James I of England
	Civilization:	British: England
	Era:	Stuart
1566–1625	Field of Renown:	monarch: King

James I and his Queen, Anne of Denmark.

James I of England was the first of the Stuart kings. He was over thirty-five when he came to the throne of England, but had been sole monarch of Scotland, (there known as James VI), since his first year. Scotland was a far poorer and ruder country than England at the time, and the transition was a somewhat difficult one. James was very well educated, and the Stuarts were known as a refined and somewhat poetical family. It Scotland, they were considered very high-bred. In far wealthier, and more sophisticated England, however, where dozens of nobles lived in higher estate than the King of Scotland, they were considered rubes.

In Scotland, James' reign was relatively successful. He had brought many of the ever-rancorous Scottish barons to bay, and had prevented the totalitarian strain of Knox's Calvinism to take firm hold by asserting the predominance of the state over religion and refusing to allow the Presbyterian preachers unlimited political power. He managed to be on good terms with the Church of England while allowing the Scottish Kirks to manage own affairs, and he had brought most of the religion-based civil wars to an end.

England, however was in an different political condition than Scotland, and his methods of government were not entirely successful there. The Tudors, particularly Henry VIII, and Elizabeth, had been exceeding powerful and flamboyant rulers, and James I was unable to command their level of respect. Plots were laid against him from the beginning, and as some of the leaders of parliament grew in power, he neither acquiesced, nor won them over to his side. One of the unfortunate legacies that he left to his son Charles was a history of bad relations with parliament. This conflict did not break out into war during James reign, but it did under his son.

Although of necessity James had tolerated the Calvinists in Scotland, they annoyed him terribly because in essence, they failed to recognize the ideas of tradition and authority, which were central to the legitimacy of the monarchy. As king of England, he was a strong backer of the Anglican Church and supported the persecution of Puritans and non-conformers. Many puritans, including the Mayflower pilgrims, in fact, left England during the reign of James I to settle the new world. James even preferred Catholics to the inexorable puritans, although he stepped up his persecutions of Catholics after the gun-powder plot was discovered.

In short, James was a good and effective king of Scotland, but a considerably ineffective king of England. In the absence of a personally powerful king the influence of parliament was certain to grow, and many, in retrospect, consider this a good thing. It was James personal ambition to be remembered for his literary contributions as well as his kingship, and he left a larger body of writings than any other king of England, but his writings reflect the dual nature of his legacy—exemplary by Scottish standards, but mediocre by English standards. He was a Stuart poet, in the age of Shakespeare, Bacon, and Johnson.

	Image Links
King James I  in Queen Elizabeth	James I  in Sir Walter Raleigh	James I. of England  in Builders of our Country Vol. I
James I. and his Queen, Anne of Denmark  in Tudors and Stuarts	The Stuart Kings and Queens  in Tudors and Stuarts