The 1630s in England began effectively in 1629 with the abrupt dismissal of Charles I’s third parliament and ended in 1640 at the first meeting of what would become the Long Parliament. Similarly we may start the 1650s with the regicide of January 1649 and finish with the surprising return of monarchy in May 1660, which rounded off a decade, less coherent than that of ‘the personal rule of Charles I’, but rather more eventful. Kingship and the House of Lords were expunged in a matter of weeks in 1649 as equally useless and dangerous.