1. Introduction: Loyalty to the Monarchy in Late Medieval and Early Modern Britain – Matthew Ward and Matthew Hefferan.- Part 1 – Loyalty to Late Medieval and Early Tudor Monarchs.- 2. ‘I claim no right but would this land defend’: Loyalty to the Institution of Kingship in Blind Hary’s Wallace – Callum Watson.- 3. Tiltyard Friendships and bonds of Loyalty in the Reign of Edward IV, c. 1461-1471 – Emma Levitt.- 4. Political Dialogue, Exchange and Propaganda in Yorkist and Early Tudor England, c. 1461-1537 – Wesley Correa.- 5. Towards God religious, towards us most faithful’: the Paulet Family, the Somerset Gentry and the Early Tudor Monarchy, 1485-1547 – Simon Lambe.- 6. Dedicated to Loyalty: Book Dedications to Henry VIII – Valerie Schutte.- Part 2 – Loyalty to the Later Tudors and Early Stuarts.- 7. Not ‘to Confound Predicaments’: Loyalty and the Common Law, c.1400-1688 – Michael A. Heimos.- 8. Loyalty to a Queen: Elizabeth I, the earl of Essex and the Catholic Nobility – Janet Dickinson.- 9. Loyalty to a Nero? Publicising Puritan Persecution in the 1630s ­– Jamie Gianoutsos.- 10. Divided Loyalties of East Midlands Sheriffs, 1630-1640 – Richard Bullock.- Part 3 – Loyalty, Civil War and Restoration in the Seventeenth Century.- 11. 'Bad and Evil Patriots’: Understanding the Motives of Scottish Civil War Royalists, c. 1639-1651 ­– Andrew Lind.- 12. ‘Seditious’ Memories and Disloyalty after the Restoration, c. 1660-1668 – Edward Legon.- 13. Loyalty and Insecurity in Charles II’s Virginia – John Rushton Pagan.- 14. ‘These Repeated Testimonies of Duty and Affection’: Constructing Loyalty in Cornwall and South-West Wales, 1681-85 – James Harriss.

This book explores the place of loyalty in the relationship between the monarchy and their subjects in late medieval and early modern Britain. It focuses on a period in which political and religious upheaval tested the bonds of loyalty between ruler and ruled. The era also witnessed changes in how loyalty was developed and expressed. The first section focuses on royal propaganda and expressions of loyalty from the gentry and nobility under the Yorkist and early Tudor monarchs, as well as the fifteenth-century Scottish monarchy. The chapters illustrate late-medieval conceptions of loyalty, exploring how they manifested themselves and how they persisted and developed into early modernity. Loyalty to the later Tudors and early Stuarts is scrutinised in the second section, gauging the growing level of dissent in the build-up to the British Civil Wars of the seventeenth century. The final section dissects the role that the concept of loyalty played during and after the Civil Wars, looking at how divergent groups navigated this turbulent period and examining the ways in which loyalty could be used as a means of surviving the upheaval.

“Ranging widely in time and space, from late medieval England to late seventeenth-century Virginia, the contributions to this volume demonstrate that the concept of loyalty was highly contested in this period and often used to discriminate and exclude. … the contributors have made a significant contribution to understanding of loyalty in the early modern period.” (Ted Vallance, Journal of British Studies, Vol. 61 (2), April, 2022)“The strengths of the collection show clearly from the beginning; it covers an impressive range of topics, localities, and chronology on the theme of loyalty … . This volume is a necessary addition to the growing conversation in early modern studies examining concepts of loyalty. Ward, Hefferan, and all the contributors are hopefully quite proud of this diverse and well-put-together collection of chapters, which is a great primer for the subject at hand and opens further conversations and research.” (Courtney Herber, Royal Studies Journal, Vol. 8 (2), 2021)“The editors should be congratulated on a well-balanced volume which is an important addition to the historiography on loyalty to the monarchy.” (Mark Shearwood, History – The Journal of the Historical Association, Vol. 106 (370), March, 2021)

Explores how loyalty to the British monarchs was cultivated, maintained and expressed in the fifteenth to seventeenth centuries Approaches the concept of loyalty from different perspectives: from the legislature, from the government and from religion Analyses the role that loyalty played in the many trials that the British monarchy faced in the late medieval and early modern period