ABSTRACT
There is a brief but provocative contrast between classical and Christian views of history in R.G.Collingwood, The Idea of History (London, 1970, first pub. 1946). On classical historians see J.B.Bury, The Ancient Greek Historians (London, 1909), and M.L.W.Laistner, The Greater Roman Historians (Berkeley, 1947). C.A.Patrides, The Grand Design of God* (London, 1972), gives a survey of Christian views and has useful bibliographical notes. See also C.R.North, The Old Testament Interpretation of History (London, 1946); R. L.P.Milburn, Early Christian Interpretations of History (London, 1954); and a more specialised work, R.A.Markus, Saeculum: History and Society in the Theology of St Augustine (Cambridge, 1970). N.Cohn, The Pursuit of the Millennium (rev. edn, London, 1970, first pub. 1957), is an excellent history of millenarianism, though concentrating on the Middle Ages. On changing attitudes to history in the Renaissance P.Burke, The Renaissance Sense of the Past* (London, 1969), is a useful introduction for students; the first two chapters of W.K.Ferguson, The Renaissance in Historical Thought (Cambridge, Mass., 1948), are indispensable. For English historiography in general see F.J.Levy, Tudor Historical Thought (San Marino, 1967). A superb account of the Protestant view is W.Haller, Foxe’s Book of Martyrs and the Elect Nation (London, 1963). Sir Charles Firth, Essays Historical and Literary (Oxford, 1968, first pub. 1938), includes essays on the histories of Ralegh and Milton. For changing treatments of the Matter of Britain see T.D.Kendrick, British Antiquity (London, 1950), and R.F.Brinkley, Arthurian Legend in the Seventeenth Century (Baltimore, 1932). F.Kermode, The Classic (London, 1975), discusses poetic use of classical ideas of empire. For the views of history of specific poets see E.A.Greenlaw, Studies in Spenser’s Historical Allegory (Baltimore, 1932); F.Kermode, Renaissance Essays (London, 1973), on Spenser; M.Fixler, Milton and the Kingdoms of God (London, 1964); J.A. Mazzeo, Renaissance and Seventeenth-Century Studies (New York, 1964), on Marvell.
