James II of England

King of England, Scotland, and Ireland from 1685 to 1688 (1633–1701)

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Lived 1633–1701, aged 68United Kingdom

United Kingdom PoliticiansPolitician

Wikipedia
80 languages
Cross-language footprint
Era
1633–1701
Aged 68
Awards
2
recognised works

Summary

Updated 2026-06-08

The last Catholic monarch to rule England, Scotland, and Ireland — whose push for religious tolerance and absolute power triggered the 1688 Glorious Revolution and ended a century of strife by settling, once and for all, that Parliament outranked the Crown.

Biography

About

James was born 14 October 1633, the second surviving son of Charles I and Henrietta Maria of France, created Duke of York at birth. He took the throne in February 1685 at 51 after his brother Charles II died, welcomed widely because the public still recoiled from the republican Commonwealth and assumed a Catholic king would be temporary. That tolerance didn't extend to policy: when James tried forcing Catholic-friendly measures by decree — invoking divine right — both English and Scottish parliaments blocked him. Two blows in June 1688 turned dissent to crisis: his son James Francis Edward was…

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