In 1549, during the short reign of Edward VI, the archbishop of Canterbury Thomas Cranmer published the Book of Common Prayer, which established the doctrine of the Church of England and set it in law. There was much that was different – among other things, church services now had to be conducted in English rather than Latin. However, Cranmer cleverly left just enough of the old liturgy to prevent wholesale revolt. Nevertheless, there was bitter resentment and, in the summer of 1549, riots and uprisings, especially in the south-west.
The Reformation was gathering momentum, and in 1552, Cranmer produced a second Book of Common Prayer, which hardened the Protestant doctrine and ended any spirit of compromise: there was no mention of saints, but there were prayers against the pope. England was now an advanced Protestant country, with a zealous, radical young king at its head.
That all changed a year later when the militant Catholic Mary I succeeded Edward – she banned the prayer book and had Cranmer burned at the stake. In 1559, the new Protestant queen Elizabeth I saw to it that another edition of the liturgy was put in hand, but this time, more Catholic elements were allowed in, including saints' days and suggestions for suitable vestments – and the pope was no longer the subject of prayers against him.
This version was outlawed by the Puritan Long Parliament in 1645. Given the Catholic leanings of Charles II, the prayer book that came into being on his restoration was surprisingly Protestant. It is this version that, with a few modifications, has survived to today.
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 The Book of Common Prayer
http://justus.anglican.org/resources/bcp
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This website contains two dozen Books of Common Prayer from all over the present-day worldwide Anglican community. There are also links to a number of (rather outdated) histories of the prayer book.
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