Join the 17th Century
Explore the story of early Boston, Massachusetts, and the wider 17TH century world
No Kings? No Tyrants!
Charles I was a tyrant. Of that, English Puritans had no doubt. He ruled arbitrarily, imposing his personal will. He imprisoned dissenters and executed not a few. He taxed people, arguably illegally. He cancelled Parliament, and therefore representative government. And as for the Puritan practice of their faith… Archbishop Laud had the answer: imprisonment, loss of jobs, fines, and even execution.
Not until Cromwell’s rule did an English republic emerge. But if not No Kings, then certainly No Tyrants was the Puritan motto.
In the final two presentations of our series on the Revolutions Before the Revolution, learn all about how English and New England Puritans understood tyranny and its opposite, liberty. Join our two brilliant presenters this November:
Renowned historian Francis J. Bremer, Thursday November 6, 7-8:30pm, on Resisting Tyranny, Defining Liberty
Historian Rachel Foxley, University of Reading, Wednesday, November 19, time TBC, on the radicalism of early English political thought during the civil wars - and the political environment of pamphlets, protests and parliamentary might.
Who knew the past was so very radical?
our 2024 annual report is out now
Yes, it’s a little late… But we have finally managed to produce our very first public annual report. We think you’ll like it. In it, we tell you how, in 2024, we:
hosted 13 illuminating presentations
produced a politically pertinent fall lecture series, Tyranny vs Liberty
reached 8,000 people in dozens of countries across the globe
achieved audience satisfaction, with 89% of those surveyed saying our events were very good or excellent.
Find out what you made possible - with your participation, your donations, and your enthusiasm for the 17th century.
Events
the slews and hoars of beverly
jeanne pickering
ONLINE, TUESDAY, OCTOBER 28, 2025, 7-830PM ET
In 1692, Dorcas Hoar, a fortune-teller, was accused of witchcraft during the Salem trials. Generations later, her descendant, Jenny Slew, was enslaved. What linked these two women - one, a victim of witchcraft accusation, the other enslaved? Independent scholar Jeanne Pickering delves into Essex county records to explore the connection between witchcraft and slavery in this original, thought-providing presentation.
“We need a full and honest
reckoning with our history.”
— attendee, Tyranny vs Liberty series
Knowing the full picture
When we asked our audience why the 17th century mattered, they replied with gusto. “Knowing the whole picture can’t help but change what we think we are,” wrote one person. “The dispossession of Native nations has left a long painful legacy,” wrote an Indigenous woman. “We are today a ‘nation of rebels’,” wrote another person, “the outgrowth of radical protestantism.” What more did they say? Find out now!
a path not taken
We sometimes think of early New England as containing entirely separate people: white English Puritans; free and enslaved Black people; Indigenous people. A new book, Gathered into a Church, explodes this myth, showing how the heart of woodland New England - its faith - was an Indigenous-English creation, with Indigenous people not only embracing the faith but embodying its highest ideals.
Defend your rights!
The rights we take for granted did not begin in the 20th century, or in the Revolutionary era - but with the Massachusetts Body of Liberties in 1641, the first bill of rights in the English-speaking world. Honoured as much in the breach as in practice, the rights of 1641 - to equal justice under law and protection from arbitrary rule - remain for us to expand and defend today, as historian Lori Rogers-Stokes argues.
“This talk opened a new world for me.”
— attendee, ‘I Pledge Allegiance’: Sovereignty and Sanctuary in the Dawnland