The Politics and Meaning of Thomason’s Tracts

Abstract

This article takes as its starting point the reputation of Thomason's collection as royalist in orientation. It examines whether Thomason’s collection reflects 1640s and 1650s press output more broadly - offering a quantitative account of this - and whether the items he chose to purchase, and those he did not, reveal anything about his own political persuasions. As such, it reflects not just upon the scale and completeness of the Thomason tracts, but also upon the thinking involved in its development and preservation, and in exploring the complex political identities of both the collection and its collector it highlights the need to scrutinse very carefully the rhetoric that was used by Thomason and others.

Keywords

• thomason tracts
• george thomason