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How to Survive a Massacre in Europe’s Wars of Religion

Europe’s Wars of Religion were fought against entire populations, and were punctuated by events remembered as atrocities: such as the siege of Leiden in 1573-4 or, most notoriously, the St Bartholomew’s Day Massacres in France in 1572.

Commercial Philosophy: Science or Religion?

There are two types of people in the world -...

Sex, Politics (and Religion)? Contemporary Plays and Classic Revivals in British Theatre

A consideration of two waves of British theatre between the...

England’s Tudor Reformation

The English Reformation – unlike many of the other Reformations convulsing sixteenth-century Europe – was at heart more about politics and law than about religion.

How the Reformation Trained Us to Be Sceptics

This lecture will trace how, as Europe's religious landscape fractured, some people fell between the cracks. In long religious wars of attrition, it was all too easy to conclude that all religions were equally true, or equally false.

Choosing Religious Atrocities in Ireland

Nowhere in Europe have the wars of religion lasted longer than in Ireland. At the heart of this are two rival sets of memories of atrocities: above all, Protestants recall the massacres of the 1641 rebellion, and Catholics recall the massacres perpetrated by Oliver Cromwell in 1649.