Introduction

Abstract

The Popish Plot was the outburst of anti-Catholic hysteria in England prompted by allegations made in the autumn of 1678 of a Catholic conspiracy to wipe out Protestantism in the three Stuart kingdoms. Over time it gave way to the so-called ‘Exclusion Crisis’, the intense political struggle that arose in England between 1679 and 1681 over the vexing question of who would succeed Charles II as king. As matters stood in 1678, the heir was a Catholic: Charles’s younger brother James, duke of York. In an atmosphere of intense anti-Catholicism, this was bound to prove contentious, and over the next two years a campaign to exclude York from the succession would be conducted both inside and outside the English parliament. The exclusion campaign rested upon fears of a Catholic monarch which stemmed from a fear of Catholics. And hence the issue that ensured the relevance of the crisis to Ireland, and vice versa: many of these Catholics were Irish, for most of the Irish were Catholics.KeywordsVexing QuestionColonial SocietyLocal ImplicationCatholic PopulationIrish HistoryThese keywords were added by machine and not by the authors. This process is experimental and the keywords may be updated as the learning algorithm improves.