Millenary Petition

The Millenary Petition was a list of requests given to James I by Puritans in 1603 when he was travelling to London in order to claim the English throne. It is claimed, but not proven, that this petition had 1,000 signatures of Puritan ministers. This carefully worded document expressed Puritan distaste regarding the state of the Church of England, and took into consideration James' religious views as well as his liking for a debate, as written in Basilikon Doron. While many of the main Puritan goals were rebutted, the petition did culminate in the Hampton Court Conference, which eventually led James to authorize the 1604 minor revision of the Book of Common Prayer. The most substantial outcome of the conference was the commission of a new English translation of the bible, now known as the King James Version. Context and formulation In a time where it was unwise to criticise the king directly, there was no hint of dissatisfaction with the royal supremacy in the petition. The Puritan reformers stressed throughout that they were not separatists or schismatics. The document expressed much of the general Puritan feeling regarding the Church; namely, that the English Reformation had not gone far enough to purge the Church of England from all perceived errors of the Catholic Church.