi
Ø 1616, deaths of Shakespeare and *Cervantes; Chapman translates Odyssey in heroic couplets
Ø 1618-1648, *The Thirty Years' War, Protestants against Catholics
Ø 1618,
Ø 1619, Drayton, Collected Poems
Ø 1620
Ø 1620, Bacon, Novum Organum (Latin)
Ø 1621,
Ø 1622, Donne, Sermon on Judges xx.15 (other sermons published in succeeding years)
Ø 1623, First Folio ed. of Shakespeare's Plays
o 1625-1649, Caroline Age
Ø 1625
Ø 1625-1649, reign of Charles I
Ø 1625, Bacon, Essays (final ed.)
Ø 1627, Bacon, New Atlantis (Latin)--fragmentary utopia; Drayton, Balland of
Ø 1629, Ford, The Broken Heart;
Ø 1631, deaths of Drayton and Donne; birth of Dryden (d. 1700)
Ø 1632, Second Folio ed. of Shakespeare
Ø 1633, Herbert, The
Ø 1634,
Ø 1636, *Corneille, El Cid
Ø 1637, death of Jonson; *Descartes, Discours sur la Methode
Ø 1638, Milton, Lycidas
Ø 1639, *Racine (French dramatist) born (d. 1699)
Ø 1640
Ø 1640, Jonson, Timber, or Discoveries Made upon Men and Matter; Izaak Walton, Life of Donne
Ø 1642, Sir Thomas Browne, Religio Medici; Sir Isaac Newton born (d. 1727); theatres closed; Civil War
Ø 1643-1715, *Louis XIV King of
Ø 1644, Milton, Areopagitica and Tractate on Education, divorce pamphlets
Ø 1645, Waller, Poems
Ø 1646,
Ø 1648, Herrick, Hesperides
o 1649-1660, Commonwealth Interregnum
Ø 1649, execution of Charles I; epidemic of "witch-finding"; Lovelace, "Lucasta"
Ø 1650, Davenant, Gondibert
Ø ca. 1650, many French romances and novels translated into English
Ø 1651, Milton, Defence of the English People (Latin); Hobbes, Leviathan
Ø 1652, Quaker Movement culminating
Ø 1653, Walton, The Compleat Angler
Ø 1656, Cowley, Poems, Davideis, Pindaric Odes; Davenant, Siege of
Ø 1658, Dryden, "Stanzas on the Death of Cromwell"
1660-1798, Neo-Classical Period
o 1660-1700, Restoration Age
Ø 1660-1714, Stuarts restored (Charles II to Anne)
Ø 1660-1685, reign of Charles II
Ø 1660-1688, many books on both sides of witchcraft controversy
Ø 1660-1669, Pepys's Diary (pub. 1825)
Ø 1660, Dryden, Astraea Redux: welcomes Charles II
Ø ca. 1660 Daniel Defoe born (d. 1731)
Ø 1663,
Ø 1664, Dryden and Howard, The Indian Queen
Ø 1665, Dryden, The Indian Emperor
Ø 1666, *Moliere, Le Misanthrope
Ø 1667, Jonathan Swift born (d. 1745); Milton,
Ø 1668, *La Fontaine, Fables; Dryden, Essay of Dramatic Poesy
Ø 1670
Ø 1670, *Pascal, Thoughts; Dryden made Poet Laureate
Ø 1671, Milton, Paradise Regained and Samson Agonistes; Villiers (Buckingham) and others, The Rehearsal (burlesque satire on Dryden and heroic plays)
Ø 1672, Joseph Addison born (d. 1719); Sir Richard Steele born (d. 1729)
Ø 1673, *death of Moliere
Ø 1674, Wycherley, The Plain-Dealer; death of
Ø 1678, Bunyan, Pilgrim's Progress, Part I; Dryden, All for Love
Ø 1679, rise of Whig and Tory parties
Ø 1680
Ø 1681, Dryden, Absalom and Achitophel
Ø 1682, Dryden, MacFlecknoe
Ø 1685-1688, reign of James II
Ø 1687, Sir Isaac Newton, Principia (Latin); Dryden, The Hind and the Panther
Ø 1688, the "Bloodless Revolution"; death of Bunyan; Alexander Pope born (d. 1744); Aphra Behn, Oronoko
Ø 1689-1702, reign of William and Mary
Ø 1689, the Toleration Act establishes freedom of worship; Samuel Richardson born (d. 1761)
Ø 1690
Ø 1690-1699, "Ancient and Modern" controversy ("
Ø 1690, Locke, Essay Concerning the Human Understanding
Ø 1694, *Voltaire born (d. 1778)
Ø 1697, Dryden, Alexander's Feast
Ø 1698, Congreve, Love for Love
o 1700-1750, Augustan Age
Ø 1700
Ø 1700, death of Dryden
Ø 1702, The Daily Courant (first daily newspaper); Defoe, The
Ø 1702-1714, reign of Anne
Ø 1703, John Wesley born (d. 1791)
Ø 1704, Swift, Battle of the Books (written ca. 1697), Tale of a Tub;
Ø 1707, Henry Fielding born (d. 1754)
Ø 1709-1711, Steele (and Addison), The Tatler
Ø 1709, Pope, Pastorals; Rowe's ed. of Shakespeare (Shakespeare "edited" for the first time); Samuel Johnson born (d. 1784)
Ø 1710
Ø 1710-1713, Swift, Journal to Stella
Ø 1710,
Ø 1711-1712,
Ø 1711, Pope, Essay on Criticism
Ø 1712, 1714, Pope, Rape of the Lock
Ø 1712, *Rousseau born (d. 1778)
Ø 1713, Addison, Cato
Ø 1714-1901, House of Hanover (George I to
Ø 1714-1727, reign of George I
Ø 1714, Spectator revived
Ø 1715, Pope, trans. Iliad, I-IV
Ø 1716, Thomas Gray born (d. 1771)
Ø 1717, last witchcraft trial in
Ø 1719, Defoe, Robinson Crusoe; death of
Ø 1720
Ø 1722, Defoe, Journal of the Plague Year, Moll
Ø 1724, *Kant born (d. 1804)
Ø 1725, Pope's ed. of Shakespeare
Ø 1726, Thomson, Winter; Swift, Gulliver's Travels
Ø 1727-1760, reign of George II
Ø 1728, Pope, Dunciad; Gay, Beggar's Opera; Oliver Goldsmith born (d. 1774)
Ø 1729, Swift, A Modest Proposal
Ø 1730
Ø 1731, death of Defoe; William Cowper born (d. 1800)
Ø 1733, Pope, Essay on Man
Ø 1737, Edward Gibbon born (d. 1794)
Ø 1740
Ø 1740-1786, *reign of
Ø 1740, Richardson, Pamela
Ø 1741, Fielding, Joseph Andrews
Ø 1742, Young, Night Thoughts
Ø 1743, Blair, The Grave
Ø 1744, death of Pope
Ø 1745, death of Swift
Ø 1748, Thomson,
Ø 1749, Fielding, Tom Jones; Johnson, The Vanity of Human Wishes; *Goethe born (d. 1832)
1798-1830 Romantic Period
1832-1901 The Victorian Period
o 1848-1860 The Pre-Raphaelites
o 1880-1901 Aestheticism and Decadence
1901-1914 The Edwardian Period
1910-1936 The Georgian Period
1914- The Modern Period
o 1945- Postmodernism
M.R. E.
