Board: AQA | Option: 2D | Component: Component 2 (Depth Study) | Assessment Objective: AO3
This option examines the English Reformation as a depth study, concentrating on the forty years that transformed England from a Catholic to a Protestant nation. Students trace the break with Rome under Henry VIII, the dissolution of the monasteries, the Protestant reforms under Edward VI, the Marian restoration, and the Elizabethan settlement — and engage with the central historiographical question of whether the English Reformation was imposed from above or responded to genuine popular demand for change.
What this option covers
- Henry VIII and the break with Rome: the royal divorce, the Act of Supremacy, and Henrician theology
- Cromwell and the dissolution of the monasteries
- The Pilgrimage of Grace 1536: popular resistance to the Reformation
- Edward VI: the Book of Common Prayer and the pace of Protestant reform
- Kett’s Rebellion 1549 and popular responses to religious change
- Mary I: the restoration of papal authority and the burning of Protestant martyrs
- Elizabeth I and the Elizabethan settlement 1559: via media or Protestant compromise?
- Puritanism and the limits of the Elizabethan settlement
Key historiographical debates
- Was England a Catholic nation that had Protestantism imposed upon it? (Duffy’s ‘stripping of the altars’ thesis)
- The Henrician Reformation: religious or political? (Scarisbrick vs Elton)
- The pace and depth of Protestantism in England: how Protestant was England by 1559?
- The Elizabethan settlement: a genuine via media or an unstable compromise?
AO3 Interpretation Pack — coming soon
An AO3 Interpretation Pack for AQA 2D is in development. When complete, it will cover the major historiographical debates examined in this option, with named historians, paired comparison tasks built to AQA mark scheme logic, and provenance prompts for every debate. The first debate will be free and open to all.
Interpretations pack — coming September 2026
A teaching pack for this option is in development, covering all core historiographical debates. It will include named historians with argument summaries, paired comparison tasks built to AQA mark scheme logic, and provenance analysis prompts — all in a downloadable PDF.
£9.99 per pack · Available September 2026
