This biography presents the whole career of the controversial sixteenth century statesman, John Dudley. As Lord President of the council which governed Edward VI's minority, he was the most powerful man in England between 1550 and 1553, notorious for his attempt to alter the succession to the throne in favour of his daughter-in-law, Lady Jane Grey. This is a critical reassessment of a man who was the last medieval magnate and perhaps the greatest of the Tudor service nobility.

The pace and extent of England's conversion to protestantism between 1530 and 1570 is a subject of lively controversy among historians. In this study the reader is guided through the interpretations of rival scholars, and the complex events of those years. The English Reformation grew out of political action, the existing tensions between secular and ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and the indigenous heretical tradition, namely Lollardy. The dramatic events of the Reformation in Germany and Switzerland also introduced radical and unfamiliar ideas, which were then adapted to the circumstances of...