Events Timeline

Orlando includes short event entries, freestanding and embedded in author profiles, about moments and processes relevant to literary history and organized into four categories: Women writers, Writing Climate, Political Climate, and Social Climate. Explore the timelines by searching for date(s) and/or words or phrases associated with them.

1626 - 1650 of 43197

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Late 1655: Francis Osborne published Advice to a Son,...

Building item

Late 1655

Francis Osborne published Advice to a Son, bearing the date 1656. It includes strong warnings about marriage choice, from the male viewpoint.
Hunt, Margaret R. The Middling Sort: Commerce, Gender, and the Family in England, 1680-1780. University of California Press, 1996.
43-4
Pulter, Lady Hester. “Introduction”. Poems, Emblems, and The Unfortunate Florinda, edited by Alice Eardley, Centre for Reformation and Renaissance Studies, 2014, pp. 1-40.
32

9 December 1655: Cromwell issued an edict legally permitting...

National or international item

9 December 1655

Cromwell issued an edict legally permitting Jewish resettlement in England. The Jews had been expelled in 1290, though individuals had now been living in England unofficially for more than a century.
Evelyn, John. The Diary of John Evelyn. Editor De Beer, Esmond Samuel, Oxford University Press, 1959.
365
Worden, Blair. “Cromwellian England 1649-1660”. Stuart England, edited by Blair Worden, Phaidon, 1986, pp. 123-47.
137
Kunze, Bonnelyn Young. Margaret Fell and the Rise of Quakerism. Macmillan, 1994.
212
Alderman, Geoffrey. “Face to Faith”. The Guardian, 31 Dec. 2005, p. 29.
29

Hester Biddle: By 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Hester Biddle

By 1656

HB began her Quaker ministry of travelling and preaching.
Rickman, Lydia L. “Esther Biddle and Her Mission to Louis XIV”. Friends Historical Society Journal, Vol.
47
, 1955, pp. 38-45.
40

Hester Biddle: 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Hester Biddle

1656

HB was arrested at Banbury in Oxfordshire (her first arrest which is dated), and at Launceston in Cornwall with John Stubbs and William Ames .
Rickman, Lydia L. “Esther Biddle and Her Mission to Louis XIV”. Friends Historical Society Journal, Vol.
47
, 1955, pp. 38-45.
41

Margaret Cavendish: 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Margaret Cavendish

1656

Margaret Cavendish , Marchioness of Newcastle, published Natures Pictures Drawn by Fancies Pencil to the Life, which includes her autobiography.
British Library Catalogue. http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo.

Margaret Fell: 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Margaret Fell

1656

MF published a tract about the identity of various radical sects, A Testimonie of the Touch-Stone for all Professions, and all Forms.
OCLC WorldCat. 1992–1998, http://www.oclc.org/firstsearch/content/worldcat/. Accessed 1999.

Rebecca Travers: By 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Rebecca Travers

By 1656

RT married; her husband, William Travers , was a London tobacconist.
Blain, Virginia et al., editors. The Feminist Companion to Literature in English: Women Writers from the Middle Ages to the Present. Yale University Press; Batsford, 1990.

Mary Penington: 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Mary Penington

1656

MP and her second husband made the momentous conversion to Quakerism , though the mediation of two Friends named Thomas Curtis and William Simpson .
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

Anne Halkett: About 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Anne Halkett

About 1656

During her first pregnancy AH composed The Mothers will to the unborn Child (listed among her manuscript works), an example of the genre often known as mother's legacy.
Halkett, Anne, and S. C. The Life of the Lady Halket. Andrew Symson and Henry Knox, 1701.

Elizabeth Major: 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Elizabeth Major

1656

EM published her devotional collection, Honey on the Rod; or, A Comfortable Contemplation for One in Affliction.
Her title refers to God sweetening the rod with which he chastises his human children.
Major, Elizabeth. Honey on the Rod. T. Maxey, 1656.
title-page

1656: Christiaan Huygens of Amsterdam patented...

Building item

1656

Christiaan Huygens of Amsterdam patented the first pendulum clock (of which Galileo had produced a prototype fifteen years earlier).
Sobel, Dava. Galileo’s Daughter. Viking, 1999.
189

1656: Pictures of instruments employed in mastectomies...

Building item

1656

Pictures of instruments employed in mastectomies were used to illustrate Armamentarium chirurgicum by Johannes Scultetus the younger.
British Library Catalogue. http://explore.bl.uk/primo_library/libweb/action/search.do?dscnt=0&tab=local_tab&dstmp=1489778087340&vid=BLVU1&mode=Basic&fromLo.

1656: Abraham Cowley published Poems; this volume,...

Writing climate item

1656

Abraham Cowley published Poems; this volume, which included his Pindaric Odes and Miscellanies, confirmed his stature as the leading poet of the day.
Drabble, Margaret, editor. The Oxford Companion to English Literature. 5th ed., Oxford University Press, 1985.

Mary Oxlie: : After February 1656

Writing climate item
Author event in Mary Oxlie:

After February 1656

MO 's poem To William Drummond of Hawthornden reached print in Edward Phillips 's posthumous edition of Drummond's Poems.
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.
under Edward Phillips
English Short Title Catalogue. http://estc.bl.uk/.
Oxlie, Mary, and William Drummond. “To William Drummond of Hawthornden”. Poems, edited by Edward Phillips and Edward Phillips, Richard Tomlins, 1656.

Margaret Fell: 20 February 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Margaret Fell

20 February 1656

This is the date given by George Thomason , in his contemporary collection of tracts, to MF 's anonymous For Manasseth ben Israel : The Call of the Jewes out of Babylon.
Thomason uses...

Anne Halkett: 2 March 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Anne Halkett

2 March 1656

After long hesitation Anne Murray married Sir James Halkett (whom she had met at Edinburgh in 1652) at her sister's estate at Charlton.
Halkett, Anne, and Ann, Lady Fanshawe. “Note on the Text; A Chronology of Anne, Lady Halkett”. The Memoirs of Anne, Lady Halkett and Ann, Lady Fanshawe, edited by John Loftis, Clarendon Press, 1979, pp. 3-7.
6
Halkett, Anne, and Ann, Lady Fanshawe. “Preface, Introduction, Select Bibliography”. The Memoirs of Anne, Lady Halkett and Ann, Lady Fanshawe, edited by John Loftis, Clarendon Press, 1979, p. v - xxi.
xii
Halkett, Anne et al. “The Memoirs of Anne, Lady Halkett”. The Memoirs of Anne, Lady Halkett, and Ann, Lady Fanshawe, edited by John Loftis and John Loftis, Clarendon Press, 1979, pp. 9-87.
84

Anne Conway: April 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Anne Conway

April 1656

AC travelled, with Henry More and with her library keeper
Conway, Anne et al. The Conway Letters. Editor Hutton, Sarah, Revised, Clarendon Press, 1992.
57
Sarah Bennett , on a trip to Paris.
Conway, Anne, and Henry More. “Introduction; Editorial Materials”. The Conway Letters, edited by Sarah Hutton et al., Revised, Clarendon Press, 1992, p. vii - xix; various pages.
xi
Conway, Anne et al. The Conway Letters. Editor Hutton, Sarah, Revised, Clarendon Press, 1992.
57 and n7, 135

Katherine Philips: 13 April 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Katherine Philips

13 April 1656

KP bore a daughter, named after herself, who lived to grow up and bear children.
Philips, Katherine. “Introduction and Textual Notes”. The Collected Works of Katherine Philips, The Matchless Orinda, Volume I: The Poems, edited by Patrick Thomas, Stump Cross Books, 1990, pp. 1-68.
13

30 May 1656: R. Bunworth in The Doctresse: A Plain and...

Building item

30 May 1656

R. Bunworth in The Doctresse: A Plain and Easie Method, of Curing those Diseases which are Peculiar to Women expatiated on mother-fits, a deficiency disease of unmarried girls and widows, curable by sexual activity.
Mendelson, Sara Heller, and Patricia Crawford. Women in Early Modern England, 1550-1720. Clarendon Press, 1998.
23, 27

Mary Fisher: July 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Mary Fisher

July 1656

From BarbadosMF arrived by sea at Boston, Massachusetts, with Anne Austin , the first Quakers to proselytise there.
Larson, Rebecca. Daughters of Light. University of North Carolina Press, 2000.
232
Matthew, Henry Colin Gray et al., editors. Oxford Dictionary of National Biography. http://www.oxforddnb.com/.

Anne Bradstreet: July 1656-September 1657

Women writers item
Author event in Anne Bradstreet

July 1656-September 1657

AB was often ill with my old distemper of weakness and fainting.
Bradstreet, Anne, and Adrienne Rich. The Works of Anne Bradstreet. Editor Hensley, Jeannine, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1967.
257
Bradstreet, Anne, and Adrienne Rich. The Works of Anne Bradstreet. Editor Hensley, Jeannine, Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 1967.
251, 254-7

9 July 1656: John Evelyn made a sight-seeing visit to...

Building item

9 July 1656

John Evelyn made a sight-seeing visit to Quakers in prison at Ipswich, Suffolk; he thought them a melancholy proud sort of people, and exceedingly ignorant.
Evelyn, John. Diary and Correspondence. Editor Bray, William, Routledge, 1906.
249

Mary, Lady Chudleigh: By 19 August 1656

Women writers item
Author event in Mary, Lady Chudleigh

By 19 August 1656

Mary Lee (later MLC ) was born, the eldest of four siblings, of whom only she and one brother survived.
Chudleigh, Mary, Lady. “Introduction”. The Poems and Prose of Mary, Lady Chudleigh, edited by Margaret J. M. Ezell, Oxford University Press, 1993, p. xvii - xxxvi.
xviii

October 1656: Quaker maverick James Nayler set out to demonstrate...

National or international item

October 1656

Quaker maverick James Nayler set out to demonstrate the spirit of Christ within him by staging an entry into Bristol riding on a donkey, as Christ had ridden into Jerusalem.
Hill, Christopher. “The World Turned Upside Down, 1975: Part I: Inspiration and Experience”. Street Corner Society: Upside Down.

20 October 1656: A Wonderful Pleasant and Profitable Letter...

Women writers item

20 October 1656

A Wonderful Pleasant and Profitable Letter by the prophet Sarah Wight was anonymously published without her consent.
Uszkalo, Kirsten, and Isobel Grundy. Email about Sarah Wight to Isobel Grundy. 15 July 2000.
Scott-Luckens, Carola. “Propaganda or Marks of Grace? The Impact of the Reported Ordeals of Sarah Wight in Revolutionary London, 1647-52”. Women’s Writing, Vol.
9
, No. 2, 2002, pp. 215-32.
216-17, 218 and n10, 222-3
English Short Title Catalogue. http://estc.bl.uk/.