Elizabethan era

The Elizabethan era enters the novel through Thomas Woolgar’s chronicle, where Queen Elizabeth’s accession marks a change in religious and personal circumstances. Woolgar’s account places him at St. Peter’s Church in 1560, separated from Banfield and still attempting to set down his history of Einor; the manuscript makes the new reign a quiet but consequential backdrop to his isolation.

A Change of Reign

Woolgar contrasts Elizabeth’s accession with the preceding reign of Mary Tudor. Earlier in his account, he describes the Prioress and himself invoking Mary’s decree against witches and dissenters as they moved to have Einor confined. He also recalls the burnings of alleged heretics in Sussex. These details are presented through Woolgar’s retrospective, self-justifying narrative, rather than as an independent historical account.

When Elizabeth comes to the throne, Woolgar notes that the Pope is once again denied. The remark conveys his Catholic perspective on the change in authority: the new reign is registered not as an abstract date but as a religious shift that alters the position of the Church he serves. His chronicle does not elaborate on the policies behind that shift; its attention stays on the consequences as he experiences them.

Woolgar at St. Peter’s in 1560

After the events at Banfield, Woolgar’s father and bishop decide that his mental condition would be better served by keeping him away from St. Joseph’s and the village. He is assigned as pastor to St. Peter’s Church, where, in his account, his servants and the estate’s tenants largely ignore his outbursts. He describes the arrangement as a life of confinement, even as he claims that he is left in peace under Elizabeth.

The manuscript dates one entry to 17 October 1560. Woolgar writes that Einor’s presence continues to trouble him and insists that his record must be preserved as a warning. His stated purpose gives the chronicle a double character: it is both a confession of his part in past events and an attempt to leave testimony that he fears others will dismiss as madness.

The Church Chest and the Record

Woolgar’s removal also relocates material traces of Banfield’s past. His father arranges for the church chest, containing St. Joseph’s and Banfield parish records, to be taken to St. Peter’s along with vestments and other church items. Woolgar suspects that his father is concerned about what the records might reveal about the family, but says that his own earlier papers contain no account of his conduct with Einor. He distinguishes those records from the chronicle he is now composing and intends to hide for a future reader.

That distinction makes the Elizabethan-era setting important to the manuscript’s survival within the story. Woolgar writes from enforced distance, in a church where he is expected to serve quietly, while the chest carries the official parish record away from Banfield. His private chronicle claims to preserve what institutional and family records do not.

Narrative Significance

The Elizabethan era provides a historical frame for a narrative whose central testimony is uncertain. Woolgar’s account presents religious authority, family influence, and his own guilt through a voice that repeatedly asks to be believed, while also recording that others regarded him as mentally unwell. The reader therefore encounters the past through a document shaped by both a specific political-religious transition and its author’s contested credibility.

The contrast between the public record and Woolgar’s hidden manuscript also links his 1560 isolation to the later investigation of Banfield’s history. The new reign does not resolve his fears or reconcile his account with the version accepted by others; instead, the chronicle carries an unresolved warning across time, making the Elizabethan setting the point at which private testimony is deliberately preserved for discovery.