1649
Charles I Executed
On a raw January morning, Charles Stuart stepped onto a scaffold outside the Banqueting House in Whitehall wearing two shirts so he would not shiver and be thought afraid. The axe fell once. A king of England had been publicly tried and killed by his subjects. Europe drew breath, and the doctrine of divine right suffered a wound from which it never fully recovered.
English Commonwealth Declared
The Rump Parliament abolished the monarchy and the House of Lords and declared England a Commonwealth and Free State. Oliver Cromwell, the rising military leader, was its de facto ruler. For the first and only time, England had no king. The republic would last eleven years and end from exhaustion.
Cromwell Sacks Drogheda
Oliver Cromwell, crossing to Ireland to crush royalist and Catholic resistance, stormed the town of Drogheda and massacred the garrison and many civilians. Three thousand were killed. Cromwell called it a righteous judgment of God. The Irish have remembered the sack for nearly four centuries, and his name remains a byword for English cruelty in Ireland to this day.
Diggers Dig at Saint George's Hill
A band of radical English communists led by Gerrard Winstanley began planting vegetables on common land at Saint George's Hill in Surrey, arguing that the earth had been made as a common treasury for all. Local landowners and soldiers drove them off within a year. English radical tradition had its primal scene.
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Frequently asked
What happened in the year 1649?
Saeculum lists 4 curated events from 1649. The most significant is Charles I Executed: On a raw January morning, Charles Stuart stepped onto a scaffold outside the Banqueting House in Whitehall wearing two shirts so he would not shiver…
What era was 1649 part of?
1649 falls within the Renaissance (1501-1650). Reformation, conquest, and the world drawn whole.
Which regions saw notable events in 1649?
The curated events from 1649 span Europe.