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082			_a942.05 _bMAR
100			_aPetit-Dutaillis, Charles
245		4	_aThe Family of Love in English Society, 1550-1630
260			_bCambridge University Press _c2005
300			_a420 pages
500			_aThis book traces the history of the outlawed mystical fellowship, the 'Family of Love', in sixteenth- and seventeenth-century England. The Familists, devoted followers of a Messianic Dutch mystic named 'H. N.', were passionately denounced by many literate contemporaries, and an association with extremism, subversion and hypocrisy has endured. The author tracks the English Familists into their houses, fields and places of work. Although members of the Family were few in number and highly secretive, identification has proved possible in contexts ranging from the court of Elizabeth I to rural villages in Cambridgeshire. The author also examines the distinctive way of life which was developed by Family members within a wider society that, on the face of it, was hostile to religious dissenters: one surprising conclusion is that most English men and women seem to have possessed an impressive capacity to tolerate known 'heretics' in their midst.
650			_aHistory
942			_cENGLISH
999			_c576622 _d576622