In 1707, the English and Scottish parliaments each approved a treaty of union negotiated in London the previous year by commissioners representing each nation. The two parliaments thus agreed to their own incorporation in a new parliament of Great Britain that would ensure that the nations shared the same legislature from 1 May 1707, just as they had shared the same monarch since 1603 (notwithstanding the interruption of the Civil War). The first major historian of the Anglo-Scottish Union was the journalist Daniel Defoe (
c. 1660–1731). In one respect, he was the ideal historian of events leading up to and immediately following the passage of the Union treaty, because he had been on location in Edinburgh from October 1706, following the parliamentary debates, writing essays on the…
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Citation: Seager, Nicholas. "History of the Union of Great Britain". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 16 April 2018 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/sworks.php?rec=true&UID=4652, accessed 23 November 2024.]