King William III and Mary II
Rejecting Hobbes’s vision of Leviathan and James II’s attempts to impose absolutism, a group of England’s most powerful politicians invited William of Orange — a prince of the Dutch Republic — to invade England, depose James II, and occupy the throne jointly with his wife Mary. William’s army quickly overthrew James in the so-called Glorious Revolution of 1688, an event that reverberated across the Atlantic in rebellions in Massachusetts, Maryland, and New York. This portrait, from the Guild Book of the Barber Surgeons of York, was probably painted to celebrate the coronation of William and Mary in 1689. HIP/Art Resource, NY.