From Free Life, Issue 20, August 1994
ISSN: 0260 5112

The Stripping of the Altars or "Stripping", as the trendier Reformation historians might abbreviate it is a book which divides neatly into two parts. The first describes what the author means by the subtitle "traditional religion in England 1400-1580". The second describes the attempts of successive Tudor monarchs to re-form traditional religion into something which better suited their respective purposes. The sixteenth century witnessed increased state interference not only with what Englishmen and women did, but with what they thought and believed. In the 1580s, practicing the religion of the 1530s was literally treason.

In attempting to reconstruct the religious life of late medi‘val England, Dr. Duffy uses a variety of sources, some of which have not previously received the attention which they merit. His use of pre-reformation devotional material (printed as well as manuscript) will be an eye-opener for those who have assumed that print and protestantism were inevitably allies. Wills can be a valuable source for discovering testators' religious priorities, but Dr Duffy argues that the use of particular formul‘ in the preambles of wills may reveal more about the testator's desire to obtain probate than his innermost doctrinal beliefs. He suggests how religion was entwined in everything from attitudes towards death and charity to the reckoning of time and the organisation of local government. Finally, it should perhaps be emphasised that this "traditional religion" was not restricted to illiterate peasants in isolated villages: it attracted the participation of individuals at every level of society, including the highly literate and well-travelled. The religious climate which is depicted does a great deal to complicate the simple picture which most people have of "medieval religion".

The second, chronological portion of the book deals with the destruction of this evolved network of public and private devotional activities which took place from circa 1530-1580. Tudor government still relied to a large extent on local enforcement and cooperation. Because reformation was not generally popular, enforcement was haphazard and sporadic; in many parishes illegal practices persisted for decades.

Dr. Duffy assumes little specialist knowledge of doctrine, ritual, or iconography on the part of the reader, and wears his own formidable knowledge lightly. (Liturgical items are called by their proper names, but anyone who lacks the energy to look up "ambulatory" or "chrism" in the dictionary had probably better give up intellectual pursuits altogether.) His prose is attractive and vivid. Stripping is full of entertaining little stories, and whilst the author makes no secret of his passionate likes and dislikes among the characters, all of them are portrayed with a robust humanity. The text and plates are well integrated. The bibliography is exhaustive.

What, you may wonder, has any of this to do with Free Life? At one level the relevance is clear: in the sixteenth century, when "religion" pervaded every aspect of public and private life, an increasingly self-conscious and ambitious nation state managed to gain control of its erstwhile competitor the Church. The reformation was a crucial episode in the history of the British State.

But there are even broader issues afoot here. Historians increasingly accept that, until relatively late in the process of reformation, committed protestant reformers were very much a minority group. Yet through the creation of interest-groups, effective propaganda, and sheer hard work this minority managed to direct government policy and effect broad social, economic and political changes. Further, the State gained much from Reformation. By 1580 the "traditional religion" of past decades had become something alien and threatening, and the existence of a Papist Threat (both from without and within) was an effective excuse to aggrandise State power. But the State's ultimate lack of success in controlling religion <197> both its catholic and puritan dissent <197> ultimately precipated the Civil War and the Glorious Revolution.

B. P. Lambe