Personal Rule

The Personal Rule (also known as the Eleven Years' Tyranny) was the period in England from 1629 to 1640 when King Charles I ruled as an autocratic absolute monarch without recourse to Parliament.^[1] Charles claimed that he was entitled to do this under the royal prerogative and that he had a divine right.

Charles had already dissolved three Parliaments by the third year of his reign in 1628.^[2] After the murder of George Villiers, Duke of Buckingham, who was deemed to have a negative influence on Charles' foreign policy, Parliament began to criticize the king more harshly than before. Charles then realised that, as long as he could avoid war, he could rule without the need of Parliament.