Caroline Divines

The Caroline Divines were influential theologians and writers in the Anglican Church who lived during the reigns of King Charles I and, after the Restoration, King Charles II (Latin: Carolus). There is no official list of Caroline-era divines; they are defined by the era in which they lived, and Caroline Divines hailed from England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales. However, of these four nations, it is Caroline England which is most commonly considered to have fostered a golden age of Anglican scholarship and devotional writing, despite the socio-cultural upset of civil war, regicide, and military rule under Oliver Cromwell. Importantly, the term divine is restricted neither to canonized saints nor to Anglican figures, but is used of many writers and thinkers in the wider Christian church.