Sir Robert Filmer (1588–1653) and the Patriotic Monarch

'Cesare Cuttica is Lecturer in British History in the Department of Anglo-American Studies (DEPA), Université Paris 8-Vincennes and he is a member of the Sussex Centre for Intellectual History, University of Sussex

• IntroductionPart I1. Filmer: his life and cultural interests 2. From Kent with anger: Patriarcha versus Thomas Scott’s country patriotism3. Filmer’s patriarchalism versus Jesuit political ideas 4. Filmer’s patriarchalism in context: ‘popularity’, King James VI and I, Parliament and monarchists5. Writing in the early Caroline regime and the issue of Patriarcha’s non-publication6. Filmer in the 1640s and 1650s: political troubles and intellectual activismPart II7. Publishing in the Exclusion Crisis (1679-81): Patriarcha between fatherhood and fatherland 8. Much ado about nothing? Edmund Bohun’s rehabilitation of Patriarcha, the issue of allegiance and Adamite anti-republicanism 9. Patriarchalism versus patriotism in practice: Patriarcha from the Rye House Plot (1683) to the Glorious Revolution (1688-89)ConclusionAppendix Bibliography Index

Cuttica’s book offers an accessible guide to Filmer’s thought useful for students of intellectual history.Cuttica’s book is a very good case study, which hopefully will change the perception of Filmer’s theory, which until now has been seen through the lenses of its critic, John Locke.In this splendid study, Cesare Cuttica uses contextual and biographical methods to enhance our understanding of Sir Robert Filmer's intellectual life and his contribution to political debates in seventeenth-century England.This book can be highly recommended and deserves to be widely read.Cesare Cuttica’s work is the most comprehensive and convincing criticism of such an interpretation. This is undoubtedly a brilliant study of Filmer’s political thought.This extremely rich book is a major contribution to our knowledge of Filmer , and more broadly of patriarchy in the seventeenth century , primarily in England.[Pierre Lurbe; RSEAA XVII-XVIII 70 (2013)]Cuttica succeeds in presenting his reader with innovative, clear and well-argued information based on his contextualisation and biographical methods. In this way, he provides the reader with new insights and contributes significantly to our understanding of seventeenth-century English intellectual and political history. It is a major contribution to current studies of political thought....Cuttica has given us a Filmer with a new significance, and that itself is an unexpected and most welcomed contribution.